The Grand Voyage-Class Colony Ship

[NGTOne]

This ship represents an extension of the large-spacecraft design principles first developed for the Ministry of Improbable Spacecraft's Bright Future-class survey ship, to fulfil an expanded mission of colonization and exploration.

Design Goal:

A large, single-launch spacecraft capable of deploying a fully-developed colony infrastructure to a low-gravity body in one mission, including orbital stations, outposts, rovers, and crew. Intended for eventual interstellar missions, where multiple missions to deliver crucial colonial infrastructure might arrive in-system years apart (forcing undesirable delays in colonial deployment). It is then intended to be either abandoned, used as a space station core, or (where feasible) returned to Kerbin for re-use.

Specifications:

Mass:

Takeoff mass: Approx. 7000 tons.

933 tons to Kerbin orbit, approx. 50% of which is colonial equipment.

Payload:

1x 64-man prefabricated colony base

4x 4-man outpost

4x DEMV Mk2 rover

4x 12-man orbital station

Crew:

Normal complement of 128 (all colonists, ship is capable of autonomous operation), maximum capacity (with all payload modules occupied) of more than twice that. Crew normally resides in habitation block at bow of ship during transit, with colonial equipment kept vacant until orbit over target body is achieved. In an emergency, the colonial equipment can be used as lifeboats, and can be docked together to form a larger, though immobile, "life raft", allowing the colonists to hold out for later rescue.

Engineering:

1x onboard nuclear reactor

96x control moment gyroscope, to provide maneuvering torque without requiring RCS

48x SM-FFR, for sustained deep-space operations.

Development Notes:

The Grand Voyage-class went through an extensive prototyping phase, with prototype 5 being the first successful design. Early designs had far more propulsion capacity, but the structural elements required to support these massive arrays of engines proved impossible to implement and launch, and yielded diminishing returns at any rate. The largest design problem was how to stow all of the requisite colonial equipment compactly and in a manner that was easy to deploy in no specific order, and without risking damage during launch, flight, or deployment. In this dilemma, the largest single problem was stowing the large prefabricated colony base in such a way that it was a) easy to deploy, not impeding regular operation during flight or deployment of other colonial elements, and c) not going to be destroyed by the incredible heat generated by the engines. To this end, it was mounted at the far aft of the ship, and the engines set on structural standoffs around it, such that it was protected from the hot exhaust.

Orbital assembly of the spacecraft core was deemed impractical, due to the large concentration of gyroscopic control units in the aft section (which would have caused far too much rotational strain on the ship's spine without adequate reinforcement), and the precision maneuvers required to dock some of the elements, all of which lack RCS (especially the habitation block and colony base, which both have tight clearances around fragile elements).

Album:

KES Far Horizon on the launchpad.

The KES Far Horizon, the first of its class, in orbit of Kerbin.

KES Far Horizon, leaving Kerbin far behind on the way to Dres.

Dres insertion burn, showing off the powerful engine array.

The prefabricated colony base, loaded with 64 colonists, separates from its dock at the stern of the ship.

The colony base, landed on the surface of Dres.

Sunrise on the surface. So very far from home.

One of the outposts, with a rover to go with it.

The last piece of hardware to be deployed, one of the space stations, thrusts away from KES Far Horizon. The habitation and mechanical blocks are clearly visible now that all the colonial equipment has been removed.

The end result of deploying all the equipment. The stations are orbiting at equatorial, 45, 90, and 135. The outposts and main colony were landed at various locations of scenic interest on the surface. KES Far Horizon herself can be seen orbiting to the far right (all equipment was deployed from an altitude of approximately 250 km).

Downloads for this craft and other fine Ministry of Improbable Spacecraft products can be found here.

Edited July 16, 2013 by NGTOne

[musketeer]

Good God.... Sadly, my computer may commit suicide if I try to use this, but damn it looks cool....

[Tommygun]

My computer has trouble just viewing those images.

[The Error]

I can feel my PC melting from the sheer pwn of this beast.

How in the name of Ned did you get it into orbit?

[NGTOne]

How in the name of Ned did you get it into orbit?

8 7.5m "Elder Goddess" rockets from the Gaby's Quick and Dirty Miscellania pack, in a single (OK, 1.5) stages. I couldn't do anything fancier with the stages, because Cthulhu attacked prototypes 1-4 IN THE VAB, and made parts "forget" they were attached to anything. This was the first prototype that I could get consistent launches out of without struts and fuel lines mysteriously vanishing between launches.

Edited June 19, 2013 by NGTOne

[regex]

Impressive.

[Lazurkri]

My god. thats all I have to say is OMFG!

its epic!

also, this thing would make a KILLER missile battleship.... that or a carrier....

Edited June 20, 2013 by Lazurkri

[NGTOne]

My god. thats all I have to say is OMFG!

its epic!

also, this thing would make a KILLER missile battleship.... that or a carrier....

Personally, I don't use weapon mods, but if you like, I can provide you with the .craft files (and the long list of mods) for both this ship and its smaller cousin (the Bright Future-class survey ship, which I think would be more suited as a missile boat, given that it's a little smaller). I also plan to build even bigger derivations in the future, perhaps when the game is a little better optimized.

[OUScooby]

My computer lagged just trying to load the images of the giant!

I'm impressed. How does she fly? How far can she get?

[NGTOne]

My computer lagged just trying to load the images of the giant!

I'm impressed. How does she fly? How far can she get?

It flies using the Fission Fragment Rockets off the Spaceport. They can't be refuelled, generate little thrust, are heavy as hell, and output massive heat, but MechJeb tells me I can get (if memory serves) about 27 km/s of dV out of this thing. All 48 of those engines, running at full bore, give this boat a grand total TWR of 0.2.

[Fox62]

XD I think Jeb would be bored as hell waiting for the burn to complete. Also, I want a picture of this thing on the Launchpad.

[NGTOne]

XD I think Jeb would be bored as hell waiting for the burn to complete. Also, I want a picture of this thing on the Launchpad.

Well, Jeb was in that colony module you see in the screens, so he was there for part of it

And, as for the picture of the ship on the pad (or, perhaps more accurately, the pad under the ship), here you go:

[Commander Zoom]

... I'm pretty sure that each of those outer boosters (NovaPunch, right?) is what I used as my very first Mun rocket's main stage, back in the day.

[Scoobyod23]

That is just epic!!! I fear my pc would end up like most of my rockets if i tried to use that! IN FLAMES

[NGTOne]

... I'm pretty sure that each of those outer boosters (NovaPunch, right?) is what I used as my very first Mun rocket's main stage, back in the day.

Not sure if they're NP - I got them as part of Gaby's Quick and Dirty Miscellany. I tend to use KW for anything up to about 500 tons, then these monstrosities past that. Well, when the payload doesn't shake itself to pieces because of the massive force they exert, anyways.

[Fox62]

Holy ****, that is one huge rocket. I do note that those boosters look like scaled up versions of parts from NovaPunch.

[NGTOne]

Holy ****, that is one huge rocket. I do note that those boosters look like scaled up versions of parts from NovaPunch.

I think "rocket" is a bad way to describe it at this size - I prefer "small building with rocket engines haphazardly glued to it"

[astroadrian99]

How many parts does it use and what mods does it require?

[Zarhan]

Wow, I kinda wanna see if my PC can handle flying that.

[NGTOne]

How many parts does it use and what mods does it require?

If memory serves, the part count was about 1400 at launch.

As for the mod list, well... let's see now...

CrewManifest

Lack Luster Labs

Robodyne Control Moment Gyro

DEMV Mk. 2

Gaby's Quick and Dirty Miscellania

KW Rocketry

MechJeb 1.9 (not necessary for the R1 colony ship)

MechJeb 2

Compact Adapter Kit

Wayland Experimental Parts Pack

WSE Station Lab Module

And I've probably forgotten a few, too...

I've created an R1 version, which uses MechJeb2 instead of MJ1.9, but is otherwise the same. I've also probably forgotten a few mods, but that's the best I can do.

Wow, I kinda wanna see if my PC can handle flying that.

Actually, it's not hardware that's the limiting factor, it's KSP itself. My machine can handle the hardware demands of even this monstrosity more than fine, but the engine can't. Go figure, eh?

[Rainbowtrout]

This is just perfection. Have a smiley

[THENEWJOEMAMA]

can't get it to work. NovaPunch is missing a certain fuel tank, the TD-5002, for the colony ship. This sucks because I spent the last 5 hours fixing GQDP to work with it due to renaming. Can you please update this?

[NGTOne]

can't get it to work. NovaPunch is missing a certain fuel tank, the TD-5002, for the colony ship. This sucks because I spent the last 5 hours fixing GQDP to work with it due to renaming. Can you please update this?

It doesn't use NP. The TD-5K5 is from GQDM, and I don't know whether it can be found in NP proper (I've never used NP). I know GQDM is a little finicky, but if you toss out everything but the Elder Goddess Engine, TD-5K5, 2m nuclear reactors, and ultra struts, you should be fine.

[The Destroyer]

How long does it take to get to orbit? 1 hour IRL time at 1 FPS?

[THENEWJOEMAMA]

The craft simply doesn't load, anyway. It says it needs GQDP.nukeReactor, NP.lft.7p5mTD5002, NP.lft.7p5m.TheMatriarch, and gqdm.ultralaunchClamp1. This ship makes me feel like an idiot. Oh and I've got GQDM, and the parts even show, but I'm guessing it's from an older version or something. I know it's probably something unbelievably easy but please help!