Moho is a *insert cusss of your choice*

[Kialar]

I literally hate Moho. Therefore I wanted to see this planet on its knees. I need to prevail over this chunk of dirt near the sun.

Because it's there. Because the sun is so brigth at Moho. And because of reasons.

So here is a Moho mission summary.

Sunflower 1 (probe):

Mission Goal - Send a Space Bug Probe to Moho, establish a stable polar orbit, investigate the place.

Rocket - Three staged Murania IVs (Saturn V-Style rocket that can easily lift 53 tons of payload to LKO)

Transferstage - NERVA driven fuelmonster

Satellite - Space Bug 9 (some 2 tons satellite with gravioli equipmet, ion drive and 2 huge solar panels)

Mission outcome - success Space Bug 9 is now taking its path round and round the planet Moho

Sunflower 2 (probe):

Mission Goal - Establish a fuel depot in Moho equatorial orbit.

Rocket - Murania IV

Transferstage - NERVA driven fuelgodzilla

Payload - Moho Orbiter Part 1 (Orange fuel tank, solar panels, batteries, docking port senior)

Mission outcome - kind of success, desired orbit was achieved with a little bit fuel left (some 200 units)

Sunflower 3 (probe):

Mission Goal - Transfer a habitation module with cupola to Moho, dock with MOP 1

Rocket - Murania IV

Transferstage - NERVA driven fuelgodzilla

Payload - Moho Orbiter Part 2 (basically a standard space station core)

Mission outcome - inserted into Moho SOI, braked to the last drop of fuel, left Moho SOI - Bye, Bye MOP 2

Sunflower 4 (probe):

Mission Goal - Transfer a habitation module with cupola to Moho, dock with MOP 1

Rocket - Murania IV

Transferstage - NERVA driven fuelgodzilla MKII

Payload - Moho Orbiter Part 2 (basically a standard space station core)

Mission outcome - inserted into Moho SOI, braked to the last drop of fuel, left Moho SOI - Bye, Bye MOP 2

Sunflower 5 (probe):

Mission Goal - Transfer a habitation module with cupola to Moho, dock with MOP 1

Rocket - Murania IV

Transferstage - NERVA driven fuelsatan

Payload - Moho Orbiter Part 2 (basically a standard space station core)

Mission outcome - success, docking with MOP 1 done, Moho Orbiter established

Sunflower 6 (probe):

Mission Goal - Transfer a lander to Moho Orbiter (MoOrb), dock it, enjoy

Rocket 1 - Murania IV with lander payload

Rocket 2 - Murania IV with transfer vessel

Payload 1 - Nemo IIa Lander (3-kerbed lander with 2 NERVAS, science and stuff)

Payload 2 - NERVA driven fuelsatan of hell mark II

Mission outcome - Lander and transfer vessel docked in LKO and sent to Moho, inserted into Moho SOI, braked to the last drop of fuel, left Moho SOI. Bye, bye Nemo...

Sunflower 7 (probe):

Mission Goal - Transfer a lander to Moho Orbiter (MoOrb), dock it, enjoy

Rocket 1 - Murania IV with lander payload

Rocket 2 - Murania IV with transfer vessel

Payload 1 - Nemo IIa Lander (3-kerbed lander with 2 NERVAS, science and stuff)

Payload 2 - NERVA driven fuelsatan of hell mark III

Mission outcome - Lander and transfer vessel docked in LKO and sent to Moho, inserted into Moho SOI, braked to the last drop of fuel, left Moho SOI. Bye, bye Nemo. *sic*

Sunflower 8 (probe):

Mission Goal - Transfer a lander to Moho Orbiter (MoOrb), dock it, enjoy

Rocket 1 - Murania IV with lander payload

Rocket 2 - Murania IV with transfer vessel Part I

Rocket 3 - Murania IV with transfer vessel Part II

Payload 1 - Nemo IIa Lander (3-kerbed lander with 2 NERVAS, science and stuff)

Payload 2 - NERVA driven ExxonValdezFuelDepotFromAlaska Upperfloor

Payload 3 - NERVA driven ExxonValdezFuelDepotFromAlaska Lowerfloor

Mission outcome - Lander and transfer vessel docked in LKO and sent to Moho, Orbit established, lander docked to MoOrb, some fuel transfered (YES, I HAD FUEL LEFT, B**CH)

Sunflower 9 (Kerbals!)

Mission Goal - Transfer 3 Kerbals to MoOrb and awake MoOrb to life

Rocket 1 - Murania IV with transfer capsule

Rocket 2 - Murania IV with transfer vessel Part I

Rocket 3 - Murania IV with transfer vessel Part II

Payload 1 - Basically a command capsule with docking port

Payload 2 - NERVA driven ExxonValdezFuelDepotFromAlaska Upperfloor

Payload 3 - NERVA driven ExxonValdezFuelDepotFromAlaska Lowerfloor

Mission outcome - MoOrb is now operative with 3 Kerbals on it, and roughly 1700 unit of fuel in storage. Yay!

Sunflower 10 (Kerbals!)

Mission Goal - Land on Moho, investigate the planet, test the sunblocker, loft off and get back to MoOrb.

Vessel - Nemo IIa lander

Mission outcome - Landed in one of the darker areas. Planted a flag, named the area "Neilcan basin", to a view, did some science, got back to orbit and to MoOrb. 105 of 900 fuel units left.

Sunflower 11 will now bring the three kerbs back home. Hopefully.

On MoOrb are some 901 units of fuel in store. The Nemo IIa vessel is not usefull for a return mission. So I have to send a return ship. We will see.

Moho is not beaten right now. But close to. Very close.

[Scotius]

Ahahahaha. Yes, trials and tribulations of a player valiantly struggling to conquer Moho I managed to put two science stations around Moho in 0.21 - but air around me was sizzling from sheer frustration and anxiety.

[Xacktar]

Indeed. I've only managed an orbiting probe myself. She takes a lot of oomph.

[Dooz]

Well i only hate planets if they get in my way during transfer like eeloo got in my way during Jool transfer

Moho is a very hard planet but i have landed a probe and returned 3 kerbals but due to fuel issues they had to be rescued in eve orbit then that returned them

[NASAFanboy]

If it makes you happy, I'll write a short story where the space kraken literally eats Moho in front of terrified astronomers on Kerbin .

Otherwise, Moho really is one.

[kahlzun]

You need well over 7000ms dV to safely reach Moho.

Wet/Dry mass of about 2.25 should be sufficient.

Lander of 7T, means one X3200 tank would be about sufficient (With 1 NERVA)

Moho has fairly low gravity, so you can get away with a T800 & couple of 24-77 engines for the lander. If you use the EAS-1 chairs, the lander could be well under 7T.

T800 tank, 2 "24-77" engines and 1 EAS-1 chair gets dV of about 5355, TWR of about 0.85 (kerbin), or 3.1 (moho)

Edited November 11, 2013 by kahlzun

[koshelenkovv]

Moho is very easy if you doing it small.

[Superfluous J]

I have recorded a video where I got from an 80k orbit around Kerbin to an 80k orbit around Moho with 5678 dV, and I (and you!) could repeat that launch twice a Kerbin year. I didn't even do it very optimally.

I'm sure total dV would be different had I launched half a year earlier or later because Moho's orbit is eccentric but it shouldn't be different by much, and for all I know I randomly picked the launch time that was less efficient.

I don't have the video yet, but here's the before and after images. They'll eventually also be in an Imgur gallery detailing the strategy behind the mission. However, the basic strategy is to ignore the transfer window and instead launch when Kerbin and Moho's orbital planes intersect.

EDIT: Hah! I just noticed that my used dV is 5678, or the numerals 5-8 in order. Pretty sweet.

Edited November 11, 2013 by 5thHorseman

[DMagic]

Nice work, it's always interesting to see a big Moho mission.

Moho is very easy if you doing it small.

That's true, but it's also satisfying to gratuitously overdo it just because you can. My Moho mission started out as a Mun mission, but then I figured "why not go to Moho instead, no one ever does big Moho missions, how hard can it be..."

However, the basic strategy is to ignore the transfer window and instead launch when Kerbin and Moho's orbital planes intersect.

Yep, that's what I do, if you're really careful with timing you can launch into an inclined orbit around Kerbin to make it a bit cheaper to match Moho's inclination (your Kerbin inclination has to be much bigger than Moho's inclination around the sun). After I get into solar orbit I just treat the Moho intercept like a docking rendezvous. My record was around 4800-4900m/s I think, though that was really because I got a lucky intercept on my first try, no corrections were needed.

Edited November 11, 2013 by DMagic

[Superfluous J]

Yep, that's what I do, if you're really careful with timing you can launch into an inclined orbit around Kerbin to make it a bit cheaper to match Moho's inclination (your Kerbin inclination has to be much bigger than Moho's inclination around the sun). After I get into solar orbit I just treat the Moho intercept like a docking rendezvous. My record was around 4800-4900m/s I think, though that was really because I got a lucky intercept on my first try, no corrections were needed.

That's exactly what I did. One big burn from my 80k Kerbin Orbit (It was like 8 minutes IIRC. Would have been over half an hour with only one NERVA) and I was aligned with Moho with a periapsis touching it. Well, I was 0.6 degrees off and my periapsis was a bit inside, which is what I meant by not being fully optimized. And then yeah, I pretended Moho was a space station and Sun was Kerbin.

To those who don't see why we're doing this: The reason this works for Moho (and Dres and Eeloo, though for them you want to do the alignment burn when you're at their orbit, not Kerbin's) is because these planets have no atmospheres. For the other planets, transfer windows are the way to go because if you can hit the planet's atmosphere, you can save dV slowing down with aerobraking. That's not possible on Moho so you may as well optimize everything else.

[DMagic]

Another issue that's always asked about whenever these non-direct transfers are brought up is the delta-v lost because you're not taking advantage of the Oberth effect. But that doesn't really matter as much you might think, and it's an especially small effect with Moho because its gravity is so low and because you're already going so fast that fly by your Moho periapsis in about 10 seconds.

And the biggest problem with Moho, the reason why some people end up with 5000m/s burns for orbital capture, is that it's hard to get an ideal intercept, one where your solar periapsis just touches Moho's orbit and you intercept at exactly that point. But when you set up the intercept as if you're docking it's easy to do this, so you get a near perfect intercept and a cheap capture burn.

[Kialar]

Thanks for the hints.

I managed to get the "Sunflower" of Mission Sunflower 11 to Moho and dock it to MoOrb.

The picture shows the storage module (lower orange tank), the habitation and command module (cupola and hitchhiker) just above and below the node.

To the right you see the Nemo IIa lander. To the left, spacebus "Sunflower", which is by far the largest monster I ever got to Moho.

Right now Mildred, Eldos and Neilcan proceed to their transfer vessel home. After 1 year and 2 months, it really is getting time for a shower....