What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Odonian]

3 hours ago, Sharpy said:

No kraken problems, or things getting unduly wobbly?

Not really. I've had to quickload once after the parent asteroid's position shifted relative to the attached modules after initiating a time warp, causing one of the modules to shake off some attached resource tanks upon return to normal time. I learned a long time ago that you always have to quicksave before initiating time warp with something attached to an asteroid. To help with stability and to avoid summoning the kraken, rather than use the klaw to attach modules to the asteroid surface, they are welded to KAS pylons using Konstruction docking ports. Klaws are too unstable for base building, and too many of them attached to the same thing seems to invite disaster. Parts along the outer edges of station modules are also autostrutted to the heaviest part, the asteroid, which further helps with stability.

Quicksaving before using time warp is probably the most important thing for asteroid safety.

Edited November 28, 2016 by Odonian

[JadeOfMaar]

Today I finished a setup for Waypoint Manager with the help of Jeb and co, and there was plenty opportunity for casual activity, so screenshots. They're touring Augustus, and Bob's writings are proving quite alright. Maybe some Colonists should be sent out there.

[TheEpicSquared]

I landed a probe on Gilly.

And yes, that is Kerbin that's peeking from behind the surface. I rearranged the solar system a bit using hyperedit.  

[justidutch]

A few missions were undertaken in the past while, as the first transfer window to Duna began to open up for the KSC's new space programme.  Before any of the fun stuff took place though, administration directed the engineers to put a second station into Kerbin orbit.  They didn't tell anyone why, just to do it stupidly cheaply or heads were gonna roll.  The engineers of course took it upon themselves, given the lack of any parameters other than it needs to house 5 visitors, to get a little creative and see if they could push something slightly oddly shaped through the atmosphere.  

It turned out that indeed they could put a weird blunt object where they wanted without a pointy shaped covering messing with the aesthetics of it all.  The public and media loved this of course, but admin wasn't too pleased at the lack of discrepancy employed by the designers, hoping that this will not become a trend.  The new station managed to get to a 1 Mm circular orbit, but no one knows what use it will be going forward.  It is probably too far out to be functional in any way.  The newbs in the flight crew were snickering that there's just enough room for all the orange-suits to go visit and get forgotten about there...

 

The scientists began thinking (which can lead to interesting results) and came up with the idea that all three contracts for the Duna system could be fulfilled in one fell swoop; with one fell ship.  Return science from Duna, put a satellite in the planet's orbit, and one in its moon Ike's orbit.  Those were the new directives for the engineering team, and they got right to it.  No visual considerations here, this one was purely function over form what with the stringent engineering challenges confined by the materials at hand.  There is no expectation or requirement that the crew return right away, though it would be nice (mostly for them).  Three crew were selected, one of each speciality, but mostly just for the experience and to test out the range of the new comms network (will that HG-5 thingy be able to phone home from Duna?)

The entire KSC staff spent the few days watching the mission leave Kerbin's SOI, the first time this has happened on purpose.  Plus, it was a weekend.

 

When the admin types finally returned to their desks after this momentous event (though they were typically late and mad that the secretaries didn't bring donuts), they were floored by a request from a media magnate to put another satellite into Duna orbit, even though mission #1 to the red planet was only 4 days underway!  Profit margins not being too large on this project, once again the engineers and designers were forced into minimalism, which of course they find dull and boring but allows them plenty of time to fall asleep at their desks.  The result was just a modified version of the ship that puts satellites around Minmus: 

 

The transfer to Duna was plotted, and the burn went smoothly, arrival date will be about 20 days after the first mission so that some local comms support is in place should the network not actually be able to reach back to Kerbin.

 

Once again no one returned to their real duties until Duna mission 2 left the local SOI.  This time donuts awaited the admin types and they celebrated by accepting a contract to put a station into a solar orbit.  In the planning meeting with all the department heads, the repairman who was fixing the  snack vending machine at the time muttered that the only sensible thing to do was to also send this ship to Duna; a solar orbit, after all, could be just meters away from a Duna capture.  The repairman was promptly escorted out of the building and fired; and the third Duna mission was born.  The poor repairman, upon leaving the grounds grabbed a rock and slung it through a window, landing in the lead scientist's champagne.

This time the designers were happy, mission parameters and budget allowed for some creativity, plus somebody had spiked the cherry soda due to a malfunctioning vending machine.  Space for nine visitors and having 4,000 units of fuel were the only real requirements, and this is what the team came up with: 

This ship made it to orbit, then a transfer was planned that took it just outside of Duna's SOI.  After the burn and upon leaving Kerbin's SOI, the contract was fulfilled and another manoeuvre took place that will get the ship close enough to Duna for it to become a station there.  Now there will be no doubts that Duna 1 will be able to return home, they will be able to dock with this station first should the need arise.

 

With all this exotic excitement over, it is back to more mundane missions for the remaining crew since the Duna ships have a couple hundred days of travel time, and there's still some useful things to be done closer to home.  Namely: gather some new science.  The lead scientist got some idea from somewhere that perhaps grabbing some rocks off the ground of the moons and subjecting them to experiments might be somewhat interesting.  He lobbied the admin types, but it wasn't until a contract from a third party to gather science from the surface of Minmus was brought forth that the mission plan was accepted.  When pressed, the head of the third party admitted he got the idea from their new snack vending machine repairman...

Science was gained, experience was experienced, and the crew forgot to bring their camera.  The crew have been banished to snack-wrapper-picker-uppers for the next year.

 

 

[DMSP]

7 hours of driving. One tiny and crashy rover.

Now, I'm less than half an hour away from ending my journey to bring a rover that @Baybrawler landed on the other side of Duna to the Stock Community Space Program's Duna landing site.

I've had to listen to the song "Waves" 5 times on repeat now. It's quite nice, if I'm honest...

Full progress below:

So close! I can see the site!

[Halfdan]

Station is put together and all the equipment is on the ground

all thats left now is to is to put the base modules together and start digging up the nuggets! 

[Nich]

@LaytheDragon  Any better pics of the triple port?

[Sharpy]

I had an argument with a customer. The dumbass claimed that a craft, all parts manufactured from scratch on Gilly, then assembled by my finest engineer, is not considered new. I had to use the executive powers of Alt-F12. Anyway, Kerman&Kerman, your station with 5000 units of ore, ISRU, and bonus four drills, is in orbit of Eve,

Here's a pic of it fueling up before the maiden voyage.

Then, with much less hassle, I built a simple lander for Eve. Eve is really easy to land on if you don't plan to return

So I sent the science as per contract. And in the meanwhile, one of Sentinels finished finding the required ten asteroids. So, three contracts completed - and the only visits to KSC today were to go to Tracking Station and switch to Gilly.

[Brownhair2]

TIL you can use the offset tool to clip out of the VAB

It angers the Kraken however.

(image taken less than a second later)

Edited November 29, 2016 by Brownhair2

[InterStellarExplorerKid983]

Today I finally made a working Mk3 SSTO. I was so excited because I been working on making a Mk3 SSTO for 8 months. It was so frustrating that a sometimes get a little ... I don't ... agitated.

[silks]

Took a break from roving around Eve and enjoyed the skies of Kerbin for a change.

 

[capi3101]

(1.1.3, FAR to go) Yesterday began with more fiddling with the design of Yeah, Buoy 7b, mainly looking to see if I could add a sea rudder for underwater operations. Damn things kept on blocking my wheels, so I ultimately settled for an aboveboard rudder. Makes sense, I guess - it is a Whiplash-powered craft after all - but I'd still would've liked to see how a rudder below the waterline fared.

With two contracts to survey waypoints in the vicinity of the Wildcat 7 / Piper Alpha 7 drilling site and a failed attempt to get Valcy out there to survey the points via jetpack, I came to the realization that what she really needed was a rover. So, I went into my Dropbox and brought out a very old, very reliable friend into my current litterbox - the Hellhound 7 heavy rover:

The Original Hellhound 7, screenie taken in early August 2013 (v. 0.22). Note the old style 88-88 antenna dish...suggesting I was still playing in v. 0.21 at the time.

Naturally, I didn't expect a three-year / twenty-version old craft to work without some tweaking, and I wasn't disappointed there. For one thing, the game wouldn't even let me put the thing on the Launchpad before going to the VAB where I built it originally (didn't have a grasp on the SPH at the time) because it (naturally) didn't have size and mass data. The positioning of the main probe core had to be adjusted in order to steer it properly without Kerbals in the seats and the wheel properties needed to be re-set, but those were the only tweaks needed. Within half an hour of the rebuild, I was trucking in and around KSC:

My first visit out to the KSC Obelisk, if you can believe it. Only busted one wheel getting out there, too - my fault for launching it off the end of the Runway at 45 m/s...

With the rover confirmed working, my next task became getting it out to Mün, where it was needed. I did have a booster and skycrane built for the rover...from version 0.21, once again, in the days of old non-FAR atmospheric soup, where moar mass equaled moar drag. Junked that thing on the quick-fast and started from scratch, though I generally kept the same overall design for the skycrane itself. Originally went with a fairing but dumped it since it added both enough mass and enough drag to prevent a successful orbit - removal of the fairing resulted in a craft where the final booster stage had enough excess delta-V to act as the transfer stage as well, and then return itself to Kerbin afterwards. Skycrane design was...adequate, I suppose...

The Hound Rides Again!

Took some pretty helacious peaks at unsafe speeds. Only real problem I have with the redesign is the exposed position of the new control core - I did blow it finally, bringing my shenanigans to a halt. Could've proceeded on the original control core, I suppose, but they've changed how docking mode works in the past three years and I have yet to re-learn. Used to be that was the safe way to drive rovers.

Anyway, once I was done with the testing I loaded the craft file into my main save game and switched over; I'm now tasked with earning enough spare cash to afford to put one on Mün.

With two rescue contracts for LKO, an Auk I flight was dispatched. Burned a bit much on the first rescue and I was worried I'd have to come back with only one of the two Kerbals, but I did some judicious maneuvering and was able to pick up the other Kerbal as well and de-orbit with 18 m/s of delta-V to spare. Landing was once again the hairy part; wound up setting down hard and tearing off both of the engines in the process, but otherwise the plane returned intact. I have a tendency to do that with the Auk I design, so perhaps larger landing gear is in order. I then went ahead and launched the Kerbinport 7 space station with Bill and three tourists aboard, one simply desiring a suborbital Kerbin flight and the other two Mün-bound. I went ahead and docked Strange Cargo to the new space station and later came to wonder why I did that, since the craft's current load of passengers are all bound for Minmus. I might get a coat tree up there soon so my VIP can return to Kerbin; I don't have a single-kerbal space plane capable of docking aside from the Auk V, and that one requires a winch cable to dock, which is doable, but probably not advisable. Next Objective arrived at Minmus with its load of tourists and I ultimately put it in a ten kilometer equatorial orbit around the minty moon. Most of her passengers are now ready to return to Kerbin but there are a few bound for the surface, so I will be waiting for the arrival of the Minmusport 7 station before I do anything more there - six days from now. Ended my night with a contract to test a Juno engine splashed. With my recent adventures in boating, I decided to try to fill the contract that way and built a simple canoeing/rover rig. The contract was fulfilled successfully and I was able to drive the craft back to the space center for full parts credit, though I need to research ways to improve roll stability in watercraft; what I built turned without capsizing, but it came awful close. New contracts include orbital sci contracts for Kerbin and Minmus; easy pickings which I'll do first thing when I go to play later today.

Edited November 29, 2016 by capi3101
fixed some bad grammar.

[Leafbaron]

Downloaded the Mk4 Spaceplane parts mod and was doing some testing with that. Very nice mod, the first plane I constructed made it to orbit easily, I then tried a new cockpit and OMS and the damn thing flew like a brick. Will have to research the drag problems. 

[MrCalvinator]

I was going to Minmus in my prize rocket:

 

Everything went beautifully, until...  the lander tipped.

...really?

Well, I ended up successfully getting back, just with only one parachute!

Phew!  And it was all worth it, with 1200 science!

Stressful, though.  I'm sure Bob is relieved!

 

 

 

Edited November 29, 2016 by MrCalvinator

[HalcyonSon]

Building funds and my astronaut corps.  Rescue missions left and right, plus tons of tourism.  Testing a new unmanned Klaw retrieval vessel so that I can justify terminating the pre-total-recovery-design space junk cluttering my skies.  Working on a means to retrieve a stranded Kerbal and his scrap from Mun surface to Kerbin surface.

Occasionally, contracts work out quite neatly, so that a routine automated tourist flight can be scheduled to also retrieve an amateur Kerbal stranded in orbit.  These coincidences never fail to please Gene Kerman.  He can use a single four-seat launch with two or three paying tourists to acquire a new astronaut, who is usually quite grateful.  This also results in wonderful juicy PR.

Several sub-orbital tourists are getting a free ride to Mun because it's simpler and cheaper to launch one mid-size rocket with six Kerbals and let the contract hang out for a few days than it is to manage several small launches that won't fully complete the contract.  The advance was nearly double the cost of a rocket to send six Kerbals to Mun orbit and back, plus the sub-orbital sub-objectives paid for the rocket on their own.  This one contract will be quite lucrative.  It's a very simple dual-1.25m tube design with the rather uninspiring name "Early 1.25m Mun Pax V.2."  V.1 was a success, but almost ran out of EC, and took nearly a week to complete Kerbin re-entry due to a shortage of delta V leaving the periapsis too high for effective aerobraking.  V.2 includes new KER technology, more solar panels, and more delta V for a faster turnaround.  Both V.1 and V.2 are completely automated, testing the trust of tourists in their space program.

The "Early Klaw Retriever 2" has nearly 2,000 delta V on tap after reaching orbit.  It has successfully demonstrated the return of a crew module from Mun orbit to a safe Kerbin landing.  Funny thing is that Gene Kerman swears he didn't authorize the launch of an empty crew module.  The next tech demonstration will include the uncontrolled de-orbit of multiple pieces of debris around Kerbin, plus the safe return of the Klaw Retriever for re-use.  This tech demonstration will allow the Tracking Station folks to routinely call for termination of any debris remaining in Kerbin or Mun orbit.  It will also allow for the safe return of stranded Kerbals in the safety and comfort of their own capsules.

[Tw1]

Is it a plane?

A rocket? 

It's something more!

This a station for the Church of St Jeb, of the unthrottled booster. Designed as a two stage t-

Damn. 

Woops.

Come on...

ArrrrGHHHh! 

All I wanna do is dock the parts of a traditional cathedral in low kerbin orbit. Is that really so much to ask? 

That's what I did today. 


 

Edited November 30, 2016 by Tw1

[Monkey Taylor]

Today, I built the orbiter one yay I got into orbit come on lets come back through the atmosphere, deploy parachutes, eject heat shiels [Oops, KSP has crashed] NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Image of  the Orbiter One on re-entry

Edited November 29, 2016 by Evenus

[DunaRocketeer]

Today I realised that if I took the first stage of one of my rockets and flew it solo, it makes a really good SSTO for light payloads. I hope a satellite contract comes up now so I can use it to make some money.

[Puggonaut]

SRSS + Reshade 3.05 =

[Triop]

Today ? Can to the Mun

Edited November 29, 2016 by Triop

[1101]

Continuing on from my post on the last page;

Shuttles: Full size, 'gunships' Full size.

Bottom fuel tank, as big as tweakscale will let it.  Along with the panels, RCS, RCS fuel tanks, etc.

 

Seriously, the Michael is huge.  And by SciFi standards, it's small and actually buildable.

 

Edited November 29, 2016 by 1101

[Brownhair2]

I built an abomination a rover:

Fun fact: Setting the damper setting to the minimum makes your rover super playful. Just look at it frolicking around!

Jeez, why do these images turn out so dark? I swear it isn't this dark in-game...

Edited December 1, 2016 by Brownhair2

[Martian Emigrant]

Hey-ho everybody.

And Kerbals.

The last few days were spent in the Liter Sand Box.

Building a ship.

A big one.

Guess where my Kerbals are.

 

There are 3 places I have never landed...Yet.

Tylo.

Eve

And Moho.

Hopes are high.

 

ME

[Triop]

Polar Science Expo.

 

 

[The Raging Sandwich]

Shuttle T12 (The last orbital test before the first manned mission. Launched into a 123x100 km orbit and landed in the desert. It came in too steep, bounced twice, and broke a wing on landing, but everything was fine.): Success

Brooke Kerman was hired for STS-1.

Transit 10 (A Mun-based relay satellite. Landed on the Mun to provide communications for deep-space probes.): Success

STS-1 (Jancy and Brooke lifted off into a polar orbit. They completed a couple of orbits and attempted landing at the North Pole. They overshot slightly but landed on a relatively flat piece of land just south of it. Once again, they came in too steep and too slow and broke both wings but nothing else.): Success

Cubesat 18 (A Kerbal Motion Cubesat launched towards the Mun. Attempted a douple-flyby but undershot and crashed into the Mun. Lack of reaction wheels made it impossible to compensate.): Failure

Winter Owl Mun Polar Lander (The second Winter Owl satellite. Despite how we told them how it was impossible and a waste of our funds, they insisted we launched it. It (luckily) found a small flat part of land to land on.): Success

STS-2 (Billble and Irca lifted of into a regular 112x164 km orbit. They boosted to a 201x200 km orbit. After a day in orbit, they attempted landing in the desert. They entered in too steep and too slow, bounced once, flipped completely upside-dwon, and broke every wing. They landed safely though. A new objective was set for the next mission: DON'T BREAK ANYTHING!): Success

Next mission: C7 Microsat 3