What did you do in KSP1 today?

[MR L A]

I was thinking of sharing this creation with a video, but I'm so pleased I'll pop up a picture first

 

Presenting...
The Iliad

It's inspired by NASA's Nautilus X and is assembled in orbit  including the fully functional (it spins) modular centrifuge - no need for launching a doughnut rocket  and its 100% stock parts!

I've not quite finilased the design yet but this is what I've been doing today  Testing! But mostly admiring it in flight - I'm not the only one that does that right?

Also, this is the first image of one of my designs I've ever shared!

Edited April 13, 2021 by MR L A

[ZinkBot]

I think this explains itself:
The Kerbal exploded shortly thereafter. 
(I reverted the flight. )

[darthgently]

4 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

I did something i would have considered impossible, or so impractical as to make no difference:

drive a rover on Gilly!

Nicely done!  Another trick is to use RCS to hold the buggy down on surface. Something I want to try on Gilly is using ion thrusters and lots of EC for downforce

Edited April 12, 2021 by darthgently

[king of nowhere]

3 minutes ago, darthgently said:

Nicely done!  Another trick is to use RCS to hold the buggy down on surface

yes, but if you want to get a decent simulated gravity (munar gravity is the minimum to comfortably drive a rover) you need to spend a crapton of fuel. At this point, especially on Gilly, it truly becomes more convenient to take a suborbital jump.

[darthgently]

Just now, king of nowhere said:

yes, but if you want to get a decent simulated gravity (munar gravity is the minimum to comfortably drive a rover) you need to spend a crapton of fuel. At this point, especially on Gilly, it truly becomes more convenient to take a suborbital jump.

Absolutely, jumping makes the most sense even on Minmus.  It is more the challenge of driving in low gee I guess, which I think is what OP was getting at

[king of nowhere]

2 minutes ago, darthgently said:

Absolutely, jumping makes the most sense even on Minmus.  It is more the challenge of driving in low gee I guess, which I think is what OP was getting at

I am the OP, and the challenge of driving in low gee does not really apply if it's not really low gee.

Anyway, the challenge there is a no isru grand tour while finding all the green monoliths. My fuel must last for all the planets, I can't waste it for driving. But it turned out there was no need

[Cavscout74]

16 hours ago, PlutoISaPlanet said:

I did a Eve flyby for the first time! I couldn't land because I forgot to seperate my fuel from my last stage.

My first one I forgot parachutes for the lander probe.  And an antenna.  And there wasn't even enough fuel to make orbit in the transfer stage - which did actually have an antenna.  So don't feel too bad about just making a fuel staging mistake

[darthgently]

1 hour ago, king of nowhere said:

I am the OP, and the challenge of driving in low gee does not really apply if it's not really low gee.

Anyway, the challenge there is a no isru grand tour while finding all the green monoliths. My fuel must last for all the planets, I can't waste it for driving. But it turned out there was no need

Ok, didn't note the challenge aspect.  I thought you were the OP at first glance but then thought not given you were saying now driving was not worth it and jumping better, so not sure why that would lead to a post about driving.  I was too lazy to scroll back a page to verify.  Please forgive me, ha.   But yeah, if you have fuel for downforce, you probably have fuel for jumping; which is probably what you were getting at

[Cavscout74]

Technically yesterday, but I switched back to tinkering with some low tech designs and fiddling with rearranging a tech tree.   Playing with the low tech designs was definitely more fun.....

 

A Bumper aka Titov-Capella from the CNAR mod:

Then came a Moho-Redstone.   For JNSQ, I gave it a little help off the pad - although with some redesign work since this, it only takes 2 Mite's instead of 4

And a Moho-Atlas

The FASA Atlas has enough dV to (barely) put a Mk1 pod into LKO in the JNSQ system.  I added a pair of sepratrons to deorbit the Atlas body after orbital insertion to remain debris-free.  I also used a pair of Spider's for the verniers instead of the FASA ones, but they barely have enough thrust to provide proper control (reaction wheels are turned down to 10% authority) so I need to switch back to the FASA ones. 

Retropack jettisoned after deorbit burn

 

[swjr-swis]

8 hours ago, Hotel26 said:

[1]    

"Uhm, KSC Coast Guard, this is Duckboat... we are now airborne."

.

.

.

"Come again?"

 

[Pthigrivi]

Man I feel like I've been away from Kerbal for years. Nice to get back into it. Thinking about starting a virtual rocketry club with local kids this summer and started out a fresh science mode save to start planning. Why didn't anyone tell me these new terrains are amazing?

Edited April 13, 2021 by Pthigrivi

[Dientus]

4 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

Man I feel like I've been away from Kerbal for years. Nice to get back into it. Thinking about starting a virtual rocketry club with local kids this summer and started out a fresh science mode safe to start planning. Why didn't anyone tell me these new terrains are amazing?

Pssst... Hey @Pthigrivi

They're amazing!

Add some visual mods and it gets better!

 

 

[Pthigrivi]

1 minute ago, Dientus said:

Pssst... Hey @Pthigrivi

They're amazing!

Add some visual mods and it gets better!

 

 

I piled some on for one install to test things out and yes, absolutely beautiful. On the fence how many mods I want to get into if Im doing a Kerbal club. Might keep it simple vanilla so Im not taxing others' systems. 

[Stormpilot]

Added extension to K-1 (Kerbin One) Orbiting Kerbin At 500km.

 

[An Amongus Sussy Player]

Made a planet :p

[Angelo Kerman]

I made a wearable cargo part, and a plugin to handle positioning the 3D models:

Next up is the plugin to control buoyancy and diving...

[Spaceman.Spiff]

15 minutes ago, Angel-125 said:

wearable cargo part,

Kerbal Swimming Program

[Hotel26]

Wildfire 3 on a high-speed test run.  We've switched to the twin Big Berthas because they seem less vulnerable to wave impact, fish strike, floating plastic debris, etc.

   

And our engineers feel this is the best way to tow Duckboat 3. 

 

We'll post this update bulletin...

Then I'll get the result in the next 5 minutes.  You know the drill...

P.S. being a nautical man, from now on I will use the traditional kerbal term for your "meters per second".   That's 'knots', abbreviated with a 'K', as in 108K on that test run pictured above. 

 

 

Edited April 13, 2021 by Hotel26

[ColdJ]

Hi @Hotel26. If you are trying for a speed record you should try putting some hydrofoils on the bottom to lift the body out of the water but still be in contact with the water. 2 small elevons that I adjusted till I got the angles right, and then an adjustable rear spoiler and an adjustable front canard to counteract it lifting too much. The best I could ever achieve before it would take off was 270 metres a second or 524.8378 knots. That was with 2 Wheesley cruise jet engines. And yes if you got it wrong the engines were quick to rip off. Good luck.

[Pipcard]

1974-02-28 - Nozomi-2 orbits Mars

[Hotel26]

6 hours ago, ColdJ said:

you should try putting some hydrofoils on the bottom to lift the body

Yep, you've got it.  Wildfire was reverse-engineered, originally, from Ship Hydrofoil Pax 64, by Lisias.  (At the time, I had not realized he had posted it on KerbalX.)

In truth, ships have limited 'mileage' and Wildfire gets much better mpg at a speed closer to 50-60 knots.  The engines in both my versions are 'safe' as long as one doesn't attempt turns at higher speeds.

[Stormpilot]

I decided to start a surface colony on Mun. Here is the first launch, which brings about 20 kerbals to Mun before rovers and fuel/drill parts arrive in separate rockets.

Edited April 14, 2021 by Stormpilot

[ColdJ]

Hi @Hotel26 Yes, trying to turn at speed was always a disaster. At the least, loss of engines. at the most every part going in every direction. The weirdest thing for me the first time it happened was it taking off in a stable fashion and then being able to fly it back to the KSC . It was not designed to fly. It used Mk2 body parts, some elevons and front canards. The only bit of wing was right at the back in the spoiler, but yet it flew quite well. If I was very careful I could land it back in the water without ripping anything off.

[Hotel26]

 

4 hours ago, ColdJ said:

was not designed to fly

Indeed.  In KSP, one must design not to fly!  And often fail. 

My first sub flew -- and better than it submerged. 

By the way,  I didn't intend to sound like I was bragging about speed.   We're all aeronautical engineers here,  so vital data like "How fast will she go?" is stock for trade,  especially such a big ship.   I am continually surprised such a heavy beast will go so fast given the colossal drag in water. 

I've also made a series of hydrofoil amphibians,  so have some experience.   I took the original foils off Wildfire because one mistake and it rolled over.   That having been said,  a trio of small foils might do wonders.   I'll look into it before publication. Tho current speed is more than satisfactory.   At some speed,  one must go to more rarified air to go faster,  higher and further -- and then you are no longer a cruise ship! 

Edited April 14, 2021 by Hotel26

[Max von Kerman]

i tried to fly under the bigger R&D bridge using a kerbal personal parachute, an external command seat and an engine. *exploded before leaving the pad lol* and also set a rover to Minmus with 3 flat tires(there's 4 wheels and can carry 5 kerbals) , need to repair them at some point.