What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Kronus_Aerospace]

9 minutes ago, papuchalk said:

I am not familiar with gravity breaking, how it really works, never used that technique before.

The beautiful thing about gravity assists is, even if you don't know what your doing, just playing around with maneuver nodes for a while will usually get the results you need. And, even if done terribly they are guaranteed to save fuel compared to not doing them. Just winging it can often times be a valid strategy.

[invision]

7 minutes ago, papuchalk said:

sure, but i wanted to have easier way -  Jool is in the center of that system, while Laythe is going around, and i dont know where Laythe will be right at the moment when i arrive to jool.

I am not familiar with gravity breaking, how it really works, never used that technique before, didnt have to.. i thought going very close to a planet actually makes you speed up !

Also i wanted to have nice screenshot flying by Jool at close distance..

Ok thanks for reply. 

there is a trick to do it but your AP has to be right on the tip to meet Jool so its SOI captures you when you are at your lowest speed. otherwise you probably will be going too fast (9k m/s) and risk exploding. where if you meet Jool right at the top of your AP your probably will only be traveling about 5-6k m/s.

also dont dip too far down or you will blow up regardless or be sucked into the atmosphere

other options include using other moons to manipulate tranfers from one to another but requires a bit of precision 

then the last resort is using fuel and try to slow down enough Jool wont blow you up

[papuchalk]

25 minutes ago, RizzoTheRat said:

It does, but in different directions depending on how you interact, so you can use it to accelerate or decelerate depending on which way it's travelling relative to you

https://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Tutorial:_Gravity_Assist

thanks i never thought of approaching a planet from the left side, rather than from the right side. For landings, i always encounter planet from right side, so that i copy its turning direction. For landing it is trully better, as you dont have to compensate too big difference in speed of ship and speed of surface of the planet

but hey, approcaching planet from left side gives you so many opportunities for other ways of flying other places! thanks for sharing

 

however, i remember trying some gravity asissts before... to speed up (actually slow down) from kerbin to Eve (by Mun) and i remember i completely rejected using gravity assists in game, as i couldnt controll exactly the direction after very close fly by Mun (and of course burning engine at lowest point..). So yes, i gained some backwards speed, but game didnt have any interface or maneuver node controll, which would allow me to predict where Eve will be AFTER the Mun fly-by engine burn, and so i couldnt predict WHEN its the best time for Mun gravity assist, and at WHAT ALTITUDE (to controll right angle of Mun departure) .

 

Is there any mod which could do the maneuvering nodes, using gravity assist, much more user friendly? Or am i just wrongly using engine burns while going at closest distance by Mun? Actually what i am trying to do is Powered Gravity Assist, but it looks game isnt offering this kind of flying. You dont have tools to do that

Edited February 22, 2018 by papuchalk

[eberkain]

3 hours ago, RizzoTheRat said:

Nice

yep, i always look up some kind of plane pics before attempting to build one, i'm terrible at original plane designs. 

[Guest]

9 hours ago, eberkain said:

Redid my mod list again and started a new career, so new early game science plane design.  

I love this one. It's small and clever and I have a thing for things like that. With the triple Juno it must go like a turtle in heat. Very clever intake placement too.

[RizzoTheRat]

50 minutes ago, papuchalk said:

however, i remember trying some gravity asissts before... to speed up (actually slow down) from kerbin to Eve (by Mun) and i remember i completely rejected using gravity assists in game, as i couldnt controll exactly the direction after very close fly by Mun (and of course burning engine at lowest point..). So yes, i gained some backwards speed, but game didnt have any interface or maneuver node controll, which would allow me to predict where Eve will be AFTER the Mun fly-by engine burn, and so i couldnt predict WHEN its the best time for Mun gravity assist, and at WHAT ALTITUDE (to controll right angle of Mun departure) .

 

Is there any mod which could do the maneuvering nodes, using gravity assist, much more user friendly? Or am i just wrongly using engine burns while going at closest distance by Mun? Actually what i am trying to do is Powered Gravity Assist, but it looks game isnt offering this kind of flying. You dont have tools to do that

I think by default the number of "conic patches", ie how many SOI changes it will predict in the map view, is limited to 3.  You can change the CONIC_PATCH_LIMIT in in your settings.cfg file to increase this (I assume this is still valid, I've not done it in the latest version).  If you have MechJeb it has a manoeuvre editing tool that allows you to do small changes to nodes you've already plotted, much more accurate than dragging the handles around on nodes, alternatively there's a mod called PreciseNode which gets a lot of love on here but I've not tried it.

Don't forget that when planning routes you can click the plus and minus below your ejection node to move the node forward or back another orbit, meaning you can plan your ejection from Kerbin to meet the moon in a specific place.   I always forget that one.

In terms of working out where the planet will be when you get there though, the only way I know is as @Brikoleursuggested above, plot a course that intersects its path and use the distance from target indicators in the normal interface.

Edited February 22, 2018 by RizzoTheRat

[NightRunner]

I saw this and was very confused! Negotiating gravity alright

[papuchalk]

but you cannot set maneuver nodes in que, each in different conic patch. Right?

For example, set man.node 1) on Kerbin orbit to meet with Mun, immediately set Man.node 2) on periapsis of Mun, by playing with this second maneuver node you would see where you will be heading exactly after Power gravity assist burn. You could aim for other planets precisely without other huge correction burns. But it doesnt work in game this way

I think you can set the second maneuver node only when you get to influence of Mun. And that is silly. Because then it is too late to aim for Eve effectively... only then you see that You should have done first maneuver node earlier/later to aim for Eve more precisely.

Also the level of inclination is what makes it even more difficult. Not only the periapsis level is important (for correct departure angle) but also the angle from which you approach Mun affects the angle that you leave it when departure. 

 

Edited February 22, 2018 by papuchalk

[Atkara]

34 minutes ago, RizzoTheRat said:

You can change the CONIC_PATCH_LIMIT in in your settings.cfg file to increase this (I assume this is still valid, I've not done it in the latest version)

Not only it's valid, but they've also included a slider in the settings menu, accessible from anywhere in the game. The slider goes up to 6, which is alright for most situations I've had so far.

23 minutes ago, papuchalk said:

but you cannot set maneuver nodes in que, each in different conic patch. Right?

You can. Currently I have two inbound vessels from Dres & Duna respectively. Both have a mid-flight correction burn (still in solar orbit) then another inside Kerbin's SOI for a Mun gravity assist. Not to mention an experiment I did recently for a solar orbit reversal, with the craft not even having arrived at Jool yet and still, I had a maneuver set up inside Tylo's SOI.

Edited February 22, 2018 by Atkara

[papuchalk]

Just now, Atkara said:

Not only it's valid, but they've also included a slider in the settings menu, accessible from anywhere in the game. The slider goes up to 6, which is alright for most situations I've had so far.

 

You can. Currently I have two inbound vessels from Dres & Duna respectively. Both have a mid-flight correction burn (still in solar orbit) then another inside Kerbin's SOI for a Mun gravity assist. Not to mention an experiment I did recently for a solar orbit reversal, with the craft not even having arrived at Jool yet and still, I had a maneuver set up inside Tylo's SOI.

thats good to read, but does stock game allow this? i was really playing with this whole evening, and couldnt make it work. It was maybe on older version of game, and since that i didnt try it. so maybe thats the reason. thanks

Edited February 22, 2018 by papuchalk

[Guest]

1 minute ago, papuchalk said:

thats good to read, but does stock game allow this? i was really playing with this whole evening, and couldnt make it work. It was maybe on older version of game, and since that i didnt try it. so maybe thats the reason. thanks

Yes it does. I'm playing with a few mods but none that affects this behaviour. Version 1.3.1.

[Atkara]

1 minute ago, papuchalk said:

thats good to read, but does stock game allow this? i was really playing with this whole evening, and couldnt make it work. It was maybe on older version of game, and since that i didnt try it. so maybe thats the reason. thanks

You're in luck, since 90% of the mods I use are information feedback and the last 10% has nothing to do with maneuvers

[papuchalk]

since i upgraded PC, i am using lots of visual enhancment mods, and i must say. i would never play KSP without these mods again. Its so addictive, so real lookin, so special...

and by the way i play KSP from september 2017 - several hours a day, i unlocked the whole tech tree in career mode TWICE. And still i want tp play more. So much more to discover and enjoy

 

For example, i had two ships on the same orbit trajectory around mun. but one ship was 10 km behind the first ship (effect of undocking force.. and long time waiting)

I wanted to dock them again, and i was searching for maneuver with the second ship to catch up the first one. And it was a major discovery for me, that i have to burn BACKWARDS from the ship which is in front of me, to catch her one full orbital flight later...  with retrograde burn i went into lower orbit, and going faster that way. It seems unlogical, usually you want to burn FORWARDS to go faster

Edited February 22, 2018 by papuchalk

[Midline]

1 hour ago, NightRunner said:

I saw this and was very confused! Negotiating gravity alright

I got the same thing, I usually sneak a bit of MechJeb aided activity in the background at work, but when this screen hit me I couldn't stop laughing. Haven't seen it before, but I'm already longing for the next time!

[Starman4308]

5 hours ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

What the heck kinda sadistic reliability mod are you playing with, anyway? 

It's still just Test Flight. At least with the RO configs, there's a rated burn time: if you keep burning longer than that, failure chance starts to go way up. Quite often, I run stages for every second of this rated burn time and wish I could run them longer.

By shutting it off early, I restored stage specific impulse back to 404 seconds. However, this meant running the other engine well past its rated burn time, running the risk of having it shut down before the tank was empty... and, as usual, the last seconds of a stage are its most productive.

I wound up watching the failure rate update on the Test Flight panel, and it was just going up and up and up as I approached burnout. Next time, I might try to hang onto an underperforming LR-87 until 20 seconds prior to stage burnout.

[RizzoTheRat]

3 hours ago, NightRunner said:

I saw this and was very confused! Negotiating gravity alright

Gravity is the Law, it's not negotiable

[capi3101]

3 hours ago, NightRunner said:

I saw this and was very confused! Negotiating gravity alright

Was trying to come up with a word for a group of Nyan cats. Went with 'murder'. It seemed like the best description of what's going on in this image...

Weather is still bad here; wound up with another day off, so I figured I'd take the opportunity to keep my log up to date. Or, I would've but the forum seems to have eaten the rest of my post...

 

Edited February 22, 2018 by capi3101

[LordFerret]

Put up two new Comm relay constellations, because I've got ships out there (and in there) that are showing weak signals. Both heliocentric orbits, one is inside between Eve and Moho, the other well out past Dres but not threatened by Jool.  So far the launch and placement burns look good; Tweaking these orbits are a matter of years and years work... something I'm trying to avoid.

I've two Duna crews on their way home. Away for 7 years now, they'll return within this year. Two of their fellow have remained on Duna for science. In another year or so, they'll return home also. The transport ships are due into Kerbin orbit an hour separation from each other. They'll dock with Ice Station Zebra, the crews will transfer to a shuttle home, and their transports will be deorbited as junk.

My first Eve lander is about to have its encounter. A test, controlled by a probe core; If it lands, launches, and docks back with the transport and can make it back home... then the next set of missions will be a manned assault on Eve.

Busy busy busy, I find I've got 72 craft out there doing things... 43 of which are orbiting relay probes.

[Hotel26]

"What do you get when you take a cockpit and add wings, fuel tanks, engines, reaction wheel, undercarriage, control surfaces and the best silk money can buy?"

When my chirpiest Kerbals accosted me with this question in the KSC cafeteria yesterday, I thought it was a riddle.  But they were bored and wanted something new to play with...  (Who am I?  Santa?)

The answer is Foxbat [link]: It is half airplane, half spaceplane, half glider, half bicycle and a whole lot of fun.

Landing it is like landing a pancake in a pizza kitchen!  It's so barebones, it could only have come from the makers of the [Hotel26] MiG 15!

What's it good for?  Well, that's the riddle, isn't it!?  [Phone in with your vote, but keep it polite, OK?]              

Edited February 23, 2018 by Hotel26

[DJWyre]

A bit too flat on returning from a crater on Mun. Crashed into the rim. Best Scientist splattered across the surface. Last save file was 40 days ago. Last autosave is right after impact.

[Dman979]

Just now, DJWyre said:

A bit too flat on returning from a crater on Mun. Crashed into the rim. Best Scientist splattered across the surface. Last save file was 40 days ago. Last autosave is right after impact.

If at first you don't succeed, fly, fly again!

[Kebab Kerman]

7 minutes ago, Dman979 said:

If at first you don't succeed, fly, fly again!

I think you mean "If at first you don't succeed, summon the kraken and danny2462." Or is that only me?

[papuchalk]

3 hours ago, LordFerret said:

home... then the next set of missions will be a manned assault on Eve.

could you share your manned Eve ship with me? at least basic engine and fuel tanks settings. I cannot find proper construction for ascent. Most of youtube videos are outdated

if i take enough fuel, the ship is too heavy, unstable on descent, and usualy explodes. taking more inflatable shields doesnt work (like on Matt Lowne videos - they explode and your whole ship too, when you undock them)

if i take less fuel, i have perfectly stable ship, land easily, but cannot get high enough to make orbit 

quite tough mission..

 

Edited February 22, 2018 by papuchalk

[Delay]

Built a Duna lander today, untested. How far can I get with 2925m/s dv?

[papuchalk]

5 minutes ago, Delay said:

Built a Duna lander today, untested. How far can I get with 2925m/s dv?

my lander has around 2300 M/s and its completely fine for landing, using some parachutes.  see screens

https://imgur.com/a/64UrD

what do you mean how far you can get ???