First Kethane attempts, Mun and Minmus.

[Galane]

Gravity is a real drag. Especially when your Kethane miner doesn't have enough fuel to get off the Mun.

AARP's first Kethane mining rover. A complete lack of ideas for a name resulted in the fallback Kerbal position of "Adding K to every word", thus Krover.

It wasn't until Krover was on his way to Minmus (following a Kethane scanning satellite that was already there) that we realized it was likely very lacking in power and didn't have any lights. Then someone came up with the bright idea to put Kethane scanners on the rover and use it as the satellite before landing on the Mun. Saved a bunch of time, not having to send two ships. Here's Kleveland in the VAB.

Here's Kleveland launching. (Krover launched at night so no pic.) That booster stage is the product of many failed launches of the Minmus scanner satellite, trying to keep those blasted Mainsails from ripping it apart. The small engines strapped onto it were extras for the rover launches.

Krover on Minmus. Amazingly, those 3x2 panels don't destroy each other as they track the sun. He's very skittish to drive in low gravity, especially since at least one of the wheels is apparently out of alignment despite appearing to be straight. Krover got filled up on Kethane and is back in Minmus orbit, easy as can be.

Can't say the same for Kleveland! Yes, he is perched near the top of a steep crater rim, fortunately already aimed in a prograde direction. Unfortunately the descent stage was cut loose a bit too soon and dear Kleveland is around 30 second short on fuel to be able to get up to even a 4KM orbit. I broke out the infinite fuel cheat for the first time just to salvage the 4,000 units of Kethane then drained Kleveland of everything but enough RCS fuel to deorbit it. I did get a few empty hexes scanned on the way down. Was quite fun with several very close passes of crater rims.

The Minmus Kethane scanning satellite. Simple as can be, with eight 1x6 panels for plenty of power and a big fuel tank for lots of orbit changes. With the scanner front and center, a way was needed to dock for refueling in Kerbin orbit. This lash up provides a docking boom and RCS thrusters that can be cut loose to save un-needed weight. MechJeb had no problem at all with the offset docking port.

Once the wheel alignment issue is taken care of, a new Kleveland will be built (minus the scanners) with Moar Power and sent to Minmus, along with a Kethane refinery ship. It's undecided if the Krover-Kleveland Kethane mining rover design will be upgraded with a larger fuel capacity and other changes to enable it to lift from the mun with a full tank - or if an all new design will be required. With the alterations I think it'll take, probably won't resemble the original much at all.

The original Krover may be retained in use on Minmus despite its problems. It's already there and has at least proven it can get back off the surface. Won't know if it can land on its own (without the original descent stage), fill up on Kethane and return to orbit again after the refinery tops up its fuel and oxidizer. The plan was to have Several Krovers shuttling up and down from Minmus and Mun.

The refinery ship design is quite simple, with an omni docking port on its nose for easy expansion. A multi port docking module is planned to sandwich between the current ship and a second Rockomax 64, carrying four more of the giant solar panels.

[Galane]

Here's Kleveland version 2. Only 8 more parts than the first one and it drives straight.

Hmmm. Less % of fuel left than the first version, but started with double the amount, and it did the entire landing on its own fuel. I kicked loose the completely full final stage in Mun orbit, but kept the quicksave from just before in case this one can't make it back to orbit either.

More ground clearance, 10 engines which are setup with two action groups. One toggles the outside middle pair, the other toggles the four innermost ones. I had it land from 10KM on the 8 inner engines. Might have to try it on just four. With the two outers off it can lift on Kerbin right from engine start, so it should have plenty of power to go up with a full Kethane tank. Question is, does it have enough fuel? (Must remember to turn the reaction wheel back on before attempting liftoff!)

The landing was down in the crater a ways so I drove up on this ridge to get some free altitude. Will most likely explore a good looking hill nearby to see if I can get to 5KM. I'd thought about sticking on the smallest Kethane converter somewhere, but that'd add more weight. Would fix the not enough fuel to orbit problem...

[MisterFister]

You speak of testing its lift capacity at KSC, but this still not telling you what would happen with full K-tank. I've seen someone host a savefile (possibly even a testbed savefile, one used for limited purposes such as this one) wherein they mine a quantity of kethane, and specifically haul it, unrefined back to KSC, just so they can have some unrefined kethane in a tank near the launchpad. Then, using either KAS, quantum fuel transfer, or even a complicated floating transfer boom nearby for those who wish not to use those mods (can't call them mod-purists, since we're talking kethane, which is a mod itself) they can test a design such as yours here, with full or even simulated-full (equivalent weight) in the k-tanks.

[Galane]

I installed Hyperedit and have been using it to fill the Kethane tanks to do Kerbin based function testing.

Last night I wasted a bunch of time trying to build a rover with a pair of 4,000 unit Kethane tanks in tandem. Figured I could stack it on top of an enbiggened 2 to 1 adapter flipped upside down. Got it balanced with one big drill on one end, center of mass over center of thrust, and it'd flip over. The other gotcha was having to attach the one tank to everything else with struts.

Aside from the balance issues, that *could* work - if KSP didn't treat the strut attached parts as part of a lower stage and delete all the struts when the rover's cut loose. Could do it with a pair of clampotron Sr's but that'd just be more weight on the rover.

So that whole project went in the bin and I started over with the stretchy tanks, girders and wheels from Kleveland 2M (not pictured yet) and built up from there around an 8,000 unit tank and two big drills to keep it balanced. It's a heavy beast with the large converter, 6 RTGs, tons (literally) of batteries and 12 6x1 solar panels.

Amazingly, it can lift from Mun full up with the same two radial mount engines as Kleveland 2M. Doesn't leave much fuel left in the stretchy tanks (which have been pulled out longer) but it does work. I was getting real tired, don't recall if I made rendezvous with the refinery in Mun orbit or not.

Now I need to build a launcher under Kleveland 3M (M for Mun) to get it to Mun without Hyperedit, at least once!

So much for my ideal of being able to use the same Kethane rovers on both of Kerbin's moons. I supposed I could send a Kleveland 3M to Minmus... but Krover and Kleveland don't have enough fuel to land on Mun and get back to orbit while Kleveland 2M is terribly slow at refueling with its small converter. Could put a large one on and stretch its fuel tanks and call it Kleveland 2Ma but for only 4,000 a trip it's not worth it.

[MisterFister]

It sounds to me like you have three distinct phases of your operation. Extraction, refinement, and transport. You're trying to combine the first and third in your rover. Why not split those three jobs across three different platforms? Have a rover that's only design strength is extraction, design a separate tanker transport (rover or lander) and design a third refinement platform. You can refine in Munar / Minmar / Kerbal orbit, or on any surface. It can be a static installation, or one with its own propulsion.

[Galane]

Yeah, but then one has to land the rovers and the Kethane transport landers close to each other and be able to horizontally dock the two to transfer Kethane from the rover to the transport, which on the Mun will likely also need its own converter to be able to refuel to get back to orbit.

I've ended up with most of my Kethane on Mun and Minmus in some quite rough territory. So far my rovers have been able to plonk down anywhere and mine Kethane. A few times I've had to move them. If a separate rover and lander can't line up to dock, both are stuck where they are. If the rover is given large enough tanks that when refueled it can get back to orbit to relocate, may as well have everything on one vehicle.

A plain lander with both mining and refining would be stuck if it misses the deposit. No Kethane = no way to refuel, would have to make a sub-orbital hop. I may look into such a ship for deposits on flatter ground.

[Galane]

The history of the Krover-Kleveland series thus far.

First off some leftover rockets from AARP's "not-a-missile, really" Armed Camp/Guard program were hastily modified to launch Kethane scanners into Kerbin orbit. Our scientists were disappointed that not only were the best deposits under water or at high latitudes, there were none in the immediate vicinity of KSC, except for a large but low grade deposit just offshore to the south.

The next best locations to mine Kethane were the moons, Mun and Minmus. After having an unsolvable systems glitch where only a single scanner can be operable in Kerbin orbit at any time, the decision was made to send a large scanner to Minmus with a large fuel tank so it would be capable of making many orbit inclination changes. Getting such a payload there turned out to be AARP's longest, most failure filled R&D program to date, but the resulting launcher proved to be very useful for the next phase.

Alan Aerospace Recycling and Packaging next embarked on a project to design vehicles to mine the newly discovered resource called "Kethane". But simple landers won't do, noooo. They should be mobile! Also, designing a vehicle to reach the Mun is easy-peasy so we shot for Minmus instead because any rocket that can reach Minmus can also reach Mun.

The initial design, dubbed "Krover", is quickly scribbled out on a drink coaster in the CAD department's cafeteria then hastily assembled - Neglecting such niceties as lights and ensuring all the wheels were on straight. During drive tests it first goes off the back end of the pad, then wants to constantly swerve to the right. "Just keep bumping the joystick to the side, not like it can drive too fast on Minmus without crashing. It needs to be in space ASAP!" After a surprisingly short series of test flights on top of the Minmus scanner launcher, Krover was on his way to Minmus. It was extremely difficult to drive, was slow to fill its Kethane tank, ran out of power in the dark and our remote operators complained they couldn't watch it work at night without any lights. However, they did eventually find a way to remotely correct the rotation of its two crooked wheels.

After filling Krover's tank and launching it back into Minmus orbit, our attention turned to the Mun. A second Krover was assembled but with the 3x2 panels changed out for 6x1's and two RTGs and a pair of small Kethane scanners were added after the chief janitor (and engineer) said "Instead of sending a separate satellite and rover, why not use the rover as the satellite to find the green stuff, then land it on a good spot?". The suggestion was met with such enthusiasm that once again lights were forgotten and unfortunately the crooked jig used to mount Krover's wheels was reused. It was also decided that the changes merited a new name, Kleveland.

The new vehicle used a lot of fuel landing, even though the Minmus Intercept* stage was used for the initial deorbit, came down on a steep slope and was impossible to move without it violently swerving and tipping over. It also did not have enough fuel to make it back to Mun orbit, let alone complete a rendezvous. Our dream of having the same rover design for both of Kerbin's moons was dashed. After some quick BOTC (Bottom Of The Coaster) calculations, it was decided to allow Kleveland to crash and start over with a fresh coaster for a Mun mining rover.

*Called such because it was required to finish the intercept at Minmus but ended up being weight carried to Mun. Will be removed if/when there are more Kleveland 2M flights.

Phase II was then begun.

Everything on the wheel mounting jig used on Krover and Kleveland tested out perfect, but after attaching the wheels to the girders, two were always crooked.

Rather than continuing to fiddle with the design anymore, the stack of coasters was retrieved from the card table in the rec room and the best scribble was chosen to be the design for Kleveland 2. Much of Kleveland's central stack was kept, with the addition of 2 more RTGs for a total of 4, and two 3x2 panels. The girders were laid out in a straight direction, which eliminated the wheel attaching issues of the original design. LIGHTS! Someone finally remembered the lights. Placing the drills fore and aft presented a problem of where to locate the engines and fuel tanks. The new girders were ideal for laying down a pair of tanks and 10 small engines were mounted in various locations. The new arrangement was powerful enough to lift Kleveland 2 in Kerbin gravity right from ignition. "Overpowered? Don't know the meaning of that word." was heard more than once from members of the design team, along with a "YES! This ought to work on both moons!".

The general appointment was soon dissed as the new design also showed itself to be a fuel hog, burning too much on the way down to make it back up from the Mun. Having confidence in the basic layout, several attempts were made with changing the tanks out for stretchy ones, pulled out to the limits of the size of the rover and trying to limit fuel burn by turning some of the engines off but it made no difference, it'd always burn over half the fuel on the way down so there was no way this design was ever coming back up with a full Kethane tank.

There was nothing for it but to add a Kethane converter to a Mun mining rover.

During a strategy meeting it was decided that the original Krover-Kleveland design was too limited and that unless the wheel problem could be solved it was pretty much useless even for Minmus. Kleveland 2 would become the prime design for Minmus and a modified version with a Kethane converter would be dubbed Kleveland 2M (M for Mun).

A small converter was wedged in between the top of the battery and a shortened docking port support girder and after debugging the fuel flow from the converter to the side tanks (enlarged stretchy ones from the Kleveland 2 tests) a 2M was duly launched to Mun. By this point in the program, nobody was surprised that it worked, but more calculations (this time on a 2A/2B ruled writing pad) showed it to be an inefficient way to loft Kethane from the Mun.

Turning to a fresh sheet of paper, a design was sketched for a 2M with the stretchy tanks stretched a wee bit farther and a large converter installed. It was named Kleveland 2Ma then abandoned on the (writing) pad as an even less economical way to lift 4,000 units of Kethane.

The next step was proceding immediately to Kleveland 3M with two 4,000 unit tanks in tandem on top of an oversized bi-coupler with a single large drill a stack of large batteries, a large converter, 7 RTGs and lots of solar panels. Balance problems despite COM and COT being aligned (it flipped and tumbled down the pad ramp the one time it was tested under power), the need for even more wheels and the problem with it falling apart as the struts vaporized when the rover was staged off the bi-coupler doomed it. (Note: The preceding paragraph never happened, just check AARP's files, there's nothing there on this design.)

The next step was proceeding immediately to Kleveland 3M with a single 8,000 unit tank, two large drills, the wheels and girders from Kleveland 2, more batteries, 6 RTGs, a large cnverter and a lot of 6x1 solar panels should have the 3M as a useful workhorse of AARP's Kethane mining system. Despite its greater weight it has shown in simulation (that would be using Hyperedit) to be capable of lifting 8,000 units of Kethane to a 15KM Mun orbit from a surface altitude of less than 3,000 meters, with what should be enough fuel left for a refinery rendezvous. If not, just convert some of the onboard supply.

It only remains to build a launcher capable of actually transporting a Kleveland 3M to the Mun.

Done! Using the vertical external mounting properties of the large drills, small diameter tanks were extended down from beneath them, either side of a Rockomax 64. That pattern was continued down to the booster stage, which is a hybrid asparagus/parallel staging style. The three upper stage engines do not share fuel. The side engines stay on through circularization then a fuel tanker is docked to top up everything. Once the Transmunar Injection burn is finished, remaining fuel in the side tanks is transferred to the big tank and the side tanks and engines jettisoned. Didn't have to clean them up, the transfer trajectory had them hit the Mun dead center.

As for the other part of the program, the orbital refineries are simple and completely unremarkable. Just a stack of an 8,000 unit Kethane tank, an RCS tank, Rockomax 64, some batteries, reaction wheel, large converter, remote guidance unit, engine, RCS jets, a 3-in-one UbioZur Omni docking port and four giant solar panels, stacked as appropriate. A refinery expansion has also been built, but with a 4,000 unit tank, six giant panels and two standard docking ports on its sides. We left the design of these to the journeyman parts stackers and they worked first time out, nothing special about the designs.

I just had a look 'round the web, figuring I could find *something* on those 2A/2B or 2B/2A grade school writing tablets with the thick and thin blue lines and the hideous, red and blue, drum beating clown on the cover - but nothing. Absolutely nothing to be found! Students in American grade schools used them by the ton 30+ years ago.

Edited October 20, 2013 by Galane

[Galane]

MechJeb2 2.0.9.0-83 has some amazing landing accuracy, a bit too accurate at times. Things wiggled just as I clicked and the target got set to the exact location of Kleveland 3M and MJ nailed it spot on.

I was able to drive it off but it tipped onto its side. I quickly retracted the panels. I figured it'd flip completely over but it just stopped. I backed 3M up a bit then used RCS to flip 2M onto its wheels. No damage done to anything! Whew!

Here's a daylight shot of 3M and 2M side by side.

I leave the small tank on top of 3M empty for landings, fill it up for takeoff. Odd thing is, that tank is drained only after the side tanks empty. Haven't had to tap it yet in "real" use but did during "simulation" flights with Hyperedit. If fuel gets that low by the time orbit is achieved, it's not going to make rendezvous with the refinery. The fuel in that tank gets transferred to the refinery's tanks.

3M has six cylindrified RCS tanks. For the trip after next I may leave two of them empty. Less weight should save a little fuel. Even with having RCS on for the full landing, ascent and docking it doesn't come near to running out. Still crazy that the same two engines used by 2M can lift 3M just as easy with everything full. Kleveland 2 is just grossly overpowered with its 10 little engines. I should fill its Kethane tank and see if it can still lift on Kerbin.

Next step? Perhaps a rover capable of lifting 16,000 units of Kethane? Going to have to figure out a way to do it with the tanks laying down or some way to make it no taller than Kleveland 3M. Will be such a drastic change it'll have to start a new development series name.

[Galane]

And here it is, the 16,000 unit Large Rover. Nobody could think of a name, the only thing the staff could agree on was that the name shouldn't have a K in it.

"What are we going to call it? With the horizontal Kethane tank and the only pieces of the Kleveland 2M/3M design we kept were the girders and end wheels, can't call it Kleveland 4M."

"It's a big rover."

"Not a clue."

"Quite large, in fact."

"I got nothing."

"Positively huge, biggest booster AARP has built yet."

"Nothing from nothing, carry the nothing..."

"It's a really large rover."

"It's 10 minutes 'till closing time, how about we just call it 'Large Rover' for now? All in favor?"

*All say* "AYE!"

Large Rover landing. Not wanting a repeat of the previous rover-on-rover action, I clicked a little distance away, which proved to be 2.5KM and only a few meters outside a crater. Whew!

So I drove over to take a group photo. Disabled the four front wheels then used periodic tapping on S to keep the speed in check, only using the brakes below 1.5M/sec.

The booster, but with a 16K Kethane tank on top. With Large Rover onboard it's 499 parts and lags a bit until the first stage drops. My first use of Quantum struts. They hold the third stage rock solid with only 4. I put six on top of the third stage to hold the rover, which is perched on with a radial attachment so the connection is pretty small.

Many of those parts are struts binding the first stage together. I tried using Quantum struts but for some reason they wouldn't keep it together and using them to bind the first and second stages together only resulted in them popping the connections when physics kicked in and the rocket settled on the pad. So back to strut spamming.

Woohoo! In orbit with some juice still left in the second stage. I can fill that up and go places! I can go to... oh poo. I forgot to install a Kethane converter. Hmmm, still have some headroom with the lighter payload, could pull those stretchy tanks out a bit and still get to orbit with the second stage on... The second stage is the core of the first stage used to launch all the previous rovers and the big scanner satellite to Minmus. Hooray for the new subassembly feature! Made the launcher build much easier for Large Rover since I already had a powerful stage that won't rip itself apart, only had to debug the first stage. But for some reason, one of those Skippers and its orange tank will sometimes rip loose with the heavy Large Rover as the payload.

Edited October 21, 2013 by Galane