What did you do in KSP2 today?

[Oak7603]

Today I also sent a rover to Duna. It was succesful in terms of delivery and landing. However, the landing spot was way off where I wanted it to be, and I picked too small solar panels so power generation is slow. Mission 2 planned.

Detached from the delivery vehicle:

Parachutes deployed:

Wheels down. Scanners up.

[NexusHelium]

I made progress on my long term-ish project named Project DebDeb:

- I finished sending up all the satellites around all the planets and creating their respective orbits (I know there’s not commnet but I like to feel nostalgic)

-I finished designing the orbital fuel stations which not only turned out to be surprisingly light but also able to be sent up in one piece.

- I built the Jupiter IV (the name comes from a little thing I did back in KSP 1) and had a static fire on the runway. Unfortunately, it likes to rapidly disassemble itself upon the engine firing. And sometimes just when I can see it.

I only have one goal for this mission. To send up the mothership in one piece. So far it has gone against my goals but we’re getting there…

Edited January 24 by NexusHelium

[NexusHelium]

I may have just made the Kerbal equivalent to the Titanic.

[Antnee]

After completing most of the missions and unlocking all parts, I decided to mess around more with space planes and space stations. Starting small at first and having fun, but the high part count and performance hit can be a bit grueling.  Articulated hinges would be a nice feature one day!!  

 

 

Edited January 25 by Antnee

[Kimera Industries]

1 hour ago, Antnee said:

After completing most of the missions and unlocking all parts, I decided to mess around more with space planes and space stations. Starting small at first and having fun, but the high part count and performance hit can be a bit grueling.  Articulated hinges would be a nice feature one day!!  

 

 

Woah, I like how the entire nosecone goes up to reveal the docking port! I'm not sure I've ever seen anything quite like it. Looks awesome!

[Oak7603]

Duna Lander Mission 2 completed. This was a new build rover with some of the latest tech that I have unlocked. This one is called Galileo and has landed exactly in the region that I wanted - just on the edge of the northrn polar region so all regions in close proximity. The only issue is that when the rover decoupled from the lander, it had no electric, therefore no control, and so when it landed wheels down, it then slowly trundled off into the crater that it had landed on the edge of and then proceeded to roll up one side, down the other, skateboard half pipe style! Luckily the rover turned out to be quite stable so no crashes. It is still going as I type this. Kerbol is on its way so the issue will resolve once the solar panels kick in. I do remember putting the small electric generator on the rover, and the methalox fuel tank is attached but the converter isn't so I don't know if that didn't survive the launch with the fairing not providing any heat protection bug, or when reverting builds in the VAB I forgot to put it back on.

All in all though, time to science.

Galileo and it's Lander:

The Lander deployed with the stupid issue where things are held together that aren't even touching and I have no idea how to stop parts being highlighted. How do you stop either of these issues?

The rolling Galileo. That is still going. I can't seem to speed time up past 4x as I am unable to leave the active vehicle so this may take some time.

[Oak7603]

Turns out the lack of control was a bug. F5 F9 resolved control issues. Here is the lander in the daylight heading to the northern pole.

[Mister Spock]

@Oak7603 That rover is a thing of beauty! I assume it's there to stay, and it will transmit its science back to KSC via that spiffy antenna. I imagine it took a huge rocket to get that thing all the way to Duna; or did you use refueling stations? I'm way behind you on the tech tree, but I did just get my first rover mission after finishing the first set of Mun-landing missions. Your posts will help motivate me to push on!

@Antnee That's glorious! I'm also curious about how you got the spaceplane nosecone to hinge upwards. And does that vehicle with claws actually grab stuff? Is KAC (er, that mod with hinges and construction features from KSP1) part of stock KSP2?

[Kimera Industries]

20 minutes ago, Mister Spock said:

I'm also curious about how you got the spaceplane nosecone to hinge upwards. And does that vehicle with claws actually grab stuff? Is KAC (er, that mod with hinges and construction features from KSP1) part of stock KSP2?

If I understand correctly, (I don't have KSP2) there are stock parts that provide Starship-like cargo bays, including the hinging nosecone. I don't think KAC is in stock KSP2, as KSP2 has no robotics parts yet. The "grabber" arms are just immobile structural panels for show.

[Oak7603]

@Mister Spock Not a huge rocket but uses parts from the 4th tier of the R&D tree. My rovers have got better with tech. My first one is trundling around on the Mun but its so slow compared to this as well as being very small with a lack of tech as I hadn;t unlocked stuff when I built it. A replacement mission is planned.

 

3 minutes ago, Kimera Industries said:

If I understand correctly, (I don't have KSP2) there are stock parts that provide Starship-like cargo bays, including the hinging nosecone. I don't think KAC is in stock KSP2, as KSP2 has no robotics parts yet. The "grabber" arms are just immobile structural panels for show.

There is a large cargo nose in tier 3 - Large Payloads, and an XL cargo nose in tier 4 - XL payloads. Both hinge open.

[Aevitas]

I cried internally.

 

Context: Laythe ascent vehicle won't stop spinning out of control, and when I gave up on that I tried to design something so I could survive re-entry. It of course, continually flipped over. I think I need to make a fat pancake. A super fat pancake. I've done 4 completely different designs, and they all do the same thing. I'm so lost. What's in the video below isn't even the most recent attempt, but it was the most controllable. """controllable"""

 

[Antnee]

51 minutes ago, Mister Spock said:

@Oak7603 That rover is a thing of beauty! I assume it's there to stay, and it will transmit its science back to KSC via that spiffy antenna. I imagine it took a huge rocket to get that thing all the way to Duna; or did you use refueling stations? I'm way behind you on the tech tree, but I did just get my first rover mission after finishing the first set of Mun-landing missions. Your posts will help motivate me to push on!

@Antnee That's glorious! I'm also curious about how you got the spaceplane nosecone to hinge upwards. And does that vehicle with claws actually grab stuff? Is KAC (er, that mod with hinges and construction features from KSP1) part of stock KSP2?

@Mister Spock

Thank you so much!! Yeah, so I've been using the " Cargo Noses " of various sizes on my craft. The specific part in this instance is the CN - 375 3.75 m Cargo Nose. I've also provided an exploded view of the front end assembly. The medium nose cone on the front covering the docking port is only in service to the odd behavior of the current thermodynamics. I jettison it before circularization. Not sure if cargo parts or fairings for that matter are taken into consideration for aerodynamic effects and drag... They do overheat and explode at high altitudes as others have mentioned. Thanks again!!   

Oh! I almost forgot... The little space tug lobster thingy is for show only... The claws do in fact NOT articulate!.... Just a bit of creative modeling with all stock parts..... I haven't found any hinge mods so far..

[hatterson]

3 hours ago, Aevitas said:

I cried internally.

 

Context: Laythe ascent vehicle won't stop spinning out of control, and when I gave up on that I tried to design something so I could survive re-entry. It of course, continually flipped over. I think I need to make a fat pancake. A super fat pancake. I've done 4 completely different designs, and they all do the same thing. I'm so lost. What's in the video below isn't even the most recent attempt, but it was the most controllable. """controllable"""

 

Looks like there's a few things going on:

1.) You limited gimbal control so it had less control authority to correct itself.

2.) The middle top of the rocket looks very flat and is likely producing a ton  of drag which causes a lot of torque on the vessel when it's not perfectly in line with atmospheric prograde. You're also accelerating pretty fast low in atmo which exacerbates any drag issues since the atmosphere is still incredibly thick.

3.) You're taking off from exactly on the north pole which causes weird camera shifts as well and further exacerbates the visuals of the situation.

[Aevitas]

55 minutes ago, hatterson said:

Looks like there's a few things going on:

1.) You limited gimbal control so it had less control authority to correct itself.

2.) The middle top of the rocket looks very flat and is likely producing a ton  of drag which causes a lot of torque on the vessel when it's not perfectly in line with atmospheric prograde. You're also accelerating pretty fast low in atmo which exacerbates any drag issues since the atmosphere is still incredibly thick.

3.) You're taking off from exactly on the north pole which causes weird camera shifts as well and further exacerbates the visuals of the situation.

First, thank you so much for checking it out and responding.

I was limiting at first to try and prevent SAS from over-correcting. Seems to happen a lot with gimbal.

Yeah, it's badly flat... I didn't consider that. I've tried slowing acceleration as well, didn't seem to make a difference.

I never knew that happened at the Poles. Hm. 

Thank you again, I am motivated again! I will figure this out, and I'm almost certain you've solved it for me.

[Kimera Industries]

14 minutes ago, Aevitas said:

First, thank you so much for checking it out and responding.

I was limiting at first to try and prevent SAS from over-correcting. Seems to happen a lot with gimbal.

Yeah, it's badly flat... I didn't consider that. I've tried slowing acceleration as well, didn't seem to make a difference.

I never knew that happened at the Poles. Hm. 

Thank you again, I am motivated again! I will figure this out, and I'm almost certain you've solved it for me.

The #1 reason that happens to my rockets is because the center of pressure is above the center of mass. Add some big fins on the bottom and it will be much, much more stable. If they prevent you from landing on Laythe right side up, then add some detachable fins on top with a  larger surface area, so that on the descent you can point retrograde just fine, and on the ascent, you can ditch them and point prograde just fine.

[stephensmat]

So, after three days...

Spoiler

Lo, behold! Kerbal F'g'than!

The last klick was the hardest, with terrain difficulties. I must have tumbled down the hill a hundred times before I made it.

In other news, I got a proper comm satellite into Duna orbit too. My rover took the long way around, so I was able to upload another thousand points worth of observations, plus what I got just for making it to this thing. I've made it to Tier Three.

The comm satellite is a design that should be viable over Eve as well, and Eve SOI is my next 'task', I've already got it launched and waiting for a transfer window.

I'm also working a side mission to take three Kerbals to Ike. Funny thing, because I've already got two on Duna, waiting for pickup... but I'm still gonna have to launch from Kerbin.

In KSP1, my policy was to send two one way missions: A crew to land/science, and a large drone fuel tank with a drill, to go the small nearby moon and harvest/convert fuel for the return trip. Until we get some refueling parts in KSP2, that's not gonna work. Now that I've unlocked the large tanks and hi-end probe cores, maybe I can send fuel tanks ahead to refuel the landers for a return to Kerbin. Seems wasteful, but that's what I've got right now...

In the meantime, I've got a cool place to take holiday snaps.

Spoiler

 

[NexusHelium]

Had my first (technically second but the first one exploded and hardly counted) static fire of Project DebDeb's Jupiter IV just a few minutes ago. The fire was a success and nothing broke or even really wobbled. Really glad for that fix in 0.2.

Here's a picture of the completed ship (have not yet sent it to space but remember, it's supposed to go in one piece. So give me a little time before it's done)

I really like the notifications. It tells you how much everything is going wrong even though nothing really broke in the fire. Delta-V counter can be so weird some times. Even the atmospheric Delta-V wouldn't normally be that low.

Oop. My game just crashed.

Edited January 27 by NexusHelium

[Madishmike]

I launched Titanic into space and this happened

 

[stephensmat]

So. My next mission was to put a comm satellite in Jool orbit.

I could watch this planet all day. Seriously. It's beautiful.

One of the side missions... was to take an atmo sample and send the details back. Well, by pure chance, this was an early model Sat. Same type I used over Duna, only with extra solar panels, given the extra distance. As a result of the 'Tier Two Level' design, it had Science Jr Jr and a mini Atmo sniffer.

But no heat shields, no wings.

The prize was 3000 science points, and given that I'd already completed the main mission, I decided to copy NASA's fine example, and sacrifice the thing to the firey friction of a Jovian, and hope the transmission would make it out before crashdown.

I quickly decided this was a terrible idea, and instead, decided to see just how high the atmo of Jool went. Something I've never tried. Not even in KSP1.

With an elliptical orbit, I had more than enough fuel to play around, so I took the periapsis down to 210, then 205, and finally to 198km.

Atmo sampling takes two minutes. I pulled in the larger solar panels, and the comm dish. On the first pass, I got 90 seconds. And I'm grateful that I can 'pause' and 'resume' when I reenter the same biome again later. On the second pass, I got the data, and 5000 in samples (Which I can't use yet.)

Wouldn't you know it, on the last F9, the trajectory lines of everything vanished, but I still had the Ap/Pe numbers, which was all i needed to put her back in a stable orbit. Transmitting the data back to Kerbin took three charges of my in-probe battery, but there's another thing I can pause and resume.

So, I've now unlocked all the Tier 3 science, and I'm looking to see what I can do with those Science Lab parts in uncharted areas. Back in KSP1, I made it a point to try and get a Science Station in orbit of every planet and Moon, as well as another on the surface, and just start farming science points. Can't do that for profit in KSP2, but there's a stupid amount of the tech tree yet to unlock.

[Kimera Industries]

2 minutes ago, stephensmat said:

So. My next mission was to put a comm satellite in Jool orbit.

I could watch this planet all day. Seriously. It's beautiful.

One of the side missions... was to take an atmo sample and send the details back. Well, by pure chance, this was an early model Sat. Same type I used over Duna, only with extra solar panels, given the extra distance. As a result of the 'Tier Two Level' design, it had Science Jr Jr and a mini Atmo sniffer.

But no heat shields, no wings.

The prize was 3000 science points, and given that I'd already completed the main mission, I decided to copy NASA's fine example, and sacrifice the thing to the firey friction of a Jovian, and hope the transmission would make it out before crashdown.

I quickly decided this was a terrible idea, and instead, decided to see just how high the atmo of Jool went. Something I've never tried. Not even in KSP1.

With an elliptical orbit, I had more than enough fuel to play around, so I took the periapsis down to 210, then 205, and finally to 198km.

Atmo sampling takes two minutes. I pulled in the larger solar panels, and the comm dish. On the first pass, I got 90 seconds. And I'm grateful that I can 'pause' and 'resume' when I reenter the same biome again later. On the second pass, I got the data, and 5000 in samples (Which I can't use yet.)

Wouldn't you know it, on the last F9, the trajectory lines of everything vanished, but I still had the Ap/Pe numbers, which was all i needed to put her back in a stable orbit. Transmitting the data back to Kerbin took three charges of my in-probe battery, but there's another thing I can pause and resume.

So, I've now unlocked all the Tier 3 science, and I'm looking to see what I can do with those Science Lab parts in uncharted areas. Back in KSP1, I made it a point to try and get a Science Station in orbit of every planet and Moon, as well as another on the surface, and just start farming science points. Can't do that for profit in KSP2, but there's a stupid amount of the tech tree yet to unlock.

Excellent idea for getting atmo data without a heat shield. Did any thermal bars show up?

Jool is quite pretty for sure. I think it's better than Jupiter but only because Jupiter is the colors of barf.

[stephensmat]

Just now, Kimera Industries said:

Excellent idea for getting atmo data without a heat shield. Did any thermal bars show up?

Not even once. Took me a couple of tries to get the altitude just right. You gotta skim very lightly. Enough that you don't even change your orbit much, if at all.

[Urus28]

This week I dediced to give Ike some love, my little rover there is not the most beautiful, but it works well. So I went on a trip to the top of a volcano.

So this mountain will be my destination !

It's very difficult to have an idea of the actual size of the volcano. The top remain hidden behind the horizon.

Ike's terrain is not the easiest one... But climbing a volcano is really difficult with a rover.

Finally, after many difficulties I reached the summit, the volcano is so high that Ike curvature is clearly visible.

[Oak7603]

For the final Jupiter Exploration company's Mun rover mission, Jebediah Kerman was collected from the Mun surface after 52y marking half a century of kerballed exploration, leaving Commitment behind (an early tech rover) to travel to the Mare Eye. Once Jebediah came home as a hero, the latest iteration of the rover - Continuity - was then landed on the surface to explore the Rayed Crater. A succesful landing, followed by a precarious journey into the crater, marked the last of any planned Mun missions.

Edited January 29 by Oak7603

[Crazy8Chief]

Not much but played KSP1 for five hours. 

[Madishmike]

Thought I would see how the Titanic would cope with reentry. Not so great lol.

It did still float though so that's a bonus. Video at 20x speed

 

Edited January 29 by Madishmike