How do i get this rover to the Mun?

[AntiVi]

I have been having lots and lots of trouble getting this rover to the Mun :S

Any help is appreciated!

Screenshots!

[K^2]

I'd split it into 3 modules. Make sure each one has 4 wheels (or 2 wheels + landing gear) so that you can dock them on the Mun.

[little square dot]

If you've managed to get it into orbit, you've already leaped over the biggest hurdle. What is causing you difficulty? Lack of fuel? Landing? Transfer?

[macbernick]

I'd say you're trying to lift far too much fuel.

[ThePsuedoMonkey]

I think that lifter is holding you back a bit. I'd use asparagus staging for those 6 radial liquid stacks and put some 1m tanks on top of those solid boosters in order to run your liquid engines (throttle them such that your TWR stays near 2 and the tanks run dry just as the boosters run out).

[RawChicken]

you should radially attach rockets to the rover and land vertically, than decouple the rockets and make sur the rover falls as it should. If any wheel breaks you can fix it. Its not a hard rover to land anyway.

[AntiVi]

If you've managed to get it into orbit, you've already leaped over the biggest hurdle. What is causing you difficulty? Lack of fuel? Landing? Transfer?

Well i got into orbit with the tanks and engines attached to the rover itself and nothing else xD

I think that lifter is holding you back a bit. I'd use asparagus staging for those 6 radial liquid stacks and put some 1m tanks on top of those solid boosters in order to run your liquid engines (throttle them such that your TWR stays near 2 and the tanks run dry just as the boosters run out).

ok TWR?

1m tanks wich ones are those?

you should radially attach rockets to the rover and land vertically, than decouple the rockets and make sur the rover falls as it should. If any wheel breaks you can fix it. Its not a hard rover to land anyway.

don't want to land it vertically :S

[ThatBum]

You don't need that much fuel or power to land on the Mun. Remember that the Mun only has 1/6 gravity, so you'll only need 1/6 the power that you would need to land on Kerbin. Well, excluding drag, but still. Replace those 2m tanks with some 1.25m ones. Maybe use the orange radial engines.

[mewp]

How many stages are you using? Remember appropriate staging can drastically increase the fuel efficiency of your rocket.

[Malaugrym]

That initial boost stage needs revision. Way too much stuff glued on. Reduce your rocket to the bare minimum required to get your payload to the Mun, then add in a slight safety margin.

[georgTF]

I would suggest redesigning the rover. It's fine as is but if you moved the cockpit forward and placed a docking port in the middle (facing up), you could attach the rover to a skycrane. A fairly simple one could lower it to the Mun, and if you assigned the docking port to an action group, you could detach the rover when hovering close to the ground without losing control of the crane. That makes delivery easier and possibly saves you the crane for future use. And it's pretty cool too.

For the main ascent i'd build the rover+crane, flip it upside down, add a decoupler or docking port to detach the crane once you orbit the Mun, and the main rocket would be beneath.

- Docking port, ASAS, OCTO2 probecore, battery ring, RCS fual tank, and some solar panels. The fuel and engines fit below.

- Two big orange tanks, one medium with a Mainsail beneath. Strut up the connections between tanks to add strength. Add RCS thrusters to the rocket or you wont be able to turn it.

- 6-way symmetry enabled for 6 radial decouplers, then attach to each the same tanks and engine as the main rocket. Strut up the tanks or else they fall apart, and also add conections between the rockets because radial decouplers are not very strong.

- Take any pair of oposite rad. decouplers and put them together in one stage. Place a fuel line between the bottom tank and it's neighbour tank. Do this on both sides. Then find the decouplers for this pair of rockets and put them together in one stage, set above the previous pair. Again connect the bottom tank to it's neighbour with a fuel line. Place the remaining pair of decouplers in a stage, again set to stage after the previous pair and connect the bottom tanks to the main rocket bottom tank this time. This will ensure that fuel allways flows to your main rocket, and the outer rockets run out of fuel in pairs. You can drop empty rocket pairs by staging the decouplers. Depending on payload, you should be circularising your orbit shortly after dropping the last pair and can complete the rest of your trip on the main rocket.

- Once the whole thing is built you should stabilise the skycrane+rover by adding plenty of struts. They will be gone as you drop tanks, and also once you decouple the main rocket.

Don't forget a probe core for your skycrane, and give it some batteries or solar panels. Skycranes also benefit from having lights pointing downwards for night landings. Balance is crucial, you want the docking port/decoupler to be on the CoM of both vehicles, otherwise you will lose stability.

Here is my first succesfull rover delivery. It's not the best by a parsec or two, but it did the job. I crashed the rover within two minutes though... sadly.

And here is a later, more refined variant of rover+skycrane. I totally stole the skycrane from someone. Thanks, great design.

Here is an example of the rocket i described. It's already ditched all tanks and delivered payload so it's about to deorbit itself.

Edited April 26, 2013 by georgTF