What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Zamolxes77]

After a 2 months hiatus, came back to do some contracts. Picked some "build station around planet X" contracts and I hit upon the idea of building a cool looking ship instead of a station, that can satisfy the requirements. I settles upon the CR 90 corvette from Star Wars, princess Leia ship that gets boarded.

After more than 24 hours of building, during which I lost more than a few hairs (but I learned a lot about building techniques), is DONE.

At almost a million credits, is quite an expensive piece of kit. While I tried to make a faithful replica as possible, only vanilla parts were used and Tweakscale. I optimized the ship for science/ fuel depot /hotel,  it doesn't have guns like Leia's ship. I like to think corellians built a "S" version instead of "M". Many docking ports of all sizes, full SCI apparatus, labs and 2 RCS tugs:

Hangar view. Is a heavy ship, not even fully loaded with fuel

Engine view. Burn baby burn !

Sunrise.

Side detail.

Edited November 5, 2020 by Zamolxes77
make pictures work

[Popestar]

KERBARAGUA SPACE AGENCY MEMORANDUM

In Re:  Mission File 03

Vessel:  Kerbeagle I.V

Time:  Year 1, Day 16, 5 hours, 5 minutes

To:  President Manuel Kerman

Mr. President, I hope that today finds you happy and well.  We have some exciting news to share with you, and we trust that our efforts here at the KSA are bearing the fruit you had in mind when you requested this agency be born.

We did it!  We did it!  Mr. President, we landed on the Mun!  When we were drawing up the plans for this mission, we debated long and hard about sending an unmanned probe to the surface, but we decided against it and sent one of our own.  Sure, we could have stranded someone up there for who-knows-how-long without food and water.  But we decided that the pursuit of science far outweighs the potential of one Kerbal life.  Besides, they would have come back eventually.

Valentina Kerman drew the short straw on this one, primarily because she's our most experience Kerbalnaut.  We also think Jeb may have cheated; he didn't actually show us the straw he drew, but he said it was longer than Valentina's, so we just believed him and made her go.

It should make you happy to know that Valentina not only landed, but she got back to Kerbal safe and sound.  She was gone for a good 6 days or so round trip, but she said it was worth it to set foot on the Mun.  Just think - she will go down in Kerbal history!

Sincerely,

Herman Kerman

Director, Kerbaragua Space Agency

[capi3101]

19 hours ago, Zosma Procyon said:

Did you know that flying long distances in KSP is rather boring?

Can be, yes. Sucks worse if you're subsonic the whole way...that's usually when I use the Atmosphere Autopilot mod when I'm ready to cruise and crank up physics warp to x4. It's still boring, but at least it's not the real-time level of boring otherwise...

That mod's worth it if you fly a lot, if even for its fly-by-wire alone. Seriously.

[Vezbot]

On 10/22/2020 at 10:45 AM, Hotel26 said:

First of all, feel free to copy away!!  And adapt how you like.  I'd love to see what your ideas are, and also please show a screenshot, if you like, as it would be most interesting.

You need 13 RTGs to power one Dawn at full thrust.  that's a lot of weight which is OK for bigger ion-powered craft but won't work here.  I use this solution in my DSRN V, as an example

Or a combination of fuel cells and LFOX will work: see my Terrapin for the right ratio of fuel cells and LFOX to Dawn.

In the early days, I used solar because it's 'free' energy, I thought.  (e.g. Gossamer Anisoptera)  I rarely use it now actually.  I fell back to it for this craft because the payload (65kg Kerbal) was so light that it needed only a very light craft.  The big disadvantage with solar is that you had better know where the sun is at all times and this can restrict your maneuvering; don't fly into shadows in e.g. canyons; and no night-flying (except through darkness while in stable orbit).

As you can tell, I love ion-power.  People assume that 'little thrust = little ship'.  Check out my Magellan Cruiser, which is scaled up but still has the TWR to manage landings on the Mun.  Or Coulomb.  Finally, in deep space, TWR doesn't matter much if you can tolerate long 'burns' (I can).  So you can use few Dawns on a bigger ship resulting in pitiful TWR but still accomplish magnificent things at the other end of the solar system.  High-energy transfers are a good example of that.

fwiw, I added a third tank to Dandelion and got over 9 km/s but lost the scooter feel, so my initial instincts on this one seem right to me.

Finally: there is my avatar... 

 

Well I finished testing, I came to a compromise and ditched the PB-Nuk energy source due to it's weight. I redesigned the lander and payed close attention to how much I could take from the lander while keeping important components. Since the radiation generators are gone it can no longer be considered in the RADKOR class, and that's fine. PB-Nuks aren't viable for low mass ion landers because they are 0.08 tons each, I stuck closely to the idea of having a RADKOR Mun lander that I didn't consider the fact it may not even be able to work.

Anyways the RADKOR Hornet was 1.20 tons, 1.29 tons when the snack hoarding/eating kerbonaut gets in the eva command seat. I removed various components, such as getting rid of the 4 PB-Nuk generators (~0.32 tons), removing a xenon tank (0.1 ton) and adding a radial xenon tank which I clipped inside the lander (connected to the dawn engine and the first ion tank, but not visible from the surface) so the Dv is a not too bad 6000 m/s. This removes it's status from RADKOR class ion crafts but Mun landings are now a possibility. Afterwards I made up for the absence of power generation by adding 2 more 1x6 panels, and 4 2x3 panels. This means the craft generated double of what it would with the previous configuration only in direct sunlight. Final craft mass before kerbal is now 0.805 tons. Nighttime flying wasn't even viable for the previous configuration either so I didn't care, also the craft flew at full power except for when the sun is less than 10 degrees above the horizon. This means I can launch at noon and fly ~600 km west to east before I have to land, north/south isn't a problem either.

After reviewing the design, I decided to rename the new lander the "Dragonfly" lander. I think I did well on it, the solar panel formation is definitely a sight to see, like a dragonfly's wings. In my opinion, the design is an improvement from the RADKOR Hornet, and even if it didn't accomplish what I originally wanted, I compromised and was satisfied with the results.

Here are the craft screenshots:

RADKOR Hornet Concept Design

RADKOR Hornet in Munar Orbit

RADKOR Hornet Failed Descent

RADKOR Lander Cinematic

The new Dragonfly Lander in Munar orbit

Dragonfly Lander Full View

Dragonfly Lander Descent

Dragonfly Successful Landing

And that concludes my post on my goal to build a Mun ion lander and anything else the same size or smaller that can be landed on.

[Hotel26]

13 hours ago, Vezbot said:

my goal to build a Mun ion lander

Very nice-looking vehicle and definitely an own design you can feel proud of!!  "Dragonfly" is an excellent name.  [In Latin, it is Anisoptera.]  Yes, landing, low-TWR craft requires a slightly different technique to land, doesn't it?  Plenty of preparation and keeping the sink rate capped.  (Are you running Better Burn Time?)

And scooters, in general, are a hoot to fly.  (I think you've now inspired me to take a squad of them to Minmus for full exploration there!)

Thank you again, good sir, for your original suggestion for an ion-powered lander.

                                                                                           

Updating this for an entirely different topic: I'm planning on putting 5 of these into 6.1 Gm orbit around Kerbol.  As well as providing a comms ring relay, they will assist with interplanetary transfers via "the Ring Route", by acting as a "truck stop".

Edited October 24, 2020 by Hotel26

[KeaKaka]

5 hours ago, Vezbot said:

<snip>

I just wanted to point out, KSP has a built in screenshot function, just press F1. The only reason I point this out is that it makes me cringe to see a screenshot of a photo of a monitor. 

[Hotel26]

31 minutes ago, KeaKaka said:

KSP has a built in screenshot function, just press F1

@VezbotAnd this link, courtesy Geonovast, then explains how to post those pictures, inline, in the forum.

 

[Popestar]

3 hours ago, KeaKaka said:

I just wanted to point out, KSP has a built in screenshot function, just press F1. The only reason I point this out is that it makes me cringe to see a screenshot of a photo of a monitor. 

I didn't know that.  I've been using ALT + Print Screen.

[Vezbot]

4 hours ago, KeaKaka said:

I just wanted to point out, KSP has a built in screenshot function, just press F1. The only reason I point this out is that it makes me cringe to see a screenshot of a photo of a monitor. 

It's a ps4, and its connected to an old monitor. Trying to get screenshots off a ps4 is annoying as hell to do. I'm open to suggestions.

[jimmymcgoochie]

After many attempts and some minor frustration, I finally figured out why my newly created patch wasn't working- missing { at the start of some parts ). Now all the engines that are patched to hydrolox by CryoEnginesRestock can have copies that burn methalox instead. I already made a similar patch for Cryo Engines itself because I dislike hydrogen as a fuel (not dense enough, requires much electricity to stop it boiling away) but methane is much easier to use even if the ISP is lower compared to hydrogen.

I might try a methalox Mk-33 patch next, but the fuel tanks could be difficult to sort out.

 

[Fraktal]

Finished my longest Minmus mission ever just now. After having spent several real-life days harvesting the Mun bare of science (I'm playing at 10% science, so it left me about 40~ points short of finishing tier 5 of the tech tree), I finally got to Minmus for the first time in my current save and promptly visited no less than five biomes with the same craft, resulting in a ten-day mission. End result was 308 science (which, again, is equal to 3084) plus about 70 more transmitted throughout the mission. Never did anything like this before, but it left me very satisfied. Another 3 or 4 missions will finish Minmus completely, giving me ample parts for putting together my first manned Duna mission while I wait for the transfer window (it's slightly over 100 days away).

Edited October 24, 2020 by Fraktal

[N_Danger]

I launched my second mission to the Mun.  Val in command and two new kerbals.

One the way to  the Mun after the transfer burn

Undocking for landing.

Finding a parking spot.

Val and Alford pose for a picture before taking off

Alford is glad that the KSC rule of never transferring the science through a docking port allows for many EVA's. 

Explosions will make any mission better.

And back with the science!

 

[king of nowhere]

I did nothing on ksp today. or yesterday. or the day before that.

my pc cable broke. I ordered a new one, but it's a long time coming. meanwhile my brother, who is good at this stuff, tried to fix my cable by welding.

it worked, but it was very frail, and it broke shortly after. he welded it again, and to reinforce it, he stuck it with glue.

unfortunately, he does not have a specialized glue, and my laptop gets very hot when using modern videogames. using ksp caused the glue to melt and run all over the plug. and then it stopped working until it was cool again.

as a result, i cannot use ksp, or any other modern videogame that would tax the system too much. i can use internet, work with the office package, that kind of thing, but no ksp.

i'm reading random stuff in the forum to try and get my daily fix. also fishing for some sympathy

Edited October 24, 2020 by king of nowhere

[purpleivan]

Today was the first time I fired up KSP in about a month and the first thing I did in this space vehicle simulation... race rover up a mountain.

This was an entry to @Pds314 Race to the Sky challenge and featured "The Goat". This survivor of many speed drives across hilly terrain chasing down challenges did not disappoint, making it from the launch pad to an altitude of 3 kilometres in 18:46.

Eye's on the road Jeb.

There were some spills along the way, but fortunately none that damaged the vehicle.

Even one that had Jeb flying backwards.

The sweet smell of success.

 

Edited October 24, 2020 by purpleivan

[panzer1b]

Made more progress on my pegasus inspired semi-replica...

Hull is 100% done except for the very front and interior (its almost 100% hollow so i can theoretically put anything from fighters to ammo to kerbal crew stations in there).  Ill likely end up making it into a hybrid crew/cargo space since there are gonna be 2 more hangars on each side obviously (as the Pegasus from BSG had).

Hangars are gonna be the hardest part though since not only do i want them to at least vaguely resemble those on the ship from BSG, but they also need to actually fit my recently made viper mk2 replica which is perfect to go with this. 

I made a variant a few days ago, but as much as it was neat, i just had to scrap it since it didnt look right, and ate more parts then this monstrosity (which is already over 300 parts and ive yet to add hangars).  So yeah, good riddance older crap replica, hello newer slightly less flawed replica

[Fraktal]

Finished harvesting Kerbin's SOI of science. Also did a flight test of my Duna lander to just outside the SOI and back, followed by an aerobraking reentry and parachute landing. Landing legs turned out to be too high up, resulting in the docking port being crushed upon landing, which was remedied in the VAB. No time for more testing, however, as my Minmus flights and the outbound flight test took more time than I thought; I only have 11 days until an optimal transfer window to Duna, in which time I need to get both the orbiter and the lander up into space, dock them together and fuel them up in orbit before sending them off.

When fully fueled, the orbiter's dual Poodles will have slightly over 3k m/s of dV, while the lander's dual Thuds will have 2k m/s. Both have RCS and the lander docks into the front of the orbiter aft-first. I know I'm massively overengineering it, but I'm doing that on purpose due to the fact that I can't quite make bi-weekly trips to Duna like I could to Minmus (hence why the orbiter is bringing no less than four experiment storage units plus antennas, to make sure I get everything from whatever biome I end up landing in). That and if I'll have enough spare dV upon taking off from Duna, I'll attempt a visit to Ike as well for more juicy science.

Still a bit uncertain about whether I'll be able to pull off aerobraking at Kerbin upon return without a heat shield, since the orbiter is using a triple 2.5m fuselage and the lander can't mount one to its rear either because it'll block off the docking port's crossfeed.

[swjr-swis]

8 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

my pc cable broke.

First of all <deep breath>: *which* cable? Also, how would a broken cable need/benefit from "welding" and/or "glue"?? And... what kind of glue (that could have any kind of useful function for a broken electronics cable) ... *melts* when heated???

I... I have questions. o.O

 

8 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

my laptop gets very hot when using modern videogames. using ksp caused the glue to melt

Something you might want to try, often being the biggest cause of laptop heating when using KSP: in the graphics settings of KSP, set 'V-Sync' to 'Every Second V-Blank', and lower Frame Limit to 60 FPS (better yet, edit the settings.cfg and change it to 'FRAMERATE_LIMIT = 30').

KSP is not very demanding on the graphics level, but it defaults to no limit on the frames it will crank out, which counter-intuitively results in the graphics chip -even an integrated one- to work at full power (=heat!) the whole time. Limit the frames, and you'll be surprised at how cool your laptop remains when running KSP.

[Clamp-o-Tron]

Just now, swjr-swis said:

First of all <deep breath>: *which* cable? Also, how would a broken cable need/benefit from "welding" and/or "glue"?? And... what kind of glue (that could have any kind of useful function for a broken electronics cable) ... *melts* when heated???

I... I have questions. o.O

Could be hot glue... I'm imagining that "weld" meant with a hot glue gun, and that the thing that needed fixing was the end of a cable stuck in the socket, detached from the rest of the cable.

[RoninFrog]

When I first saw the new metal fairings, I immediately thought, "I'm so gonna build one of these!"

Blastoff!  100% stock, functional Starship lifting off the pad!

So beautiful.  

Stage separation!

The Starship burns for orbit on 3 Rhinos:

Of course, it's not really a proper Super Heavy if the booster isn't recoverable!

I spent about 400 units to much on the first stage, so it's gonna be a deadly suicide burn!

Yeah!  Splashdown successful!

I just wanna show off that razor-thin dV margin:

Spoiler

Behold, the Starship in all its glory.

The only problem is that the 3000 m/s of dV in the Starship is useless since I can't fire the engines:

Spoiler

I don't know of a fix, so the Starship will never visit the Mun.  Oh well.

 

Edited October 25, 2020 by RoninFrog

[Zosma Procyon]

I tested and rejected a new flying base concept.

It is propelled by two electric rotors with propellers instead of ducted fans. I thought they might be faster ducted fans; they aren't. This thing is almost 20 m/s slower than my current flying Eve base. It's also predictably very heavy, and some of those tanks are full. I got the trifolding wings to work sort of reliably, but they don't need to be that long.

The idea of this plane is for it to be large enough to hold a small rover in a cargo bay, which would be used by Kerbals to deploy science equipment.

I'm going to try a similar, though longer to accommodate reaction wheels, and with delta wings. Eventually, if it works out, this too will have to be capable of landing and taking off from "water".

[Flying dutchman]

I made a stock piston engine run at 400 rpm

[RealKerbal3x]

7 hours ago, RoninFrog said:

100% stock, functional Starship lifting off the pad!

Wow, nice! Any chance you could put the craft file up on KerbalX? I'd love to try it out!

9 hours ago, swjr-swis said:

Something you might want to try, often being the biggest cause of laptop heating when using KSP: in the graphics settings of KSP, set 'V-Sync' to 'Every Second V-Blank', and lower Frame Limit to 60 FPS (better yet, edit the settings.cfg and change it to 'FRAMERATE_LIMIT = 30').

KSP is not very demanding on the graphics level, but it defaults to no limit on the frames it will crank out, which counter-intuitively results in the graphics chip -even an integrated one- to work at full power (=heat!) the whole time. Limit the frames, and you'll be surprised at how cool your laptop remains when running KSP.

Having an integrated graphics chip myself, I just turn V-sync off entirely. For me, the slight visual improvement isn't worth the loss in framerate.

[Flying dutchman]

@klond

Edited October 25, 2020 by Flying dutchman

[king of nowhere]

10 hours ago, swjr-swis said:

First of all <deep breath>: *which* cable? Also, how would a broken cable need/benefit from "welding" and/or "glue"?? And... what kind of glue (that could have any kind of useful function for a broken electronics cable) ... *melts* when heated???

I... I have questions. o.O

It's a long story and i didn't want to make it tedious, but since i am asked....

it's not exactly the power cable that broke, but the connector of the power cable. the connector got oxidized to the point that the metal were all black and weren't making contact anymore. the connector is part of the whole power transformer piece, and since lenovo uses their own specific pieces, i cannot find a replacement cheaper than 80 euros. on the other hand, a new connector only costed 6 euros, but it had to be attached to the cable.

so what was done was ordering a new connector, removing the old, broken connector from the power cable, and welding the new connector in place.  but the thing was frail and it broke within a few days. hence a new attempt to keep it stable with glue. meanwhile i ordered a new piece, because i can see where all this is going. but i still have no news on shipping for the new power transformer, so for now i have to rely on my malfunctioning cable.

since i am here, i can also take the chance to express my deep dissatisfaction with my lenovo laptop. Now, i'll be the first to admit that i don't treat my electronics with all the care they deserve; I figure i'd rather spend some money to get it fixed every once in a while than be careful all the time. but i had this pc for one year, and this is already the second time the connector broke. my previous laptop lasted 6 years and i had to change the power cable piece once, and I spent 30 euros for it. and i was being even less careful with it than i am with this one.

[NHunter]

In preparation for my expedition to  Kerbol, I've assembled at my Armstrong Extraplanetary Launchpad and Launched to Low Rhode Orbit for refueling the cargo ship carrying a packed Castillo outpost (will be deployed either at Tribute or at Drozhe), a mapping satellite for resource survey and a local communication satellite group.

Once this ship and KSS Venture, which carries crew and science lander, are fully refueled, I'll launch both ship to Kerbol. 

Edited October 26, 2020 by NHunter