Rocket keeps clipping?

[jessyager]

I am not sure if clipping is the right term but I just started playing a few days ago and after playing in sandbox for a bit I decided to try career mode. I decided while trying to go to the moon I would play with bigger rockets for inter-planetary travel.

I have created a fairly large rocket that now I am obsessed with getting to work. I built it in 4 stages. 1- Lifter, 2- Upper atmosphere, 3- Orbital maneuvering/Orbital escape, 4- Payload/lander.

I originally built the rocket in its respective stages, saved them as subassemblies and built the rocket. The problem I have with this is that for some weird reason the 2nd stage acts like the layer of rockets below it in the first stage are not even there and fall right through the first stage and epic explosion...

I originally thought that this was because of minute mismatching of tanks and rebuilt extra meticulously paying attention to detail... Again, same results.

I then tried building the same rocket all together and then I have issues with the 4 corner rockets not properly separating from the lower stage and they won't work rendering my 2nd stage useless... It is mildly possible I have that part of the staging wrong but I do not believe so I checked it rather meticulously as well.

A few questions...

1: Are big rockets always this much of a monumental pain to build?

2: any ideas/suggestions what may be happening and how I can fix it?

3: any good resources on some basic tips and tricks to look at how to build/plan bigger rockets multiple stages etc?

Here is a screenshot:

[Vanamonde]

That's a fairly large rocket, and you are likely over-loading it. What is the G meter reading when you experience the failure? It's kind of hard to see in that pic, but do you have any struts running across the stage divisions? They will make the rocket stronger, and will not prevent separation of the stages.

[BlackBicycle]

OP: what you describe happens when the lower stage attains too much acceleration, unpon which it breaks the upper joints and plows through the rest of your structure.

Solutions: either do not go full throttle, so that the forces on the parts of your vehicle are not too strong that it destroys it, or more struts, between the sections that break.

EDIT: This is a good way to strengthen your in-between-stage connections. Don't worry, they jettison with the previous stage allright.

Edited January 6, 2014 by BlackBicycle

[jessyager]

Thx for the suggestions so far...

1: Failure occurs just after loading on the launch pad with 0 acceleration.

2: No I have struts everywhere except the stage separations, I thought that would interfere with it being able to separate?

I will attempt to put struts between the stages and get back to you thank you.

[Markus Reese]

Yup, I agree on the struts as well. Something else you can try is if that top section is wide enough, add tower supports there as well. It could simply be the connections or other part braking simply due to mass. Used to happen to me all the time.

[Kasuha]

When you add stages from subassemblies they often merge into stages already present. So you need to sort your staging column which you can find at the right of the VAB window (appears to be clipped off your image) and make sure all engines and decouples work in the right order and when you actually want them to.

An option is, when adding a subassembly with some staging information, to pre-create sufficient number of empty staging slots in the staging column using the (+) buttons between stages.

[Mystique]

That looks almost as crazy as my "mothership" of ~400 MT full weight that I managed to get to orbit almost without rituals including live kerbal sacrifices. You want at least 2 actually different vessels up there - lander and interplanetary propulsion craft. Since they'll be docked anyway, it'll be much easier to get them to orbit separately and just dock there.

Yeah, and on such a construction I'd add struts from top of each level to to of one above him, so of you look on whole vessel from the side, struts will form some kind of pyramid sides. This will add vertical stability for sure.

P.S. Why not also use asparagus instead? I'll be much more efficient. And engineer redux/mechjeb delta-v/TWR chart would be nice to see if it's all even worth it.

[jessyager]

Yes thank you, the struts did fix the issue between stages .

@ Mystique: I am actually working on that now but I just unlocked that tech tree with fuel lines after getting this thing up and orbiting the mun.

[Kasuha]

@ Mystique: I am actually working on that now but I just unlocked that tech tree with fuel lines after getting this thing up and orbiting the mun.

You had Jumbo tanks but no fuel pipes? o.O

[jessyager]

Not sure what you mean by jumbo but the tanks were all the small radius tanks not the larger radius ones.