First (ultra basic) station - tips/feedback?

[Anaxagoras]

First time playing KSP, have done some things in sandbox. Doing career mode now, and in this game I've orbited but not landed on the Mun.

There's a contract available for putting a station with five kerbal capacity in Kerbin orbit. I probably won't ever get into extra fancy station-building, and though I've done the docking tutorial I'm not comfortable with it yet. But it seemed like if putting something in orbit could be marginally useful sometime in the future, getting paid to do it now may be worthwhile.

Could I get some feedback on this craft? Especially any gotchas that I should fix so this could be useful later on?

For instance, is this OK for docking port placement, reaction wheels, and RCS? Is it worth researching to get a probe core on here that can do normal hold, for getting it lined up right esp after future docking?

I guess in other circumstances, doing separate modules for habitation, fuel, etc could be worthwhile. But since I'm not really comfortable with docking, and since it'll be a good while before I can research Sr. docking ports, the multi-point connector, etc., I'm making this kind of a basic do-it-all. (Except no science lab etc, since this will be LKO.) I've thrown a bunch  of spare parts, repair kits, etc in inventory, largely thinking of "repair satellite/attach a part" missions. The decoupler by the main engine is in case, when I do get the Sr. docking port, I end up deciding I'd like to put a large docking port there in EVA construction.

 

[Zhetaan]

18 hours ago, Anaxagoras said:

For instance, is this OK for docking port placement, reaction wheels, and RCS?

You may be better off sticking to standard ports for traffic, Sr. ports for station expansion, and Jr. ports for nothing if you can avoid it.  That's purely up to you, of course, but it reflects my usual procedure (it prevents confusion--I won't say that I've never used them and never will, but I do try to avoid it).

You don't need that many of them, either.  Let's say that you go with the full kit and eventually you have a dedicated transfer vehicle to go to the Mun, another to go to Minmus, an emergency re-entry vehicle to evacuate the crew to Kerbin, a passenger- and cargo-rated vehicle for surface-to-orbit-to-surface traffic, and an RCS docking tug for handling station expansion modules:  that adds up to an extremely fancy and well-equipped station that needs only five docking ports, of which you're regularly using only two (Kerbin surface-launched traffic and a moon transfer vehicle), and at least two of which are for redundancies (emergency return and a second moon transfer vehicle).

It might not be a bad idea to eliminate one ring of ports and move the solar panels to where the ports used to be just to better avoid trouble with collisions and the shadows of any docked vehicles.  You've already said that you're not fond of docking, so I imagine that breaking solar panels while trying to dock would be extra frustrating.

You may want to exchange the retractable (SP-L) solar panels for the non-retractable (OX-4L) ones; that will save a bit of mass and cost.

You don't really need RCS on this; other things dock with it, but it doesn't dock with anything.  Keep the monopropellant tank, but only for a depot.  Maybe only fill it one-quarter of the way, too:  you won't run out any time soon.

You may want more battery, especially with the big 2.5m reaction wheel.

Hitchhikers don't provide control, but I see that you have a probe core on it.

A probe core will be fine, and you don't need one with normal hold:  you can orient the station yourself and use stability assist instead.  You'd need to do that or something similar anyway, because you'll need to set the port you want to use to 'Control from Here' to get the navball markers in the right places.

All told, this is a good first station--albeit a little ambitious with its docking capacity--but ambition is a good thing in this game.

 

Good luck!

[Anaxagoras]

On 8/14/2023 at 9:41 AM, Zhetaan said:

You may be better off sticking to standard ports... You don't need that many of them, either...

All told, this is a good first station--albeit a little ambitious with its docking capacity--but ambition is a good thing in this game. Good luck!

Thanks for the feedback! I just now got back to this after traveling.

I've removed the RCS thrusters. If I ever were to expand (adding a Sr port to the bottom via EVA construction after I've reached that point in the tech tree), I guess I should use a tug rather than having RCS on station parts.

I switched to the Jumbo-64 fuel tank and added a SEQ-24 storage unit, which gave me more room to space out my solar panels and the two rings of docking ports. I've removed some things I realized were redundant: no need for radial attachment points for the ports, standard-size docking ports already have lights, etc.

I can add more batteries, but I thought the Z-1K seemed like enough, given that the reaction wheel and probe core are the only consumers of power here. This will go in medium-low Kerbin orbit, so darkness will last a dozen minutes or so, during which the probe core would consume less than 20e out of 1000e.

I normally do use the non-retractable panels. But as you mention, breaking panels is a concern for docking, and I think the retractable panels will let me play it safe when docking something unwieldy.  The extra 0.028 tons seems relatively negligible in this instance.

I certainly don't anticipate having 9 things docked here anytime soon. But I thought that early on, the rings of four ports could be nice for reducing approaching vehicles' need to maneuver to another side of the station to get a port, and maybe some of that added capacity might be helpful in the late game.

That said, the number, type, and placement of docking ports is the thing I'm still most unsure of here.

I had thought that a little Minmus vessel, or a little 1 engineer craft for satellite repair/refurb missions, could dock here, and might want the Jr rather than standard port. Maybe that's not actually a good use case? If I don't dock any Jr vessels here then yes, it makes sense to remove that ring.

[Anaxagoras]

Again, the idea was that the port on the top would be a good place to dock a large craft, the other standard docking ports would be good for more normal ships, and the Jr. ports would give the option of having something like a tiny satellite service ship and a tiny Minmus ship.

To say more about why I didn't  just launch this after those fixes:

Suppose, at some point in the future, after I've reached the tech for Sr. docking ports and the HubMax, I add those by EVA construction and start adding stuff.

Then I might end up with something like this monstrosity. Please excuse the somewhat nonsensical additions; my point here is the now-largely-useless standard size docking port placement on the top piece which is the original station.

The things I can do about this:

1.  Just don't bother with thinking of future expansion. Launch as is, and if I really want new features in a station that far ahead in the game, just construct another station. I think I'd just do this, without trying to get more advice, if I didn't also see this as an opportunity to learn something from this effort.
2. Design any expansion to give the docking ports on the original a lot more room so they aren't useless. Put some big extension between the old station and the hub.
3.  Ignore the issue. If an expansion blocks old docking ports, it can compensate by having more ports in a better position.
4.  Think of a better port placement to accommodate both near-term and post-expansion docking.

[Anaxagoras]

Ended up launching this as is, a few days ago.

Have already thought of a couple things I could have done differently, but this'll do for now. And I realized that if it really matters later on, I could change some things about port configuration with EVA construction later on.

(Changing the location of a docking port on a real station in space would be rather difficult!)

I left it in very low parking orbit and moved on to other things for now. I intend to fire the engine again and raise it, but I haven't decided the altitude.

In case I do end up with several non-trivial ships docking here at once, I do want to have it over the 160km procedural terrain rendering cutoff for performance reasons. Maybe 240km for warp purposes? And that is more of a "gateway orbit."

[king of nowhere]

the thing is, this game is a sandbox. and a space station is just whatever you define as a space station.  it literally does not matter how you make it, as far as the game is concerned. you don't really need it besides completing the contract.
of course, if we approached the game this way, it would be boring. so you can add as many things to your station as you want.

but they are not actually needed, besides anything else you may want to do with your station.

so, don't fret too much over it. if you do something and you're not satisfied, you can always send a new one. basically,, launch the station and see if it does what you want. if later you see you'd have wanted to add more, that's how you learn what you want in a station