cubinator Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 Worked on my great journey around the planet, I'd say it was a good distance for the first day. Also figuring out how to best transfer the information onto Koogle Kerbin: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrooperCooper Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 (edited) Currently in the Gemini stage of my RSS / RO career. After the first few flights with the new capsule and a first spacewalk, I designed an upgraded spaceship variant that comes with a service bay for scientific instruments and supplies. Since I was able to install PEM fuel cells as well, I got rid of some massive batteries. So despite the capabilities of the spacecraft to perform operations in low Earth orbit improved a lot, its weight increased only marginally (14.5 tons - still a lot more than the real Gemini crafts) and thus I was able to stick with the same lifter that I used before... Edited December 28, 2015 by TrooperCooper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Workable Goblin Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 (edited) I struggled with hard-to-land airplane designs in my current RP-0 game all day, until I finally got wise and copied the Viggen layout. Got me all the high-altitude performance I wanted, plus far more lenient takeoff and landing characteristics than the XF-103 clones I was building before. But that's not what was exciting. Or, it's not the most exciting thing. The maiden flight of this Viggen clone, I went ahead and fulfilled a supersonic X-planes contract with it. Then I had an idea... See, while I was testing the airplane, I had tried to see how high I could get it, and had managed to get to 29,993 meters. Now, if you've played RP-0, you'll know that there are "records" that you can break, one of which is getting a crewed aircraft up to 30,000 meters, and since I had been playing with jets I hadn't actually gotten that high yet. The payouts for these records is fairly nice, especially early in the game, so I was really motivated to try to break it, considering I was literally just a few meters away in testing. Better yet, I had a good idea for how to beat it. See, I use an autopilot mod called "Pilot Assistant" (hey, I don't have a joystick, and you try doing a coordinated turn with the keyboard), which, among other things, can automatically aim for certain altitudes. In testing, I had just told it to go for 30,000 meters. But! It caps how quickly it will climb, to fifty meters per second, and at the high altitude it was losing too much velocity, thrust, and, ultimately, climbing power to reach 30,000 meters. But if I climbed at a faster rate...in a zoom climb...well, the actual FAI world altitude record was set by a MiG-25 in a zoom climb. So, I tried it. And it worked great! Really great, actually--not only did I get to 30,000 meters, I got rather beyond that--to over 35,000 meters, which is outstanding when you consider that I was basically flying a monstrous Viggen-Lightning hybrid. So I was feeling rather good about myself at this point, since to do much better I would have to wait a year or two to get to the rocket planes tech node with the XLR-99, ramjets, and such stuff. Then the descent started. At first, nothing particularly exciting happened, but then...if you've ever seen the movie The Right Stuff, you probably remember the last scene with Chuck Yeager (it's pretty memorable). He's flying an NF-104 and tries to set a new altitude record, even though nobody cares about airplane records anymore, and gets pretty close. When he goes to descend, though, his plane goes into a severe spin. They don't mention it in the movie, either, but the same thing had actually happened to him a decade earlier (in 1953) flying the X-1A, where the aircraft had gone into a bad, high-speed spin while descending after setting a new airspeed record of Mach 2.44 at nearly 23,000 meters, and nearly killed him (a similar incident actually did kill Mel Apt while flying the X-2 a few years later). Well, that happened to me. On the descent, the aircraft suddenly went into a spin. I fought it all the way down, trying to fiddle with Pilot Assistant and then taking the controls manually to do a spin recovery, but to no avail. Finally, I gave up and pulled the ejection charge at 1,000 meters, just fourteen seconds before the plane hit the water (since an incident in testing an earlier design, I've made sure that the cockpits of my aircraft have decouplers and parachutes mounted so that I can "eject"). Again, this is just like Chuck Yeager in The Right Stuff, but fortunately my escape system worked a lot better than his, and the pilot, Wanda Stone, made it to the ground completely unharmed She had a habit of screaming uncontrollably at everything but, man, I don't know anything more BadS than flying a spinning airplane almost into the ground trying to save it. So, I edited the save file and made her BadS (no automatic Valentina and Jeb in RP-0, you see). First one this game. I'm also going to award one of Final Frontier's "special" ribbons to her... (Oh, I also boned up on my spin recovery procedure. I'm aiming for 37,650 on the next flight, you see...) Edited December 28, 2015 by Workable Goblin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Triop Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 (edited) What I did in KSP today ? Spend all day overdesigningaperfectcraftsoitwontworknomore. I say good day to you, sir... Edited December 28, 2015 by Triop Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianwubby Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 (edited) While getting a probe into polar orbit, I noticed I had a transit of Moho occurring in the background! Not sure how rare this would be, but it seems special enough to be of mention. Also, the new version of KSP Renaissance breathes wonderful new life into this game. Edited December 28, 2015 by Ianwubby Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maccollo Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 Built the most overengineered Duna lander imaginable.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA-uMHj5aZM&feature=youtu.be Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LordKael Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 10 minutes ago, maccollo said: Built the most overengineered Duna lander imaginable.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA-uMHj5aZM&feature=youtu.be That was a work of art... I usually go in the other direction, and try to get a simple vessel to do the job, but that has inspired me. and I thought it was impressive that I landed an asymmetrical base in one go... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatastrophicFailure Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 It appears I have finally succeeded in upgrading my 64k game to 1.0.5 and running more stable than before with the 64-bit hack, so some nice visual improvements too. My system now laughs at 7.5 gigs of RAM usage! Now I can get back to playing "for real" instead of just farting around in my stock-ish farting-around save. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikki Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 8 hours ago, maccollo said: Built the most overengineered Duna lander imaginable.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA-uMHj5aZM&feature=youtu.be Very cool, i do that stuff all the way since we have fairings! Nice Kerbal engineering! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
algwat Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 Just some fun, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snarfster Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 (edited) Did some KAS assembly work on my Class E asteroid to turn it into a tourist trap/hub/transfer station. It involved juggling 11 kerbals on EVA to be able to attach the 3.5m KAS container to a radial attachment point that I drilled into the asteroid. Additionally, a nuclear reactor with cooling was installed so the base will have ample power. Just to add... having 11 kerbals on EVA around a 1000 ton rock is NOT fun. Edited December 28, 2015 by Snarfster Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DunaRocketeer Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 (edited) 12 hours ago, maccollo said: Built the most overengineered Duna lander imaginable.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA-uMHj5aZM&feature=youtu.be I'm jealous! Edit - I'm curious, your velocity coming in is initially rather high, even for interplanetary approaches - are you running RO or something? Edited December 28, 2015 by DunaRocketeer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inverurie Jones Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 I sent a probe to Eve and it landed with a 'plop' in what appears to be an ocean of Ribena, whose waves lap gently at the shores of a nearby island of Angel Delight. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GarrisonChisholm Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 On 12/25/2015 at 2:25 AM, Expositor said: Finally landed on the mun! Love this game :). BTW, I never made it back Wow, did you manage to fly that with asymmetrical parts, or did you lose a mono-tank somewhere along the way? :? & Congratulations. :] Only a bit of modification and you'll be able to sent it back unmanned to pick him up! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maccollo Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 1 hour ago, DunaRocketeer said: I'm jealous! Edit - I'm curious, your velocity coming in is initially rather high, even for interplanetary approaches - are you running RO or something? It's made for a 2x kerbol system, so that goes some way to justify it's size =P Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fearless Son Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 13 hours ago, maccollo said: Built the most overengineered Duna lander imaginable.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA-uMHj5aZM&feature=youtu.be Beautifully engineered, beautifully executed. It looks like it might not go back up though... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 I will never play KSP without visual mods again... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maccollo Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 1 hour ago, Fearless Son said: Beautifully engineered, beautifully executed. It looks like it might not go back up though... It uses the monoprop engines to boost the TWR to 3, so It has no problem getting back up again. With decent piloting it can make it back to Kerbin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrooperCooper Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 (edited) Dawn at the Kourou space center in French Guayana... Ignition of the Pulsar lifter system with the upgraded Gemini OS Ship on its maiden flight strapped on top of it... 524 tons clearing the pad... Tony Woods and Nancy Rose enjoying their beginning gravity turn... Going supersonic... Two minutes after take off, at 80 km altitude... release of the emptied launch boosters... The center stage continues to push the two astronauts out of the atmosphere... Three minutes after take off, at 160 km altitude... seperation and ignition of the 2nd lifter stage... ...and removal of the launch escape system... Continuing to accelerate over the Atlantic... the shown suborbital probe is the signal from the first stages avionics and guidance package, falling back to the Earth... Six minutes after the launch, 280 km above the Atlantic... the apoapsis of more than 1,000 km (as reuired by a contract) has been burned out and the main engine cut off... After the circularization-burn east of Africa, the upper lifter stage is pulling back and the Gemini OS spaceship is released... Tony began with orbital science immediately... And then cleaned the windshields off dead flies from the launch... The crews mission lasted for more than ten days, achieving a new record-time for staying in space. Then they safely returned to the Earth surface... Next up, aside from some unmanned Moon impactor missions, strapped on top of a Tartarus-lifter the Agena target vessel is beeing prepared for future rendezvous and docking training missions... Edited December 28, 2015 by TrooperCooper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snarfster Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 The tourist trap, although far from complete, has started operations. It has received the first four tourists who are bound for Eve and Gilly. On the right is the tourist shuttle, just minutes after docking. On the left the return vehicle for the construction crew. Down below on the left you can see the resident 2.5m nuclear reactor, which keeps everything nice and toasty. Right now there are only three kerbals stationed here, so the work that can be done is limited. This will be the view the tourists will be enjoying until the next launch window to Eve. Thankfully there's plenty of stuff to do. (I wish tourists could EVA.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geschosskopf Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 I landed a plane on Tekto. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snarfster Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 7 minutes ago, Geschosskopf said: I landed a plane on Tekto. Looks interesting. Is that a planet with an atmosphere? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geschosskopf Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 13 minutes ago, Snarfster said: Looks interesting. Is that a planet with an atmosphere? It's Titan-analog orbiting the Saturn-analog in the Outer Planets Mod. Which rocks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magimix Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 I'm brand spanking new to KSP, so what I've been doing very much comes under "little acorns". Nevertheless, chipping away in career mode as I am, today I did my first successful de-orbit. It felt real good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikki Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 Duna massive invas ... errm yes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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