What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Guest]

Testing Eeloo Landing sites for big bases

[A Fistful Of Double Downs]

6 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

if i may give a little hint: you can put some stage separators under those nose cones. this way, they do their job during launch, but you can shed them in orbit. it saves a couple tons of dead weight, which on a mining vehicle means a couple tons extra fuel for every trip.

you can even put docking ports on those towers and attach the nose cones to the docking ports.

Yeah I was thinking of doing fairings instead of nosecones so I could use the space for relay dishes or science parts or whatever, but I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

 

And I was about to say that I did the math and figured I could use a scaled up version of this for a Tylo mission if i refuel on the surface, but I've just been mucking around in the debug console and it turns out that landing a few hundred tons of virtually unsteerable metal on a high-G moon is hard and I think I might limit myself to just doing a self-refueling grand tour of more modest destinations.

[A Fistful Of Double Downs]

So I built on the two lessons I'd learned yesterday ("how to make kinda big things" and "Tylo is way too hard") by abandoning my plans for Tylo and putting something bigger on Minmus.

 

Behold Chungopolis! A self-sufficient mining colony that weighs in at 460 tons fully fueled and has a crew of 46 (well more actually, but I got tired of picking up more at the astronaut complex and decided 46 is a good number of Kerbals for a 460 ton base). Three drilling/refining stacks and three habitation stacks surrounding the command tower. It also sports eighteen hella large solar panels and no less than nine reaction wheels, because I've learned my lessons.

 

But how to get it into space? Some people might bust it up into six pieces that can be reassembled on Minmus, but that sounds too complicated so I just put six rockets under it.

(not pictured: dozens of launch failures involving improper rocket staging, improper stack separator staging, improper fuel transfer line installation, lack of sepratrons, sepratrons installed backwards, and improper sepratron staging. At least I remembered to strut everything up though)

 

So that gets it into space, and it makes a fine looking station right?

 

Wrong! Let's ditch what's left of the launch stage and make like a spaceship!

 

Now let's take it all the way to The Mun Minmus! (I'm lazy)

 

And I forgot to take any pics of the landing, so here's one of it comfortably parked near the shore of a Minmusian sea.

 

[Grogs]

There were several fuel tankers moving around the Kerbin system, including this Giant MOFO that brought fuel to Kerbin Station in LKO. The tanks at the station were almost dry, so the arrival of the tanker was a welcome sight.

 

The crew shuttle arrived at KEO Station from Minmus. The are the first kerbonauts to visit the shiny new station - everything else has been controlled by probes since the station was launched.

 

Over at Minmus, the ISRU rover and refueler intended for the Duna mission arrived.

 

The rover separated and landed first on the Greater Flats. Between the Vernor engines and reaction wheels, I was able to keep the ISRU rover level while landing.

 

Next up, I landed the fuel tanker beside the rover for refueling. In the low gravity, I just left the small station core on the top attached.

 

Unfortunately, I found a bit of a design flaw. With the taller Rhino engine, it's nearly impossible to get the claw on the ISRU rover to connect to the tanker. The wheels are too wide to fit between the landing gear and reach the engine. I finally managed on about the 10th try using a highly technical maneuver known as "ramming the hell out of it." I am a bit concerned that things will blow up when I try to separate the two ships. Refueling on Ike will be harder because of higher gravity and less than perfectly flat ground. I'm probably going to have to redesign either the fuel tanker legs or the rover to make connections more reliable. I guess it's better to find out now rather than to have it get all the way to Ike and fail there.

[Zosma Procyon]

My quest to build an amphibious boat base for exploring Eve's oceans has been going in circles. My designs keep suffering from the ground vehicle shimmy. So I decided to try an electric sea plane base. I realized that with ducted fans my base doesn't need to carry mining and refining equipment. Two 8 bladed ducted fans using the largest size of rotor take 80 RTGs, which I routining load on my creations anyway. So this is what I have so far.

It will cruise at about 70 m/s (158 mph). The low hanging pontoons let it hydroplane and take off from "water". And it has theoretically unlimited range. My design philosophy requires it to carry two science labs.

[Singhnaut]

figured out how to fly a spaceplane in enhanced and revised my Gemini craft by changing engines and adding service module 

14 hours ago, Grogs said:

There were several fuel tankers moving around the Kerbin system, including this Giant MOFO that brought fuel to Kerbin Station in LKO. The tanks at the station were almost dry, so the arrival of the tanker was a welcome sight.

 

The crew shuttle arrived at KEO Station from Minmus. The are the first kerbonauts to visit the shiny new station - everything else has been controlled by probes since the station was launched.

 

Over at Minmus, the ISRU rover and refueler intended for the Duna mission arrived.

 

The rover separated and landed first on the Greater Flats. Between the Vernor engines and reaction wheels, I was able to keep the ISRU rover level while landing.

 

Next up, I landed the fuel tanker beside the rover for refueling. In the low gravity, I just left the small station core on the top attached.

 

Unfortunately, I found a bit of a design flaw. With the taller Rhino engine, it's nearly impossible to get the claw on the ISRU rover to connect to the tanker. The wheels are too wide to fit between the landing gear and reach the engine. I finally managed on about the 10th try using a highly technical maneuver known as "ramming the hell out of it." I am a bit concerned that things will blow up when I try to separate the two ships. Refueling on Ike will be harder because of higher gravity and less than perfectly flat ground. I'm probably going to have to redesign either the fuel tanker legs or the rover to make connections more reliable. I guess it's better to find out now rather than to have it get all the way to Ike and fail there.

suggestion: add a rover with MK2 lander can body. It will look like the JAXA rover for Artemis!

[RP1IsSuperior]

These past couple of days haven't been spent in my save. I've been foodling around with launch scripts and trying to learn kOS, while also trying to make RealPlume Configs for some engines, and being able to fix some that were broken when RealPlume got the big update in 1.9, which I recently updated to.

[iamn00b]

I deorbited a ship from Kerbin orbit without killing my crew. (yes im a newbie)

[jimmymcgoochie]

2 hours ago, iamn00b said:

I deorbited a ship from Kerbin orbit without killing my crew. (yes im a newbie)

We all had to learn to do that.

Space is difficult and you’re going to make mistakes, but as long as you keep learning from them you’ll be doing Mun landings in no time, and landing on other planets shortly after that. There are plenty of people on these forums so if you need help, just ask!

[Kerbals_of_Steel]

47 minutes ago, jimmymcgoochie said:

We all had to learn to do that.

Space is difficult and you’re going to make mistakes, but as long as you keep learning from them you’ll be doing Mun landings in no time, and landing on other planets shortly after that. There are plenty of people on these forums so if you need help, just ask!

Hell, putting them on the Mun isn't a problem, it's bringing them back

 

3 hours ago, iamn00b said:

I deorbited a ship from Kerbin orbit without killing my crew. (yes im a newbie)

Welcome to the dark (green) side, my friend

[Mikenike]

Time warp

[DunaRocketeer]

Friday commute to orbit:

[Grogs]

9 hours ago, Singhnaut said:

suggestion: add a rover with MK2 lander can body. It will look like the JAXA rover for Artemis!

I had to go look that one up, and I have to admit it does look a lot like the Mk2 rover can.

 

Today I rescued a kerbal stranded around the Mun. As usual, the rescue ship just flew by and let the rescuee make up the 46 m/s closing speed with his EVA pack.

 

Gregrim managed it with no problems and boarded the rescue craft. He's a scientist - first one I've gotten in a while. My last five have been engineers so I'm in good shape there.

 

My rover probes and survey satellites made the injection burn for Duna. This is the second of four transfers planned for this expedition. One benefit of burning from a high orbit (3000 km - just above KEO) is more accurate burns. I was able to get a very accurate intercept with no need for corrections.

 

And I did some redesign and testing of the Duna ISRU rover. An extra piston gives the claw a lot more standoff from the wheels. I kind of cringe about the idea of putting a claw on a piston though. My one experience with a docking port on a piston found that it was very unstable docking two ships in orbit.

 

On the surface on Minmus (using ALT-F12 to test) it seems to work pretty well though. The rover wheels were well clear of the landing legs, and there was no apparent instability in the connection. I'm also going to switch the Rhino engine for vectors so I can have flatter/wider (and more stable) landing legs on the fuel tanker. I will lose a bit of dV going that route, but it should still leave plenty of fuel for getting the whole package to Duna and then refueling on Ike.

[Singhnaut]

today I created an escape pod with a high thrust engine and infinite fuel (with debug), and the kraken tore it apart, or it broke the light barrier, because now it shows that they were wiped out of existence. 

[DStaal]

28 minutes ago, Grogs said:

On the surface on Minmus (using ALT-F12 to test) it seems to work pretty well though. The rover wheels were well clear of the landing legs, and there was no apparent instability in the connection. I'm also going to switch the Rhino engine for vectors so I can have flatter/wider (and more stable) landing legs on the fuel tanker. I will lose a bit of dV going that route, but it should still leave plenty of fuel for getting the whole package to Duna and then refueling on Ike.

For this type of refueling, you might want to take a look at the KAS mod.  Then you'd be able to just run a hose over.

[DerekL1963]

TFW when your lifter is just a hair too efficient...

[what4nick]

this game is so cool 

[KeaKaka]

4 hours ago, DerekL1963 said:

TFW when your lifter is just a hair too efficient...

This is why JNSQ and other rescale mods exist 

[Mitchz95]

I got a contract to rescue a Kerbal who was stranded in Duna orbit.

When I was halfway there, he apparently got too close to Ike and was flung out into a solar orbit.

Edited September 25, 2020 by Mitchz95

[Cavscout74]

On 9/24/2020 at 7:45 AM, A Fistful Of Double Downs said:

So I built on the two lessons I'd learned yesterday ("how to make kinda big things" and "Tylo is way too hard") by abandoning my plans for Tylo and putting something bigger on Minmus.

 

 

That's like the big brother to the design I've used a few times.  The really big brother actually

 

[Grogs]

10 hours ago, DStaal said:

For this type of refueling, you might want to take a look at the KAS mod.  Then you'd be able to just run a hose over.

For sure. It's probably a lot more realistic too. Certainly more realistic than hooking on with a claw. Don't mind those puncture marks in the fuel tank - I'm sure nothing will leak out.

[Kerbals_of_Steel]

I went on a serious seek and destroy mission against surplus parts on the surface of the Mun, trying to reduce the amount of Kraken bait laying around. This meant substituting several of the first generation rovers with more compact (and fewer parts) Akita units, and replacing my Auto-Miner ISRU unit, the massive fuel tank stack nearby, the Mobile Mining Command pod, AND the MK II version of my fertilizer plant with one ship/craft/semi-mobile building. Meet Mega-Miner:

BTW, did you know that the Kerbal religion includes reincarnation??? Having not killed one, I didn't, until I went to hire some replacements and saw Giesel and Obbo (the Unfortunate) waiting patiently in the lobby for their next assignment. Anyhow, Mega-Miner has a S4-256 fuel tank, mono, ore and fertilizer, tanks two converters, a 250 and a 125 for fertilizer creation, full life support and hab space for two Kerbals for a year,  6 big solar arrays, and no fewer than 7 full size Drill-O-Matics. The cherry red radiators indicate that it's going about 3/4 speed, full throttle brings the heat bars almost to max. Of course, throwing something this size to the Mun required an equally massive booster. My previous Thunderer class 5m booster didn't quite have the lift capacity, and I have a hate-hate relationship with the radial decouplers on the SRBs, so it was time for a new ultra class booster, the Gromoboi:

It sports a total of 9 Mastodon engines, 5 on the stock quincrux adaptor, and 4 more on rigidly attached sponsons. For the sharp eyed reader who thinks I had an excessive amount of Delta-V, I simply plead that the stock system didn't really appreciate the elegance of the second stage:

With a removable Rhino for the orbital manouvering, and 4 EXTREMELY overworked Terriers for landing engines, the stock system seemed to count the DV in the second stage twice. In the actual event, I ended up on the surface with ~ 500m/s left over. A good margin, but considering the sheer size of this thing, not excessive, IMO.

Now it's time for further janitorial work, using Bills favorite cleaning compound, K-4...

[A Fistful Of Double Downs]

7 hours ago, Cavscout74 said:

That's like the big brother to the design I've used a few times.  The really big brother actually

 

It turned out to be the impractically big brother. Chungopolis didn't have enough drills to keep up with the Convert-o-trons. It also didn't have enough solar panels to keep up with the drills or the Convert-o-trons (let alone everything at once), and it didn't have anywhere near enough batteries to stay online overnight. Oh and the one I landed on Minmus sorta accidentally didn't have any cooling. 

[Hotel26]

2 hours ago, A Fistful Of Double Downs said:

enough batteries to stay online overnight

The two major things I have learned (over a very long time; duh), about mining, have been:

1. fuel cell arrays (accept no substitute)
2. optimize everything on the assumption of 12+% ore grade (sfc), because if, on any particular operation, you don't care to find and land on a gravy location, then you are not looking for 'optimum'.

The Convert-o-tron is the heaviest (most expensive) piece of equipment, so optimize the balance of everything else around that.  Ensure it's always able to run, unlimited by lack of other equipment, given the best ore flow.

Edited September 26, 2020 by Hotel26

[Kerbals_of_Steel]

2 hours ago, A Fistful Of Double Downs said:

It turned out to be the impractically big brother. Chungopolis didn't have enough drills to keep up with the Convert-o-trons. It also didn't have enough solar panels to keep up with the drills or the Convert-o-trons (let alone everything at once), and it didn't have anywhere near enough batteries to stay online overnight. Oh and the one I landed on Minmus sorta accidentally didn't have any cooling. 

Building refineries is hard,man... I am on my fourth time building one with Mega-Miner and I still misjudged the power requirements, and have only barely enough cooling. It might be time to "invent" nuclear power, because 6 gigantor panels, 8 big fuel cell arrays, and a whole stack of z4000 batteries still isn't enough to run it flat out without a bunch of micromanaging.