What did you do in KSP1 today?

[TrooperCooper]

Whats that? A giant space based laser cannon? Did the Kerbals turn violent and put arms up there?

No, its just a fully illuminated 500 tons Pegasus-class tanker beeing moved into orbit by a medium lifter.

I m getting ready to do my first babysteps at docking. *excited*

[Frank_G]

Just tested the Micro SSTO for my upcoming interstellar mission. Flies nice so far and reached stable 85km Kerbin orbit with 800 m/s deltaV left. The design weighs only 8.95 tons and is the smallest working SSTO with actual functionality that i have built so far. This design will now receive 2 KAS container clamps so it can transport stuff to planet surfaces and back. I really love the inline clamp-o-tron and how it integrates in the design, but i think it will be sacrificed for weight reasons and being replaced with a standard docking port... sad the part was made so heavy in the last release... The design used some clipped parts, but only as the editor allows it. No cheats, air-hogging or wing stacking used.

[Concentric]

Finished up yesterday's mission and sent the kerbals home. Bill retrieved the crew report from the lander can before it ran out of charge, and kicked it up into the air(less void). Then, he got back on the rover and drove it back a touch to reduce the chance of the falling lander can hitting the solar panels.

Next, he and Bob got onto the ionic ascent system and lifted off. The Jr docking port would be unable to dock with the one on the bottom of the orbiter because of the position of the seated kerbals' heads, so this would be a rendezvous and space-walk. I hadn't done that before: I'd always docked the ships together before getting crew out for transfer.

Got them nice and close - within about 60m and drifting slowly closer - then Bill got out of his seat and went over to the orbiter. After he was aboard, Bob did the same.

I already had several "vessel returned from Minmus' surface" instances - the science value would be zero - but I hadn't returned many that were just orbiters. It would be more valuable, therefore, not to bring the landed ion-system back. Instead, I landed it on the site again.

The return was straightforward, and I fired the engines in atmosphere at the periapse to make it a direct landing in the ocean. The single XL parachute wasn't really enough to slow the orbiter ship down sufficiently for a safe landing, so the descent was softened with four pillars of nuclear fire and smoke.

It's kind of strange how it decides what to destroy... The engines survived, but the tanks directly above them didn't, and the RCS tanks above those did, leaving them sat atop the floating engines as though the intermediate tanks had never been there. Until the engines tipped over and they slid off into the sea, that is.

Recovery of the capsule was an okay science load, considering no experiments were sent.

Additionally, in the previous mission, there was a failed box sent up. That particular rocket sent up another payload also: four tiny ion probes that look like this:

They're made of a Jr docking port, a Z-200, an Okto-2, an inline xenon tank, an ion engine and four OX-STAT static solar panels. Today, I corrected their orbits a touch, putting them in circular 100km orbits. The reason I put them up is for flight planning: using the method outlined by 5thHorseman here, I can now get decent times for up to four interplanetary launch windows at once without having to use external tools or calculations, which is wonderfully useful. Also, they have plenty of Delta-V if I decide they'd be more useful to me elsewhere.

Edited May 18, 2014 by Concentric

[TheVillain]

So I decided to give it a take on making a satelite like Voyager, I think it turned out pretty ok for a simple try without many science experiments on it.

Edited May 18, 2014 by TheVillain

[NecroBones]

Made a super-short version of my Free-Return tutorial. For the TL;DR-inclined:

[Pwnstarr]

Wrapped up a Jool mission and tested a new build at Eve. The Astronomer visual pack is really pretty.

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[NoPanShabuShabu]

Got the Eve Science Rover to the highest elevation.

[NoPanShabuShabu]

I started the live tests with my Eve lander and made three observations:

1. My parachute action group deployed only the drogues and half of the radial parachutes. I'll have to add a new stage to deploy all parachutes.
   
2. The stronger joints in 0.23.5 make the actual landing on Eve very easy. Nothing broke down when I deployed the parachutes.
   
3. When you make the deorbiting burn at 20000 km, it's very hard to aim at anything smaller than the dayside of the planet. In particular, continents are too small targets to hit reliably.
   

The landing should happen tomorrow.

In my experience, with stock aero, if you come from a 100k circular orbit and set your periapsis at 80k, you will land almost exactly under the periapsis marker.

[Felsmak]

I had to evacuate the KSC.

[LameLefty]

Installed FAR on Friday night and spent all day yesterday trying to fly spaceplanes. Turns out I VASTLY under-estimated the difficulty of landing back at KSC. After re-entry I had overrun KSC by something like 550 km. I managed an unpowered Mach 5+ 180º turn at 35,000 meter (that took almost 70 km) and got myself headed back towards home. I cruised back, bleeding off speed and altitude until I was within about 50 km of KSC, quick saved and began trying to land. It took me about four tries and once I finally managed it, I overran the runway but hey, nothing exploded or broke off so I'm counting it as a win.

[Othuyeg]

Edit: Original post went to the wrong thread, so what have I done in KSP today. Absolutely nothing but planned my grand mission to EVE. And mapped EVE for kethane.

Edited May 18, 2014 by Othuyeg

[Major "zubb" Tom]

I finally succeeded in my long standing quest to build a cargo plane that I can actually fly.

Also the cool little buggy on the back works well. Despite being easy to flip it keeps the three kerbals fairly safe.

I got my first blue orb kracken fall through the earth with this thing.

The cargo is parachute drop only because I cant land.

[coreross]

I did an exciting mission to Mun with no solar power (don't have the tech yet) I was running out of fuel and power at Mun, so I had to do some of my best manoeuvres to get back to Kerbin as my return trip was entirely out of power.

Watch below:

[Alephzorg]

I experimented with [thread=55905]EnvironmentalVisualEnhancements[/thread] and [thread=65754]HotRockets! Particle FX Replacement[/thread] to pretty up my game.

I was afraid my laptop would slow down so much as to make the game impossible to play but it's still fine.

I also got rid of a few old and useless satellites while setting up a network around network. 3 satellites in geosynchronous orbits and 3 in polar orbits with 6h orbital periods.

[KerbMav]

An unsatisfying evening of trying to design a Voyager like ion probe for Jool and whatever else it can reach - not quite there yet.

[Jouni]

My big lander finally touched down on Eve. On the way there, I learned a few more things.

The weakest point in my lander were the connections between LFBs and orange tanks. Unless the ground was perfectly clear, one or more boosters usually broke, if I landed too fast.

The area I could land after doing the deorbiting burn at 20000 km was difficult: a lot of seas, hills, and mountains.

Eventually I was able to find a reasonably level area at around 2100 m.

LFBs don't work too well in atmospheric powered landings.

After a successful landing, it took a while to get the kerbals out from the ship.

A group picture with the crew on the left and the passengers on the right. Inactive kerbals were slowly rotating due to high gravity and uneven ground.

Tomorrow it's time to return to orbit.

[LethalDose]

Last night I captured my first two asteroids, a B class and a D class.

That was a lot of freakin' work for 120 science...

[NecroBones]

Made a 16-minute launch test video, with a lifter designed for a 1100-ton payload to LKO.

[cantab]

Savescumming in my normally-no-reverts permadeath save. Because seriously, I'm not having Bill test fly a Duna lander-rover, maintain control despite a staging error, and land safely with the parachutes and a little rocket thrust, only to die in a fricking car crash on the Space Centre's lawn.

[Dire_Squid]

Yesterday, I FINALLY Landed on the Mun, in Career Mode, and made a half-decent Solar Plane (kinda better than Yogcast Duncan's) in Sandbox Mode.

Today... Contemplating what to spend my 243 Science Points on (not enough for the one remaining 90-point Science Venue... but more than enough for one 160 Point One... but cannot decided on Heavier Rocketry [bigger, more powerful non-solid fuel rockets and boosters], Specialized Control [that Lander Can, command pod and that big SAS stabilizer], Specialized Construction [Docking ports for building bigger rockets WHILE in space DOES seem promising], Supersonic Flight [better jets/spaceplanes and better rocket flight], Precision Engineering [minute maneuvers AND probe/rover-work... plus softer planetary/moon landings], or Advance Landing [better surviving the fall/crash?])

Edited May 19, 2014 by Dire_Squid

[TrooperCooper]

Another Megatron test during nighttime. Dropping the launch boosters in perfect symmetry.

Pegasus tanker disembarking from its lifter...

Monoprop hauler on the launchpad. I realized these would be excellent docking training vessels for obvious reason.

My first docking ever.

[Seret]

That's you sorted with monopropellant for the next hundred years then.

[Brotoro]

I posted Part 33 of my Long-term Laythe adventure.

Mysteries of Tylo revealed!

[KerbMav]

Have not been in KSP yet today, but after seeing more and more anomalies in forum posts and youtube videos, I made a decision:

I choose to go to all anomalies in this update and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are sleep consuming, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of my energies and skills, because that challenge is one that I am willing to accept, one I am unwilling to postpone, and one which I intend to win, and end spoilage of anomalies for me too.

(Although I fear for disappointment for any anomaly currently invisible due to errors in terrain. )

[DeepSpaceDutch]

Made a super-short version of my Free-Return tutorial. For the TL;DR-inclined:

Nice, short and very well narrated!