What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Hotel26]

(I knew there was a way to do it.)  I've rediscovered a way to use the keyboard to set the parking brakes (you know what I mean).

Wasn't sure whether I would post it in Shower Thoughts(!!) or here, but I do have a picture that almost made the cut to exhibit here in WDYDIKT -- so now I'll do a twofer.

                                                                                  

Here's the tip:

1. hold the B key down.
2. tap the 'Esc' key to pause Flight View
3. release the 'B' key
4. tap 'Esc' again to unpause

Voila, your brakes are locked.    And, yes, I think I prefer this to reaching for the mouse.  YMMV.

Not enough??  OK, here's the recent achievement:
 

Spoiler

My first landing on an oil rig, courtesy of Kurumi...  (The Orc is visible on the deck in the back RHS.)

 

 

Edited January 24 by Hotel26

[Pipcard]

[ARA] Y1, D420 - Denebola 16 (with extended habitation module) enters a polar orbit around Minmus (2.5x scale)

Y1, D453 - Denebola 17 docked to the Tejat 1 Minmus lander

Y1, D454 - Tejat 1 lands in Minmus's Flats (and five more biomes)

Edited January 22 by Pipcard

[Martian Emigrant]

Hi all.

Gilbree borrowed an SSTO and spent the weekend in the Minmus base.

 

 

ME

[Kimera Industries]

I realized that CERES station has no way of scanning for the anomaly once it arrives at Dres, so I threw together a quick attachment to put on before the lander, which would take up all the docking space if it was launched first. The extension has two small detachable probes with the rover core as it has a 100% chance of finding anomalies. They don't have reaction wheels, though, so getting them to dock was hard. I don't think it'll be as hard as getting them into polar orbits, though. Once the probes are gone, I'll have the lander deorbit the extension because at that point it will just drive up the parts count.

Also, CERES had some phantom wobble from its centrifuge, but quicksaving and quickloading fixed the issue. Some of the parts seem to have shifted, however. This is annoying. KSP is biased against stock centrifuges, which is sad because it's one of the best uses for the DLC rotors.

Edited January 23 by Kimera Industries

[CollectingSP]

Twas the night before the NROL-1 Mission launched for the NRO...

After many months of development, in my save game, ULA and the NRO are preparing to launch NROL-1, a classified satellite. 

I wrapped up final preparations today in my save game and created launch graphics and promo images.

More info can be found by clicking on the poster below.

[Hotel26]

So I have a project underway to explore/define "instrument approaches" using stock KSP.  No mods, no navaids.

This is raw navball.  Camera View pointed up.  Skyward.

Just after touchdown/shutdown.  You'll notice the QBE "marker" sitting center on the VAB heliroof (just in front of the port engine pods).

When I spawn the QBE onto the roof using Alt-F12 Set Position: -0.0968 -74.6187 +104, the device actually gets located just under the helideck, in the space below.  ("104" being the magic key.)

I was so thrilled to pull that off because it's center-deck but not an obstruction to landing vehicles.

KSP, in all its majestic wisdom, will however promote it up onto the deck after a scene switch returning to the heliroof.  Shazbat.

In any case, the Orc pictured (the "Director's Cut") has a vertical control reference and a belly Vernor as well as carrying a small supply of monopropellant oxidizer in the cockpit for "instant-on" descent-arrester control.  (Which is what makes the whole enterprise manageable.)

Concentration level is quite intense.  I 'mimed' the operation in "stop motion" in Vessel Mover to get things into my head just before this first successful 'full-dress rehearsal'.

Bottom line is that a returning VTOLjet can return to KSC in fog and land on the roof in zero visibility (plus standard radar altimeter; heliroof altitude is 175m MSL).

Spoiler

UPDATE: and twice.  Not a fluke, then.

 

Edited January 23 by Hotel26

[Martian Emigrant]

So I am about to abandon my current career game.

I have been using it as a sandbox and there are things all over the place.

There are asteroids orbiting Kerbin the Mun and minmus.

One landed on Kerbin.

 

So what do you do with an asteroid so close to the home world?

 

Put a ring on it!

 

ME

 

Edited January 23 by Martian Emigrant

[space_otter]

Reditus-Minmus I Launched on board an LV-3L rocket. Most of the flight was nominal.

The boosters separated and the dual skipper stage activated and performed the rest of the ascent.

Minmus Landing and return was pretty nominal. All went as expected, however I was dismayed that the goo units don't work in different biomes with Kerbalism installed.

During the return, the vessel first circularised then landed with over 50 kg of important samples.

Unfortunately, the launch of Sirius-B1 (the original program was terminated but then subsequently restarted) failed during launch (The mainsail exploded during booster sep, from overheating). The crew performed an abort with the tower.

Early in January the next year, the same crew performed the mission again, this time successfully. They launched on board the new Scimitar I rocket.

The first supersonic jet flights were performed.

Finally, Reditus-Mun I launched.

[Martian Emigrant]

Hi all.

 

The ring on a Rock at to be re centred. The C of G was too far off for the gimbals to compensate.

 

But compensate they did.
 

Spoiler

To prepare the arrival of the ring.

Bill undocked the grabber unit from the zenith-Minus port of Kerbin Station.

 

Almost touching.

 

Voila!

 

 

ME

[kurgut]

Well today, I planted some corn (Korn ? : P) in the plain middle of the Kerbin desert, and started the new construction of a ranch house....

The company to paint the walls has delayed again. They say they're used to paint on bricks and wood, not on some weird procedural wings on which the paint doesn't catch. That house sure is the one of a pilot to be made out of wings..  

Cheers

[Hotel26]

11 hours ago, Martian Emigrant said:

I have been using it as a sandbox and there are things all over the place.

My primary world, Orbit, is six earth year's old and contains that period accumulation of versions of vehicles and other flotsam, jetsam and, especailly vacsam (which can be quite hard to round up due to distances and orbital mechanics).

So I'm in a very similar situation, especially as Dr Albert Kerman's 'Theory of Extreme Relativity' has been validated once more now by observation that Time itself is slowing down in Orbit (relative to Earth time, that is, of course).

Advisory: schmaltz alert:   

Spoiler

My response has been to launch Operation Declutter (rather than heartlessly abandon a whole solar system filled with thousands of kerbals with their own stories, histories, relationships and achievements).

Hearts are torn here in Mission Control every time the wrecker (usually a "Crab") approaches within visual range to give that final, fateful push toward fiery deorbit.  And, yes, of course, we rescue any kerbals still left onboard after these centuries without snacks (let's not think about this too long).  And we milk any remaining fuel, as directed by the COFB (Central Orbiting Fuel Bank) that these days, occupying the LKO hub it does, seems to have its fingers into every snack and pie.  But we have quotas to make.  And we console/encourage each other by flashing a little secret handsign (out of CCTV view) that we know means, "we will just send new stuff up, by the Force!".

Due to the foresight of our kerbal ancestor and pioneer of our space program, Dr Thaddeus Kerman, who instituted the "Divine Intervention" program shortly after Orbit inception, rounding up everything is not totally impossible as any and every object deemed "lost in space" has automatically qualified for a classified process known as Alt-F12 GKO Teleportation.  Once relocated to GKO (Geosynchronous Kerbin Orbit) strict quarantine rules have applied, but properly-equipped scavengers scour GKO now, as we speak, to efficiently rescue/deorbit FOD ("foreign object debris").

It is probably certainly too late for your former contract world, @Martian Emigrant, but perhaps you would consider instituting a Decluttering Strategy/Policy from inception in your new world so that it might last longer before going all "red dwarf" on its inhabitants? That would be the merciful thing to do, hmm??   

After all, we play rule guide KSP in order to go where no kerbal has been before...  and do things...  there.  Any thing that keeps our mind busy on the doing of the, ah...  thing -- and not necessarily on the purpose (if any).

 

 

Edited January 24 by Hotel26

[Royalswissarmyknife]

Tested Novera's Orbital Flight Test.

More Screenshots:

Spoiler

 

[space_otter]

Launched a test station module. Unfortunately, the mainsail of the scimitar I fail again, there seems to be a design flaw with the sepratrons. However, as this was a light payload, the rocket could achieve orbit with just the poodle and OMS.

Sirius 2 launched successfully (The heavy capsule means it is incapable to fly from booster sep to orbit on the second stage alone, so the sepratrons were disabled and the flight was nominal.

However, we launched at a bad time, so Roland Vincent (the pilot) and the tourist had to wait 9 days to rendezvous. Due to the failure of the station's rocket, it had to go into a lower than average orbit, thus the spacecraft couldn't easily catch up to it.

After docking, the crew spent some time on board the left to return to Kerbin. The service module's solar panel hit the heatshield, although no damage was done.

 

[Kimera Industries]

USC 13 and 14 were launched on my new hardcore science save. For now, I'm alternating Mun and Minmus missions until I work up to a Duna return. So far, I have yet to see any diminishing returns, since my new science parts and capabilities unlocked for each launch outweigh the science losses from doing the same thing every time. Next up will be USC 15, which will go to Minmus. This will be quite an overkill mission as the 1.8m core has been upgraded to 2.5m, and I went full asparagus on the side boosters.

USC stands for Untitled Space Craft. I've used the same naming pattern on several other saves, but never so prominently before. It's because all these rockets are direct modifications from the previous model, traceable back to USC 1, your basic first-launch hopper. What's unique about this save was that my second launch got me into orbit.

[Kimera Industries]

USC 16 is our newest, bestest rocket to ever yet fly. Well, not quite. It uses the Apollo command pod, so I can hold all 3 kerbal job types, but I just use the SAS hub for SAS and pack it with whichever kerbals are inexperienced. On our first flight, I discovered a major flaw with its asparagus-staged boosters. If you do it properly, the booster's fuel lines all lead to the next one, until the last pair of boosters leads into the main tank. In a silly little mistake, I forgot this and they were all leading directly into the main tank. The reason it took me this long to detect it, (the same problems showed up in USC 15, which used the same core stage) is that the fuel priorities were still correctly set up for proper asparagus staging, so it looked like everything was going normally. However, the side boosters would be partially drained when they were supposed to be full.

*inhales deeply* Anyway, what I learned from this is that my new rocket's setup wasn't flawed, it just needs new fuel lines.

As for USC 15 itself, I tried a new trick to launch directly into Minmus' inclination. It worked great, except for the amount of time warping involved to get the target or anti-target node on the navball at the same time the rocket was at an ascending or descending node. And the fact that I forgot I was looking at target info and not my orbit info, so I had an apoapsis of 200km by accident.

However, to offset my stupidity, I deploy a tactic known as "MOAR:" Much mOre thAn is Really needed. This strategy, which if a mission goes well leaves me with almost 2k dv to slow down for Kerbin reentry, also compensates for accidental staging, inefficient gravity turning, or bad maneuver execution in a save with no reverting or quicksaves.

As you can imagine, after killing Jebediah in a highly avoidable accident, I've followed the principle of MOAR pretty well.

*inhales deeply again* 

Edited January 26 by Kimera Industries

[Angelo Kerman]

I've been working on some new suits for my International Space Consortium (a global space exploration organization akin to Starfleet). First is a prototype of the uniform (Thermal Chaps not shown):

Cadet Uniform:

Junior ranks:

Senior Ranks:

Flag ranks. Commander requires minimum experience level of 4, Captain requires a minimum experience level of 5:

[king of nowhere]

I completed circumnavigation of the most remote world I know: Ammenon, from the whirligig world planetary pack

Ammenon is the innermost planet of the red dwarf Gememma, itself orbiting the main star Kaywell. The reason it's so remote is exactly its being innermost: it sits deep into Gememma's gravity well, at barely 130000 km from the surface. It moves at 35 km/s and completes an orbit in seven hours. It takes 15 km/s to reach Ammenon from the nearest planet, of which 10 km/s are the intercept speed and can't be reduced by gravity assists.

Ammenon is tidally locked on Gememma. On one side it is a scorching desert, and under the star itself there's an ocean of lava. But the dark side is covered in ice. Ammenon is half as big as Mun, a bit low on gravity (and definitely too small to provide gravity assists) but good enough to drive a rover semi-comfortably.

I landed on the dark side, on a mountainous region.

this is natural light, provided by Kaywell despite the distance (the bright dot in the sky). Kaywell also allows using solar panels on the dark side. When Kaywell is below the horizon, it's pitch black. In this picture I'm coming closer to the dayside.

Stopping in twilight. the report describes the surface as very hot, but the thermometer does not seem to agree. Look at how much electricity is producing the solar panel; that's a glitch, though.

Gememma in all its glory

One thing I liked about Ammenon is that it has varied terrain. Most worlds are similar in every place; Ammenon alternates highlands - rugged terrain - with smooth maria. Here shown in the transition between the two. elevation is really low, with most of the surface between 900 and 1500 meters - though it goes down to 0 m around the molten sea. it's probably the world with the least altitude variability I know; despite that, it's remarkably differentiated.

too bad my landed-rover was pretty crappy for long distance driving, it kept exploding in the highlands due to hitting bumps. I regret not bringing a better rover, Leaping Mantis would have been a lot of fun here.

And here, arrival to the molten sea

And taking a swim in the molten sea. it's a lot less hot than I was expecting, it doesn't even overheat the kerbal.

The light is very strong while directly under Gememma, it's somewhat hard to see in perspective.

This rock formation is one of my favourites. it's a crater, but the walls were either eroded (possibly by solar wind), and/or the bottom was filled with lava. it's a sign of ongoing geology. and it's very rare to find on most planets. much less on a small one without atmosphere.

leaving behind gememma, back on the ice

Ammenon starts from the Mun model, so it has all the same anomalies in the same places. here crossing the arc near the equator.

The ice cap is also a mix of rough and smooth terrain. for most of the driving, it was smooth.

while shortly before the landing spot, there was a patch of highlands. which was quite hard to cross, because Kaywell does not provide much solar power, so I kept running out of battery.

 

a very beautiful world, I'd recommend it to anyone. at least, to anyone willing to undertake the trip. With its huge deltaV requirement, Ammenon is exceptionally difficult to reach, but well worth the effort.

 

[Kimera Industries]

USC 16 went swimmingly, with a biome hop on the Mun, so I figured I better do another mission. Long story short, USC 17 Riz-Cue became my first rescue mission to rescue one of my own crafts, USC 17. (This is just because this world has no quicksaves. Well, it does, but that's just insurance against a game-breaking bug, which I ended up using them for since the game was acting weird.) As usual, only the command pod survived, and I launched a copy of USC 17 but with no crew and a probe core. Crew is safe and sound back on Kerbin, and I am building a relay network now because I've been putting it off.

[Pipcard]

{ARA - 2.5x scale] Y1, D473 - Aries 1, the first probe to another planet (Duna), is launched

Y1, D474 - Gemini 23 scans for resources on the Mun

Y1, D486 - Yellow Dwarf 2, the first reusable rocket with propulsive landing

edit: Due to a glitch in which all of my contracts and strategies were deleted, I had to redo this launch.

Y1, D494 - The Gemini 24 Minmus scanner enters orbit

Edited January 28 by Pipcard

[LTQ90]

Refueling, only refueling.

i m looking for a good monopropellant video. Need your help kuys.

[kurgut]

Today, good news ! The painting company has finished their work on the ranch house !

(This is made out of B9 proc wings, with custom textures applied to conformal decals put on them ^^)

I also made this Rooster vane thingy part, and it's a proud blender moment for me haha

Spoiler

KSC team also started the consctruction of a new spaceship, Kantive IV....  

... And the Statio-port to go along with it ! (not finished yet ofc, this gets kinda tricky as it's already 1.5 km long, and only half of it is finished. Quite funnily I've hit the limit of the 1 km craft size in SPH, even with hangar extender, forcing me to package the thing in multiple subbassemblies haha)

more :

Spoiler

Engine section : 

Some bits near the KSC, for scale comparison :

I will probably replace those giant SSPX parts in the middle, in favor of procedural parts, with hundreds on non-scaled crew module parts and passengers module on them, to better give a sense of its scale...

Cheers  

[TwoCalories]

8 hours ago, kurgut said:

KSC team also started the consctruction of a new spaceship, Kantive IV....  

"Did you hear that? They've shut down our main reaction wheels! We're doomed!"

[Akagi]

There may or may not have been a slight oopsie in the construction of my polar orbit space station...

tHuNdErBiRdS tO tHe rEsCuE-

Back to the drawing board on this design.

[Kimera Industries]

17 hours ago, kurgut said:

Today, good news ! The painting company has finished their work on the ranch house !

I watched Interstellar again today and I am getting huge vibes from this.  

If the kraken attacks it, you could say that the house is experiencing some gravitational anomalies...

I built a two-satellite relay system. Since the settings are on hard mode, terrain and atmospheric occlusion are really harsh, and if I'm flying a probe it means my connection is unpredictable. The system sucks, but it was good practice to actually set up a really efficient two-sat system: one is in an eccentric equatorial orbit, the other in a polar eccentric orbit with the same orbital period, and while one is at periapsis the other is at apoapsis. It provides maximum coverage for minimum rocket, but I'd recommend a system with more satellites that are easier to set up.

[Martian Emigrant]

Hi all.

World premiere.

Valentina did a flyby of the Mun and came back alive.

 

In another first 2 Kerbals from failed startup-Space-Companies were saved by Jeb.

 

ME

 

Edited January 28 by Martian Emigrant