Manoeuvre on the ascend node - why takes hours?

[alkopop79]

The topic title may not be clear so let me explain my problem: I want to go to Minmus and so far I managed to get my ship on orbit around the Earth (altitude around 90km). I set Minmus as a target to be able to change the ships inclination. When I create a manoeuvre on the ascend or descend node, the burn time is generally hours, sometimes even days. What am I doing wrong? The burn time should be a few seconds, am I right?

[Wjolcz]

You must fire up the engines first. The burn time on manouver nodes depends on thrust you have. If you show the game you have really low thrust by burning just a little or none at all, it will think you have a really crappy engine on your vessel and will calculate the burn time for that.

[blizzy78]

Jet let the engine burn once on little thrust for 1-2 sec before coasting to your maneuver node.

[alkopop79]

Doesn't seem to make any difference. It still takes more than 8 hours burn time to change the inclination. I tried burning the engine at full trust before and after creating the manoeuvre node. Any ideas?

[vexx32]

Moved to Gameplay Questions and Tutorials

[Garek]

How much delta-v does the node show? What ship are you using? (especially TWR?)

[Wjolcz]

Pics of the node, orbit and the craft would be helpful

[kahlzun]

I don't suppose you're using Ion engines, or LV-1s by any chance? they have poor thrust, and often take forever for a single burn.

[blizzy78]

Are you sure the engine is activated?

[el_coyoto]

You must fire up the engines first. The burn time on manouver nodes depends on thrust you have. If you show the game you have really low thrust by burning just a little or none at all, it will think you have a really crappy engine on your vessel and will calculate the burn time for that.

I don't suppose you're using Ion engines, or LV-1s by any chance? they have poor thrust, and often take forever for a single burn.

Also, changing the orbital inclination at a low altitude is rather inefficient and can be long and expensive, but in the order of magnitude mentioned in the OP...

A pic of the craft might indeed help diagnose the problem.

[alkopop79]

The ship is made of stock parts and the engine is an LV909.

[Smidge204]

I've had this happen, and the best advice I can give is to ignore the burn time and just use the direction mark.

The inclination change to Minmus is small enough that you can just burn and watch as your Ascend/descend node move. It's hardly an interplanetary voyage here and you should be able to eyeball it.

Edit: The problem is you don't have an engine. Click on the decoupler at the base of your ship and activate it. Something went horribly wrong with your staging.

=Smidge=

Edited November 22, 2013 by Smidge204

[capi3101]

The ship is made of stock parts and the engine is an LV909.

Oof. You've got your decoupler with the shroud over the LV-909 in the same stage as the engine; the shroud's still on so the game thinks that engine is covered, and won't apply any thrust (despite the fact that you can see the engine bell and see fire shooting out of it, the game thinks there's something blocking it). Right click on the decoupler and select "decouple" to get rid of it manually. If that doesn't work, you'll need to re-launch and be careful about how you set up your staging in the VAB next time.

[SSSPutnik]

I don't see an engine?

What capi said...

Edited November 22, 2013 by SSSPutnik

[alkopop79]

The engine is there and is working. It's the decoupler that got stuck on it.

[alkopop79]

Oof. You've got your decoupler with the shroud over the LV-909 in the same stage as the engine; the shroud's still on so the game thinks that engine is covered, and won't apply any thrust (despite the fact that you can see the engine bell and see fire shooting out of it, the game thinks there's something blocking it). Right click on the decoupler and select "decouple" to get rid of it manually. If that doesn't work, you'll need to re-launch and be careful about how you set up your staging in the VAB next time.

Brilliant, will give it a try!

[Monkeh]

The numbers it's coming out with may be calculated with the rcs thrusters as the main push. Just a guess.

[alkopop79]

The decoupler cannot be removed. I've got to redesign the ship. Thank you for all the help!

[blizzy78]

The decoupler cannot be removed.

Why not? It's pointing the right way.

[Motokid600]

Edit: Oh nevermind. Remove that decoupler in the VAB and redo it. Then a quick test to make sure it seperates properly.

Edited November 22, 2013 by Motokid600

[arq]

Why not? It's pointing the right way.

Nope. Looks upside-down to me. Flip the decoupler over and it should eject properly.

[Sirrobert]

As a final note: Don't try to change inclination at 90km orbit. That'll take aLOT of fuel. Instead burn out towards minmus first, and change inclination while you are on route. Much cheaper

[Deadweasel]

Changing inclination on a ship that small shouldn't take that much, but that decoupler is definitely blocking the thrust. We're not seeing the actual dV estimate for the maneuver in the screenshots (hit the "." key on the numpad or click the little toggle arrow at the bottom middle of the screen to bring up the navball), but 8 hours seems excessive with anything other than ion engines, which you obviously aren't using here.

That decoupler is oriented the right way, (the red arrows show which surface the unit will eject from) but as already called-out, the staging is wonky. It's certainly blocking your engine's ability to actually do any real work, so if manually decoupling the thing (right click on it), then you'll have to re-sort the staging in the VAB and launch again.

[Taki117]

Decoupler is definitely pointed the right way, and I always set my decoupler in the same stage as the engine it covers (So that the thrust of the engine pushes the decoupler away) you could try that?

Edited November 22, 2013 by Taki117
New information

[Deadweasel]

Decoupler is definitely pointed the right way, and I always set my decoupler in the same stage as the engine it covers (So that the thrust of the engine pushes the decoupler away) you could try that?

It looks like that's exactly what he did do, and I agree that should work. I've done it many times myself. But, there might be something else in the ship's design that causes that stage to get bugged the way it did. Without a look at the complete ship with its lifter, there's no way to tell though.