Round-trip ships.

[Vaebn]

Hm, I think I'll throw my little ship in this thread as well. =]

Behold, the Bacteriophage.

It's a minimalistic, 91 part, two-person space yacht. It does include some RP elements however, like each Kerbal getting it's own cosy cabin for the duration of the trip.

It's main party trick is that it doesn't push a lander, the lander pushes the ship. The aft section in this picture detaches and lands.

And yep, it's Moho capable.

Edited August 28, 2013 by Vaebn

[iDan122]

Both of these can go everywhere in one trip:

You MUST give us the .craft file because....DAT IS ONE HECK OF A SHIP DUDE.

Anyway more pics of Eeloo-1!

Still 15 minutes away from Eeloo at max timewarp. The crew is getting bored after 10 years of flying around the Kerbolar system

[Vanamonde]

So I just completed my first interplanetary mission in 21, landing Kerbals on Eeloo for the first time, and returning them safely to Kerbin.

The KSP-10 Eeloo was assembled in orbit, fuelled up, and loaded with 82.12 tons of payload.

Plotting the outward leg went well, requiring only a minor mid-course correction, and the mission arrived at Eeloo without trouble.

Once in orbit, one satellite each was put into an equatorial and polar orbits.

Then the two small robotic rovers were launched,

and landed.

And then the major phase of the mission, deploying the descent phase.

The lander's engine moved itself and the station core to a lower orbit,

and then the lander continued to the surface, where Genevin Kerman became the first (ker)man to set foot on (my) Eeloo.

And the lander then returned to orbit and met the ship for the return leg of the trip.

The crew transfered and the lander was jettisoned. However, the return trip was ugly. I could not for the life of me plot a Kerbin intercept from Eeloo. Not only was there the usual difficulty and inclination complications, but my orbit of Eeloo was so high and slow that I would miss the launch window while on the other side of the planet. Finally, throwing fuel efficiency to the winds, I launched to solar orbit, burned down to close to Kerbin orbit, circularized still in solar space, and then waited about 2 Kerbin years for an intercept. But an intercept was achieved, and eventually the boys were relieved to see the homeworld for the first time in almost 2000 days. Several aerobraking passes later,

the ship settled into orbit, home at last.

The crew will be rotated, the ship refueled, and a new cargo loaded for Eeloo's next mission.

This is the 4th mission for this ship design, which has now made roundtrips to Moho, Tylo, and two visits to Eeloo.

Edited August 30, 2013 by Vanamonde

[Sirine]

This thread is so...resourceful.

I would like to join the club, but I'm not using mechjeb (at the moment).

So, I don't think I can make it to other planet, except Eve and Duna manually.

But I believe sooner or later "I will" use mechjeb, and join the club.

[iDan122]

This thread is so...resourceful.

I would like to join the club, but I'm not using mechjeb (at the moment).

So, I don't think I can make it to other planet, except Eve and Duna manually.

But I believe sooner or later "I will" use mechjeb, and join the club.

Mechjeb almost lost its popularity since you don't really need it. You have maneuver nodes and an improved SAS now.

All you need pretty much is the interactive phase angle calculator:

ksp.olex.biz

[Sirine]

Thanks IDan122. I already bookmark it. You are in "Zokesia Skunkworks", can I join?

[The Procrastinaut]

Starchaser Orion Mk.II (Moho Edition)

(Mods; Mechjeb)

(I had no idea there was a thread for this! I've posted this in the 0.21 stock and mod repository, then I found this, so allow me to present to you my Moho-capable design)

After conquering the moons of Kerbin, the KSA desired to stride deeper into space, but none of their current spaceships were capable of landing on a body larger than the moon. Designed to enable a crew of up to 6 Kerbals explore the far reaches of the Solar System for years at a time, with the potential to stop at multiple planets along the way, this huge ship was their solution to the problem.

Too big for a conventional launch, Orion was constructed on-orbit from three different launch vehicles;

1. Orion Return & Propulsion Module

2. Orion Lander & Habitation Module

3. Orion Replacement Lander + Fuel (The replacement lander was sent up to replace a fault on the original lander, which has since been fixed, so unless you knock something during assembly, you can remove this)

4. (Optional) Nano Moon Lander (provides a 2-seat moon lander with Dv~2km/s, plus 2 atmospheric probes for deployment in places the lander cannot land and return from (eg Eve, Jool)

From the beginning, Orion was designed to be modular, allowing a wide variety of module combinations.

Need more fuel? Add another fuel module!

Barebones mission? Ditch the habitation module, any extra crew can sit in the 4 external seats (provided)!

(Handy Infographic? you got it!)

Action Groups

1 - toggle all solar panels on the vessel

2 - toggle all floodlights/landing lights

3 - toggle all ship illuminating lights (excluding floodlights)

Included Lander

Bundled with the ship is a very capable lander:

-Up to 3 crew

-Dv~2+km/s

-TWR on Kerbin = 0.96 when full

-Drogue 'chute allows almost powerless landing on celestial bodies with an atmosphere (In this example, Duna)

-Scientific detectors onboard

-Single stage so completely re-usable

The Delta-v of the lander can be increased to 3km/s by docking to the additional rockomax fuel tank (provided) to allow landing on larger celestial bodies, or those without an atmosphere (in this example, Moho)

As a test run, Orion was sent to Duna with 6 crew; 3 landed on the surface in the lander (see above), 2 took the Moon lander to land on Ike (below) and 1 stayed in the mothership (below). After all crew successfully returned and ships re-docked, she still had Dv~8km/s to spare.

Things to note:

1. when a second jumbo fuel tank is added to the stack, when firing the Kerbin Departure stage, a large wobble appears. However, nothing broke so I think its okay.

2. When using the nuclear engines, remember; its top acceleration is 2m/s, so expect loooong burn times. As an example, when entering the Moho SOI, the burn time is about 30 minutes to achieve orbit!

Overall a very capable ship, hope you enjoy.

Edited August 30, 2013 by The Procrastinaut

[iDan122]

Thanks IDan122. I already bookmark it. You are in "Zokesia Skunkworks", can I join?

I do not have the required rank for hiring people into ZokesiaSkunkworks.

You have to be president or Vice-president to do that, I am only an engineer and tester.

P.S. Sirine is the name of the fictional moon of Earth from the anime Girls Bravo!

It was inhabited mostly by females(90%) and the rest you understand.

Edited August 30, 2013 by iDan122

[Oddbin]

Mechjeb almost lost its popularity since you don't really need it. You have maneuver nodes and an improved SAS now.

All you need pretty much is the interactive phase angle calculator:

ksp.olex.biz

I, and I am sure others, would disagree whole heartedly with you on mechjeb.

[iDan122]

I, and I am sure others, would disagree whole heartedly with you on mechjeb.

Okay, so maybe mechjeb shows you delta v and TWR, but you can calculate that yourself. All mechjeb really does now is point you, drive your rover, dock for you, emptying half your Rcs tank, and tell you how far you will land. I might install it again to calculate my apoapsis after aerobrakes.

[iDan122]

By the way guys Eeloo-1 is no more. It was eaten by the Kraken or suddenly got into a wormhole. A video report lasting 3 seconds was received showing the ship. The ship was at apoapsis of its Kerbol orbit, extending farther than e orbit of Eeloo.

The ship experienced an anomalous increase in altitude, then the speed indicator broke down and contact was lost, forever. The ship is now missing and is not in the Kerbolar system anymore. Clones of Jeb, Bill and Bob are prepared and Eeloo-2 is being assembled.

[Wjolcz]

How did I not notice this thread earlier?

Here are my 3 little ships I made :3

Nebulon

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Stratus

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Kilmister

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Edited August 30, 2013 by Veeltch

[iDan122]

This thread is quickly pushed behind others, i try very hard to keep it alive.

[Vanamonde]

Okay, my other roundtrip ship has now been fully tested in 21.1. I loaded it up with 85.87 tons of payload and set out for Eve/Gilly.

After wrestling the bigger ship to distant worlds, this one was amazingly responsive and easy to fly to Eve.

There it placed a satellite each around Eve and Gilly,

two small rovers landed on Gilly,

and two larger rovers were deployed on Eve.

And a small station core was placed in Eve orbit.

Nailed the return burn (which I'm bragging about because I usually don't),

and brought the ship home, ready to be refueled and sent out again.

[SeventhArchitect]

Well, I'll be damned. I've seen a single, SSTO ship, ****ing massive, BTW, take off on from the spaceplane runway, LAND on a distant planet (Laythe), and then get back with plenty of fuel. They aerobraked as they landed, and all that, left behind a rover/base on the planet, and when they got home, used the military base runway instead of the spaceplane runway because of something with hit boxes from the pipes. I'll be honest, that was a feat, but now I've seen this, I'm sitting here imagining so many things. Not just stock but Semi-stock ideas. I will definitely be starting off on a two-way path here, one which I will actually recode some pieces, make copies of pieces that do different things, and even use regular stock pieces to do the equivalent.

Electric charge to Liquidfuel, Solidfuel, Rcs, even Xenongas, newer, differently functioning parts. Just a whole bushel of new parts out of stock parts. A simpel add-on, yes, but eventually I'll move on to retexture them.

And as for the stock ships, thats going to be one badass and insanely hard challenge to complete. I'm currently trying to just put my Halberd (large twin-engine Implausible ship) in orbit of Eve. The mission is currently taking over 500 years, and those kermans are jsut plain dead, rotted away long ago. Out of a cool idea I had, thats not even going to be allowed unless I can move the crew to a Hitch hiker pod.

I'll sleep on it, then get to work tomorrow, coding.

[M.Wolfy]

EDIT: don't mind this

Edited September 3, 2013 by M.Wolfy

[iDan122]

Well, I'll be damned. I've seen a single, SSTO ship, ****ing massive, BTW, take off on from the spaceplane runway, LAND on a distant planet (Laythe), and then get back with plenty of fuel. They aerobraked as they landed, and all that, left behind a rover/base on the planet, and when they got home, used the military base runway instead of the spaceplane runway because of something with hit boxes from the pipes.

That guy is G4virus on YouTube. He made a bunch of monster SSTO'S. One could go to Laythe, deploy a payload and land at Kerbin.

[Vanamonde]

So there were some requests for craft files, but I posted mine http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/48610-My-roundtrip-ships-for-download and there's been no response. Did folks not notice the new thread, or is it just that no one cares?

[Oddbin]

Slight necro but it's relevant so why not. What's the general consensus when doing a reusable round trip ship for docking connectors. Are the Sr ports good enough or are we still best using a tri-connector and normal docking ports? The Sr seems to wobble a bit for me at time but others it's fine.

[AceofPengwins]

My first Duna mission was a reusable* modular ship that used the senior launchers, it can work but it is a bit wobbly. I've never been able to get the tri-docking to work very well.

* (You have to leave all the empty fuel tanks in Duna orbit. And if you aren't careful you'll end up orbiting Kerbin but in an extremely eccentric backwards polar orbit with no fuel, and sitting there waiting while the folks at KSC figure out how to get a rescue ship to you...)

[Vanamonde]

Tri-couplers drive your part count through the roof very quickly. Three rings, on each side, plus a tri-coupler, on each side, and then some struts to preventing wiggling, on each side equals around 14 parts to do what 2 Srs. will do. The only reason folks used them in the past is because we didn't have the Srs.

[Giggleplex777]

I'm planning on assembling my new interplanetary ship soon. Here's a mockup of it:

Here's what I have in orbit right so far:

[Giggleplex777]

Completed the ship!

[7yl4r]

Great ships guys. Pretty awesome stuff.

My space program operates on the following general payload lifecycle:

launch->rendevous with fuel station->assembly->transfer->rendevous with station(if any)->assembly->landing.

In order to accomplish this I have several different "craft roles". Mine are:

* fuel station - place to dump excess fuel from launch/transfer or fill up if low

* orbital tug / assembler - RCS powered craft for assisting in moving modules around in orbit

* interplanetary tug - very efficient, low thrust pusher (or puller) for moving modules between planetary bodies

* lander - specialized atmospheric or vacuum craft with efficient but powerful enough engines to touchdown & liftoff

* lifter - method for getting off the launchpad & into space

So when planning out a mission I consider what I will need, what I have currently in LKO, and build up the mission craft from these modules. At least... that's the theory. In practice I often get lazy and just launch giant, inefficient ships to do whatever I want because Kerbals currently live in a pre-scarcity universe.

I'm seeing a lot of awesome ship assemblies doing awesome things here, but are these just one-off assemblies or can we share and compare modules? I'm tired of reinventing the interplanetary wheel.

[Wayfare]

I'm seeing a lot of awesome ship assemblies doing awesome things here, but are these just one-off assemblies or can we share and compare modules? I'm tired of reinventing the interplanetary wheel.

Did someone say modules? Check out our MOdular Mission System (MOMS), twenty-one modules including launchers, propulsion, payload and support craft that can be arranged at will around a simple, functional ship's core. Have some pics while you're at it: