Konstellation Duna 01 [IMAGE HEAVY]

[ANWRocketMan]

So, basically my history with Duna is very much like the real world: a lot of failures and no crewed landings.*

The Konstellation program is the replacement for the old Duna Direct missions. THEY WERE NOT REAL!*

Launching the Habitation and Cargo lander. Yes, I use Kerbal Engineer Redux in my stock part/aerodynamics install. Deal with it. Please... Seriously...

The Habitation and Cargo lander is docked to its transfer stage a couple of Kerbin months ahead of the crewed vessel.

The prerequisite friendly Ike encounter.

My standard encounter plan for this mission.

Phase #01: Powered orbital capture into a highly elliptical orbit.

Phase #02: Near apoapsis inclination change to match the orbit of the other mission craft. in this case a derelict Duna Direct Lander. We decided to use this lander(which was, for all intents and purposes, never launched*) due to our low budget and the high overall cost of the first mission.

Phase #03: A second burn is done to partially circularize the orbit, this is done to easily gain an encounter with the other vessel(s).

Phase #04: Final particularization burn is completed to place the vessels in parking orbits near each other with minimal drift.

Phase #01 orbital insertion burn.

The Habitation and Cargo lander is deployed to a pre-determined location with an equatorial facing to allow the Solar Panels to properly track Kerbol. This mission was landed inside the Great Dunian Canyon.

Some months later the crewed mission departs. Visible is the Port-side low-gravity habitation arm with the crew's bunk beds.

Phase #01 orbital insertion burn for the crewed mission.

The crew rendezvous with the Mars Direct Lander using the "Kerion" NKO-01 CTV.

Once the crew is transferred, the "Kerion" CTV will remain in orbit as the lander uses the remaining fuel in the transfer stage to deorbit.

Powered descent. The Mars Direct Landers were originally designed to land with drogue chutes to slow them down, these would then be cut close to the surface and the soft powered touch down would occur. The placement of the parachutes caused severe instability and two of the three test landers were destroyed in their landings. They were designed with a backup abort-from-landing procedure functionality ready. This meant the landers carried enough fuel to stop the descent in mid-air and return to Duna orbit in an emergency. Consequently some configuration changes were able to be made that allowed the lander to descend under rocket power without need for parachutes.

Touchdown! The lander deploys its nsolar panels while the crew suit up for the first Duna-walk.

The first Kerbal-hero o walk on the surface of Duna! What an expression!

The first Duna-walker has a "short" EVA to the Habitation module. We blame the non-existent descent computer... Not our pilots!

Roving! Rocing up the cany-ooOoon!

Apparantly, "Wobbles the Rover" was depressed and planted his face into the dirt. Possibly expecting to grow into something better.

Unfortunately, the external cameras failed to transmit the ascent video. So we're stuck with the crew rendevouzing and docking with the "Kerion" CTV in Duna orbit.

Three orbits later, the "Kerion" delivers the crew to the Crew Transfer Vessel still waiting in orbit. Fun Fact: fully fuelled, the "Kerion" NKO-01 CTV has more than 900m/s dV with a full RCS load to boot!

trans-Kerbin injection burn.

The crew transfer Vessel encounters Kerbin's SOI and completes some final adjustments to ensure a safe re-entry.

The crew transfer to the "Kerion" for Kerbin re-entry. This will be hot. 3100m/s and counting.

This is... uhm... 3600m/s re-entry effects speak for themselves with dazzling displays!

The Crew Transfer Vessel is still visible at 1.4km distance.

The drogue chutes open at no more than 400m/s descent speed at around 10km above the surface.

Splashdown as Minmus sets in the distance. We TOTALLY planned it this way!

*There were several manned missions before, but we decided to not tell anyone about them. The embarrassment would be too big for Jeb himself!

Edited November 17, 2013 by ANWRocketMan