Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" (LOTS of pictures)

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne"

After the successful mission to Jool, a target more close by was picked.

The successful launch of the Behemoth was the first step to accomplish this.

This vessel has more than enough Delta-V to get a large payload to Duna and back.

Edited September 6, 2013 by Tokay Gris

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Mission profile

With the huge capacity of the Behemoth, a rather ambitious project was started.

Primary Objectives:

- Place communications satellites around Duna and Ike

- Place kethane mapping satellites around Duna and Ike

- Land a rover on Duna that can dig for kethane and process it

- Make a manned landing on Duna

- Return to Kerbin

Secondary Objectives:

- Make a manned landing on Ike

To accomplish all these objectives, a four-part vessel will be staged and assembled in orbit.

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Vessels

Getting the transfer vessel (a "Behemoth MK 1") into orbit was of course rather difficult, due to the immense weight of the vessel.

This problem was solved by emptying the the tanks before launch.

For some reason, one of the SAS-modules fell off during launch.

It was decided to go on anyway and regard this as tribute to the space kraken.

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Vessels

The kethane rover

Although this mission brings along more than enough fuel, it was decided to add kethane mining abilities to a rover that should be able to cover distances with ease.

A version without parachutes was tested on Mun.

The test was successful and an additional orbital maneuver stage was added and placed into orbit.

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Vessels

Satellites module

These rather simple satellites - two for communications and two for kethane mapping - are placed around a lightweight structure and placed in orbit.

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Assembly, fueling and crew

Assembly worked without difficulties.

First, the satellites module was docked to the rover module with the help of a RCS-capable remote controlled vessel. After this was completed, the transfer stage was docked.

And lastly, the lander was successfully docked.

Refueling was tedious, but also no problems occurred.

Three "OT Lummox MK2" were enough to fill the transfer stage.

To change the center of mass more to the transfer vessel, the tanks of the other three modules were emptied and the reaction wheels disabled to reduce the expected instability.

Since this vessel has a TWR of only 0.2, it was then placed in an orbit of 300 km to avoid dipping into the atmosphere during the ejection burn.

Crew

- Jebediah Kerman, commanding, landing pilot.

- Bill Kerman, docking pilot

- Bob Kerman, astrogation.

- Huddas Kerman, pilot of transfer stage

- Enkin Kerman, docking pilot

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Mission report

As was expected, the complete vessel - now officially christened "Podkayne" - showed tremendous oscillations during the seven minute ejection burn.

This could be compensated by switching one of the reaction wheels on again in the middle of the vessel.

Although the oscillations did not vanish, they were now manageable and did not destroy the vessel.

Due to the complicated nature of this vessel, it was decided at this point NOT to try aerobraking in Dunas atmosphere.

[BostLabs]

This appears very well thought out. Good stuff!

[Tokay Gris]

Thanks!

This is as far as I am right now with this mission... Let's hope that it works as planned...

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Mission report

As was hoped, the transfer and minor course corrections worked without a glitch.

And even better: The arrival was in a nice orbit to directly head on to Ike!

So, the first braking maneuver was a little bit shorter.

Although the intercept orbit to Ike was not perfect, it was good enough to get there with minimal Delta-V usage.

After proper orbit around Dunas moon was achieved, the satellites where then fueled and one after the other sent on their way.

At this point a minor problem arose. The reaction wheels of the satellites were not strong enough to counter the imbalance the remaining docking struts.

But luckily this could be countered by reducing the thrust of the satellites to 50 and 30 percent respectively for the two types.

This is how the "Podkayne" looks without the satellites:

So, one of the primary objectives is complete!

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Mission report

Right after deployment of the four satellites, another problem arose.

Due to a minor oversight in construction, there was no docking port on top of the rover itself.

The initial plan to dock the lander after successful landing on Ike to the top of the rover module had to be discarded.

Luckily, the Duna area is forgiving... The Delta-V needed to get from Ike to Duna is low and it payed off at this point that the rover was equipped with an additional orbital maneuver stage.

So the revised plan is as follows:

- Undock the link between the - now empty - satellite module and the rover module.

- Undock the rover module from the transfer stage, leaving the adaptor (senior to normal docking port) attached to the transfer stage. (PRAY that the docking bug looks the other way...)

- Transfer the rover with the orbital maneuver stage to an orbit around Duna.

- After deorbit burn of the lander, decouple everything from the senior docking port of the lander downward to collide with Ike.

- Land on Ike

- Ascent and redock with the transfer stage, head to head, using the adaptor

- Transfer to Duna

Execution:

Phase One: Decouple

The second adaptor will stay in place on top of the rover module, just in case refuelling will be necessary in Duna orbit. The rover module has no other docking ports.

Phase Two had to be revised due to time restraints. The lander was docked to the transfer stage prior to the transfer of the rover module.

The rover module was then transfered to a Duna orbit, roughly circular and roughly equatorial.

As a landing site on Ike, a rather flat area was chosen on the equator. From orbit, it all looked similar.

After successful landing, the obligatory flag was planted by Jebediah Kerman.

Ascent was without problems. The rendezvous maneuver, however, was a problem.

After the ascent, the two deployed solar panels were shielded from the sun by various parts of the vessel and the lander lost power.

The docking computer went into berserk mode after restart and did weird things.... Thankfully, a cold restart solved that problem and there was enough Delta-V left to make the rendezvous.

It was decided to NEVER EVER use a Microsoft docking computer again....

After rendezvous and emptying the tanks of the lander, the transfer to Duna worked again without problems.

Secondary objective complete!

Edited September 6, 2013 by Tokay Gris

[Tokay Gris]

Mission to Duna - "Podkayne" - Mission report

After successful transition to Dunas orbit, a landing site was chosen. As this mission is on a side not supposed to find a suitable spot for a base, anomalies were neglected and a site on the equator was chosen.

Parachutes did help. Due to some malfunction in the landing autopilot (Mechjeb doesn't seem to like Duna), quite a bit of fuel was wasted.

Also, for no known reason, the parachutes ripped about ten metres off the ground, right when the fuel in the landing stage was ran out.

The "touchdown" was hard. But luckily the craft stayed upright, nothing broke off and landing on Dunas surface was accomplished!

Another primary objective complete!

[Tokay Gris]

Since landing on Duna, there is a 135 day period until the next window, an ambicious project will be staged....

Eeloo. Plan so far and in the making: Landing Kerbals on the surface, one small rover, one big rover with kethane mining abilities, one habitat, two kethane satellites, four Com-satellites.

All in one mission and one ship.

[Tokay Gris]

I decided to continue the Saga of Delos Aerospace in a blog...

That way, it will not get lost in the depths of the forum. Also, with the current browser bug.... But I will try to post here as well.

It is still a work in progress, but here it is so far.

[Tokay Gris]

Immediately after successful touchdown of the lander, the landing of the kethane rover was attempted.

All progressed well and it was possible to get the rover to the surface near the lander.

After this was accomplished, finally Jebediah Kerman set foot on the surface! Recorded first words: "Pretty red around here."

Ike setting on the horizon.

After refuelling the lander, further exploration of Duna can begin!