No-emission Kerbin Circumnavigation Challenge

[Pds314]

On 10/18/2022 at 10:08 PM, camacju said:

Actually, no - the limiting factor is torque per mass, rather than top speed. Reaction wheels provide a lot more torque than the Breaking Ground rotors - with normal elevon props, the rotors can't even reach 300 meters per second. The lift to drag ratio is just too low.

One interesting compromise would be using reaction wheels to spin a Breaking Ground rotor and provide more torque this way, but I haven't quite worked out how the control scheme would work yet.

Well yes. I said BG bearings, not necessarily motorized. As in powered by reaction wheels but using a BG motor to replace the complex, finicky, and often draggy stock bearings, be they Sputnik, Needle, or wheel-based, that have many parts.

Edited October 25, 2022 by Pds314

[Nazalassa]

On 10/11/2022 at 6:18 AM, Mars-Bound Hokie said:

good luck going anywhere with their weak thrust

Let's see... I have a terrible idea.

[Icky]

i suppose this counts for trekker division, depending on your definition of "vehicle that cant fly"

posts from elcano threads. not sure exactly where you wanna define the total mission time. i approached the starting flag and took the screenshot at 9 days 56 minutes 11 seconds, so maybe that? i dont have the actual final mission time from the summary when i recovered the vehicle.

On 2/1/2021 at 7:52 PM, Icky said:

day one down. many many more to go. ill just keep updating this post. after driving to the north pole from ksc i wanted to build a rover with better suspension. i had good success with using hinges to make control arms. when i was building for this challenge i knew i would need to do a few water crossings with it so i stuck a couple small props on top. upon testing i found they would get me upwards of 80m/s on land all on their own, and do it using a LOT less power! so i ditched the powered wheels in favor of medium landing gear which could take much more abuse. with some fine tuning of the landing gear's suspension settings and the hinge settings i got a rover that will comfortably cruise at 80m/s across kerbins terrain and soak up bumps and jumps with ease. with added rudder for steering (steering at that speed with the wheels is too sensitive) and ailerons so it wont nose over on jumps, it ends up looking like a plane without wings, but i assure you it wont fly in its current configuration. it will descend at around 10m/s. heres the first few minutes of the trip. setting off, planting the flag: 

this is the route ill be taking:

day 1:

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day 2:

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got around to my first water crossing, which is i think the longest at around 57km. at 14.3m/s it should take just over an hour. luckily its mostly hands off, just small corrections every now and then. 

day.....idk...something. theyre getting a bit blurred now. you can see the mission time.

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got all the water crossings done. i discovered i could back the power on the motors down to 5-10% so its just stupid efficient now. i found with sas on its pretty much hands off, it stays level enough off jumps that i dont worry about the landings. i just correct the heading occasionally. its easy to forget im doing nearly 200mph!

 

over half way!

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almost jumped clean over this ridge! managed to set it down just at the top. kinda hard to tell from the picture i guess, but that water is a couple hundred meters DOWN the mountain.

 

On 10/28/2022 at 1:20 PM, Icky said:

In 2021 i started my rover kerbin run and got most of the way around and just got burned out by it, did other things, and kind of forgot about it for a while. with the recent ksp2 reveal i decided i wanted to finish this before ksp2 comes out. when i started, this new thread wasnt here and the old rules of the challenge didnt have the specifics regarding thrust/control while airborne. my rover DOES use control surfaces and prop power in the air (but it wont actually maintain flight, the longest jumps are maybe 10 seconds) so if this run doesnt count then so be it, ill leave that up to the powers that be to decide. ill probably do it again in ksp2 anyway lol. i just want to finish this run. so ill quote my old post with its updates up to this point and continue underneath.

 

 

 

ok first leg of 2022 done.

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so immediately i noticed something changed in the wheel physics since i played last year. even just barely moving the wheels are super jittery and the rover bounces all over the place. i turned the spring rate down from 3 (max) to about half and that calmed it down. eventually i dialed it back to 0.6 and it seems ok now, but not perfect. it'll still be a little weird sometimes.

 

into the desert!

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saw my first cactus of the trip (i think). and since i recently found out theres supposed to be a temple in the desert i figured i might give it a visit if it wasnt too far out of the way. also had one or two hard landings.

 

getting close! 

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right after i set off from the ruins i found this weird purple crystal. ill have to come back with a scan arm and see what it is.

 

MISSION SUCCESS!

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Final mission time just over 9 days, but it took nearly two years lol. i plan to do it again in ksp2. hopefully with better wheel physics and a smoother surface.

 

final water crossing

way point in view! 100-ish km to go!

KSC spotted!

final set of waypoints. the only real deviation i took from the original route outline was going north over the mountains at the very end instead of south.

 

[Snigel]

I'm concidering doing an airship circumnavigation, but I have some questions first.

if one is using the heisenberg airships mod, is one allowed to use the electric engines wich said mod provides? If not, are electric engines from Kerbal Aircraft Expansion(KAX) ok?

also, where can i find the leaderboard, I can't see it anywere in the thread?

Edited March 7, 2023 by Snigel

[Mars-Bound Hokie]

13 hours ago, Snigel said:

if one is using the heisenberg airships mod, is one allowed to use the electric engines wich said mod provides?

Thanks for asking, and yes. If you're going to use the Heisenberg mod for an airship (which I rarely see these days), you might as well use everything else it provides.

• Sure, planes and rockets and helicopters are awesome, but let's not forget that balloons took mankind to the skies centuries before the Wright Brothers did.

 

14 hours ago, Snigel said:

where can i find the leaderboard, I can't see it anywere in the thread?

It's on the OP now.

 

Oh, and to everyone else, I would like to submit an updated entry for myself. You will find the full details of my E-40's performance in the original post of this showcase thread I made:

• Feel free to submit your electrifying entries on there as well.

 

[Snigel]

I herby submit my entry: the SS Thunderbolt

Takeoff!

Folowing a somewhat chaotic ascent to the crusing altitude of 12 000m, the SS thunderbolt contined its voyage without any major problems, only requiering intermitent yaw adjustments to stay on course.

Quickly descending to the KSC.

The hard landing unfortunetly broke of the lower battery pods, as any landing gear had been omitted in order to reduce weight.

It flew non stop with solar power as the only means of electricity production and for the most part kept a crusing speed of 185-212 m/s, largely enabled by some fairing tricks, hiding the main envelope from drag.

Almost the entire flight was done with twelve times timewarp enabled as I didn't fancy sitting behind my computer for 5 hours.

More images can be found here: Imgur: The magic of the Internet

 

 

Edited March 9, 2023 by Snigel