Bringing ice from Eeloo

[koshelenkovv]

I've sent a rover once under $10 000.

This time I decided to send a manned mission.

I completed it in 'classic' manner - single spacecraft without any refueling, rendezvous with return stage or space tugs.

Here is my biggest for now 141 ton rocket. This is second time I used orange tank and first time I used three of them at once.

Monstrocket at launchpad

Staging

20 ton Blizzard heavy transfer vehicle finishing circularization on her engine.

Ready to depart.

Jeb never uses plane alignments and such fuzz. It much faster and cheaper on delta-V to eyeball launch window, overshoot AP somewhat over planet's orbit and rotate your plane to make AN/DN close to intersection, then correct.

For example, plane alignment with Eeloo will take 1200 dV, while eyeballing and correcting will take only 250 dV, thanks to advanced maneuver node system!

Other crewmembers seem to be slightly concerned about this method.

Braking at Eeloo

Releasing droptanks

Icicle heavy lander deorbiting with legs exended

And touchdown!

Crew is tired and happy. Everything was perfect, and there is almost half of landing fuel left!

They landed at sunset. Now they will sleep and tomorrow will start exploration.

Fooling around

Obligatory group photo

While Jeb and Bill inspecting Icicle, smartest crewmembers Bob and Tomgun going to investigate Eeloo canyons and mountains and bring some samples back.

New rover is very nice and stable, hopping easily without breaking.

First samples was taken and flag was planted

Roving to mountains far away

Second set of samples was taken and another flag was planted

Tired explorers returned back to lander

We will leave Eeloo tomorrow. There is no need to wait years for launch window - every day is proper launch window when you use non-Hohmann transfer. It takes very little dV to fiddle with orbit when you so far away from Kerbol.

Take off!

Dropping langing stage tanks

Ejection burn

Approaching Kerbin

And home at last!

Edited November 11, 2013 by koshelenkovv

[DMagic]

20 tons to get to Eeloo and back, nice job.

That's a good point about cheap return trips from Eeloo. I realized that too when I was coming back from Eeloo. When you're just slamming into Kerbin's atmosphere it doesn't really matter how good your intercept is, you can just fiddle around with maneuver nodes until you hit Kerbin at some point during its orbit and go.

[lajoswinkler]

LOL, that rover reminds me of Segway.

[Cydonian Monk]

LOL, that rover reminds me of Segway.

A Kegway, perhaps? (No, no - that has all the potential in the world for going horribly wrong....)

I like the rover design. May try something similar myself.

[AndrewBCrisp]

Agree on the rover design - incredibly cool. It's... just such a Kerbal design.

The whole mission is impressive. I'm amazed a crewed mission could be sent to Eeloo with something so small. Kudos.

[Javster]

Is there a download link?

[koshelenkovv]

Here the craft http://yadi.sk/d/vn_r5Xv0DdkWm

It have not enough dV for Hohmann transfer with planes alignment, so use this calculator or eyeball for 'orbital rendezvous' with correction late in flight.

Burns will take very long time (longest was almost 15 minutes), so better eyeball and correct, because it's almost impossible to make 2000 m/s maneuver perfectly.

Edited December 1, 2013 by koshelenkovv

[turbo917k]

Such a great adventure, awesome rover!

[Yllier]

I can't seem to open the ship file in .23. I am really interested in the rover. I tried constructing a replica based on the pictures but was unsuccessful. Do you mind telling me what parts were used?