Munar Colony

[ihtoit]

The Challenge:

Land a colony on Mun. Simple, eh?

No.

You must take *at least* 25 Kerbals in one go to Mun (the Partystarter would be useful here but it won't work on the chairs).

You may use addon structural parts, engines etc, but no obvious cheats like infinite fuel or null gravity!

Your spacecraft *may not* have separable boosters (ie it must be single stage to Mun)

Your spacecraft should make use of the HOME addon for habitats, but there's nothing stopping you strapping a bunch of chairs to a few structural platforms or even girders! Bear in mind though, that you will LOSE points if there is no shelter for your Kerbonauts!

Your spacecraft must be electrically independent; you may use an orbital waypoint to top up on monoprop, LF and oxidizer.

Extra points for taking at least one Rover. Extra points for taking a *mobile* kethane mining platform. Uber extra points for landing within 1km of an Arch.

THE BIG RUB:

Your Kerbal to spacecraft mass ratio MAY NOT EXCEED 3.2 tons on the launchpad (if you're taking 25 Kerbals your spacecraft *must* be less than 80 tons).

Spoilage: I did this one, 116 tons on the pad:

Munbase Alpha. 38 Kerbals, 4 broken engines, a slightly southward listing, and one fired Danald Kerman.

Edited August 21, 2013 by ihtoit

[Francesco]

the rules you have set up are very strict: you say we lose point if there is no shelter, and I don't know about the HOME habitats, but carrying 25 kerbals with stock parts means using no less than 6 hitchhiker modules = 15 tons at least.

now try to carry that to orbit with a craft that's under 80 tons.

I'd like you to show us your attempt at this.

(inb4 air hogging SSTO)

[ihtoit]

the rules you have set up are very strict: you say we lose point if there is no shelter, and I don't know about the HOME habitats, but carrying 25 kerbals with stock parts means using no less than 6 hitchhiker modules = 15 tons at least.

now try to carry that to orbit with a craft that's under 80 tons.

I'd like you to show us your attempt at this.

(inb4 air hogging SSTO)

1. shelter: enclosed (hitchhiker or HOME hab) or open (structural plates?) roof. No roof=lose points (1 per kerbal not under a shelter).

2. see above photo. I did way overkill on fuel (I could have easily switched out the orange tank with something way lighter, like say a rover bay, and still have enough fuel to make a six-point landing *and* land with a rover thus fulfilling one of my own mission objectives! DUH!).

2.5. I've tried four times now with strictly stock parts: stock atomic engines (7 of), 6 hitchhiker cans 1 nose cockpit to bring it to 25, one largeish fuel tank to bring it to 43 tons and I keep misjudging the landing (usually ending up faceplanting it at a million miles an hour! I'm tired...)

Edited August 21, 2013 by ihtoit

[ihtoit]

you could also use the Kosmos Salyut modules but I think they're designed more for orbital habitats than tail landings on solid rock

[ihtoit]

This one do you, Francesco?

42.79 on the pad, exactly 25 Kerbals, and landed (well, nursed it the last 50km!) with over half a tank left.

As a minimalist answer to the challenge, it's actually pretty successful (and proves that it's doable).

Yes, I know only a few Kerbals are shown here but it does take a while to fetch them all out on my poor laptop - rest assured the Partystarter did fire and filled all the cans. All the little yellow guys are accounted for. And a big "Well done!" to Luke Kerman for not CRASHING.

[Johnno]

Your spacecraft *may not* have separable boosters (ie it must be single stage to Mun)

I think this is the confusing bit (as I'll show further down to your examples), single stage from Kerbin surface? That's how it reads.

This one do you, Francesco?

42.79 on the pad, exactly 25 Kerbals, and landed (well, nursed it the last 50km!) with over half a tank left.

As a minimalist answer to the challenge, it's actually pretty successful (and proves that it's doable).

This one doesn't do me at least, nor does it prove that it's possible. First off you claim 42.79 tons on the pad. However, here's some very quick math:

Hitchhiker pod 2.5T x6 = 15T

LV-N 2.25T x7 = 15.75T

X200-32 tank 18T

Total already at 48.75T

Not to mention that the 'base' in your image has less than 1 TWR on Kerbin and under 2800dV.

So, I take it this is about single stage from Kerbin orbit, which in that case should be specified. And Francesco even pointed out "to orbit" which you brushed aside, rather than explaining. So, feel free to explain how you got your latest base to Mün, with about 0.8 TWR and less than 2800dV from Kerbin's surface.

Oh I just noticed, how does your 7 LV-N have 2240kN of thrust? Tweaked your engines' thrust and ISP a bit?

[Francesco]

Well, if by "shelter" you simply mean structural panels above each Kerbal's head, that changes everything.

Also, if you allow orbit refuelling, then I'll just build a Kerbin SSTO with some 4500 m/s of delta-v, launch it, and refuel it before Mun transfer.

I'll do it tomorrow.

Oh and by the way, I agree with Johnno: what's with the cheaty LV-N engines?

Seeing both of your screenshots, you seem to be using an upgraded, 320 kN version. Hmmm...

[ihtoit]

They're the Super Atomics, they came with the Luvodicus pack, I haven't done anything to them - nobody's shown me how.

[ihtoit]

.craft file

in the VAB:

...and for those who know how, please feel free to check the stats on my Super Atomics with that as supplied by Luvodicus and you will see that I have NOT tampered with it.

[slay_mithos]

(someone just reading barging in)

Wait, ISP of 2000 at sea level, 5000 in void, and 320 thrust?

I sure am not the only one finding those engine cheaty, right?

The stock nuclear is 220/800 and 60 thrust.

Heck, even the most efficient engine in stock parts, the ion "only" has an ISP of 4200 in the void, but for a thrust of 0.5.

If you use engines that are so much more efficient and powerful than the standard ones, you might as well let people toggle infinite fuel or gravity via cheats, no?

Not taking part into the challenge, it might be just me talking without knowing, but it seems to me that your entire challenge is based on having access to vastly overpowered things, so you might want to try to stick with parts more in line with the stock ones, at least for engines and fuel. Just my two cents though, so feel free not to take it to heart.

Edited August 22, 2013 by slay_mithos

[Johnno]

If you allow ridicilously overpowered mods there's no point to a challenge. Just because *someone* created something and uploaded it to the spaceport doesn't mean it's okay to use in a competition vs other players without everyone knowing about it. Just because you didn't tamper with it doesn't change the fact of how utterly overpowered it is. And what's even less okay is that it uses the same model/texture as the regular one, leading to confusion.

In that regard this isn't even a design challenge, this is a challenge in who can find the most ridicilous mod to use from the spaceport.

[ihtoit]

it's not ridiculously overpowered, the Mainsail is ridiculously overpowered.

[slay_mithos]

Mainsail is OP?

Guess you need to rework your definition a bit...

Sure, it offers a damn powerful thrust, but the efficiency is not that great, it chew through your fuel at an incredible rate.

If you don't look at ISP numbers, or if you use "infinite fuel", they sure pack a lot of power, but if you take into account that they need a lot of fuel, their TWR plummets really fast.

In the case of this challenge, it's even worse, because you can't decouple empty tanks, so good luck even getting to orbit while still having your rules.

ISP is 280/330 for a thrust of 1500.

In case you don't understand ISP, let's just say that the lower the number, the higher the fuel consumption for a given thrust.

This is the main reason why people use nuclear engines in the void (low thrust, but very high ISP in void), and small vessel can be fully reliant on aerospikes (quite high ISP with a decent thrust).

Your engine basically has a bit more thrust than the NovaPunch mod's version of the 2.5m of Nuclear engine (it has 300), but with ISP values far off the chart for any engine apart from the ion engine.

To speak in terms you will understand, look at the Delta-V and the acceleration (in m/s²) for your ship, and try switching the engines for the "overpowered" mainsail, or other stock-like engines.

While mainsail will give you a far better acceleration, due to their high thrust, you will see that the total acceleration with the given fuel (Delta-V) will be significantly lower.

If you still don't believe me, then try your ship with Mainsails, and come back to us after testing that out, I would be amazed if you even manage to orbit your ship.

EDIT: As I read my post, it's damn offensive, so let me say this. The challenge itself is not bad, but some of the rules (one stage, kerbal to weight ratio) make it really hard to come up with interesting designs.

Maybe making the rules apply starting from when you get a stable kerbin orbit would be a bit better, I don't know.

Edited August 22, 2013 by slay_mithos

[ihtoit]

I'll have a think Slay, you've given me some very valid points to consider here...

[stupid_chris]

Alright, since this seems to be kinda confusing and because the rules seem self contradicting on the "no cheats" part, I'm going to close this challenge now. ihtoit, if you want to give this challenge a second go, feel free to do so but be sure to specify clearly what people are allowed and not allowed to do

Alright, thread closed.