Enjoying the little things.

[Shania_L]

I see a lot of posts here about the screen-bendingly big ships, the stations with enough parts to fry a cpu in all of 3 minutes (and 2 frames), how about the petite space craft? The little rocket that could?

I would like to see other peoples small/low part count ships that can do more than you would expect, lets show all those FPS hoggers what they can do!

Recently I have been achieving quite modest progress with my small scale space program, I have been deliberately stopping myself from just building a hextuple-asparagus-double-jumbotank booster and wacking a single part station into orbit.

I play a 'mostly stock' style, I.e I wont use a modded part that replaces anything provided as stock, mods add to my abilities not replace it. As such I only use 3, Ferram, Infernal Robotics and Procedural Fairings. Initially it was just going to be Ferram, but the other two are really important for launching non aerodynamic payloads.

Humble beginnings, this is the first launch I made on a new save with the mods, I think if I could control the initial boost phase better and get the launcher to lie down a little earlier it could make orbit

I am quite proud of this dual purpose launcher, a manned mun orbiter, with a robotic lander probe. Being able to have two 'tops' on a rocket frees up so many more possibilites.

However the biggest enabler by far is the ability to fold satellites, seriously, how did I survive before? This particular example was one of my first attempts and I am still proud of it.

Even though I have yet to get beyond Eve/Kerbin/Duna, I am enjoying the challenge and constantly being surprised at how much you can do with little ships.

I am even getting better at re-entry, Look I'm on the right continent !!

So let me see your little ships, especially those of you who use Ferram, I want to see how people package stuff for launch. The next thing I want to do is get a manned rover, but folding it, or getting it nicely on a rocket is proving a pain.

[WillHop]

I built this micro-station a while back. All docked in orbit, but the modules were such an easy launch.

[Bobhendly]

How do you get those clouds in there? Universe replacer? I never could get the cloud mod to work.

[WillHop]

How do you get those clouds in there? Universe replacer? I never could get the cloud mod to work.

Yep - except it wasn't the cloud mod where it added clouds to all planetary bodies, it was just a Kerbin HD Cloud pack, so only Kerbin looks this good. I'll see if I can find where I got it from.

EDIT: Here ya go http://www./download/ysne40basz7boo5/Kerbin8k-clouds.rar

[Whackjob]

[Shania_L]

WillHop

Wow, nice station, would I be right in guessing 7 seperate modules?

I might have to go for some sort of thing like this, just imagine how far you could go if you could refuel in orbit ...

Whackjob

Now that is small, seems you can go to both extremes. I see you have a parachute fitted, did it land? is it properly return capable?

[NoMrBond]

If you're a fan of the smaller side of space exploration and you're not mod averse, there's a very nice line of stock-alike 0.625m (probe size) parts/tanks/engines in hoojiwana's RLA parts pack

Seriously, they're great;

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[KatzOhki]

There are a handful of people who appreciate a tiny sized space program, including myself. At the moment I have been doing large ships that carry a lot of small probes and rovers.

[Anton P. Nym]

I built a "Kercheapnik" satellite just to see how little I could "spend" and get a working science package into orbit; one big SRB with three tailfins, a size 1 decoupler, a small SRB with a reaction wheel, a size 0 decoupler, an Ant engine, the ring-shaped fuel tank, an OKTO probe body, two static solar panels, two low-gain antennae, one each of the stock instruments (yeah, even the barometer), and a high-gain antenna. I can't remember the price, but it got into a 250km circular orbit with fuel to spare. (There were some issues with compression heating on the way up, and the second stage solid did run it up to almost 10G before flame-out, though... in the real world that'd probably break something.)

I'm also about two game-weeks away from finding out if my super-cheap "MiniMoho" ion-engined probe is an orbiter or a fly-by probe, but at ~$17,000 kerbucks all-in (including launch towers) the current 100km periapsis already makes it a success in my books.

-- Steve

[WillHop]

Wow, nice station, would I be right in guessing 7 seperate modules?

I might have to go for some sort of thing like this, just imagine how far you could go if you could refuel in orbit ...

Including the core, 7 modules is spot on it was really fun to put together and mess around one, would definitely recommend building one.

[Whackjob]

Now that is small, seems you can go to both extremes. I see you have a parachute fitted, did it land? is it properly return capable?

Nope! It was a colossal (microcolossal?) failure. Not enough delta-v. We made a new crater that day. But it was the first in a long, long line of things done on my "Lilliputia" savegame. All tiny ships. With the goal being tiny-est I can manage.

Edited October 8, 2013 by Whackjob

[Anton P. Nym]

I built a "Kercheapnik" satellite just to see how little I could "spend" and get a working science package into orbit

I just revisited Kercheapnik and I misremembered two particulars; the probe body was indeed a Sputnik, and the peak g-load was a hair under 20g, which'd definitely break things in a real probe. Still fun, though. For the record, on the pad (including launch tower) it's 21 parts and 12.5T.

-- Steve

[Whackjob]

Here's my Munar lander and RCS tug on its launcher.

All tiny parts. Limo don't count.

[spikeyhat09]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGvrCp5ZWqs

[Brotoro]

I was playing with making lightweight reentry vehicles a while back. That was fun.

This first one seemed too likely to scorch your helmet:

So this one has a bit more protection:

But for only a little more weight, you can bring along a friend:

[Odo]

Ive got a super tiny 2 stage rocket that has been extremely useful to me in the past. I use it to dock one manned pods to my station, and Ive even landed on mun, and minmus with it and returned.

Ill try to post pictures!

But I absolutely love little ships vs huge ships. It takes true skill to make a puny thing get to Duna.

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

Another way of beeing minimalistic is to explore your own celestial Body, which is indeed the most beautiful around

[csanders]

My SSTO

Refueling

[lajoswinkler]

What an awesome thread.

Brotoro, how do you manage to get a Kerbal on such vessel? External seat doesn't offer a place in VAB. My approach was to connect the stuff to a capsule and then detach it before activating the rocket.

[Moar Boosters]

What an awesome thread.

Brotoro, how do you manage to get a Kerbal on such vessel? External seat doesn't offer a place in VAB. My approach was to connect the stuff to a capsule and then detach it before activating the rocket.

Well those were carried up to orbit so presumably he had a rocket or spacestation containing kerbals and EVA'd them on there.

If you want to launch vehicles with seats, build a rover that has a hitchhiker container, and then you can use that to deliver kerbals to the launchpad for vehicles with seats.

[Brotoro]

What an awesome thread.

Brotoro, how do you manage to get a Kerbal on such vessel? External seat doesn't offer a place in VAB. My approach was to connect the stuff to a capsule and then detach it before activating the rocket.

Those each got launched along with a lander pod that supplied the kerbals. I was testing these out as possible low-weight rescue craft to attach to the side of a station or whatever...so they wouldn't start out with kerbals in them in normal use.

[mellojoe]

My most recent mission plan, and my new save, is for smaller crafts.

My maximum payload will be what I can accomplish using a craft of the Delta-V Heavy proportions, or whatever that comes out to in KSP terms. So far, my max payload is 36t. This is 3 orange tanks that drop the two outer ones. Less is more in this space program.

36t is a lot more than I initially expected, but still is a limiting factor. My Delta-II rocket can get about 11 tons. It is a single orange tank with 9 solid-fuel boosters. Both crafts are modeled after their real-life counter-parts. Or, at least what I can squeeze out of KSP and still resemble their real-life counterparts.

This whole project has made me appreciate the smaller things. I can't just slap 12 nukes on something and call it interplanetary. I can't just drop an orange tanker into orbit as a refuelling station. Smaller is better.

Its been fun to start and play with, but now I think I'm going to make some serious missions.

[Shania_L]

Wow so many interesting replies! You are all taking tiny to different meanings

Wackjob

I knew you couldnt resist it... that launcher..... you managed to make tiny, huge

Brotoro

That is quite an extreme sport you are developing there, maybe I am too kind on my Kerbals, I like to keep them safely wrapped in the tin-foil of the Mercury capsule

How much deceleration do you get off the structural panel versus the parachute? on a sufficiently light craft would it be possible to build a solid canopy? Maybe something for Eves thicker atmosphere

Odo

I would love to see that, Here is my Mun/Minmus craft for comparison, 34.45 Tonnes on the pad.

MalfunctionM1Ke

Did you drive that rover all the way there, or was it boosted? (I am assuming those are the mountains West of KSC?)

A decent manned rover is something I want to do, but I am having difficulty getting one that I can launch. Folded rovers tend to, well fold. You need to have a low wide rover for stability, but width is quite hard to get launched when you need to maintain a streamlined rocket.

csanders

Ohh an actual re-usable SSTO, now there is an idea. Just the job for supplying the ever increasing number of snax to the space station! also an excuse to use the massive rover wheels on a re-fuelling wagon!

I can see 2 aerospikes fitted, are all 4 motors the same? Did you consider maybe using turbo-jets as your atmospheric boost?

Anton P. Nym

I think the massive G-loading you get is a result of the atmospheric drag you are experiancing rather than pure acceleration. My rockets are of a similar scale to yours, yet I do not get such high G because Ferram allows streamlined rockets to accelerate to higher speeds. The same with re-entry, I carry much higher speeds to lower altitudes and as such decelerate slower.

Here is an example, This rocket is 30.4 Tonnes on the launchpad, I launched it on full throttle (normally I idle the liquid at about 15% until the solid boosters run dry. During the entire launch the G-meter never got above 6G, and that was right at burnout of the second booster pair.

And Finally, my latest launcher, I present the Black Arrow 3.

This version is carrying my first rover that managed so heroicly on the Mun, that we are sending it off to Duna. It will meetup with a second launch in LKO that is supplying the atomic transfer stage. The payload fairings are doubling as a re-entry heatshield hence the drogue chute on top, the rover has its own standard chute fitted. 37.02 Tonnes on the pad.

[Agent86]

Why, it's a tiny little SSTO! how cute...

[inigma]

The Ion. 1 kerbal VTOL SSTO, 52 parts only, capable of undocking from 120km, landing at KSC on top of the VAB roof no less, and then returning to orbit, and docking back at 120km, all without refueling. Shed the computer core and sacrifice its capability for autonomous flight, and you get 51 parts.