What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Toaster355]

Went to the Moon in KSRSS (Again).

More Screenshots on my latest post here: 

 

Edited October 2, 2023 by Toaster355

[Hotel26]

The new Kitson SP Launch Point (75.7S 152.7E) undergoing trials...

   

(Why is it always so dark near the poles?  Don't blame this on my photography!)

I just love it when I get a nice, tight seam.  "Amphibians go in.  Amphibians come out."

Spoiler

Does anyone happen to know which side of the road you are supposed to drive in the Antarctic...?

 

Edited October 2, 2023 by Hotel26

[Nazalassa]

2 hours ago, Hotel26 said:

Does anyone happen to know which side of the road you are supposed to drive in the Antarctic...?

On the middle side of the road

Edited October 2, 2023 by Nazalassa

[Hotel26]

1 hour ago, Nazalassa said:

On the middle side of the road

Or to paraphrase an old Russian air force joke, "wheels down"...

Spoiler

After the Berlin Wall had come down, two retired air force pilots, one American and the other Russian, met in a Berlin bar.

They started reminiscing about the bad old days.

The Russian is talking about how bad the blizzards were in Siberia and how a dear friend of his was coming back from a training sortie in very bad weather and landed "gear up".

The American says, "that's not so bad.  We say there are two kinds of pilots: 'those who have landed gear-up and those who will'."

The Russian says, "it was bad for my friend, I can tell you.  He lost his life because of it."

The American, shocked, says, "See, that's the difference between our countries: we don't execute people for making mistakes like that.  We just learn the lessons together and then move on and do better."

The Russian replies, "No, you don't understand: gear up.  He landed upside-down."

It's a reference to the very old Artificial Horizons, which had a horizon line but no coloration differentiating brown: earth and blue: sky...

 

Edited October 2, 2023 by Hotel26

[Kimera Industries]

On 9/28/2023 at 2:23 PM, Lyra said:

Command pods can hold one of every unique experiment completed, so you should be fine. As for dv, I've been able to return to Kerbin with ~600 and my go-to dV calculator says 556 is the minimum; if you have 700 or more then you're 100% fine. If you really need to push the limits, transfer the liquid fuel, use EVA construction to put unnecessary parts (like extra solar panels or even empty fuel tanks) on the lander while it's docked, and then ditch the lander in Duna orbit.

Good luck!

Turns out I had no worries, I seriously overbuilt every aspect of this mission. I was able to brute force a transfer to Kerbin, circularize into orbit, and even land very close to the KSC! Strangely, I couldn't transfer any of the science from my lander to my Mk 3 command pod, but due to the lucky choice of using the soviet style- pods on my lander, (it was the smallest option for 3 kerbals) I could just decouple the rest of the lander since that's a built-in feature of those parts. It also had the parachutes for Duna descent on it, so any extra weight during reentry could be handled. Turns out I still didn't need those parachutes, and I got over 4,000 science points from this mission! (I got science whenever I could, from whatever scenarios possible, and also hopped into a different biome with the lander.) With the new parts I unlocked, I decided to make a recreation of the ships of The Martian. The Hab: Yes, you can EVA inside of the fairing- kinda pointless, though. The Rover: the "windows" are an abuse of struts. The MAV: Actually, this one turned out flippin' awesome. The Hermes: Kraken bait/ lag machine. 

Making the Hermes alone has given me a strong desire to just download a mod for those parts, and I haven't even built anything past the centrifuge... 

Anyway, yay for my first Duna mission!

[Krazy1]

I did some half mission so I'll update later...

On 9/26/2023 at 1:53 PM, Duke MelTdoWn said:

I am not sure if the weird placement of the heat shields in front is considered cheating ^^. 1937 m/s is not bad for a days work. I saw some old threads with higher altitude ceilings, you can go much faster it seems  

That's pretty darn fast. I wouldn't say the heat shield is cheating but a fairing could be a bug exploit I think. Rapier thrust drops to zero at Mach 5.75. So you can go faster at lower altitude where the speed of sound is higher. At 22 km I could "only" go about 1710 m/s on KSP 1.12. If they got higher speed at higher altitude, they must be using rockets, or diving, or maybe old KSP versions.

On 9/28/2023 at 6:51 AM, Hotel26 said:

[3] which is why I am currently managing 932 flights.  Oy!

Dude what?! How big is your save file? I get bad stutter when it autosaves and I never had close to that many flights. Every scene change must be slow. I never made it to Eeloo and I never had any such real-time rules.

On 9/30/2023 at 10:42 AM, miklkit said:

You would be wanting to install "fill it up"  with CKAN to do this.  It is the gas nozzle icon on the bottom.

I use Fill It Up but RCS Build Aid is also very helpful... it shows you full and empty CoM with different colored balls without actually changing the fuel levels.

[Hotel26]

1 hour ago, Krazy1 said:

How big is your save file?

Quote

ls -lt saves/Orbit/persistent.sfs
-rw-rw-r-- 1 kmk kmk 113007210 Oct  3 14:58 saves/Orbit/persistent.sfs
>

113MB. 

(I guess I don't have enough to do...  )

Edited October 3, 2023 by Hotel26

[RevanX_LSR]

Landed on both of Revan's unnamed inner moons. Let me know what they should be named. LSR is the name of the mod, which is in 2.5x scale.

 

Body	Radius	Gravity	Orbit	Delta-V*
Revan	2000km	1.38g	53.4Gm	7000
105010	150km	0.05g	16Mm	3800
105020	240km	0.08g	40Mm	3100
Canyon	600km	0.31g	114Mm	4200

*In the case of Revan, orbiting, in the case of its moons, capture from elliptical revan orbit, landing and returning to elliptical revan orbit. All are estimates i made up.

In addition, Canyon (the large moon we did not land on) has a thin atmosphere.

About 2 minutes after launch. 4 Clydesdales just got jettisioned, and so did the first stage.

Inside the payload is a nuclear stage with only one nerv and 0.28 Kerbin TWR. Still, it was able to circularise from 3000+m/s (still 2km/s less than orbital speed) and get all the way out to 105010, the extremely close moon, in one burn. nuclear stage had 9000m/s.

105010.

105020.

Brutal re-entry. We survived using 120+ ablator, but the velocities involved were higher than expected. I blame this on the fact that we had a sharp re-entry profile.

On both instances the slope was huge and I couldn't land properly so I bounced off the surface without planting a flag. Still counts, IMO.

3000+m/s left after leaving 105020. Jettisioned that stage while still escaping 105020.

Edited October 4, 2023 by RevanX_LSR

[AtomicTech]

8 minutes ago, RevanX_LSR said:

Landed on both of Revan's unnamed inner moons. Let me know what they should be named. LSR is the name of the mod, which is in 2.5x scale.

 

Body	Radius	Gravity	Orbit	Delta-V*
Revan	2000km	1.38g	53.4Gm	7000
105010	150km	0.05g	16Mm	3800
105020	240km	0.08g	40Mm	3100
Canyon	600km	0.31g	104Mm	4200

*In the case of Revan, orbiting, in the case of its moons, capture from elliptical revan orbit, landing and returning to elliptical revan orbit. All are estimates i made up.

In addition, Canyon (the large moon we did not land on) has a thin atmosphere.

About 2 minutes after launch. 4 Clydesdales just got jettisioned, and so did the first stage.

Inside the payload is a nuclear stage with only one nerv and 0.28 Kerbin TWR. Still, it was able to circularise from 3000+m/s (still 2km/s less than orbital speed) and get all the way out to 105010, the extremely close moon, in one burn. nuclear stage had 9000m/s.

105010.

105020.

Brutal re-entry. We survived using 120+ ablator, but the velocities involved were higher than expected. I blame this on the fact that we had a sharp re-entry profile.

On both instances the slope was huge and I couldn't land properly so I bounced off the surface without planting a flag. Still counts, IMO.

3000+m/s left after leaving 105020. Jettisioned that stage while still escaping 105020.

Maybe Oshkosh and Modicum?

[Kerballlistic07]

On 10/1/2023 at 4:10 PM, N_Danger said:

Go on a road trip.

 

What mod is used for the map? I assume that you can give it a waypoint and tell it where to go?

[Watermel00n]

1 hour ago, Kerballlistic07 said:

What mod is used for the map? I assume that you can give it a waypoint and tell it where to go?

Mod used is scansat 

[RevanX_LSR]

11 hours ago, RevanX_LSR said:

Landed on both of Revan's unnamed inner moons. Let me know what they should be named. LSR is the name of the mod, which is in 2.5x scale.

 

Body	Radius	Gravity	Orbit	Delta-V*
Revan	2000km	1.38g	53.4Gm	7000
105010	150km	0.05g	16Mm	3800
105020	240km	0.08g	40Mm	3100
Canyon	600km	0.31g	104Mm	4200

*In the case of Revan, orbiting, in the case of its moons, capture from elliptical revan orbit, landing and returning to elliptical revan orbit. All are estimates i made up.

In addition, Canyon (the large moon we did not land on) has a thin atmosphere.

About 2 minutes after launch. 4 Clydesdales just got jettisioned, and so did the first stage.

Inside the payload is a nuclear stage with only one nerv and 0.28 Kerbin TWR. Still, it was able to circularise from 3000+m/s (still 2km/s less than orbital speed) and get all the way out to 105010, the extremely close moon, in one burn. nuclear stage had 9000m/s.

105010.

105020.

Brutal re-entry. We survived using 120+ ablator, but the velocities involved were higher than expected. I blame this on the fact that we had a sharp re-entry profile.

On both instances the slope was huge and I couldn't land properly so I bounced off the surface without planting a flag. Still counts, IMO.

3000+m/s left after leaving 105020. Jettisioned that stage while still escaping 105020.

I'm also looking for suggestions for how to improve the two bodies.

[Kerballlistic07]

On 10/3/2023 at 6:45 PM, Watermel00n said:

Mod used is scansat 

Thanks! I'll look into that... 

[N_Danger]

On 10/3/2023 at 2:26 PM, Kerballlistic07 said:

What mod is used for the map? I assume that you can give it a waypoint and tell it where to go?

I can't play a game without it. 

But I manually drive. to my knowledge Scan Sat does not have an auto pilot.

[Kerballlistic07]

Thanks to @N_Danger, I downloaded the scansat mod and very quickly threw together a probe I called KMAP-1. I plan on using the map for an upcoming project that I will probably post here in a few days...

KMAP-1 in orbit:

First visual map produced:

[Lyra]

Made progress on another big SSTO design and skimmed 19 m above the water before the plane finally started to level out... quite a scary moment tbh

[N_Danger]

I sent off a high risk mission to Otto's moons. Featuring a nuclear power plant(from a mod) on the lander/imaging sat  instead of solar power. If I can, I'll  try a landing on one of the airless moon's. 

Fairing Sep and 2 second stage start.

And trans-Otto burn.

(to be continued.... )

 

[Nazalassa]

Guess what it is...

Fully Stock + DLC btw.

[N_Danger]

My trip to see Otto's Moons continues. We used so much delta vee for capture, we had to rule out landings much less any orbital surveys of the moons.

We did get flyby's of Augustus,

 

Jannah,

and Hephaestus.

[Krazy1]

Last few days I mostly did some typical career stuff... took tourists to Mun and Minmus, did a couple surface science contracts...

Spoiler

Then something more unique... meeting a Class I asteroid in JNSQ.

(I also just adopted Tahoma font instead of the defective default that has the same character for I and l... dumb.)

Based on Class E experience... 150m radius and 1 million TONS... I expected a Class I to instantly crash KSP when I got to physics range. 

My ship was landed on Mun and when I switched to it, it was bugged... Mun surfaced wasn't visible, everything dark and my lights didn't work, and it fell a few hundred m and exploded. Great start. Restarted KSP, then OK (?)

I intercepted the asteroid at about a 90 deg. angle high above Kerbin. Principia actually makes it somewhat easier because you can find intercepts on paths that pass through SOIs.

Spoiler

Visible with DOE...

 

The ending was slightly better than expected... slightly.

>>> Here's the video <<<

[Toaster355]

My main KSRSS install can be quite a pain most of the time... Over 120 mods installed makes for very long load times (and if I even have more than 2 Opera tabs open, my entire PC will freeze nearing the end of the loading and will not recover), many bugs, and it's very easy to completely break the game.
This, as you can imagine, can cause a lot of burnout.
However, something that really helps with the burnout and keeps me in a Kerbal mood is a semi-stock install with much less part mods. The lower amount of mods boosts the load times, reduces the amount of bugs, and the ease of breaking the game.
I started a save in science mode.

Spoiler

Moho-1, launching Jebediah to sub-orbit on a Kerbal-rated Grasshopper-2.

All of the cacti induces nostalgia in me for Arizona, where I was born.

Moho-2, launching Valentina on an upgraded launch vehicle; Grasshopper-2.5.

Linx's Parallax 2 looks absurdly beautiful, just like Blackrack's volumetric clouds

Stayputnik-1; the first artificial satellite launching to orbit on a Porpoise-1.

 

Moho-3, launching Jeb to orbit on the Kerbal-rated Porpoise-2. (Turned on some camera grain as I should have done earlier, for the immersion of the early space program)

Loosly inspired by @Kerbalsaurus's Beyond thread.

Edited October 13, 2023 by Toaster355
Minor typos.

[Lyra]

Sent up a relay in kerbostationary orbit for my new career save. First time playing with the DLC and first time playing career.

[Kimera Industries]

Well, I was on vacation for a week and didn't feel like making anything for Wrong Red Moon, 'cause it was my break, you see. Didn't want KSP to feel like something I have to do as a chore. Instead, I got more involved with my science save, and as I mentioned before, I did a Duna mission (my first!), and suddenly my thirst for the red- okay, reddish orange- alright, reddish brownish orangish with white polar caps- planet could not be satiated. Immediately, I began working on a massive space station with a purpose similar to the Hermes of The Martian: ferry Kerbals around the Kerbol (Kerbolar?) System. Naturally, I named it Mercury. (The Roman Hermes.) With nuclear engines, it has dv of around 5000 and a twr of- well, they're NERVs. What do you think? Using an inflatable heat shield and retractable radiator + solar panels to aerobrake, it can carry up to 12 Kerbals, unless you count the centrifuge, which is made up of Mk 1 crew cabins. Ah, yes- the centrifuge. I came up with lots of ideas for it, eventually realizing if I connected them (yes there are 2 rings because torque sucks) in the middle with docking ports and another motor, it worked much smoother, happily spinning along at 4x time warp no kraken, and the ship could turn while they were still spinning (not at 4x time warp though).

I launched all three modules last week, (habitation/command, centrifuges, and propulsion) and I made my own "heavy" launch system for them. Turns out you can't make one of those without it turning into the SLS. (Gee, I've never used the Mamoth engine before, let's try it, and oh, those fuel tanks would look better in orange, and do I have the Clydesdale, I do, no, it's too big, oh well, Pollux will do, besides I like the nosecones for 1.8m the best...)

The centrifuge was an entirely different affair, as any fairing accommodating the outsize shape causes the center of drag or pressure to be above the center of mass, so it had to be launched on the bottom of a custom-built rocket. Much tears and frustration there. 

After Mercury was built in LKO, I used a resupply craft I designed for nothing else but to fill M's fuel tanks. (Drained in the VAB to save weight during launch, my Not-SLS ™ only gets 50 tons to LKO.)

Next, I will choose which lander I want to use for the trial mission (to Duna, naturally) and a crew. I did build two reusable Duna descent/ascent ships beforehand, one of which could get a precision landing using smaller rocket engines to translate. Probably gonna go with that one. 

Next, probably a small deployable science base or a rover. Still stuck on a rover because of one simple thing: the cockpit.

Do I use an airplane cockpit? The MK 2 inline looks nice, but how to handle the ends? Leave them bare or cover them up? With what? And it's too big! Should I use the only designated rover cockpit in the game? I just wish I had the one from KSP 2, it looks so cool... Seats on a structural panel, Apollo-style? Do I use a helicopter cockpit from Airplane Plus? Install a new mod entirely? Questions, questions!

Speaking of which, any cool rover mods?

[N_Danger]

I blew things up

but later I launched a second mission to Otto.

On our way to Otto after the transfer burn.

Capture at Otto.

Orbital games ensued with Augustus to shape the orbit for maneuver to capture at Jennah.

Start of the capture burn at Jennah

And doing an orbital scan before landing.

 

Edited October 12, 2023 by N_Danger
Grammer

[Kimera Industries]

Just made a mission challenge to recreate the Psyche mission to asteroid 16 Psyche!

Watch the launch live (hopefully) and do the mission yourself! The highest possible score is a Psyche-16 and a job incredibly well done!