SSTO to Moach and back (Beyond Jool, 1.12.5)

[FTLparachute]

(I'm aware the pictures are broken, I lost them all lol sori. if you want to see moach, check out beyond jool)

(this was a stupid idea)

The last two missions I have done for Beyond Jool have been relatively simple. However, mod author @Mr. Kerbin decided to make another challenge for the mod, landing a plane and rover on the moon Moach. During the design phase, I was surprised that, testing my lander as a LKO SSTO, it was able to achieve orbit with 2600m/s remaining. And so, I began one of the hardest missions I've ever done.

TLDR today I'm landing on Moach and returning with an SSTO.

What is a Moach?

Moach is a moon of Sarkin, the mod's Saturn / GP2 analogue. It is a dead world, with frozen wastes, desolate continents and an oxygenated atmosphere. While this leads to the conclusion that it is 'Laythe Easy Mode' (tbf its 100km smaller in radius), the problem comes from Sarkin itself, which is massive.

The giant has a surface gravity of 4.11g, which combined with its general girth makes Moach spin around it at >6km/s. This makes transfer to and fro really hard. So, what craft have I engineered to get there?

The SSTO

This is the Daphy, an SSTO (im shocked). Running on 6 Rapiers and 2 Nervs, it has enough range to get to Minmus. However, the cost of high dV is low vacuum thrust, with a Kerbin TWR of 0.12 fully fueled.

The cockpit design is borrowed from previous planes I have built, wanting to keep the plane looking somewhat flush. It also serves a second purpose, as on the end of its fuselage is a Convertotron, which is needed to get even close to Moach. The only issue is the front nosecone (which also has fuel) clipping into the front fuel tank, so this part has no Oxidizer to keep this looking nice without clipping fuel.

In order to qualify for the challenge, I had to stuff a rover into the cargo bay (hence why I went with the MK3 form factor). This birthed the Potatus rover, a very unstable design which looks more like the Bat-cycle from Dark Night than an actual rover. The worst feature is the docking. Having seen @MythicalHeFF's recent Jool 5 video, it seems I was inspired to make an even more convoluted method of re-attaching the rover.

It drives in backwards into the Daphy's cargo bay, where on Kerbin this bay must then be closed slightly to stop the rover getting stuck on the floor. A MK2 docking port then attracts the lander's port, aligning them. If the gravity is too high to let the two auto-attach, a set of Twitch engines on the rover then pushes the rover into the port until the two connect.

oh it also has a scanning arm.

Y1 - Launch

The two modules had to be separately loading in, as despite my best efforts the Potatus would remain attached even after separation, is the two were the same craft. One quick drive from the Launchpad to the Daphy, followed by loading, later, and the crew of Jeb, Bill, Bob and Vall took off.

The ascent from Kerbin was very sketchy, as poor TWR lead to a short re-entry during orbital insertion. But, it was successful, and 3 separate burns were done to get to Minmus.

I initially landed on a plateau overlooking the Great Flats, as I wanted to pay homage to my first surface base, located in the same spot. However, it seems old me was an idiot, as this area had no ore, so I instead landed in the south strip of the Great Flats, which has ore (and was the site of my favourite suface base, go figure).

Val and Bob took the rover out to scan nearby surface features, although the slippy surface of the slope resulted in some interesting ways to keep still.

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After returning, the rover was reattached to boost overall EC, and the mining began.

Y3 - Transfer to Jool

The transfer was done at Y3, as I was trying to use Jool as an assist to reach Sarkin. This plan was scuppered when, forgetting the Oberth effect was a thing, I spent 2.5km of dV ejecting to Jool from Minmus' orbital height. Just when all hope seemed lost, I remembered Pol existed.

Y6 - Pol Landing

Landing on Pol was tense, as by this point Daphy was running on fumes. Landing though, was achieved.

The rover was not deployed, as there were no large features on Pol.

During the mining process, I was able to experience a Jool eclipse.

The colours are extra vivid as I installed Spectra Scatterer, which makes the eclipses, IMO, look better than stock Scatterer.

Following this was a 19 year long wait for an efficient Sarkin window.

Y25 - Transfer to Sarkin

This was pretty standard, though this did take place during a rare Bop eclipse on Jool.

And, after 11 years...

Y36 - Sarkin Arrival

After several assists of Tyrant, the capture burn around Moach began. Half of it was done at Sarkin periapsis to keep the actual encounter as efficient as possible. Even still, the full circularization took several orbits.

The descent was turbulent, as Daphy span out hard.

Luckily, I was able to stabilize the plane, and made a successful landing on the surface. (see top of post)

The rover was deployed, before being stowed for the mining process.

I'll do a second post for the return, as this is getting quite long.

Edited January 28 by FTLparachute

[Mr. Kerbin]

You said bring them on!

Since you landed at the Rusty Red Shores, I’ll tell you a secret.

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That isn’t rust.

IT lives on.

 

[FTLparachute]

PT2 - The Return

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After the year long refuel, the Kerbals finally decided to get a surface sample. But what Val found shocked them:

Packing the crew with a copy of The Thing was not a good idea, as they immediately took off without planting a flag. When reaching orbit, they also passed over the big pin mountain Mt. Ebott.

Y37 - Kotta Landing

Kotta is the next moon out, and is the next stop for refuelling. After finally learning how to do Oberth splits correctly, the Daphy was ejected from Moach.

Despite having quite a low TWR for Kotta, the excess Oxidizer from the Moach ascent helped slow the landing.

Ascent itself was hard, as the rocket had a TWR of around 0.8, but the final Oxidizer pushed the Lander to orbit.

Y57 - Transfer to Jool

Transfer took 17 mins as, to keep the bearing of the Daphy stable, no PhysWarp was used.

It also didn't help that the orbit lines got a bit... scuffed.

But the Daphy eventually got to Jool.

Y70 - Bop Landing

I went to Bop to get some use out of the scanning arm. Other than that, landing went as planned

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After the refuel, I then ejected the Daphy from Jool, as Astrogator was not happy with my orbit and refused to give me a Kerbin intercept.

Y105 - Minmus Return.

Ejecting from Jool lost me a lot of dV via Oberth, so I had to do a Kerbin gravity assist before capturing. My timings, however, left the Kerbals waiting for over 25 years before finally returning to Minmus.

Funnily enough, I landed just 3km away from the original site.

Y105 - Kerbin Return.

I'll elaborate on the Minmus detour - while the plane had enough dV to safely re-enter from interplanetary space, my amazing design was completely unstable during flight when not fully fueled. Hence, we needed to mine Minmus again.

Just like before, a series of burns was needed to return to a 75km orbit.

Aerobraking was still hard, as this thing is unstable even at the best of times

Final approach was complicated by having Kerbin Side installed, as it put many obstacles for me to avoid.

But, one skechy landing later, it was done.

Conclusion

Sparse science over the mission netted 3708 points. I did enjoy this, but never again.

Unless I have an excuse, though. 

  On 1/2/2025 at 6:19 PM, Mr. Kerbin said:

You said bring them on!

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Have I at least passed?

Edited January 2 by FTLparachute
polish

[Mr. Kerbin]

  On 1/2/2025 at 7:12 PM, FTLparachute said:

Have I at least passed?

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Definitely.

I only say this because you said

  On 1/2/2025 at 6:13 PM, FTLparachute said:

this was a stupid idea)

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also did EVE break?

I gotta fix Eeloo’s orbit.

[FTLparachute]

  On 1/2/2025 at 7:36 PM, Mr. Kerbin said:

also did EVE break?

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No, got uninstalled when I removed AVP. I should probably put it back on.

[FTLparachute]

Curious if anyone can guess what Daphy and Potatus are referencing...

[Mr. Kerbin]

  On 1/2/2025 at 11:24 PM, FTLparachute said:

Curious if anyone can guess what Daphy and Potatus are referencing...

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heehee

I get the feeling people will need to understand Kerbol’s origins if you know what I mean…

[FTLparachute]

  On 1/2/2025 at 11:33 PM, Mr. Kerbin said:

I get the feeling people will need to understand Kerbol’s origins if you know what I mean…

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Didn't even know that they're in KO. We're referencing the same thing.

[FTLparachute]

Here's a quick teaser for the next mission I'm working on - and probably the most complicated yet, too...

[Mr. Kerbin]

  On 1/3/2025 at 8:33 PM, FTLparachute said:

Here's a quick teaser for the next mission I'm working on - and probably the most complicated yet, too...

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Jool ascent vehicle?

[FTLparachute]

  On 1/3/2025 at 10:05 PM, Mr. Kerbin said:

Jool ascent vehicle?

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Yep. One of at least 6 ascents, if you get what I'm saying.

[DennisB]

  On 1/3/2025 at 10:08 PM, FTLparachute said:

Yep. One of at least 6 ascents, if you get what I'm saying.

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Oh, a new record breaking attempt . I'm curious to read the report, and also, how long it will take for you. (I know, I'm really slow)

[FTLparachute]

  On 1/4/2025 at 6:37 AM, DennisB said:

Oh, a new record breaking attempt . I'm curious to read the report, and also, how long it will take for you. (I know, I'm really slow)

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I have absolutely no idea if I can even break the record, but the only science I know I'm not getting so far is the repeat Goo/SciJr from JoolASL.

The whole mission been set back though, as now I have to refit about 8 craft to have 4 experiment storage units each.

Edited January 4 by FTLparachute