(OLD) The Ultimate Jool-5 Challenge:land Kerbals on all moons and return in one big mission

[SSSPutnik]

Hey Kasuha, nice work!

That's a very long ship, did you get any bad wobble? I guess putting engines higher up the stack rather than pushing from the back helps a lot.

[700NitroXpress]

I don't get it, if you were heading back to Kerbin then what Kerbal was stranded en where? Or the one in space? (sorry but I don't have time to analyze these very long videos )

After the landing on Pol, the docking port on the lander broke and I still had a lot of fuel left, so I just sent the kerbal pretty far back to Kerban by himself. He has an orbit almost from Kerban to Duna. I'll meet up with him and have plenty of fuel to get all the way back.

[Kasuha]

Hey Kasuha, nice work!

That's a very long ship, did you get any bad wobble? I guess putting engines higher up the stack rather than pushing from the back helps a lot.

It was wobbling a bit but nothing unmanageable. I guess placing the engine in the middle helped too. It got way more wobbly after I dismounted the science module at Laythe (Laythe science block was in the middle) and all struts that held it together disappeared. The tug at the end was like a pendulum.

[SSSPutnik]

Yeah I hate it when thrusting a long ship when the head waves around like a snake, it also seems to use more Deltav. Trying to make my next one stubbier.

[Kasuha]

I updated [my post], all pictures are now uploaded and posted.

[700NitroXpress]

After a really long mission out to Jool and successfully landing on all of the moons, I returned all five kerbals home to Kerban. It was all going well until I tried to land them all in a space plane on the KSC runway because that would have been epic. After a fantastic explosion, Jeb, Bob, Charlie, Kelson, and Mitrod all lost their lives on the runway. R.I.P.

[Kasuha]

I returned all five kerbals home to Kerban.

It's Kerbin.

R.I.P.

Awww that sucks. No quicksaves left? I don't see them excluded by rules...

[700NitroXpress]

Nope they're dead for good...

[SSSPutnik]

Wow bummer dude. I guess technically they returned alive to Kerbin surface, it was just an unforgiving surface.

[Ziv]

I upgraded to 0.23 then got stuck in a krut while trying to get my head around a 4 man 5 moon lander.

I'll also have to remake my main ship so I will be delayed for some time and will post my completed entry totally out of the blue and with glorious kanfare perhaps months from now!

Happy flying in the meantime.

Wow, a 4 man lander sounds very ambitious! Good luck, hopefully we will see some great engineering and flying solutions at the end!

[Ziv]

I've just completed this challenge.

It was done in .23 career mode, but didn't completely meet the rules for Jebediah mode.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/65421-Jool-5-tour

Nice job, congratulation! I've posted your mission onto Mixed Solutions because you went out with three Kerbals instead of five, but good job anyway!

[Ziv]

After a really long mission out to Jool and successfully landing on all of the moons, I returned all five kerbals home to Kerban. It was all going well until I tried to land them all in a space plane on the KSC runway because that would have been epic. After a fantastic explosion, Jeb, Bob, Charlie, Kelson, and Mitrod all lost their lives on the runway. R.I.P.

OOOPS, poor guys! But they did History! 700NitroXpress, Now you are on the Hall of Fame too, well done! Good luck with the next mission, with less rescue mission and accident!

Edited January 15, 2014 by Ziv

[Ziv]

Okay - I finished this challenge too. Hopefully I did not miss any of the rules. This was the most epic mission I have ever done in KSP. I'll post images when they're uploaded, there's 200+ of them. Might take a while and will require multiple albums.

In the meanwhile:

- trying Jebediah's Level, crew of five (landing crew two Kerbals every time) + required science from all moons

- multiple launches (8), one ship docked together in Kerbin orbit, reconfigured as needed during flight

- zero space debris

- no refuelling

- final landing in three separate pieces (science module, lander/engine, crew capsule)

- total science 8524 (64 + 2786 + 5674)

No mods used, all designs were guesswork. In the end I returned with fuel to spare. Elliptic parking orbits are amazing.

Edit: pictures

1/ Launches and orbital assembly

http://imgur.com/a/EuRsy

2/ Transfer, Tylo, and Laythe

http://imgur.com/a/6FIS4

3/ Vall, Pol, and Bop

http://imgur.com/a/qKXzw

4/ Return to Kerbin and Science summary

http://imgur.com/a/lFDUJ

Hey Kasuha, nice job! Sorry for misspelling your name at first. I love your solution for the lifting rockets. What version did you use?

You are on the Hall of Fame now, well done!

Edited January 15, 2014 by Ziv

[700NitroXpress]

OOOPS, poor guys! But they did History! 700NitroXpress, Now you are on the Hall of Fame too, well done! Good luck with the next mission, with less rescue mission and accident!

Yeah, now I'm going to make a memorial for the mission and put it somewhere at the KSC. I'll retry this challenge with career mode and with a much different ship.

[Kasuha]

What version did you use?

It was 0.23. Thank you!

[sdj64]

If you do this in career mode, would it be okay to bring a mobile lab? That would probably disqualify from Jeb level though, would it.

Doing the math, this is pretty much the only mission in the game that a lab is less weight than just bringing a bunch of science modules. There are 19 areas to do science in the Jool system (high space, low space, and surface for all moons, flying and upper atmo for Laythe, high space and low space for Jool) So bringing all the science x19 would weigh about 7 tons.

[Kasuha]

This challenge originates in 0.22 when there was no Lab module.

I can't speak for Ziv but I am pretty sure that if you bring five science units and a Lab module, you're free to come back with any amount of science you wish to bring. Personally I'd allow just the lab (plus any science tools you want) too because it is definitely heavier than five science units. But I'm not making rules here.

[Ziv]

If you do this in career mode, would it be okay to bring a mobile lab?

When I was planning my first Jool-5 mission I wanted to collect as many science as possible. I made this challenge and realized that this is already a huge mission and part counts can make it too laggy for many people and so destroying the fun of it, so I created the "lower" levels. My intention with this challenge is to encourage people to plan/execute huge and serious missions too, and to share their engineering experience so this is good for them and for the newbies too.

Going on Jebediah's level needs a lot of science parts which can make the game laggy so you have to take care of part counts, and returning all the experiments to Kerbin without damage is an other big challenge, so going with a Mobile Lab makes it easier (weight difference is not so big when you have a 100+ tons ship). But I will allow it because that's the new thing in the game and it may help people with slower computer to go on Jebediah's level too.

So Mobile Labs are accepted, yes. I will note it in the Hall of Fame if it were used but it doesn't make the achievement smaller. But you still have to bring 5 Kerbals, one to each moon (not simultaneously)!

Edited January 18, 2014 by Ziv

[Ziv]

Hmm, can somebody please give me some more information about how science collecting works in 0.23? My questions:

1. What science parts can be "emptied" by a Kerbal when he is on EVA next to them? Which of them can be reused after it? Can you reuse them as many times as you want?

2. How many science data can a Kerbal hold while EVA?Can he collect multiple data from multiple science parts?

3. If a Kerbal collected a science data from a science part and boards a command pod then all the data will be held inside the pod?

So, is that possible if you have one command pod and one "Science Package" (containing all the science parts together) then can you make the landing and do all the science with the package (+EVA/samples), empty all the science parts into the command pod, then reuse the science Package in the next landing again? Because this way all the data would be held in the command pod and you don't have to bring back all those science parts (and this would make science collecting much more easy).

What do you know about this?

Edited January 18, 2014 by Ziv

[Kasuha]

1. What science parts can be "emptied" by a Kerbal when he is on EVA next to them?

All

Which of them can be reused after it?

All except goo and Science Jr. These can be reused after being cleaned by the lab.

Can you reuse them as many times as you want?

Yes

2. How many science data can a Kerbal hold while EVA?

Any amount. Only cannot hold duplicate data (e.g. two surface samples from the same biome).

Can he collect multiple data from multiple science parts?

Yes. Also can collect data from command pods and move them to different command pod.

3. If a Kerbal collected a science data from a science part and boards a command pod then all the data will be held inside the pod?

Yes. Or he can store the data there without entering. All data are always stored (AFAIK), duplicite data are discarded.

So, is that possible if you have one command pod and one "Science Package" (containing all the science parts together) then can you make the landing and do all the science with the package (+EVA/samples), empty all the science parts into the command pod, then reuse the science Package in the next landing again?

Yes, except duplicite data/measurements. You need second command pod to keep them and perhaps second science set to collect them at once with the first set.

[Ziv]

Kasuha, you're awesome, thanks! I'm going to link this into the first page!

Hm and, let's say, if you land with two GOO then the first will get 100% data, and what about the second? If you bring back them to Kerbin will it be 200% data or just 100%?

Ok, I made a quick try on the launchpad. The first GOO gained 3 science points (100%), the second one was 0.7 (23%), the third one was 0.2 (6%)... it was similar with the Material Bay, but with the other science parts only the first reading had science points (100%), the second and all the other was 0%...

Edited January 18, 2014 by Ziv

[Kasuha]

Kasuha, you're awesome, thanks! I'm going to link this into the first page!

Hm and, let's say, if you land with two GOO then the first will get 100% data, and what about the second? If you bring back them to Kerbin will it be 200% data or just 100%?

Ok, I made a quick try on the launchpad. The first GOO was 3 science points, the second one was 0.7...

It's always appropriate part of what remains. So if the effectivity is 90%, then first delivery gives you 90% of available science points and second gives you 90% of the remainder, i.e. 9%. 1% will be left undiscovered.

[chlue]

Ok my 3rd-Level entry. Still not sure whether I should call it great planning or incredible luck that I didn't run out of fuel

Javascript is disabled. View full album

- game version:

0.23

- What mods did you use, if any?

Design Assistance: EditorExtensions, RCSBuildAid

Flight Assistance: EnhancedNavBall, TacFuelBalancer, KerbalAlarmClock, Mechjeb2

Parts: RomfarerHSTWlaser (only on the fuel vessel in Kerbin oribt), KAS (the EVA assemble-able struts to keep the vessel from twisting)

Lessons learned: Don't build a long vessel hold together with single medium sized docking ports.

- How many launches was needed to start your mission from Kerbal?

4 (Lander, Crew module, some refuelling and finally delivery of some KAS struts due to instability)

- How many refueling did you do during the mission, how much and where?

Nothing after leaving Kerbin orbit

- Did you bring a Living Quarter (Hitch-hiker's Storage) for the guys during the long journey?

Jep, but one person had to stay in the lander

- Did you bring additional stuff like satellites, rovers, etc?

No

- Share the delta-V informations too, if you tracked it!

Not really tracked. Some information are in the screenshots trough. I planned the vessels based on a delta-v map, but the necessary amount of fuel was not checked. Was actually pretty sure after Laythe that I have to bring a refuel vessel but it turned out that the amount of fuel was just enough to finish the mission.

[Ziv]

Chlue, thank you, but I cannot accept your entry without pictures about all of the crucial moments (especially landings)!

I was checking your mission (where I was able to do it by the pictures) and I made a same ship and checked the dVs and it may worked without refueling, but there are some really strange things:

1. to land on Laythe, you have to deorbit first, that would already use up some dV... so maybe your lander was on the edge with 3500m/s.

2. your lander didn't have anything to reload electricity. Okay, 1050 can be enough.

3. Your Tylo lander's descent stage (the huge fuel tank with a general rocket engine) had ~2200 m/s, and your lander about ~3500 m/s (on the screen it was 2200+2200). To land is about 3300 and to get off is about 2400 (I know you started from a ~20km orbit). So it should have been very close, too!

I can believe that you made all the mission without cheating but without picture proofs of crucial moments I cannot be %100 sure, so I cannot accept your entry, sorry.

Edited January 18, 2014 by Ziv

[chlue]

Hello Ziv. Unfortunately I cannot provide more screenshots. I really need to learn to take more useful screenshots - But let me try to give some additional information:

1. to land on Laythe, you have to deorbit first, that would already use up some dV... so maybe your lander was on the edge with 3500m/s.

As you can see in Jool5_12.jpg my main ship was in highly eccentric orbit with a PE of only 57km and a AP of over 2800km. So to land on Laythe I decoupled only the lander and made a short retrograde burn at the AP. With the help of mechjebs aerobrake predictions (see Jool5_37 for kerbin return) I was able to set up a very precise aerobrake and as such I barely used any fuel to land (with something like deadly reentry the ship would have burned up for sure trough). Surprisingly I was even able to get back to the mothership (I can tell this because if I had used the orbital-tug I would had to dock the Tylo descent stage somewhere else later.).

2. your lander didn't have anything to reload electricity. Okay, 1050 can be enough.

There is a RTG on the lander, but I have no clear screenshot. It is barely visible on Jool5_29. The 1050 would have never been enough, because for the outer moons the lander was separated from the mainship for weeks

3. Your Tylo lander's descent stage (the huge fuel tank with a general rocket engine) had ~2200 m/s, and your lander about ~3500 m/s (on the screen it was 2200+2200). To land is about 3300 and to get off is about 2400 (I know you started from a ~20 orbit). So it should have been very close, too!

Yes this was very close and I had to quickload a couple of times. Displayed delta-v values are all wrong because I used docking ports instead of staging. Thats why I show a reconfigured variant in my first screenshot with decouplers in between the modules so mechjeb can calculate some reasonable delta-v values (The first 6 screenshots were done after the mission was finished based on my craft files.).

This screenshot Jool5_21shows that my lander has 3092 delta-v left on Tylo, so for my descent I used 2628m/s (3533+2187-3092).

I can believe that you made all the mission without cheating but without picture proofs of crucial moments I cannot be %100 sure, so I cannot accept your entry, sorry.

Unfortunate thats all I can provide apart from the craft files and some backups of the savegame (Jool5_1_Kerbin persistent.sfs, Jool5_2_Laythe persistent.sfs, Jool5_3_Tylo persistent.sfs, Jool5_4_Tylodone persistent.sfs, Jool5_5 AllMoonsDone persistent.sfs).