Greetings, help please?

[rottielover]

Greetings! So I purchased off Steam a few days ago, have installed a half dozen mods (MechJeb, Engineer, Escape Pod, Orbital Fuel Station, etc).

I have some general questions and searching the web has helped me, along with Scott Manley's YouTube videos, but I'm still running into a few things that I'm just not sure about. So I thought I would ask (in no particular order) to see what I'm missing.

1) Struts - I assumed that when you use a strut in conjunction with a radial decoupled that the struts would disconnect as well (tested and it worked), but I also had one design where the struts didn't disconnect when the separation fired. I ended up abandoning that design, but are there any instances where struts don't come apart?

2) Fuel Lines - I've had some issues getting fuel lines to connect, lots of "fiddling" usually solves it. One thing I'm not sure about is if they have any use beyond launch. IE: can u you use fuel lines on a space station to balance the fuel load between two tanks without having to manually transfer fuel?

3) Unmanned pods - I take it there is no other way to "un-man" a pod before launch other than to Eva and end then go back to the pad... Do you have to include a probe or remote unit in order to retain control or is the unmanned pod enough?

4) Space Station wiggle - I used the Orbital Fuel Station design (very nice btw) but at one point I didn't like the way the station was facing. I had two vehicles docked at the time and activated the RCS. Every thuster fired and the whole thing started to "shake". I killed RCS but after a little while one of the vehicles shook side to side so badly it ripped the docking port off the station and took some parts with. I'm assuming my screw up was that I should have undocked everything, then adjusted the station?

5) Docking ports as couplers? Can you "dock" two things together and send them up on your launch vehicles? Do/Can you use struts to stabilize that connection?

6) Rovers - Haven't used them yet, I was thinking about trying the stock rover out, but how do you put it into your lander?

[rottielover]

Well a quick update... I found and loaded up the Dev release of MapSat and I successfully mapped Kerbin, yea, go me! LOL Still much more testing to do I guess, and still much more forum searching...

[Vanamonde]

1) Struts should automatically vanish when one of the stages they're connecting is ejected. Your situation sounds like a bug, but it might help to see a picture of the ship. 2) Fuel lines will pump fuel on a station or ship or whatever, but only when an engine is firing. To get fuel to flow when engines are not firing, you have to use the right-click menu. 3) The whole crewing system is getting replaced in the next update, but for right now, EVA is the only way to empty a capsule. If a ship has no capsules that currently have any crew members in them, it will be inert, unless you've also installed a probe core. 4) ASAS is currently disproportional to large ships and will cause shaking and the RCS spasms that you've seen. But that is also slated to be reworked in the next update, and shouldn't be a problem much longer. 5) Docking rings can not be used to combine saved ships before launch (I think that's what you're asking). You can use them as connectors, but only if you build the whole thing as a single launch vehicle. After launch, you can combine or separate ships to your heart's content. There is a mod or two that will allow you to place struts on docked ships, but that option does not exist in the stock game. 6) I haven't tried the stock rovers, but you can hang rovers beneath or on the sides of a lander, and a trickier option is to mount it on top and drive it off. I made some examples http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/35916-Small-Medium-and-Large-moon-rovers-from-Yeahletstrythatdyne of the most popular type of rover delivery system, which is called "skycrane." In it, a disposable mini-lander comes close to the surface or actually lands, and then drops the rover.

[CCKinnison]

2> Fuel lines specifically have firing engines draw from the FARTHEST tank they're connected to first, until they're dry. Look up "Asparagus Staging" on the Wiki or in Scott's videos, that'll make how fuel lines work more apparent.

3> There is a mod for .20.2, "Crew Manifest", that will let you fill or remove crew from any/all crew pods attached. by default, the game FILLS only the first crew-holding part it finds when loading a design. So if you put a Hitchhiker module below a crew pod, that might also slave your issue, unless you want a totally un-kerballed mission.

4> ASAS, as noted, is destructive in trying to do stationkeeping with RCS right now. However, RCS with a large, dispersed structure is a problem all it's own. More thursters is not necessarily better, placememt matters a LOT. For rotation, you want thrusters evenly spaced around the center of mass, as far from it as possible. note that with a BIG structure, it may simply not be able to take the maneuver - you might have to split the station into pieces with docking ports, rotate the core, and re-dock the bits, using tugs. For TRAMLATION with RCS, one set of thrusters arrayed DIRECTLY AROUND the Center of Mass is generally more effective.

5> Yes, you can launch docked ports. It's more parts, and "more flexible" than sending up assembled structure not intended to come apart... and yes, you can strut across docking port.

[ScramblesTD]

Rover deployment is entirely up to you.

Most of my designers either have the rover mounted at the bottom of the lander, and then dropped to the surface before touching down or if the lander is tall enough, dropped after landing and rolled out from underneath the main craft. Usually though, the rover and the lander are two separate parts the same original craft, with the lander deploying first as the rover waits in orbit, then it gets deployed to the landing site via skycrane.

[Eric S]

2) Fuel Lines - I've had some issues getting fuel lines to connect, lots of "fiddling" usually solves it. One thing I'm not sure about is if they have any use beyond launch. IE: can u you use fuel lines on a space station to balance the fuel load between two tanks without having to manually transfer fuel?

The truth of fuel lines: they don't actually transfer fuel, all they control is where the engines pull their fuel from. Also, you do not EVER want to have a case where you have two different routes to go from one engine to a single tank, especially not with loops. Branches that remerge can cause problems, fuel loops do so more consistently.

[rottielover]

Thanks all so much. You've been very helpful. So much so that I was able to take the stock Z mapper satellite and turn it into an interplanetary probe with mapsat on it. Engineer claims the design has roughly 12 km/s Dv. I suppose it might be true.

Anyway didn't do me a whole lot of good because for some reason I keep messing up the planet encounters. Either I end up missing completely or I end up getting to the encounter only to find a need a crazy amount of Dv to slow into an orbit.

I've tried watching Manley's videos a few times, but I must be missin something with the "correction burn" part?

[Ralathon]

Thanks all so much. You've been very helpful. So much so that I was able to take the stock Z mapper satellite and turn it into an interplanetary probe with mapsat on it. Engineer claims the design has roughly 12 km/s Dv. I suppose it might be true.

Anyway didn't do me a whole lot of good because for some reason I keep messing up the planet encounters. Either I end up missing completely or I end up getting to the encounter only to find a need a crazy amount of Dv to slow into an orbit.

I've tried watching Manley's videos a few times, but I must be missin something with the "correction burn" part?

A correction burn is just what it says on the tin. You first use a large burn to get you near the planet you want to go. This usually takes somewhere around 1500-2500 dV. Since you're a human being this burn probably won't be perfect. So you mess around with maneuver nodes until you do get an encounter. This secondary burn is usually only a few dV.

And yes, you do need a lot of dV to get into orbit with other bodies. All that speed you added to escape kerbin, you need to counter all that to get back into orbit. If you're going to a planet with an atmosphere (Eve Jool or Duna) you can use an aerocapture maneuver to save fuel. You basically make sure that when flying past it you skim the upper atmosphere, this will bleed off most of you velocity allowing you to enter orbit for free (except a small burn at apoapsis to raise your periapsis into a stable orbit)

[rottielover]

Clearly I have more reading to do. The last time I tried to send a probe to Moho I forgot to correct the plane and missed completely (passing under it by a good distance), funny thing is that I was pretty sure the Ap marker thing was right on the line when I started.

On the manuver nodes, I figured out the green markers (basically speed) and the purple/pink ones are for the plane/tilt , but what do the blue ones do?

[Ralathon]

Clearly I have more reading to do. The last time I tried to send a probe to Moho I forgot to correct the plane and missed completely (passing under it by a good distance), funny thing is that I was pretty sure the Ap marker thing was right on the line when I started.

On the manuver nodes, I figured out the green markers (basically speed) and the purple/pink ones are for the plane/tilt , but what do the blue ones do?

The blue ones are just 90 degrees on the other 2 options. If you fire along that axis while in orbit you make your orbit more/less eliptical. It's more efficient to just fire along your velocity vector (green) to achieve the exact same thing though. I mostly use it for my final approach for munlandings etc. I usually set up the orbit so my spacecraft will hit the mun. Once I'm on a proper trajectory I'll stage and fire along the blue vector so my lander stage misses the mun. That way my boost stage hits the mun and I don't end up with debris in solar orbit.

[CCKinnison]

Hmm. I use the blue ones to set up an orbit with a body.

For instance, when I get an encounter with the Mun (we'll take an easy one) you then need to bend that encounter into an orbit. I usually do that by setting up a maneuver that BOTH burns retrograde, and burns OUT from the Mun (blue). For me, that seems to generate an orbit (highly elliptical, but a Mun orbit) faster and simpler. Then I circularize. If I want to change inclination (equatorial, mapping, specific landing, whatever) I try to do it at the same time as the first "capture" burn, or at least roughly.

[rottielover]

After further reading I realized that picking the innermost planet was probably a mistake (its listed as one of the more challenging to get too).

Looks like I need to crawl before I can walk then run.

Guess its time to map Kebal's moons then maybe Duna or Eve. Get some more experience so to speak before going for Moho.

[SRV Ron]

The most efficient is to do the orbital burn at the paragee marker. If you don't have one because you are on a collision course, do a burn as soon as you have an encounter using the blue marker to get a paragee, then do a second burn at paragee to circularize the orbit.

My second Atlas probe sent to Mun last night saw a 25% savings on second stage fuel. I aim for a apogee short of Mun orbit for capture letting Mun pull me in rather then flying by and getting captured on the return loop.

Far more difficult is Minimus due to its lower sphere of influence and its inclined orbit.

[rottielover]

Well I managed to get my map sat to Eve.... After a few orbits at 350 to 450 km I decided to move my angle to a 90 (polar) to get mapping. After the burn I guess I was too excited about mapping it and I wasn't paying attention and my probe crashed into the surface (at least I got some readings on the other instruments).

How frustrating.... Does anyone have a list of "rule of thumb" how much Dv you need to do various operations? Basically I'm trying to figure out how the heck I'm going to get everything mapped.

I'm runing out of game time for tonight so I guess It's off to the Mun to map it...

[Capt'n Skunky]

Happy Launching!

Arrr!

Capt'n Skunky

KSP Community Manager