What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Cavscout74]

In my 1.5.1 career, my first probes arrived around Duna.  First came a polar relay & science satellite, followed by a polar lander.  Third was a Venera-like setup from Probes Plus with orbiter & lander.  The orbiter is safely in a slightly inclined low Duna orbit, but the Formalhauf lander exploded upon landing - despite landing this exact same probe multiple times before, and it has a 65m/s impact limit, and was barely doing 10 m/s on landing.  Oh well, at least the polar lander survived (mostly)

Approaching Duna entry:

Under canopy, over the north polar caps, with the sun & Ike visible

Landed - the landing "foot" didn't survive, but it wasn't too important.  Everything of value survived the landing & immediately began transmitting science back home

 

Edited December 2, 2018 by Cavscout74

[TrooperCooper]

 

Launched another piece of equipment for my Eeloo operation...

 

 

The Prometheus is a crew module for interplanetary flights, able to keep a crew of 4 Kerbals alive and happy for ten years of transit time.

 

 

Like most of the gear put into service at the moment, it was designed to also be pushed by the Pegasus interplanetary tug. Meeting up with the puller just as the last hydrogen tanker finnished fueling it up and heading for de-orbit...

 

 

Prometheus leaving its lifter stage...

 

 

Then the ship went to dock up with the Pegasus. Unfortunately, once docking was achieved, the external tanks of the tug were set into resonant swinging motion and ripped the ship into pieces. While the Prometheus module survived and remains in orbit, it became clear that the heavy puller had to be re-designed. It seems like KJR + auto strut + rigid attachement gives no wiggle room for the joints and they will break to easily.

 

 

So  I came up with this: the Pegasus 3 (the Pegasus 2 only existed on the drawing board and didnt make it into service - lets not talk about that ). Pegasus 3 has no radial tanks to avoid resonant motions. Instead one single oversized hydrogen tank was used. The reaction wheels at the bottom are upscaled to 5 meters width. A few other minor improvements here and there from lessons learned with the predecessor... including a more powerfull reactor, increaed RCS abilities and removal of the large nuclear fuel drum (since I need an engineer on board to move nuclear fuel anyway and thus cant do it remotely). All in all it became slightly more powerfull and weights about 50 tons more... while part count was reduced.

 

 

Now... how do we get that into space?

 

Well... lets empty the tank, strap it on top of a rocket and see if it flies. 

 

 

And well, yes... it does.

 

 

After arrival in orbit, a fleet of about 10 hydrogen tankers were sent to fuel it up. Thanks to routine mission manager, that was done within about one real hour.

 

 

Prometheus transfer was pushed further back and instead a 260 tons supply package for the Eeloo station was launched...

 

Docking it up to the new Pegasus...

 

 

Then it made its way to Sarnus / Eeloo... three big balls in line.

 

 

While the Pegasus returned to Kerbin, the Eeloo station, still uncrewed, was supplied with goods and it is now ready for the first team of Kerbals to arrive...

 

According to plan, two more interplanetary transfer flights to Eeloo and Stage One of Project Dreamland will be complete. Then surface operations will begin.

 

 

[Eriksonn]

In my carrer i went to duna with a "Apollo style" lander that separates from the main ship, lands, gets science and then docks again. I also realized that my landing legs was put on the external tanks that was ment to decouple, and i wanted to land on ike too. Fortunely i had enough dv to save the tanks and the legs so i could land on Ike. And i might not have had enough to land and get off Ike without them… The Ike landing was a bonus part that i did not think of when starting the mission but since i hade some extra fuel and was in need of all the science i could get my hands on i did that too.

Ballistic capture around Ike with ~22 dv from duna orbit. ~20(+-10) dv from elliptic duna orbit to ike capture(didnt need to circuralize at duna capture. Lander had enough anyway), ~2 extra to avoid crashing and minor stabilizing(to avoid flying away again). These types of orbits are really sensitive so a 0.1 dv push at the start could mean the difference between a somewhat nice ike orbit and escaping duna completely...

Nice scenery over here

 

 

[Fearless Son]

4 hours ago, dr.phees said:

I love that submersible!  It's so tiny and looks so functional!

[FezCool]

Today I created a medium sized two engine ssto.

 

[Cavscout74]

I was going to take up a mid-tech spaceplane in my 1.5.1 career for a rescue mission.  This particular spaceplane (based on @AeroGav 's tutorial for a panther-NERV design) has been used before (1.4.5 at least, possibly earlier).  But when I switched to NERV power, I had ~1000 m/s dV LESS than I did in 1.4.5.  I couldn't even make orbit.  Previously, I was able to go all the way out for a quick trip beyond Kerbin's SoI & back for pilot training without refueling.  Really disappointing - but it kinda confirms the feeling I already had that 1.5.1 had less dV available for the same designs as 1.4.5.  Since I've only been launching rockets so far in 1.5.1, it wasn't as noticeable, and I hadn't done a direct comparison until now.

[qzgy]

5 hours ago, dr.phees said:

All  craft files are in my hangar: https://kerbalx.com/hangars/46627

Really quite like those sea planes too., especially that use of the mk2 on its side.

[DeltaDizzy]

Edited December 3, 2018 by DeltaDizzy

[Angelo Kerman]

I launched the new A-51C Flapjack into LKO:

Unfortunately it ran out of fuel and I had to use the RCS to complete its orbit. But Skybase has spacecraft available for contingencies like this. I sent out the nuclear tug to retrieve Flapjack 3:

... and arrived safely back at Skybase:

[Angelo Kerman]

One more thing I did:

[dr.phees]

8 hours ago, Fearless Son said:

I love that submersible!  It's so tiny and looks so functional! 

It is. I love driving it with raster prop monitor. The IVA view with the little camera on the bottom is great! I ran full missions from the driver's seat.

[deufrai]

On 12/2/2018 at 1:28 AM, Eriksonn said:

It is quite a compact lander design, i like it.

Here are some tips:

I recommend putting the heatshield between the tank and the cargo bay and adding a decoupler to ease the load on the parachutes.(Meaning you can have less parachutes and save on weight.)

It does not look like your landing legs touch the ground very much, you can extend them in the vab to see if they reach far enough before you have even launched.

If you have problem with dv you can use an engine with higher isp like the poodle, it gives you 14% more dv and weighs half as much as 4 thuds.(You might need larger landing legs when using the poodle)

Thanks for the tips. Indeed, I cannot find a good reason as to why on Kerbin I kept the fuel tank and 4 motors for re-entry

[Bev7787]

Finally was bothered to fully update my 1.0.4 RP-0 game to RP-1 (I did a horrendously old AAR on this)

Also for the fourth time, i'm coming back to KSP after another four month or so hiatus, haven't played much since 2016.

[Angelo Kerman]

I finished my new storage depot:

It has 200,000 liters of omni storage capacity.

[superstrijder15]

I just got the new version of KSP, after using 1.0.5 for pretty much forever. It runs pretty well so far, though I only played the first bit of career. I decided to push for the 4 starting missions first, and in my third launch (the first didn't leave the launchpad and not count, how unfair!) I got into space. For a short while. Due to unfamiliarity with the weakness of chutes, I lost mine on the way down only about 6km up, so I eyeballed a suicide burn with the remaining fuel. 

 

Let's just say that any landing you can walk away from is a good landing.

Spoiler

EDIT: Somehow this convinced 6 people to take a tour up to suborbital trajectory. Kerbals...

Edited December 3, 2018 by superstrijder15

[Cavscout74]

So here is a demonstration on how NOT to launch a Mun rover:

The rover (mounted horizontally) was the root part, and I totally forgot to switch control to the launcher probe core before launch.

[Geonovast]

Had a stage just up and disappear while putting some other ones out of order.  This was new.

[Delay]

Hi Eve.

Hi Gilly.

Bye actually-way-too-overpowered-because-it-still-has-895m/s-of-dV transfer stage.

(the decoupler survived it, though)

Okay, I landed on Gilly, took as much science as I can and went back into orbit. Now about those temperature contracts I accepted.

How long is it going to take?

Ugh... 1 hour, or 15 minutes at x4.
I'll be sitting here for a while.

In the meantime, look and appreciate the trajectory that took me to Eve, from Gilly's ground reference frame:

[Tyko]

Back to station building in GPP 3.2x. I'd tried to build a station around Ceti using 2.5 core parts earlier, but didn't have enough lifting capacity. I put the project on hold while R&D developed the Mainsail engine. My new lifter can throw 20 tons into LGO and has no problems with my 15 ton station modules.

The station was constructed over 5 launches, the core with command, power and fuel storage went up first followed by 2 service modules, a habitation module and finally a laboratory. Station can accommodate 4 crew for up to a year, but crew mission lengths will typically be 3-6 months.

Mission: conduct landings in all Ceti biomes and test on-orbit research methods in preparation for crewed interplanetary missions

First Launch with new lifter

Station Core in Ceti orbit

First Module approaches station. The transfer vehicle will dock the module, transfer spare fuel to the station core then de-orbit

First Module docked

Halfway done! The transfers vehicle in the background will be de-orbited

Final Module attached. The last transfer vehicle still docked in the back left

Edited December 4, 2018 by Tyko

[Tonka Crash]

My Minmus base has expanded to add workshops and a ground assembly line using Global Construction. I shipped up the workshop and material kits storage (KPBS parts) and the first DIY container was the ground assembly line. 

[Plane Crazy]

Went to the Mun today.  I never really realized how great Nertea's cryogenic engines are.  The simplest one got me from a suborbital trajectory on Kerbin to a suborbital trajectory on the Mun.

 

[Cavscout74]

After being annoyed with 1.5.1 (specifically a tried & true spaceplane design losing 1000+ m/s of dV going from 1.4.5 to 1.5.1), I sent a lander (and separate crew cycler) to Dres.  Then my Bop remote ISRU station arrived & was landed near something odd

Jeb, you're supposed to wait for the crew cycler, the lander doesn't have enough snacks for the trip to Dres....

"Ok, I'll hide behind these fuel tanks next to the launch pad"

Bop ISRU landing.  Note the white speck in the distance.  In a few weeks, when the fresh Jool crew arrives, the current crew will head over to Bop to investigate the anomaly.  This was another reason I wanted to go back to 1.4.5 - I've never gotten around to investigating either the Bop or Tylo anomalies, and I have crew landers on the way for both of them.

[Eriksonn]

8 hours ago, Cavscout74 said:

After being annoyed with 1.5.1 (specifically a tried & true spaceplane design losing 1000+ m/s of dV going from 1.4.5 to 1.5.1)

Why did it loose dv by upgrading ksp, did some engine stats change? I have not heard that anywhere.

[Xurkitree]

1 hour ago, Eriksonn said:

Why did it loose dv by upgrading ksp, did some engine stats change? I have not heard that anywhere.

There were some aero bugs in the new update, the most prominent one being the direction of the Lifting Body Lift being the same as the Drag vector, leading to more drag on Mk2/Mk3 Spaceplanes. That was fixed in the 1.5.1 Hotfix, but apprently there are some more bugs somewhere leading to loss in performances.

[jkeller098]

accidentally escaped orbit....used bit to big of a booster.