Overbuilt Duna Craft

[The Dulas]

My goal for this project is to create a single launch, two way Duna science lander and transport craft. This is what I have come up with so far:

The top module separates in orbit and acts as a lander and docks with the transport ship to return home. As you can see, the ship is quite large (took up all of the VAB height and just hardly fits into a 3.75 expanded fairing), and with my current level of ship building, wouldn't be able to get off the ground with out the KW mod. Although it works well to get to Duna, land, and return home, I have to wonder if there is a more simple way to do this? I have made ships that can reach other planets before, but this is my first that has the ability to land and return. Is this an overbuilt design?

Edited January 18, 2014 by The Dulas

[Captain Sierra]

you have way more fuel than you need, pretty much everywhere.

[Taki117]

Ok, make a ship for going to the mun, Ensure your lander has about 1300m/s dV (And lots of chutes), then add some extra dV for insurance.

Also: dV map, Aerobraking Calculator, Launch Window Planner, Use these to help planning how to get there (Not sure how familiar you are with them, so I thought I would post them here)

The dV map gives a rough estimate of how much dV it's going to take to get there. The Aerobraking calculator is invaluable for saving dV at your destination (Since Duna has an atmosphere) and the Launch window planner tells you when the best time to launch is to save even more dV.

[Captain Sierra]

Another thing to add to the above is that it takes less than 1000 dv to return from Duna. It takes somewhere around 1200 to get there (that assumes you aerobrake both ways).

A 12-13 km periapsis at Duna will get you a good aerocapture. Be careful on the low end, 11.8km= point of no return (and a new crater on Duna).

[Skorpychan]

That tiny tiny connection between lander and cruise stage is going to be risky under acceleration.

Also, you literally have twice what you need for the job. Twice as much fuel as you need, twice as many nuclear engines. Engines on the lander are good, though. You just need half as much fuel on it,

[The Dulas]

So, would I be able to make a laythe trip?

[Grover]

For my first dunar return mission, i just took my workhorse munsr return craft, added parachutes to the lander, then two pairs of asparagus fuel tanks (without engines to reduce mass) to increase thr dv, and finally went from 4 asparagus boosters to 6 on thr launch stage, it doesnt takd much engineering to get a sensible craft.

Then just make sure you land close to the equator, and dont be scared to use a couole f slingshots to reduce your dv requirements; you dont have to plan a perfect and complex solution, just use the sling**** around mun or ike to boost your orbit up high well before your ejections, so that your ejection burns use less fuel (since youre already halfway out the SOI)

You dont even need nuclear engines, just keep your craft as LIGHT as possible and use the tiny rockomax engine, youd be amazed how far they can go, my probe satalites with very little fuel often have over 2000 m/s dv due to their low mass, in a manned mission, that means use thr mk1 pod, as few science instruments as possible (remember to move data to the command pod so you can bring more back ) and use kerbal enginerr and a dv map to minimise the amount of fuel you take ( i usually add 10 or 15 % to what the map says, coz nobodys perfect )

Hope it helps