What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Guest]

I think Firespitter is the one you're looking for. That's the only one I know of with working props.

[GwynJHawke]

Simulated and tested out several planned mission scenarios for my Jool 5 mission lander. I plan on using a detachable multi-part heat shield to areobreak at jool and laythe, detach the shield, dock my lander to the shield, and use it shield my high angle entry (hopefully, steep entry angle will help me be more accurate in hitting a safe landing area). Results: Mixed. Kerbin's atmosphere is thicker and slows down my fully fueled lander faster than it will on laythe. The trick is to flip the ship 90° once its slow enough to deploy the drogue chutes while also detaching the heat shield. Out of 6 test runs, I only had 4 successful results of shield detachment and chute deployment. One was a successful detachment and and drogue chute deployment, but the lander couldn't decelerate enough to deploy the main chutes before impacting on the high mountains west of KSC. The other was a complete failure wher the shield was detached too early and collided with the ship. I will have to see what I can do to improve the arrangement. 

 

The other test revolved arround increasing my deltaV capacity for landing on Tylo. I came up with the idea of a detachable fuel tank with a pair of small retro rockets to push it away when I detach the tank while still burning at max burn towards retrograde. It looks awkward, but it works, which is a lot better than looking awkward and not working.

[Slam_Jones]

Had a productive day!

Rescued one Captain Lisa Kerman, who turned out to have a soul patch beard.  (Hey, I don't judge!  But Lt Dan looks a bit worried there...)

 

Realizing the short range of the rescue chopper, I set out to make a boat that it could land on and fuel from.  I never got the chance to fully test it though... after getting it in the water and then returning to it from the Space Center, it had the tendancy to explode as if it had been hit by a torpedo.  No Kerbals killed, luckily, but it was a bit alarming.

 

So after that I decided to build a work truck.  Once that was done, I decided it needed a trailer.  No idea what to use it for yet, but it's sure fun to drive around.

[SciMan]

I stacked two 7-core asparagus boosters on top of each other, added crossfeed between the layers, and made it so when one pair of the lower cores is jettisoned, the engines of the top layer core that were in line with it ignite.

Then I tried one with 3 layers. This one got 15km/s with just a HECS 2 core and a nosecone on top, without even thinking of touching an LV-N or ion engine.

I'm sure there's more performance to be had, but I think 2 layers is the sweet spot. The advantage of this design compared to traditional asparagus is that it lets you use engines with good sea level thrust on the lower level, and engines with good vacuum ISP on the upper level.
It's basically the same method used in a more "normal" looking rocket, but with the advantages offered by Asparagus staging available to both stages.

If I had to guess, I'd say that this kind of thing would be good for getting to orbit (and maybe back to Kerbin) from the surface of Eve without using advanced tech like a Mammoth, LV-N "Nerv", or Aerospike engine.

If you do have the aerospike and Mammoth, it might be worth looking into putting one of these on top of a Mammoth stage, with Aerospikes on the lower level and LV-909's on the upper one. Not sure how well that would work in practice, but it sounds promising and a tight cluster of 7 1.25m cores is about the same diameter as a single 3.75m core, so it should go in a fairing relatively easy, maybe.

Edited June 4, 2016 by SciMan

[Van Disaster]

Sea science!

The nose kept digging in ( that's a horrible hack of a bow anyway ) so I extended it a little:

The canisters on the side are underwater science packages from somewhere ( DMagic? ) and taniwha's Survey Transponder parts, with an EL ore canister to make it sink. And goo, of course.

The plane is completely amphibious


I did start with something rather smaller & lighter ( and cheaper! ) but once it landed on the sea it didn't even have the power to move, let alone take off...

 

Edited June 4, 2016 by Van Disaster

[Bev7787]

While waiting for the Eve transfer window so I can send my tower to Gilly, I landed a science module and crew at my new Minmus base. Habitation and ISRU are being launched as we type.

[Draco T stand-up guy]

Launched a tourist party of 5 plus scientist and pilot to Minmus:

Despite appearances there was nobody on board called Blake

Worked as planned with that Poodle having just enough go in it to drop me out of Minmus orbit and then using the three outer engines to land (twice), escape to a Kerbin orbit and then de-orbit at Kerbin periapsis (I'm playing hard mode career and so try not to enter atmosphere at high speed - killing pilots and tourists is expensive).

[PnDB]

Mün has become a busy place as of late.  Four tourists in various stages of arrival/orbit/departure, and one satellite positioned with a second in process.  Kerbal alarm clock really helps with managing that many vessels in flight.

[michal.don]

Landed a space potato with my shuttle. 

(level 9 of the Shuttle Challenge v3)

Michal.don

[Kertech]

My Mios landers arrived in the system

Separated and went to the moons, the atmospheric lander will come later on Explorer two, with some scansats

This has to be one of my favourite photos to date, it's from @Xenonclave's planet pack (who I'm mentioning so much it feels like I'm plugging the mod! Though would recommend these inner planetary bodies are great!!) My lander on Glac with the ring's of Mios visible over the horizon

While the Serc lander got down safely, these little landers are great for science, enough fuel left for some hops when the budget gets tight!

Explorer 2 arrived with scansat 3 and the Mios lander

Detached everything and got landing

Mios Lander arrived and settled down with no problems either, lucky didn't need the heat shield, never landed on Mios before so...

Meanwhile at Duna the scansats arrived late, missing the mission entirely, so they're gonna scan for next time

The Duna crew reassembled and prepped the ship for departure

Exit burn goodbye to Duna for now

Back on Kerbin the new cadets were learning howto use the EVA equipment (finally gotten round to this mod, which is just great fun! finally EVA is useful!)

Although when bill came along to inspect their work the cadets had decided to attach an instrument to the sky!!

Training over they decided to saunter over to the Mun for a bit of training whilst they wait for everyone else to return, Bill doesn't mind them being gone, He's in charge!

They missed the launch of the new Mercury class interplanetary! The Mercury 2 (to be named at somepoint)

To deal with Sarnus being soo far away the newly invented Cryogenic technology was deemed worthwhile adaptation (though weirdly the only one unlocked is the 4 man base one from K&K) 

Landers to be built closer to the launch window!

[grosser_Salat]

I built a cargolane in RP-0:

Than I put a Rocketplane on it:

On release the Rocketplane fliped, due to aerodynamic instability and the rocketmotor stoped working, due to vapor in the feedlines. But I landed both vehicles savely

I'll have to repeat the mission with a better dessign tomorrow...

Edited June 4, 2016 by grosser_Salat

[N_Danger]

Bill gets into the mining ship around Val

Clinches up for the suicide burn to land

And lands it successfully.

I then find out this design has very poor efficiency and will require multiple trips to refuel a tanker. Instead of going full kerbal maybe I should have tested it first. 

 

 

[StrandedonEarth]

Those zero-star pilots are pretty clueless! I had a mission that involved bringing some tourists to visit the MinLab in Minmus orbit. On the way in, they rescued a stranded pilot in Minmus orbit before docking to the station. Then they loaded up some station crew to bring home with them. While plotting the return burn, I noticed the ship passed through the Mun's SOI, so i planned a quick orbit there to get some more XP. That's when the real fun started.

The rescued pilot (I think now I know how he got stranded in the first place) plotted and executed an escape burn, to put the ship on a Kerbin reentry course. After the burn, he realized his trajectory took the ship well below the surface of the Mun (close to the core!) before leaving the SOI. After a panicked radial burn to just skim past the surface of the Mun, he executed a burn at Kerbin apoapsis to put everybody back onto a reentry course, with just 7m/s of dV to spare!

[Waxing_Kibbous]

Did my first "Get Out and Push" today- was sending a biome hopper to the Mun to keep my science station busy and after I time-warped to Mun intercept I had no power! My @#$-end was facing the Sun and my small panels were getting zero exposure. Finger on the F9, I decided instead to try to EVA, and my scientist head-butted my lander enough to get half a panel exposed, which was enough to save the day- the mission was a success, maxed out my MPL

[Srpadget]

Today I learned that struts don't just provide mechanical strength and rigidity.  They are also a HIGHLY EFFICIENT heat-transfer pathway.

NERVs have a low thrust and don't really need reinforcing anyway.  I've just always strutted the engines on my nuclear tugs for aesthetics. 

And I may even continue to strut them, just because I like the looks of it. 

But I will never again strut them to a hitchhiker or other crew compartment.  Not for a design that has to do more than 10 minutes of solid full-power burn all in one go....

Edited June 4, 2016 by Srpadget

[Gojira1000]

I spent too much money and dV in managing a Mercury flyby

 

[fourfa]

Started missions from the Interplanetary Mountaineer contract pack.  Built this overpowered plane to get to K1 quickly.  Moved the copilot into a Mk1 pod in the cargo bay, flew high and slow over the summit, opened the bay door, staged the decouple & parachute.  Circled around to stay inside 2.5km until he landed (the red 5.2km icon - not a very direct hit LOL).  Landed the plane in the grasslands nearby.  Hiked the copilot to the summit, planted a flag.  Started to hike down to the plane, got bored, and took ~20 tries at landing the plane on the glacier just below and left of the summit.  Lots of explosions, a few crippled landings with broken landing gear, and finally nailed it with inches to spare.  Picked up my brave mountaineer, hucked the plane over the cliff with not enough speed to fly, picked up speed in the dive, flew home without drama.  Mission success

[pasukaru76]

Flew a spaceplane from Kerbin to Ike to make use of the ISRU unit stationed there. Next stop will be Pol for another refuel, and then a trip down to one of the fabulous vacation spots on Laythe.

[Dispatcher]

I added some hydrofoils (actually canards on structural pylons) under my latest SSTO plane.  Now it can take off from water.  I had been looking for something akin to what I wanted to do and found the Convair Sea Dart.  While the skis are not really hydrofoils, the end result is the same:  using water as a runway.  I think you'll find this interesting.

 

Edited June 5, 2016 by Dispatcher

[bumrocky]

I got to Mun and while galavanting about, Jeb hit a strut and it went POOF! and the whole thing fell over.

[Dispatcher]

4 minutes ago, bumrocky said:

I got to Mun and while galavanting about, Jeb hit a strut and it went POOF! and the whole thing fell over.

Your first post.    Yes, its the little things that make a Mun (or other landing) so satisfying.  Good luck in bringing Jeb back!

[Thatguywholikesionengines]

On 6/3/2016 at 9:08 PM, cantab said:

A great second landing of the Britannia on Serran, after giving it some minor wing tweaks, and delivery of my forklift. Now I can play at warehouses on another world!

 

New Horizons is updated for 1.1?

[Bev7787]

Q: How do you get your Duna lander to orbit without the launcher being too complex?

A: Place the boosters around your lander

[Cupcake...]

Enjoy!

 

Cupcake...

 

 

[Gojira1000]

Open the pod bay doors, HAL