What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Ruthgar]

I also docked a lander to just a fuel depot space station, as it appears in some youtube video tutorials. Before this one I did another test, unsuccessul because the probe was too small and the RCS system was too poweful, and because of my lack of control. So this time I tried a lander with more inertia. Also i put several RCS systems to test what happens when they are out of the center of mass.

Most of my ships are WAY too heavy for the [CAPS LOCK] fine control system, plus I always seem to mount the rcs at 45 degree angles to the control system

[Ruthgar]

Lol it's funny; I only noticed they turn blue yesterday.

Back on topic. I did a lot more contracts. One in particular gave me trouble. OCD and pride prevented me from ignoring/rejecting a tough contract that I only accidentally accepted. This is a quote from another topic:

I had to get a LFB KR-1x2 (again!! :'( ) to 6300 M traveling at at LEAST 470 M/s. It's impossible. I'd love to see one of tou guys do it. I tried all kinds of super expensive configurations of Radially mounted (using girder segments) LFB KR -1X2 engines and no matter how many I had going at once there was never enough thrust to get the payload LFB KR -1X2 up to speed in time.

So I used my magnificent brain and thought outside the box like a maverick genius, and instead launched it much higher than the 6000M mark and cut my engines until free fall. I then sped it up to speed on the way back down and as I got within acceptable altitude requirements, I staged the test.

Use a jet for those contracts under 30k height and you can find it quite easy for those specific height/speed tests. Check out my 'Wonder Thump' test plane that has tested everything from the smallest to biggest engines successfully at any range of altitude under 30k.

This is it at prelaunch/prestaging config, but that flight had that big engine to test (at 20k alt I think), a small LV-1 (not seen) 3 separate jet tests (landed, inflight, and splash down), plus radial chute tests at 20k, and at 2-5k, and finally landing gear test splashed down. Parts recovery was about 80-82k, contract payments were 300-500k (was all initial tests) So the actual expense of the flight was only 1-3k in funds.

[Kamuchi]

:sticktongue:

[Mister Kerman]

Use a jet -snipped-

I haven't made a space plane yet. I've got my hands more than full trying to unlock all the lander/structure forming parts I need to make an aesthetic copycat of the Apollo missions.

KSP has opened me up to the reality of modern space exploration. Been wikipedia'ing tons of space stuff lately and it's really amazing and interesting. I want to try and emulate real-world builds as much as possible; but because I'm so new to KSP, I'm still getting the hang of appropriately accommodating lander missions just to the Mun and Minmus.

I love the contracts because they let me start gathering science independently when I feel like it. Contracts are like your training wheels in KSP. They let you advance your space program's R&D without leaving Kerbin's SOI; which is the absolute best for me since I like to make stylized payloads. The more I unlock before leaving the planet, the more able I'll be to explore my own way. Plus having a couple million in the bank never hurts!

One of these days I won't be a monstrous noob, and I'll make a cool SSTO spaceplane capable of carrying a payload to other planets; but until that day I'll be happy enough just pecking away at my campaign whenever I have a bit of free time.

PS: I never noticed your super-cool double cockpit. One day I will steal that aspect of your design lol.

Edited July 27, 2014 by Mister Kerman

[Loerelau]

Having a roadtrip to the mun! Get to all the biomes etc. It is a long process....

[TrooperCooper]

Working on a new sattelite carrier, this time with FAR + DRE...

EDIT: took a couple attempts and fixes, but now its able to achieve orbit.

Edited July 27, 2014 by TrooperCooper

[Fizwalker]

Lol it's funny; I only noticed they turn blue yesterday.

Back on topic. I did a lot more contracts. One in particular gave me trouble. OCD and pride prevented me from ignoring/rejecting a tough contract that I only accidentally accepted. This is a quote from another topic:

I had to get a LFB KR-1x2 (again!! :'( ) to 6300 M traveling at at LEAST 470 M/s. It's impossible. I'd love to see one of tou guys do it. I tried all kinds of super expensive configurations of Radially mounted (using girder segments) LFB KR -1X2 engines and no matter how many I had going at once there was never enough thrust to get the payload LFB KR -1X2 up to speed in time.

So I used my magnificent brain and thought outside the box like a maverick genius, and instead launched it much higher than the 6000M mark and cut my engines until free fall. I then sped it up to speed on the way back down and as I got within acceptable altitude requirements, I staged the test.

I have never... Noticed that before... and I wish I was home so I could see it now lol

[ThinkOutsideTheHangar]

If this gets to 10,000 replies, I will make a memorial on every game for just this post.

[ScriptKitt3h]

Today I did a night landing on Duna with this:

Gallery:

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[Concentric]

Launched the multi-mission. It turned out that I didn't need that first set of drop tanks, after all. As for profit: the orbital test alone brought in more than three times the launch cost... Ended up with almost 1.5 million in net profit, and that's before deorbiting and recovering the launch core.

Launched straight up until the overlap point came, slowly reducing throttle without letting the speed drop. Once at half throttle, I left it there until the LFBs were on their last dregs, at which point I throttled all the way up. The overlap point came just before it was time to drop the drop-tanks, so I staged the TR-2V and radial 'chute tests then. I then realised that I had yet to begin gravity turn, so I started that as I dropped the tanks.

Performed the LV-N test suborbitally before burning for orbit and testing the S3 KS-25x4. Then, I set Seanlan as the target.

Checked the fuel levels: one full X200-32, and a little left in the last Jumbo-64. Then, for ease of control, I dialed down the thrust-limiter on the S3 KS-25x4 to 10%.

Spent a little fuel making a rendezvous and matching orbits with Seanlan, then staged off the ship from the lift core to more finely approach him. Got him in, and then quicksaved. This was a slight mistake, as I learned after I had attached the science module to the Minmus ship: Somehow, fuel had fed from the tanks of the Mun and Minmus ships into the Vernor engines on the lift core (only place I can think could have used it...), leaving only 15 liquid fuel in the Minmus transfer stage, and nothing in all the others.

Fortunately, I had a plan. It was a ship I had been thinking of putting up previously, a probe-controlled rocket with a Claw, a large empty LFO tank, some xenon and empty xenon tanks, and some monopropellant in an R1. The idea was to grab and drain debris, push it into a decaying trajectory, let go and stabilise the Fuel Recovery Probe's orbit. It could then grab other ships and fuel dump stations to transfer fuel into them. It could also drain fuel from the lift core, which had probe control, no docking ports of any kind, and a bunch of leftover fuel that would otherwise go to waste.

A Skipper and Jumbo-64 is perfectly capable of vertical SSTO. I then rendezvoused with the ManyMission lift core, and through trial and error managed to figure out a correct ramming speed to get a grip on the ship. I completely drained the X200-32, then poured the contents of an FL-T100 into it, refilling the FL-T100 afterwards. Managed to smash off one of the Fuel Recovery Probe's solar panels, though...

Rendezvoused with the crewed (still connected) ships, and rammed them also. This set it rotating and wobbling, so I disabled the SAS and just performed the fuel transfers.

Once all the tanks were full, and the excess monopropellant had been drained (the Minmus satellite's Cylindrified tanks were full, the science module was connected, and the rescue capsule had full tanks too - there was just 2.22 spare in the other capsules), I detached the Fuel Recovery Probe and disarmed the claw. That will wait in orbit, possibly returning to the lift core if it turns out that an FL-T100 worth of fuel is not enough to deorbit that once the LV-N modules detach.

Next, I staged to separate the three ships by destination. I could have used decouplers rather than stack separators, really. It's not as though the Mun lander or the return capsule need their docking ports: they were just there to provide a connection point and hide the clipped parachute underneath them. The Minmus ship made its inclination burn, and then the return capsule reached apoapse and burned retrograde.

As Seanlan parachutes back to Kerbin, both the other destinations of the launch are visible in the sky: Mun on one side by Kerbol, and Minmus on the other.

The Minmus transfer burn preceded the Mun one by almost an orbit. Bill's burn seemed to give a Minmus periapse of 60km, on the prograde side, but this later disappeared for some reason.

Songer arrived at Mun and burned for a 50km orbit. Then, he lowered it to 10km circular before coming down over the East Crater. I spotted an arch during the deorbit burn. I may have to investigate that more closely at some point.

Songer's landing was on the edge of the crater. There was a slight skid downhill, but it stopped soon and nothing broke off. There should be enough fuel there for a safe return - or at least a return to orbit. But Songer's going to stick around for a bit and plant flags for money, just like the one he planted when he arrived.

Bill apparently lost his Minmus encounter on the way out. Some adjustment burning made it reappear, but with a high, retrograde trajectory. An adjustment just after the encounter brought the periapse to the other side of Minmus at around 20km. Then, he burned into a circular orbit and undocked the satellite. The science module would come with him. Also, he took reports and readings in high and low orbit over Minmus, transmitting the crew report from Minmus orbit.

Bill then waited in orbit until the Greater Flats were on the day side of Minmus, before deorbiting to land there. Once landed, he took more readings and reports, transmitting the Crew Report to complete the last mission. Well, I say last, but I then accepted Mun orbit science, Minmus orbit science and Minmus flag-planting missions. Those were quickly completed with the aid of the Mun satellite and Bill's earlier readings. Bill should still have the fuel to get orbit, rendezvous with the satellite, leave the science module behind on the satellite and return safely.

And that's my active contracts clear. New part tests have become available, as has a new exploration mission: Eve. I think I'll just send probes there for now: I've never done an Eve ascent, and I don't really want to send any Kerbals to a place from which I will be unable to retrieve them. Perhaps four probes? One to land, one to orbit, and the same again for Gilly. Duna and Ike exploration will be manned, though. They'll also use my remaining science modules.

Edited July 27, 2014 by Concentric

[Ruthgar]

I haven't made a space plane yet. I've got my hands more than full trying to unlock all the lander/structure forming parts I need to make an aesthetic copycat of the Apollo missions.

KSP has opened me up to the reality of modern space exploration. Been wikipedia'ing tons of space stuff lately and it's really amazing and interesting. I want to try and emulate real-world builds as much as possible; but because I'm so new to KSP, I'm still getting the hang of appropriately accommodating lander missions just to the Mun and Minmus.

I love the contracts because they let me start gathering science independently when I feel like it. Contracts are like your training wheels in KSP. They let you advance your space program's R&D without leaving Kerbin's SOI; which is the absolute best for me since I like to make stylized payloads. The more I unlock before leaving the planet, the more able I'll be to explore my own way. Plus having a couple million in the bank never hurts!

One of these days I won't be a monstrous noob, and I'll make a cool SSTO spaceplane capable of carrying a payload to other planets; but until that day I'll be happy enough just pecking away at my campaign whenever I have a bit of free time.

PS: I never noticed your super-cool double cockpit. One day I will steal that aspect of your design lol.

Strange thing is I've never actually taken that thing about 36k (and that was from inertia only) I had done the double cockpit for two reasons

#1 I've found the forward set of delta wings can mess up getting in/out of the cockpit, however having them on there also increases the amount of control you have. So I just added the mk1 cockpit in front of the mk2.

#2 When I initial started putting this together it was with the intention of someday in the future using it for the orbit rescue missions, however I found it more economical to do the rescue missions as part of other missions involving suborbital, orbital, mun/min locations

Aside from copying/modifying other's designs, this (the mk2 wonder thump) and also the mk1 which while not AS successful have been the only planes I've designed/built and were able to get off the ground without crashing within a minute. (we don't talk about the prototype of the Wonder Thump which strangely enough led to the naming of the design)

BTW, here's a picture of the mk1

I consider the mk1 to be a successful failure as it did manage to fly, about as well as the first planes of the wright brothers. Damn thing took the entire runway to get up to speed, and even with the double boosters did not have enough speed at the end of the runway to keep from sinking a bit. Swapped the boosters with 2 sets of jet engines, added the extra wing on the outside of those engine clusters, and the mk2 Wonder Thump was born. Technically it's now the mk3B as I first upgraded to turbojets and then swapped the intakes, but you get the idea.

*edited* even tho the mk1 didn't get above 2k in height ever, it was fun as hell flying a set of SRBs

*2nd edit* Yes I do have a few mods like Kerbal rocketry, however the final version of the Wonder Thump is used with just stock parts as far as I know.

Edited July 27, 2014 by Ruthgar

[Dracula]

I redownloaded KSP today! been so long, i gotta get me them new mods!!!!!!

[Ruthgar]

BTW, this is an old screenshot, but it is by far the one I like the best of all of them, just wanted to share it with you.

If you need me to explain why it's my favorite, then you just wouldn't get it.

[7499275]

Today i recorded a new episode of my series.

http://youtu.be/lr1xffVw08E

Plus I also recorded a review of TAC LS which is being rendered now, hopefully uploaded later tonight or tomorrow morning! Than, no KSP for a week as I go on vacation to visit family in Florida... They better be glad I love them, missing KSP AND band camp for them

[Ruthgar]

Today i recorded a new episode of my series.

http://youtu.be/lr1xffVw08E

Plus I also recorded a review of TAC LS which is being rendered now, hopefully uploaded later tonight or tomorrow morning! Than, no KSP for a week as I go on vacation to visit family in Florida... They better be glad I love them, missing KSP AND band camp for them

That's why you install KSP on your laptop, in addition to your desktop, even if you can only install vanilla KSP. Trust me, I've done it for my own visit to my family for next weekend.

*edited* Just a suggestion, but you might want to list the mods you're using in the video information (doesn't actually have to be in the video, but just in the YT comments about it)

Edited July 28, 2014 by Ruthgar

[7499275]

That's why you install KSP on your laptop, in addition to your desktop, even if you can only install vanilla KSP. Trust me, I've done it for my own visit to my family for next weekend.

*edited* Just a suggestion, but you might want to list the mods you're using in the video information (doesn't actually have to be in the video, but just in the YT comments about it)

I knew I forgot to do something! I wanted to add a link to that colonization mod! Thanks!

[Parallax]

[smysha]

Today I was looking for a perfect place for my new Munar colony. MKS/OKS is wonderful thing.

That rover goes realy fast! And crashes pretty easy. But I installed RCS balancer, which can quickly stabilize it.

Ugh. Such a shame that I have no idea what does that "ppm" rate mean. If it good place to settle the base or not...

[Mister Spock]

Looks like you're having fun with MKS/OKS; I'd like to try those too. For now, I'm doing more newbish stuff. Today I docked successfully on my first attempt. The Kerbil-rescue missions prepared me pretty well.

- - - Updated - - -

[Mister Spock]

Plus I had my first successful round-trip to the Mun! I've made a one-way trip, but this was my first successful there-and-back. Came home with lots of science and completed contracts.

Yes, that's the "Kerbal Federation of Planets" flag. Kirk made me use it.

[Ruthgar]

Today I was looking for a perfect place for my new Munar colony. MKS/OKS is wonderful thing.

http://i.imgur.com/vMC8O0A.png

That rover goes realy fast! And crashes pretty easy. But I installed RCS balancer, which can quickly stabilize it.

http://i.imgur.com/h0g1U5b.png

Ugh. Such a shame that I have no idea what does that "ppm" rate mean. If it good place to settle the base or not...

ppm generally stands for particles per million. It means that for every 1 million particles from the sample x particles are of that type

[KerbMav]

Jool Ion Probe entered Jool SOI - it will still be days before reaching PE and begin maneuvers to start mapping the moons, esp. Vall and Bop.

Renegade vessel in Eve orbit seems to have insufficient fuel to get into a Gilly orbit ... now what ...

Explorer III completed course correction for Jool - will still take about a year to reach its destination.

Duna Return mission arrived at Duna an filled its lander with fuel from Kethane reserves. Two of the crew managed landing 1km to the first anomaly to be investigated. (Game crashed, will see today where my last save was. )

[smysha]

ppm generally stands for particles per million. It means that for every 1 million particles from the sample x particles are of that type

Thank you! Probably, this is not the best place for a colony

[soulsource]

I finished refueling my Eve lander with one full tanker still in Eve orbit. The crew transfer to Eve went smooth as well, yet I didn't dock the transfer stage and the lander, because both are horribly big ships. Jebediah had a fun spacewalk to get to the lander capsule...

After three <strike>big fireworks</strike> not so successful attempts, which I declared "simulations" by pressing F9, I finally managed to land the ship in more or less one piece. Two engines obviously detached when they touched the ground, but Jebediah is convinced that it will still fly without them, because it was designed to launch from sea level, but landed nearly 2000 meters above, so that the first stage of the rocket probably isn't necessary anyhow. Sadly I copied the wrong screenshot before I went to work, so all I can show at the moment is a photo of Jebs back... Also funny: He could grab onto something here, but I have no clue what, so I didn't dare to press the F-button...

The next time I play KSP I'll send down a rover for Jeb to drive around - the goal would be to get a "water" sample ;-)

When Jeb is back in orbit, two other brave Kerbals will go to Gilly. Originally I wanted to do these two missions in parallel, but the transfer ship has a design flaw that would require an additional docking manoeuvre (I was just docking 9 tankers to the lander - no thanks), what makes it much more appealing to first finish the Eve landing mission, then gather all Kerbals into the transfer vehicle, go with that to Gilly and only undock the Gilly lander in Gilly orbit, although it would have enough fuel to go there from and return to low Eve orbit...

I'll post lots and lots of screenshots in the mission report forum once all Kerbals are back home. Since Jeb is currently looking forward for a rather long drive to Eves shores, it might still take a while. When talking about "a while": I haven't even started transcoding the Moho videos...

I'm really looking forward to finish this Eve mission, so I can finally have a look at 0.24...

[benzman]

Had a new Kerbonaut become active today, Buzz Kerman! I think I will keep him for missions that require rendezvous and docking.