Need some help getting a rover on the Mun

[jarmenia]

I've been trying to figure out how to get this rover to the mun, but I just can't come up with a cargo bay / garage type thing that I can then put on a rocket. Do you have any suggestions? Mods are acceptable.

[sal_vager]

Maybe put it under a landing craft with radial engines

[LethalDose]

Can we get a larger picture? I can barely tell what going on in that image.

You've got an axial mounting point free on it's top (that battery). Based on what I can see, I'd mount the rover and "sky-hook" style landing craft upside down on a transfer stage.

[jarmenia]

Here's a bigger image. So, I'm trying to model something that would realistically get launched so I'm trying to put this on a rocket. How would I make the upside down sky hook aerodynamic?

[LethalDose]

Oh, wow thats even smaller than I though.

Yeah, I'd recommend ditching the landing legs, placing the lights where the legs used to be, and attaching the rover to a small sky-hook using a separator. If there's nothing on the bottom of the rover, you can mount the whole thing upright on top of the transfer stage. I'd also probably lose the 6 radially mounted batteries on the body, too. But that's just me.

[Tank Buddy]

Like this:

Or this

Be sure to reverse the decoupler if you want it to detach from the rover, and add a probe body to the sky crane if you want to control it after landing. Dandy if you have enough fuel to send it on an escape trajectory if you just let it go by itself. You can just steer it into the terrain.

[capi3101]

Like what Tank Buddy suggested. A small stack decoupler with your rover hanging on it would do the trick. Be sure to aim the decoupler so that it stays with the crane and not on your rover. And make sure the engines are not firing into the rover itself - that's a great way to make noise and, later on, a new Münar crater.

May I offer some unsolicited advice? You need to stick something with a high impact tolerance on the front of that rover (a girder or structural panel), and probably on the top as well. You'll thank me the first time you lose control over it at 20 m/s; the Mün, she is a heartless RAGING HERD OF SOMEWHAT FERAL RABBITS, especially towards small rovers like yours.

EDIT: As for putting it on a rocket, you should have an attachment point on the bottom of that Rovemax. If not, make one with a BZ-52 or Cubic Octagonal strut (be sure to place it right under the center of mass or you'll have additional fun (using the Dwarf Fortress definition of fun)). Then use a small stack decoupler with a girder underneath to attach it to your booster. Do it right and you can send up your whole skycrane that way.

Edited January 28, 2014 by capi3101

[jarmenia]

Like this:

http://i.imgur.com/vlNcyI7.jpg

This is kind of what I've been trying. But how to I then attach that lander thing to a rocket that actually flies?

[EtherDragon]

This is kind of what I've been trying. But how to I then attach that lander thing to a rocket that actually flies?

Instead of the nose-cone, add a decoupler - and have your sky-crane and rover inverted on the rocket. Here's a video from my 0.22 career mode let's play - skip to about 8:00 into the video to see how I made the Landercan and Rover the "top" stage, by inverting them.

Edited January 28, 2014 by EtherDragon

[irongut]

You could swap the landing legs for the tiny radial rockets, add a few toroidal fuel tanks and land it without a sky crane like my Mun Bug:

Note it was very difficult to land and is somewhat top heavy, making driving difficult. If I was to do it over I'd still try the no sky crane idea but would probably design the rover a bit differently.

[luizopiloto]

I did this way... used a tug with a main engine to push the rover to the moon... and 4 smal radial engines to pull it while landing... once it got close to the ground, detached the rover and flew the tug back to kerbin...

[Tank Buddy]

You can do either of 2 things:

A. Remove the nose cone (just there for show) and place a decoupler, flip the whole apparatus upside down and put it on a rocket with a probe core oriented correctly.

B. Just put the rocket under the rover and add struts.

[specs]

Sky-cranes are all right... But why not put a base up there while you're at it?

Here's me, pre-launch:

-and-

As soon as I touched down, I retracted the legs attached to the 909, and gently tipped it onto the lateral gear.

The final result:

-note-

Damage to the rover seen here was caused post landing, and by pulling sweet jumps

[jarmenia]

Strange thing. I've built it and flown it, but during flight, my prograde, retrograde, and maneuver symbols are backwards. That is, if I point to the prograde icon, I'm actually burning retrograde and vice versa. Any ideas why this is?

[capi3101]

Usually that means the control point you're using is oriented upside down relative to the rest of your craft. If you go to attach things inverted, it's something you have to deal with (personal experience on this). What you can do is select another control point when you go for launch...say, add another probe core just below that decoupler in that pic you've got there, switch to it before you lift off and then when you go to decouple, whatever control point you've got on that lander should take over and be oriented the correct way.

[jarmenia]

Thanks for all the help everyone! My rover has made it to the Mun!