What planets do parachutes work on?

[Phesired]

What planets do parachutes work on?

[KasperVld]

Anything with an atmosphere: Eve, Kerbin, Duna, Jool and Laythe (moon). For Duna you'll want to keep in mind that the atmosphere is very thin and you'll probably need to bring a decent engine to slow your descent before the parachutes deploy, or else they will rip off your craft when they open at several hundreds of meters per second

[Phesired]

What about Minnimus?

[Taki117]

nope, No atmosphere, same with the Mun

[SRV Ron]

What about Minnimus?

No atmosphere. However, the low gravity and flat sea at zero altitude on Minmus makes landing there easy for your first attempts.

[Phesired]

Thanks all that commented, this is my first successful landing on any planet or moon, I don't count crash landing survives as success because they're cheap.

What would be my next bet for conquering?

[Wallace]

I think you need more batteries.

[Phesired]

Okay is that sarcasm because I am really not even sure anymore xD

[SRV Ron]

Get some OxStats and you can eliminate a ton of batteries.

[Phesired]

I am on career mode there's that and I am new to the game so I don't know what they are.

[SRV Ron]

I am on career mode there's that and I am new to the game so I don't know what they are.

They will be available soon.

You find them here on the tech tree.

Edited October 28, 2013 by SRV Ron

[Oddible]

Yeah I think most people make a bee line to Electricity early on to get the solar panels, and then to Fuel Systems to get the fuel lines for asparagus staging.

Congrats on your Minimus trip! Go to Mun next!

Did you REALLY need that many batteries? Why? I think I went to Minimus with only 2 batteries and my command pod, didn't transmit and returned with 360 science, my trip to Mun was 306 science, again without transmitting. That was enough to get me quite deep into the tech trees.

[Phesired]

People said make batteries so that's exactly what I did.

[astropapi1]

It's Minmus, not Minimus.

[MarkyJ279]

People said make batteries so that's exactly what I did.

I've read those posts; Kerbart in your lander thread was being sarcastic (and it does not matter which way your goo canisters face) and Sirine in the unbalanced ship thread was exagerating by an order of magnitude at least.

Just a heads up, your engines will produce electricity when they are running. In the very early game, you only need enough energy storage to last between using your main engine. You can track how much energy you have left with the resources tab in the top right of the screen. The biggest users of electricity are command-pod/reaction-wheel torque and transmitting data. You can turn SAS off when you are on the ground or not turning so that just leaves the transmitter.

If you are using all the energy stores: You must be transmitting contantly! Get those Oxstat solar panels asap.That'll allow you to remove most of those batteries and generate eletricity when your engines are deactivated. Make sure you angle your panels/craft so they catch as much sun as possible.

If you are not using all that energy: Take off the spare batteries based on how much excess energy you have stored when you stop consuming it. Batteries don't weigh much compared to other parts but with that many the weight will start to add up quickly, especially when you don't have access to the ludicrously powerful rockomax engines or the efficient nuclear engine. The solar panels are still a good idea for weight efficiency, particularly for probes which will constantly consume energy and spend a long time with the engines off. Weight saving is a good habit to get into early.

It all depends on how much of your resources you're actually using which you will have to workout based on your own flying style.

Anyway, back to topic;

If it has an atmosphere (see the first few posts in this thread), you can use parachutes on it. Only 2 things to watch out for:

1) Heavier craft will need to spread the load with multiple parachutes at different points around the structure and potentially drogue chutes if you have them. Fortunately, you can unlock more parachutes later for this if you do want to go super-size. You'll have to experiment and see just how much shock your craft can take when the parachutes open and potentially slow down before then with engines if it is too much. It all depends on how you build your landers.

2) Duna has a thin atmosphere so parachutes will fully-deploy while you're going very low and very fast. You can still use parachutes but aerobrake and use your engines to slow yourself down if you're landing with the lander pictured above or anything larger (particularly since it looks like the legs are a little too high. You're sitting on your engine).

Now, to the Mun!

Or wherever, you know? It's your space program!