Eve drives me nuts!

[Tokay Gris]

I am trying to build a lander for Eve that can lift up again.

Many iterations, many tries...

Many problems.

First: Get enough delta-V into a vessel that it can reach orbit.

Second: With enough TWR

Third: Get it on the ground on eve

The latest iteration mad it to the surface. AND it does have enough delta-V to reach orbit.

But it lacked stability once the aerospikes kicked in...

DAMN. Back to the drawing board....

[NASAFanboy]

The only Eve mission I've done in career was a sample return/upper atmospherical flight.

But in 0.21, I managed to return by sending the ship out suborbitally, then quickly EVAing the Kerbals in a massive rush to the other ship.

Edited October 28, 2013 by NASAFanboy

[Tokay Gris]

On a side note: YES, I am "cheating" during the testing phase.

But not that much. This beast gets into orbit. It has the capapitilty to get to eve orbit.

But until testing is successful, I will "transport" it to Eve by "magic". I.e. hyper edit.

[Luckless]

I haven't gotten the time to try it yet, but my personal plan is to try it with the most minimal of Eve ascent vehicles that has no other goal than to throw the 2 or 3 seats needed for the crew straight up. Won't even be designed to make it to orbit, just force it above the atmosphere to meet a de-orbited tanker to refuel and get it the rest of the way to an orbital way-station.

[Tokay Gris]

Actually, this isn't a science mission.

Get one Kerbal on the surface, get him back up again.

"Above atmosphere" sounds nice, but how do you plan to let it meet with a tanker if it can't obtain orbit?

[Luckless]

The ascent stage doesn't meet the tanker, the tanker meets the ascent stage. Timing on such a project is exceptionally tight, as the tanker needs to de-orbit itself (and do so accurately) to be able to slow down enough to dock with the ascent stage while it is still in its upward portion of its free-fall, while then matching its changing velocity closely enough to dock with it rather than smashing it to bits.

So your timing on the launch has to be matched to the orbit of the tanker craft. When the primary burn fuel is gone both ships are either in position to dock, or the mission failed. No real time to screw around and fix things if you botched.

[Tokay Gris]

Well, next test proved to be a part success.

The parachutes didn't rip the lander apart even without burning prior to opening. That is something.

But the ascent test failed, because of a not so flat starting surface. The vessel stuck to a part of the landing platform.

Nice fireworks, though....

[Luckless]

Nice fireworks, though....

That does make failure feel more worth it, doesn't it?

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

Eve is a heartless bitch and she will never let you go again if you get too close to her

[Audiopulse]

Eve is a heartless bitch and she will never let you go again if you get too close to her

Reading this... "Eat ALL the Kerbals!!!"

Made me chuckle

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

Reading this... "Eat ALL the Kerbals!!!"

Made me chuckle

You are welcome

[Westi29]

Try it

.

[Tokay Gris]

Try it with balloons.

Nah. I'd rather use stock.

[Tokay Gris]

Damn! I know where the problem is.

Back to the drawing board, because that problem can't be solved in the existing vessel.

The only controlling engine for the ascent is too high. AND it is right in the center.

Maybe I can do it with control surfaces, since the aerospikes kick in pretty low and still in atmosphere... Maybe I bridge that gap with ailerons. The innermost asparagus ring is placed higher, so maybe the COM changes enough once the outer aerospike is dropped.....

Testing right now....

[rholtsla98]

Ya if you are going to try and meet the in orbit escape vehicle without orbiting make sure to do it at apoapsis because the is the slowest point in an orbit. It may be harder to get there but the transfer will have mor time and it will be much easier

[McFarnsworth]

The ascent stage doesn't meet the tanker, the tanker meets the ascent stage. Timing on such a project is exceptionally tight, as the tanker needs to de-orbit itself (and do so accurately) to be able to slow down enough to dock with the ascent stage while it is still in its upward portion of its free-fall, while then matching its changing velocity closely enough to dock with it rather than smashing it to bits.

So your timing on the launch has to be matched to the orbit of the tanker craft. When the primary burn fuel is gone both ships are either in position to dock, or the mission failed. No real time to screw around and fix things if you botched.

That ... seems pretty much impossible to pull off. I'd love to be proven wrong though in this case, make sure to take pics.

[Traches]

With a couple of quick loads, some decent timing, and some excess delta-v on the rendezvous tanker it's definitely possible. I've pulled off some pretty sweet sub-orbital rescues before.

[KerbMav]

Now this would really call for maneuver nodes for landed crafts.

What I noticed yesterday: If you place a node on your orbit while approaching the surface, the node somewhat hides in the ground in mapview but does not vanish - with precide node mod at least. As Kerbal Alarm Clock can save man.nodes (one at least), could this be used to plot a course for a lander? Make a node prior to landing, save it as an alarm in KAC to recreate it as needed and put in vectors with precide node?

[magnemoe]

Two words, rover seat and 48-S7.

Take a 90 liter tank, put an octo2 probe and rover seat on top, add a small batery and a solar panel.

put 6 90 liter tanks and 48-S7 around in asparagus and you have 9100 m/s.

This is the accent stage, put the landing stage below, landing stage consist of the command module, the science stuff landing legs and fuel and engines for deorbit and landing. put parashutes on radial decopler on accent stage, however you would probably prefer to use some engines landing to.

You have to land high however you can hang an small rover below the command module.

[Spence1012]

I made a return capable vehicle for someone else but KSP broke on me and I can't load ships in any of my saves so I'm starting over

It had 13k m/s of delta v assuming you drop your parachutes and landing legs on takeoff OR put them on one of the first stages to drop. If you're not super efficient with that, about 12.5k m/s dV. It weighed about 85 tons IIRC.

I'll try to make another in a new save (extracting a new download of KSP now) if I can get all the necessary parts sometime soon.