What did you do in KSP1 today?

[maranble14]

Had to do a fresh install because some mods were causing the game to crash :/

[Tyko]

I managed to (barely) get my lunar exploration ship home. After several weeks in orbit around the Mun, the KSS Buzz Aldrin was returning to Kerbin. While at the Mun, the Aldrin had moved from an equatorial to a polar orbit to gather science in the higher latitudes, but I'd failed to calculate the plane change into my return DV budget. She'd achieved LKO, but was unable to sync orbits with my Science lab. To save weight she ejected her two side tanks - they were designed to be replaced, so I was lucky to have that option, but that was an expensive loss. The now lighter ship was able to get within a few kilometers of the science lab when the tanks ran dry. The science lab dispatched its orbital tug with additional fuel. With the help of the tug's fuel and RCS, she was able to limp back to station. 

 

 

[kraden]

54 minutes ago, tjt said:

I managed to (barely) get my lunar exploration ship home. After several weeks in orbit around the Mun, the KSS Buzz Aldrin was returning to Kerbin. While at the Mun, the Aldrin had moved from an equatorial to a polar orbit to gather science in the higher latitudes, but I'd failed to calculate the plane change into my return DV budget. She'd achieved LKO, but was unable to sync orbits with my Science lab. To save weight she ejected her two side tanks - they were designed to be replaced, so I was lucky to have that option, but that was an expensive loss. The now lighter ship was able to get within a few kilometers of the science lab when the tanks ran dry. The science lab dispatched its orbital tug with additional fuel. With the help of the tug's fuel and RCS, she was able to limp back to station. 

 

 

I like your ship design. I may have to borrow it for my Kerbin SO I bus.

[kiwi1960]

Last night, before going to bed... I had a breakthrough... so happy that I need to place it here.....

For days now I have wanted to build a base on an island close to the KSC (North-ish of it) but I had a few problems... a Jet or Propeller plane would run off the runway (also the length of the landing area was in doubt), so I built a boat, ... it had its own issues... for one thing, it had wheels... I tried to run it up the steep bank to a flat spot but it broke down half way up....

So then, using Allista's "Throttle Controlled Avionics" mod, I built a VTOL plane... many different designs... but a lack of fuel means none of them had the range....

Getting annoyed.... I tried the helicopter mod and.... YES! Flew a small two seater to the Island and had more than half a tank remaining...

So I designed a heavy lift helicopter as well... and that flew in a test flight.... success.... then I went to bed.

So.... this morning, I have a few hours to finish testing and building the monster and fly a base, and fuel, to the island....

In fact, both designs of the helicopter as so good I might share them in the craft sharing area....

NOW..... I can get moving and do this before I build a base on the Mun....

 

Edited July 22, 2016 by kiwi1960

[Tyko]

36 minutes ago, kraden said:

I like your ship design. I may have to borrow it for my Kerbin SO I bus.

Thanks. Be my guest! I can share the Craft file, but we'd have to make sure you have all the mods i'm using. Also, there's a custom part on the lander I built. It's little storage canister for storing science. Again, I'm happy to share it.

By the way, if I was redesigning her I'd cut back on greenhouse capacity. She has way more than she needs. On the Aldrin the crew converted one whole bubble to growing "non-essential" greenery. This may explain why they utterly failed on their DV calculations. I may have to write some regs for my kerbalnauts.

Edited July 22, 2016 by tjt

[Tomato29]

today I finally finished the design of the Atlas, the mothership for my next grand tour (more than 15500 dV, thanks to a ssto lander with karbonite drills I'll go anywhere I want, excepted tylo)

note: I changed a few things since these screenshots: I deleted most of struts, so much security stuff stresses Jeb out, and I added decals, coolness is my first priority in that mission

edit: sure I hyperedit that, but only for screenshots. I'll get that into orbit later, and I feel like it's going to take me a while

Edited July 22, 2016 by Tomato29

[Geschosskopf]

I unintentionally tested the melting point of Kerbals.

Here's Artificersmate 3rd Class Jedley hastily abandoning his overheating base unit.  He had the presence of mind to grab anything useful out of storage on his way out the hatch and was mentioned in dispatches.  Not for bravery, but for letting his base overheat.

For scientific purposes, I discovered that Kerbals sublimate rather than melt.  Any hotter and he'd have evaporated in a cloud of gray vapor, yet at this temperature he was still solid enough scamper around flailing his arms wildly

 

 

[CatastrophicFailure]

20 minutes ago, Geschosskopf said:

... was mentioned in dispatches.  Not for bravery, but for letting his base overheat.

 

 

 

So... I s'pose the ceremonial sword is out of the question?

[Geschosskopf]

5 minutes ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

So... I s'pose the ceremonial sword is out of the question?

Yeah, he'll just be assigned some onerous duty and have his pay docked

 

[Lich180]

Woo! First successful Mun landing complete!

Last night I blew up a few dozen times, and finally landed sideways with no engine.

Today, I blew up once, landed sideways once, shattered the struts twice, and finally... Landed upright, with everything intact.

Now I've got to figure out how to get back to Kerbin on half a tank of fuel, that barely gets me into orbit around Mun.

[GarrisonChisholm]

1 hour ago, Geschosskopf said:

Yeah, he'll just be assigned some onerous duty and have his pay docked

 

...after he cools down enough to transport & discipline...

[Geschosskopf]

50 minutes ago, Lich180 said:

Now I've got to figure out how to get back to Kerbin on half a tank of fuel, that barely gets me into orbit around Mun.

I find it easier to rendezvous with a ship in orbit than to land within easy walking distance of something on the ground.  So if you've got enough fuel to orbit, wait for rescue there.

 

29 minutes ago, GarrisonChisholm said:

...after he cools down enough to transport & discipline...

Yeah, I made him stand in the shade for a few hours so he wouldn't overheat the black maria

 

[magnemoe]

Bop base established,

just four of the kerbals will stay on base, six will replace crew on Pol base 3 will return with the old Pol crew.

I wonder if the kerbal flag direction is an sort of political statement, either towards north or south on Bop, know its east - west on some other bodies. 

Tylo south pole, not an chaos terrain as on Mun but a few knife edge ridges towards the pole. 

Landed an probe there, will land another on the north pole.

Edited July 23, 2016 by magnemoe

[kraden]

3 hours ago, tjt said:

Thanks. Be my guest! I can share the Craft file, but we'd have to make sure you have all the mods i'm using. Also, there's a custom part on the lander I built. It's little storage canister for storing science. Again, I'm happy to share it.

By the way, if I was redesigning her I'd cut back on greenhouse capacity. She has way more than she needs. On the Aldrin the crew converted one whole bubble to growing "non-essential" greenery. This may explain why they utterly failed on their DV calculations. I may have to write some regs for my kerbalnauts.

I do see that our mods don't entirely line up so I was planning on doing some slight adjustments to that end (and possibly adding one I recognize ), however I would not be opposed to knowing what mods you use.

I probably wont put a greenhouse on her at all since the stations she'll dock with either have or will have two each. Is the custom part the piece that the lander legs are attached to, or am I just not recognizing that part?

[Lich180]

3 hours ago, Geschosskopf said:

I find it easier to rendezvous with a ship in orbit than to land within easy walking distance of something on the ground.  So if you've got enough fuel to orbit, wait for rescue there.

 

 

Well as best I can do is a giant leap around Mun, no orbit. I'm a few seconds burn shy of a stable orbit. Rescue team is currently in orbit around the Mun, ready for the attempts tomorrow.

I might have to make a trip to Minun for science and get docking ports.

[Slam_Jones]

Built a ship today, which may be used in a circumnavigation.  Has plenty of living space for crew, as well as a greenhouse, a science lab, and a garage for storing rovers (and an extendable ramp to get them onto/off the ship!).

After knocking the helicopter off the stern a few times, I made the wise decision to park in on the bow instead.  It's only fallen off once so far from there.

[Corona688]

The space station needed refueling, and you know how annoying it is to put little engines on big cans.  So I put a hamburger in orbit.

At the core is a rover drone, cheaper than adding a decent battery and looks less ridiculous when stacked between big tanks.  It made a nice base for the resulting cruciform of fuel tanks, sufficient for circularizing its own orbit and numerous manuevers.  Probably more RCS than needed but its refueling that too.

It manuevers very well.

[nightingale]

Not so much in KSP, but today I updated all the things.

[HazelPine]

Didn't really fly a mission today, but designed a new cargo plane for the upcoming polar operation, unanimously called "Operation Polar Inquisition".

The plane is called the SkyLift, and comes in two versions, one for extended short range usage and another for single long-range flights, to say, the poles. The Mk1 uses 6 turboprops to achieve flight and is very efficient, but my go it's slow. That's why its for short range missions, I don't have the patience to fly to the poles at 100 m/s. The Mk2 uses 2.5m jets to fly way faster, at the cost of fuel economy. Both have a ventral bay where payloads are loaded or dropped using KAS winches.  Hoping that nothing goes wrong with any of the flights, since I plan on dropping around 10 bases around Kerbin reusing the short range plane and a couple long-range ones.

Anyway, pics!

Spoiler

Also, had to install KJR since it did this all the time when pulling up on the jet version:

 

[Tyko]

5 hours ago, kraden said:

I do see that our mods don't entirely line up so I was planning on doing some slight adjustments to that end (and possibly adding one I recognize ), however I would not be opposed to knowing what mods you use.

I probably wont put a greenhouse on her at all since the stations she'll dock with either have or will have two each. Is the custom part the piece that the lander legs are attached to, or am I just not recognizing that part?

Mods that I (think) add to my ship - USI LS, Ven's Stock Revamp, Stock Station Parts, DMagic Orbital Science, Space Y. The core of the lander is a tweakscaled FL-T9000 service tank (hybrid LFO and Monoprop tank)

The special parts are shown in the pic below right above the crew hatch. The first one is a modified USI Kontainers box that's scaled down and holds 300L of KIS parts, The second is right above it and looks like a small Mystery Goo, but is actually a cooler for storing science or 6 packs - it's the goo model, but with a command pod's ability to store science.

Edited July 23, 2016 by tjt

[Vermil]

(Some decorative pictures from testing or former flights to be inserted here later)

 

Things (exploration, research) are coming together nicely for an entire chain of new manned expeditions. It seems the only thing I have to do to re-energize my KSP efforts is to postpone any plans on my big looming Mt Everest at the horizon, - Eve. Emphasis now is two manned firsts - Gilly and Vall. But to do that the right way, new rovers will be developed. And those will be tested on other manned expeditions. So there will be an attempt at a Hover-Rover, for Gilly, and this will be tested on Minmus, during the first manned expedition to Minmus in ages (I'm not even sure I've ever done a multi crew expedition to Minmus?). Then my new GPE-Rover (General Purpose Exploration) is coming along very nicely indeed, after much, much testing and development works on Kerbin. I'm quite excited to try it out on Mun and Duna (there will be some anomaly search) and then it will go on to Vall. 

So Mission Control and Dr Horst called together the guys and after some discussion the plans were fixed with everybody happy. (There was a slight argument about the Vall expedition. Mission Control had intended to re-schedule the fourth team from Laythe to Vall. This met with vehement protests from Cerly & Co. Understandable perhaps, since they've long been very personally set on visiting Laythe. Even though Vall would be a first landing, it couldn't compete. It was solved by the most junior team volunteering for the Vall expedition. Since that team performed brilliantly during a very strenuous Duna/Rover expedition recently and Danvey was outstanding during the difficult landing, Misson Control, Dr Horst and Bob (Chief Astronaut Safety Officer) all agreed. So in some consistence with previous laid plans:

Mun:  Rover_E   Rocket:  Firebrand_G   Crew: Tandan, Sigrid and Bilfal.

Minmus:  H-Rover_A   Rocket:  Firebrand_F (preferred to Firebrand_G due to better control)   Crew:  Jebediah, Bill and Bob.

Gilly:  H-Rover_B   Rocket:  Ikaros_I (Ikaros specially modified for Gillie)   Crew: Valentina, Madly and Kimene.

Duna:  Rover_E    Rocket: Ikaros_H   Crew: Jebediah, Bill and Bob.

Laythe:   Rover_F (special low sunlight version of Rover_E)   Rocket:   Kronos_D   Crew:  Cerly, Eilla and Asdra.

Vall:   Rover_F   Rocket:   Kronos_E (Kronos specially modified for Vall)   Crew:  Danvey, Lealin and Lindra.  

Notable is J&B&B's return to space operations. Since their extremely daring and challenging first manned expeditions to Duna and Laythe, they've basically been grounded. But hardly idle. Bob has taken a personal initiative to involve himself in astronaut safety (since he doesn't trust Mission Control). Jebediah was instrumental in introducing Rovers and has involved himself heavily in their developments, as well as ladders as usual. Bill has involved himself in future component research.

This is going to be fun.

 

Edited July 23, 2016 by Vermil

[Geschosskopf]

9 hours ago, Lich180 said:

I might have to make a trip to Minun for science and get docking ports.

You don't need docking ports for a rescue.  Just rendezvous and EVA the stranded kerb to an empty seat in the rescue ship.  And the stranded kerb can grab any science stored in the old ship on his way over.

[moogoob]

I've re-installed Scatterer and EVE. Loving the new lens flares! Also, sending stupidly tiny probes without reaction wheels to the Mun's surface. This one in particular used a Puff engine jammed in the bottom there... we really need a proper monoprop engine for small probes, as the puff gives this half-ton probe a Munar TWR of something like 21. Hey, at least my gravity drag losses were minimal.

EDIT: And I went to Eve.

 

Edited July 23, 2016 by moogoob

[Gojira1000]

I did almost nothing useful and just flew through some terrible weather around some mountains.

 

 

[MaxwellsDemon]

Horus 19 returned home from the Mun successfully, the orbital tug docked at the KSS, and its engineer-pilot added some reinforcing struts to the structure while waiting for the next module to come up.  And I attempted to put together a vehicle to bring up the truss assemblies but developed a severe case of rocketflipitis, so I took a break.