12 Kerbals to Jool and Back - The Philadelphia Program (Picture heavy)

[Blue]

I've been landing on the Mun since version 0.13 so I knew that I had to do something of epic proportions to prove to myself that I'd really learned something about this game when I finally bought it for Steam at Version 0.17. So, I began planning a manned mission to Jool- to land on every moon, and return safely to Kerbin.

The initial version of the Program called for three kerbals in one spacecraft, which would also carry a low-gravity Lander, spare fuel, and a large set of probes-orbiters and probe-landers. A second spacecraft would carry a Tylo/Laythe lander, with the ambition that in a single mission, the three kerbals would visit all of the moons of Jool, before coming home. It was soon concluded that the initial design for the Philadelphia Interplanetary spacecraft had far too little thrust, and that such a mission could not be done with the initially planned provisions. Over a month later, and with a Gilly-Return landing under PRANCE's belt, the Program was redesigned and re-planned.

Philadelphia-A would carry 12 Kerbals in 2 Habitation modules, the Nazareth Multi-purpose low gravity Lander (tasked with Pol, Bop and Vall) and a spare fuel module, all carried by the vastly improved Philadelphia III spacecraft.

The Nazareth Lander was more than sufficient for the tiny moons, and up to the task for Vall.

Crew being transferred to the Philadelphia-A, only hours away from Jool departure.

Philadelphia III spacecraft with Clover-Heavy Lifter system. Clover was designed to carry 1 Orange fuel tank into orbit for refueling, but is capable of carrying a Philadelphia when dry of fuel.

Philadelphia-B would carry 4 return capsules, and would be the only spacecraft returning to Kerbin. It was launched before more recent revisions of the Philadelphia spacecraft, so the mission was carried out by an older Philadelphia II model. Note the different engine configuration and tail docking port extension.

Philadelphia-TLT would carry the heavy Damascus Laythe-Tylo Lander alone.

The Damascus Lander is extremely heavily based upon the design used by Scott Manley in the Tylo Or Bust video series, extending the core tank and adding several parachutes.

The Philadelphia-TLT was launched in a Pre-Docked configuration from the surface, since an effective system for ensuring stability during transport couldn't otherwise be concieved. Here it's being launched by the Ziz Apex Lifter.

Approximately two full orange-tanks worth of fuel made it into orbit along with the Transport and Lander. This was transferred aboard.

All in all, after the launching of the main spacecraft, 20 Refuelings were required with the Clover Fuel Tug. Each were nicknamed "Philly-Fueler" and numbered according to their task, A1-6, B1-5 and TLT1-9

Departure took place Day 17, Year 3. Unfortunately, no pictures were taken during the departure of Philly A, B or TLT.

Each of the spacecraft was given a trajectory so that they would arrive within 20 days of each other, all arriving shortly after the arrival of Chastity 7/8; a separate Program for mapping all celestial bodies in the system.

Chastity 7/8 Arrived at Jool, and aerocaptured into a high orbit around Laythe.

Philly-TLT was the first to arrive, and also set itself into a highly eccentric orbit around Laythe. Little was known about navigating Jool, and for this reason, more careful orbital planning did not happen until after the first landing.

It had a very scenic flyby of Vall upon arrival.

Since the transport did not cut into the Lander fuel, Philly-TLT was front-heavy and areocaptured into Jool in a prograde attitude.

Philly-B arrived next. Due to a fortuitous circumstance, Philadelphia-B was able to do a direct aerocapture through Laythe. It was later sent to Vall to await the crew following all five landings, for departure back to Kerbin.

Philly-B arrived last.

Trouble with one of the solar panels caused an EVA with the tight constraint of only a couple of hours before the Joolian aerocapture, resulting in one of the most iconic images of risk the Philadelphia mission.

In Laythe orbit.

After a prompt Rendezvous of Philadelphia A, B and TLT, the crew immediately got to work with their first landing.

And they can tell you: docking such spacecraft is not something to sneeze at. Nevertheless, Bill Kerman was glad he brought his handkerchief.

Unfortunately, after the rendezvous, a fuel stock was taken, and it was realized that not enough fuel was with all three spacecraft in total for a full mission, including Tylo and a return trip. Ad-Hoc, a Philadelphia IIIF was built and launched using the Ziz-Apex Lifter, to arrive at Jool, ASAP.

It would arrive at Jool in 170 days via a bi-eliptical transfer, going closer than Moho to Kerbol.

Damascus was sent with much gusto, piloted by the best and brightest on the mission: Bill, Bob and Chuck.

Damascus, at a higher point of the highly eliptical orbit. More than 4 simulated landings were conducted to verify safe landing sites.

Although the landing was Rocket-assisted Parachuting, it was soft and done in a highly professional manner by Bill at the helm.

PRANCE's fourth satellite landing, after Gilly, Minmus and the Mun.

Our brave kerbalnauts, and the Damascus Lander sitting proud and tall.

Hopefully she'll handle Tylo in fine style as she did Laythe. Decouplers attach the outboard tanks, which will be jettisoned after Tylo takeoff.

Chuck took some time to make sand-angels on the minor-gravity world.

Looking out at the sky, Tylo and Vall were clearly visible.

And at night.

Departure from Laythe, there was some apprehension on the ascent since Damascus had landed on such a steep slope. But the launch went splendidly, returning to the Philadelphia-TLT's high orbit with fuel to spare.

Philly-A began transferring out from Laythe and towards Pol, to land on all the other moons in a descending pattern towards a Jool-direct departure.

Philly-TLT was transferred to Tylo, where it would stay, awaiting the arrival of Philly-A after it conducted landings on Pol and Bop. Bill, Bob and Chuck would wait.

Luton and Franklin Kerman would be the bold microgravity-ker-men, who would be the first to use the Nazareth Lander.

Moments from contact.

Aw yiss.

Posing for publicity.

Jool isn't visible from the surface due to the landing site, but it is near enough to the horizon to be reached by a jetpack-assisted jump,as demonstrated here by Luton.

It was decided that another landing would be conducted due to the ease with low gravity, and that Frank and Lu would check out a mountain ridge. Frank wanted to see Jool during the transit and went on a brief EVA while they fell upwards towards the mountain.

An excellent site for a mountain landing, straddling the ridge.

And what a ridge it is!

Each of the Landing sites was named after a buddy's last name - Pol 1 and 2 were named Balchtown and Summerstown.

Lining up for a rendezvous with the Philly-A, followed by a transfer down to Bop.

Donlas and Sidfrey would be next to dominate the surface of another Joolian world.

The faces of Bop. (Not shown: a mysterious face on Bop that may be discovered in the future.)

Meanwhile, after 30 days in space, the Philly-F arrived at its Kerbol periapsis and began the burn to transfer out to Jool, tout-suite.

Much science was carried out and rather egregiously ignored by the publicity department in the 120 days it took for Philly-F to arrive at Tylo, in which time Nazareth launched and re-docked.

And here I thought docking A with TLT was hard.

Philadelphia A transferred down to Tylo and the three giants met once again. Bob, Bill and Chuck transferred back to the Philly-A.

Unfortunately again, it was concluded that a decision would have to be made- either there would be a real nail-biter of a Tylo Landing, or the crew would come home. Even with the large arrival of fuel from the Philly-F, it wasn't enough for both and provisions decided that another Philadelpha-F couldn't be sent fast enough to try for a more well-fueled Tylo Landing along with a homeward departure. In the end, it was decided that the Philadelphia TLT would be left to wait patiently in orbit, awaiting a future crew of gallant Kerbals who would brave the surface of Tylo. The Philly-A would have the spare fuel tank (now empty) jettisoned and reconfigure how the Nazareth was docked, and prepare for a Vall landing before heading home.

The heat was not too much for the Nazareth, and managed well getting all the way to Vall.

Luton would again pilot the Nazareth, with the Vall geological specialist Palcott.

Although the fuel margins were much tighter than the Mun test landing, Vall was a smashing success.

While they were on the surface, Philly-A and B docked, and began transferring crew, and the fuel that Philly-A would no longer be needing.

Last moments to take an EVA in Joolian space.

Philadelphia B with her homeward crew, having had quite an adventure and ready to leave when the boys on the ground were.

Due to a communications error, Nazareth launched from Vall to dock with the now-abandoned Philadelphia A. It was a 120km retrograde phase-change to get them back with the Philadelphia B.

Palcott and Luton, also ready to go home.

After 5 days of waiting for a favourable alignment, all twelve kerbals were ready for the departure, shown here to be taking place in only half an hour.

After a 7 minute burn, Philadelphia B was on its way. It would be nearly half a month before it left Jool's sphere of influence.

After 50 days in space, the first of three mid-course corrections.

Finally seeing home again, after 270 days coming back from Jool.

For the last time, Philadelphia B goes super-saiyan, killing off 4.3km/s of transfer velocity. At an altitude of 8000 meters the spacecraft is ditched.

A view from one of the return capsules.

Philadelphia: Went big, came home.

Landing site.

The mission has inspired a generation of Kerbals, being in space continously for 2 years and 33 days, and will inspire further expansion and ambitious projects.

Future updates to the Philadelphia interplanetary transport spacecraft were already underway while the crew were returning:

And even a proof-of-concept launch with the docking of the Philadelphia IV-D Serial Staging Experiment.

All in all, Philadelphia has forebore only good things for the future of PRANCE and all space exploration everywhere.

Edited August 24, 2013 by Blue
finished.

[1D-1()T]

That was a really good read, thank you very much for sharing that. May I ask how long that took you to do?

[astropapi1]

Ahem... KSP came out for Steam in .19

Might want to edit the OP.

[Blue]

That was a really good read, thank you very much for sharing that. May I ask how long that took you to do?

I had doodles in my notebook of the Philadelphia I in December last year. It was only a few weeks after I got reintroduced to KSP by stumbling upon Scott Manley's Klonepollo videos. Specifically, the line that sold me on the game was "My periapsis is only 112km. I'm so close! But you know what, I can get out and push." and proceeded to use the EVA jetpack.

It was only a few weeks after I bought the game I think in March this year, that I began working on initial versions of the interplanetary spacecraft and landers. Things went in earnest through July when I actually went about building, launching and committing the damn things. I also didn't want to waste the intermediate periods of the 200 day transits each way. For that, I did other missions at the same time. (My mission to Gilly returned shortly before Philadelphia arrived at Jool, which is why Jebediah was not in the mission.) Then after I learned that v0.20 would be a save-breaker, I got a jump on doing all the landings that I could before it came out. I was unable to do my first landing before it came out, and when it did, I had saved just before planning on rendezvousing Philadelphia A, B and TLT over Laythe. When the update went live, it made my ships control and navigation effectively useless until v0.21 came out.

The process of landings and transfers was the consist of me playing the game for several days (about three weeks ago), and then I continued doing various missions after Philadelphia B was sent on its way home. The return arrival occurred on Thursday last week. My next big project is to do a return 2-Kerbal mission to Moho, so Palcott was right back up in space after only literally five minutes of being back on Kerbin.

Ahem... KSP came out for Steam in .19

Might want to edit the OP.

I was playing KSP long before it was available on Steam, but I didn't bother with the detail that I transferred the game after I bought it by about a month.