Operation Forager

[merendel]

Operation Forager

Prologue

Jebediah Bob and Bill are called before the Kongress Space exploration committee to be informed of the most recent project to be undertaken by the KSP. Operation Forager.

Chairman Kerman“Gentlemen, your mission should you choose to accept it(or not) is to go to space...â€Â

Jeb “Coolâ€Â

“... to collect science for the advancement of all kerbals...â€Â

Bob “sounds goodâ€Â

“...and to lay the groundwork for permanent colonization of space.â€Â

Bill “um... why am I here again? I don’t even like flying.â€Â

Jeb/Bill “Shushâ€Â

Chairman “To facilitate this you must establish at least rudimentary mining and manufacturing facilities beyond low kerbin orbit.â€Â

Bill “A bold plan. We will need quite a few resources to acomplish these goalsâ€Â

Chairman “Yes about that. Unfortunately there was a bit of a snag in appropriations. We could only secure funding for an orbital mission or two, a munar flyby mission, and a landing on each moon. Kongress has also committed to a pair of satellite launches a small space station and monthly resupply shipments of crew, air, water, and snacks. Every thing else you'll need to find out there or crowd source through the MorBoosters programâ€Â

Bill “oh great kraken!â€Â

Bob “This is going-â€Â

Jeb “-to be so epic!â€Â

Bob “I was going to say hardâ€Â

Bill “I was going to just curl up in a ball and cryâ€Â

Chairman “You can of course do any prototyping and ground testing of vehicles at the KSP facilities. There is also room in the budget for a suborbital hop or two or some atmospheric vehicle testing as long as the pieces are in a resalable condition afterwords. If you crash it its coming out of your paychecks. Good luck gentlemen.â€Â

MorBoosters: A Crowd funding initiative to help pay for missions outside of those funded by government. Funds for 1 ton of launch weight are accumulated every kerbin day, (6h universe time) or 120 tons per month universal time. In addition science excites the populous resulting in 1 ton of credit per 10 science.

This is going to be a modded campaign play through with the goal of establishing viable offworld operations with very limited launch capability from kerbin after the first few missions. The early missions have lesser limitations mostly to jumpstart the tech tree to the point of important offworld tech otherwise I'd have to timewarp a ton for the first year or two of game time Primary mods content/parts include KSP interstellar, Kethane, Extra-planetary Launchpads, Kerbal Attachment system, B9 and KW rocketry. Ferram, deadly reentry, and TAC lifesupport are added for difficulty. The usual quality of life improvements such as Kerbal alarm clock, Enhanced nav ball, precise node, RCS build aid, and mechjeb(mostly for info windows) and a few others I cant remember right now. Expect the thread to be fairly picture heavy and to have a fair bit of (hopeful funny and entertaining) story telling for good measure. Enjoy.

First few chapters are done and will be posted fast as I can finish the layout.

[merendel]

Chapter 1 Press Day.

Knowing they have their work cut out for them and needing to drum up public support for later our intrepid Kerbonauts pose for the cameras in front of a capsule mockup on the launchpad.

While they are at it they collect whatever meager science can be gleaned from around KSP. Jeb handles getting samples and a report from the launchpad. Bob covers the runway. And Bill decides to make a report from the KSP snackbar. Jeb and Bob scold Bill for goofing off, mostly because they are upset they didn’t think of it first. However the sample bill took shows promise for future experiments and they shove the wobbly green substance into a canister to strap to their rockets. All and all 56 science was gathered on press day. Not a bad days work for not even attempting to leave Kerbafirma.

Still there is much work to be done and the team must at least leave the spaceport to advance further. So Jeb whips up the first of several suborbital rockets. Thanks to the overzelous use of parachutes and mystery goo he splashed down safely and gathered 45.2 science.

Bob is baffled at how quickly the stuff multiplies as they only had a single sample when bill collected it a few hours ago and now they have 8 strapped to a single rocket with more back in the lab. On the bright side that flight gave them another idea for experiments. The advent of the SC-9001 Science JR materials bay neted them another 18.2 science just on the ground.

Bill flew a bottle rocket MK2 with Materials bays attached. He was aimed for the grasslands and landed safely. Unfortunatly he landed hatch down so he couldnt get out and take a sample but still collected 43.7 science.

Bob flew a second mark2 aimed north to the highlands. He landed on flat ground and remained upright so he colected another 62.2 science thanks to the surface sample and the fact that he reached the upper atmosphere.

At last the team determined that they had exausted all of the science that could be had on these short fully recoverable hops. It was now time to start planing the first orbital mission.

Results of chapter 1.

Science

56+45.2+18.2+43.7+62.2= 225.3 science

Time y1,d1, 01:00:00

Current MorBoosters credit.

22.53 Tons

[merendel]

Chapter 2 Falling without hitting the ground.

We last left our intrepid trio preparing to send the first orbiter mission into space. While the designs were being worked on Bill noticed that Kongress had not actually specified the details of the mission. The purchase order literally said “One Orbital mission†Nobody said they couldn’t strap an extra booster or two to the rocket so the final lift stage arrived in orbit mostly full instead of empty. After all who does not like more boosters? And any materials that got left behind in orbit could be retrieved later when they actually had to pay for missions. Waste not want not and all that jaz.

And so the orbiter 1 was born. Included was a new glass control panel which Jeb is checking out.(Rastor prop monitor mod installed, forgot in first post.)

However there is no time to play with our new toys. Light is failing and if we don’t want to launch in the dark its time to go.

Booster seperation and main engine activation.

And a stable orbit achieved. Time to do some science. Jeb enjoys the view of kerbin after retrieving science data from the lift stage.

With over 600 units of fuel and 2700 dV remaining the decision is made to raise apoapsis a bit and get the high over kerbin Science as well as the near kerbin.

After retrieving experimental data from another pair on the drive section a short burn was performed to aerobreak over the next orbit or two to lower the AP back down to a parking orbit thats easier to access. We are also waiting for daybreak at the KSP as we are going to an attempt to land there or at least splashdown nearby. With dawn breaking over KSP Jeb circularizes at ~120km there is still almost 500 units of fuel left in the main drive, hopefully there will be an opportunity to come back for it later. Either way he has about half an orbit to go before his deorbit burn. We are targeting a 31km PE.

Burning in low over reentry mountain and Jeb is cool as a cucumber. Oddly enough the deorbit engine makes a rather decent heatshield. There is a proper one underneath it just in case but it was not needed. Only lost the downward facing external camera.

Sadly fell 25km short of the KSP. Jebs in for a bit of a walk back but at least he can get that surface sample bill missed due to his landing earlier. On the bright side 165.2 science earned for a 4 hour mission.

Spirits are high after a successful mission. While the trio do indulge in a brief party there is no time to rest. It is time to set their sights even higher. Next stop, the mun.

Results of chapter 2.

Science 165.2

Time y1:d1:05:00:00

MorBuster Credits 16.52 tons

Balance 39.05 tons.

[merendel]

Chapter 3 Aiming higher.

Jeb: What ya working on there Bob?

Bob looks up from a pile of scattered parts and circuit boards. “Oh just a few instruments for the next missionâ€Â

Jeb “Did we get a new shipment of science parts after I landed?â€Â

Bob: “No. well yes we have that new thermometer but this is something we had but couldn’t really use last mission. Thanks to those new solar pannles we can actually power these babies now. Did you know we can use magnets to scan for ore deposits from space?â€Â

Jeb: “I thought those devices had too limited a range to work from orbit.â€Â

Bob: “True enough on kerbin, at least for the devices small enough for us to launch right now. However on the mun theres no atmosphere so we could fly low enough for it to actualy work. I was thinking the orbiter 1 had enough fuel that we could have done the flyby mission with it. With just a few tweeks and a slightly biger tank on the final stage I bet we could actualy enter orbit and stick around long enough to do at least a partial maping of the planet looking for future mining sites. We will need those maps eventualy.â€Â

Jeb: “Sounds like a plan. I'll have the boy's down in the VAB strap some extra snacks to the orbiter. We should probably send Bill on this one. After his last faceplant landing I dont think its a good idea to make him perform any landing without lots of parachutes. The next Kerbaled mission after this will require such a landing.â€Â

Bob: “Good plan. I'll have these sensors and solar panels sent down in a little bit for installation. You going to tell Bill he's slated for the next mission?â€Â

Jeb: “No. I'll just have him dust the controls one last time before launch and then just lock him in the capsule till its to late to abort.

And bill's off weather he likes it or not. The second launch of the orbiter, this one christened the high flyer, went off without a hitch.

The ship underwent minor redesign, an extra fuel tank with 100 units of fuel was added to the return/deorbit stage boosting its delta V up to 1316 more than enough to ensure a safe return. Additionally the top mounted parachute was replaced with a pair of radially mounted ones so a small mapping satellite could be mounted in its place.

The gravity turn was nearly perfect placing the ship into a 100km orbit, a bit higher than the 80 that was intended. Still it is well within margins for the mission and so the plan for the lunar transfer burn is transmitted up. The fact that it sets a collision course does not amuse bill in the slightest.

Still it was a mission requirement so the mapping satellite could enter a polar orbit while the main vessle enters a slightly inclined orbit with the minimum of additional deltaV spent. That and jeb wanted to see the look on bills face when he ploted the burn. He even mounted a small camera behind a false panel to capture it for posterity.

On the other hand Bill got a lovely view of kerbin on the aft camera during the departure burn, this time cleverly mounted behind the heat shield at an angle to hopefuly not get cooked off in reentry.

Bill Kerman is officially the first Kerbol to enter the moon SOI. The mapsat is jettisoned and makes a short burn to set it on a polar orbit

Meanwhile while the high flyer makes a different burn aiming for a 50k 30 degree inclination orbit. With all burns out of the way for the next hour its time to do some science. Instruments are turned on the goo and materials bays are exposed to vacuum and bill takes a short spacewalk to colect the data while recording his thoughts on the subject for posterity. His comments have been redacted for content not suitable for young audiences. Or any audiences for that matter.

Both the flyer and the probe make their circularizeation burns successfully and after confirming that the flyer had sufficient battery power to run all the instrumentation through the night side of the orbit Bill took another jaunt out to collect more data from the goo and materials bays.

Every so often ground control would ask him to step outside and observe his surroundings once again when the ship flew over a new and interesting biome. Many of his observations revolved around him noticing that jeb derived a sick sense of pleasure making him get out of a perfectly good capsule over and over.

The mapping went very well uncovering several potential locations for mining colonies near the equator. One location near a large crater on the far side of the mun, that bill dubbed the east farside crater, even had overlapping fields of kethane and ore deposits withen a degree or two of the equator. It may not have much of a view of kerbin but if landing conditions are good it may be an idea base for mining. Interestingly enough there was virtually no kethane on the kerbin facing side of Mun. The lab monkeys are still pondering the implications of this finding.

After a Sol day of orbiting the mun the low res altemitry scan completed for a windfall of 60 science worth of data. Sadly the tech whines had not designed this sensor to have its data removed directly but they'd stuck a transmitter on-board the high flyer. Bob dutifully flipped the switch to transmit that science home. He also asked why they had a sol day that was 24 hours when a kerbin day was 6 hours. Mission controll told him to shut up and concentrate on continuing to miss the ground while he was falling towards the mun. The panic this statement induced kept him busy for several hours and let Jeb take a nap.

This nap nearly lead to disaster as 38 hours into the mission kerbin eclipsed kerbol for an extended period of time. Sensors were not deactivated in time and the ship ran out of power. Bill proved that dispite his tendency to panic he works well under extreme pressure. Activating the engines generated enough charge to rotate the ship and get the air flowing again. Angling the ship so as to reduce its inclination kept him from flying too far off corse.

Once there was enough charge to power up his EVA suit he went for a bit of a walk for half an orbit as his suit consumed power more slowly than the ship. Coming back around the mun again blessed daylight shown on him and he got back in the ship. He spent the next hour yelling at jeb over the radio.

As the sensor sweep was nearly complete and the unexpected burn disrupted the original path the decision was made to bring bill home at last. The guys in medical were also concerned about the potential of space dementia, a theorized consequence of long term space flight. An undisclosed secondary objective of this mission was to prove or disprove this theory as it would impact the longterm viability of the greater mission. Bill was not informed of his test subject status.

As preparations to separate from the transfer stage were underway it was realized that the techs forgot to put any solar panels or batteries on the return capsule. Bill was forced on another spacewalk to fix this over-site lest he get quite cold on the way home.

eventually Bill started to burn for home. A 44Km aerobraking pass was planed.

As it turns out 44km was a bit overly conservative. They probably could have gone deeper safely but Bill has plenty of snacks he can wait another orbit before coming home. A few m/s at apoapsis drooped the orbit down to 38 to test the viability of that aerobraking depth. There is a stronger heat shield on the under side of the pod should the engine be insufficient.

Another pass this time some shock heating effects were observed but temperatures stayed withen tolerances. Mission controll made a note to aim for 37-38km passes for inbound aerobraking on future missions.

On the 4th pass it turned out the high flyer was comeing in a bit too deep to remain in orbit. There was no risk of burning up but a targeted landing was not in the cards. Like it or not bill was comeing in.

Not the best targeted landing. Bill didnt even land on the right landmass. He also crushed the mechjeb flight computer box when the pod tiped over on landing. He's about 1/3 the way around the planet from KSP. Kongress was not pleased at having to send a plane out to get him but they were happy with the 552 science brought back in the pod on top of the 60 transmited home.

Bill was in space for a record setting 2 days 10 hours and 36 minutes. Medical rushed him into a nice padded observation room as soon as he got back to the KSP. While there was no sign of any space dementia they wanted to watch him for a few days just to be sure. He wouldnt be going anywhere till the results were in.

Chapter 3 results

Science 60 + 552 = 612

Time y1:d3:16:30:00 (+5 tons)

MorBoosters credit 61.2 + 5 =66.2 tons

balance 66.2+39.05 = 105.25 tons.

[merendel]

Chapter 4. Higher Better Faster MoreBoosters!

Jeb and Bob are called back before Kongress. Bill would be there too but medical still wont let him out.

Chairman: “The bean counters downstairs noticed some discrepancies. Notably that you've been sending up noticeably more rocket parts than have been coming back down. Would you two like to explain this?â€Â

Jeb: “Wow I had no idea the economy was that bad off.â€Â

Chairman: “What?â€Â

Jeb: “Well things must be really rough if your having to pay for rocket parts in beans.â€Â

Bob: “Bean counters are accountants, they don’t actually count beans.â€Â

Jeb: “Oh. Then why do they call them bean counters?â€Â

Chairman: “if the comedy team is quite finished I would like an answer to why you've been sending extra parts into orbit tacked onto the approved missions.â€Â

Jeb: “Because we could and you didnt say no?â€Â

Bob: “If it works with earmarks and legislation why not rockets?â€Â

Chairman: “Real cute Bob. And Jeb consider yourself told.â€Â

Jeb:â€ÂTold what?â€Â

Chairman: “NO! No more off the books mission objectives. As you've already seen fit to attach a satellite launch to your last mission we are scrubbing one of the 2 satellite launches. You can do one more.â€Â

Bob: “You cant do that! Our plans need that other satellite. We had a deal.â€Â

Chairman: “We are altering the deal, pray we do not alter it any further. Its only because your program has had such success that you haven’t been brought up on charges already. Don’t let us catch you in any more improprieties. Now get back to work.â€Â

Back at KSP

Jeb: “I think that went wellâ€Â

Bob: “Well? This is a disaster. How are we going to map kerbin and minmus now, let alone the fact that we really should send another one to mun with the equipment for a more detailed scan.â€Â

Jeb: “Oh thats not a problem. What if our satellite just happens to have redundant systems. Furthermore what if it suffers a kracken attack that just happens to break it in half resulting in 2 fully functional satellites and throws them into the proper orbits.â€Â

Bob: “I think were going to end up in jail.â€Â

Jeb: “You worry too much. Now lets get to work, we have a mission to plan.â€Â

Bob: “I wonder if they need another rocket designer over at the kremlin. Ye-ouch, Jeb whered you get that cattle prod?â€Â

Jeb: “Less whiny more designy.â€Â

And so our intrepid kerbals are aiming to send an object higher and faster than ever before and strong enough to survive an attack of the fabled space kraken. Even if said kraken takes the form of an extra seperator in the stageing.

Our satellite carefuly shrouded in a fairing for aerodynamic reasons. Of corse we wouldnt be trying to hide anything under there.

Main booster burnt out and detached. This looks high enough to ditch the fairings. Nobody below will suspect a thing.

Oh no disaster, Oh the kerbolity!

Strangely enough 2 pieces of the debris are actually responding to com signals. Each one appears to be fully functional. The mission is saved!

Well the first one is off to minmus like planed.

May as well send the second one to the mun for a complete biome survey that the first sat was incapable of. There should be sufficient dV in the tank to finish its mission and drop back down and scan kerbin afterward.

Meanwhile back at the KSP, It came to the scientists attention that neither the thermometer nor the barrometer had been used around the spaceport. It was absolutely unthinkable to leave all that valuable science laying around so the live probe class vessle was designed. This is obviously too mundane a job for Bob, Jeb, or the still confined Bill so a quick visit to the lounge and several interns are drafted. We'll need them to man the space station and mining colonies later anyway. Kennie is up first. Dispite the troubles of his namesake he survives his short hop from the launchpad to the KSP lawn picking up readings in both places as well as in mid air, the overachiever. A whole 20.6 science.

Next we've got buzz kerman, a time honored name among spacers. heading out to the water. He also overachieved and got 28.8 thanks to realizing nobody had taken a sample of the water yet nore done an EVA report. He came back wet but happy.

James covered readings from the runway and shores biome. Only 12 science but every bit counts.

Danlin was given a slightly bigger fuel tank and told to aim for the mountains. He actualy overshot and landed in the highlands but redeemed himself by also grabbing data from the upper atmosphere garning 33.5 science.

At this point the scientists were appeased and jeb was bored with hazing the interns. 2 new research goals had been achieved thanks to the total of 94.9 science gathered.

Dispite the “Setback†of the early mission “Kraken Attack†both satellites successfully completed orbital trim maneuvers to place them in polar orbits, encountered their targets, and established stable orbits to begin their scans.

Bob eagerly await the results of the scans. If they prove as fruitful as he hopes It could provide the breakthrough needed to make the next mission even more successful. That however is for the next installment.

Chapter 4 results

Science 94.9 (9.49 tons)

Time y1:d6:00:00:00 (9tons)

Ballance 105.25 + 18.49 = 123.74 tons

[merendel]

chaper 5 Keep It Simple Stupid.

After several days of design work Bob was going over the results of the orbital scans sent back by the probes. While not 100% complete they were far enough along to give a good idea of what they had to work with.

Jeb: “Those the scans of minmus? How are things looking?â€Â

Bob: “Yes and the results came back good but not as good as we hoped. While its relatively fuel rich compaired to the Mun if you take the size difference into account its ore concentrations are much lower. There are concentrations scattered across the surface but they are all less than a million Kermits apiece, some significantly less so.â€Â

Jeb : “Kermits?â€Â

Bob: “Yes, its a unit of measurement I created and named after myself to quantify the relative concentrations of resources off an orbital scan.â€Â

Jeb: “Why not Bobbits then?â€Â

Bob: “I'd considered it but every time I did I had an inexplicable pain in my crotch so I went with Kermits. Mun has many patches over 15 million Kermits. Its still worth mining on minmus due to the lower fuel requirements but mining stations will have to be more mobile and we'll mine it out faster. Anyway while the data could have been better it did give us what we needed to finalize the plans for the Kerbal International Space Station Core.â€Â

Jeb: “Did you really design a rocket called Kissy?â€Â

Bob: “No I... wait... K.I.S.S.C? Damn it.â€Â

Jeb: “To late to change it now, strap some boosters on it and send a couple interns up in it to test it out. Oh and tell the interns that any science that happens in that module stays in the module if it involves its namesake.â€Â

Bob: “I hate you. I really really hate you.â€Â

Science returns from satellites so far. Mun biome 60, Minmus altemitry 80, minmus biome 75.3

And so the KISSC was launched with James, Camrin, Buzz and Kennie Kermin on-board. Liftoff proceeded according to plan.

Aside from a bit of unexpected rotation during the gravity turn orbital insertion also went well. Our slightly dizzy but elated crew in LKO. They have ~ 6 months of food and 3.5k dV in the lower drive section. While LKO will be the stations final home it will have a short systems tour including stops at minmus and mun to support the lander missions. A small refinery is included to support eventual kethane tankers docking and refilling the fuel tanks. Shipyard facilities are planed for future expansions.

Speaking of Kethane and lander missions here we have the design for the Kethane 1. Jeb took the design bob drew up for the transfer stage designed to deliver the lander capsule to either moon, split it in half, and put some kethane tanks in the middle. A set of landing gear and some extraction equipment later and he had an automated lander that could fill up on kethane and rendezvous with KISSC from either moon. Bob, after yelling at Jeb about prison and more importantly not messing with his designs added a power system and balanced the RCS so it could actually dock properly. As long as the 4 tanks have fuel levels equalized the COM should barely shift between empty and full and fuel could be transferred as ballast.

Next we have the Moon Lander. Sufficient dV for a landing on the Mun as long as one is efficient Obviously a bit overkill for minmus but it will have good hang time there. It is designed to land, colect data, and then return it to KISSC for processing and cleaning. 2 copies of the experiments are included, 1 for transmission and 1 for return in the KERS.

Speaking of the KERS here we have the KErbal Return System. Its detractors call it a glorified escape pod however in reality this is a precision designed capsule capable of safely carrying a precious cargo of science safely back to kerbin. There is also room for 1 kerbal and enough snacks to keep him from complaining too much for 11 days. A secondary ablative heatshield should allow for very aggressive return profiles.

And here is the whole mission assembled and piloted by Bob. As both jeb and bill have had their outer space missions now its his turn. Besides he's the only one qualified to fix this thing if it breaks down. At 24 tons its actually lighter than the KISSC by payload weight which was around 40 tons. Its siting on the same launch system however, not strictly needed but since it was not coming out of Operation Forager's budget. (turns out I've got a glitchy IVA view on this pod, you can see some of it on the portrait)

The thing was a bit wobbly on the way up but got up just fine. Actually left a tank and a half of gas in LKO. Chairman will not be pleased but we'll scavenge that later.

Chapter 5 results

Science 60 + 80 + 75.3 = 215.3 (21.53 tons)

time y1:d10: 00:40:00 (16tons)

Balance 123.74 + 21.53 + 16 + 161.27 tons.

Note this is the end of my backlog. Further chapters will be as I play them. Hope you've been enjoying so far.

[merendel]

Chapter 6 The land of snow and Kethane.

When we last left Operation Forager Bob and the Interns were in orbit and preparing to set out for a landing on minmus. While they were launching the maping satellite that was thrown into munar orbit by the kraken attack, totally by chance mind you, had finished its task and returned to kerbin to begin mapping its home world.

Sadly due to some poor piloting and a slight overestimation of its dV potential it was not able to achieve the most ideal mapping orbit. After several aerobraking passes it burnt its remaining fuel and ended up in a 56 degree orbit ranging from 480 to 327KM. Its a start but a new satellite will need to be sent when there are no higher priority missions to be dealt with.

Despite the mixed results of the satellites Bob plots a course for minmus. The KISSC will follow an orbit later.

interestingly there was a close flyby to the spent booster from his own ship right at the start of the burn. It passed within 200 meters.

The Interns departed 20 minutes later on a nearly identical course.

Bob decided he did not want to spend the next 2 days starring at the displays and controls appearing to hover in a blacker than space backdrop that his cockpit had inexplicably been painted. Probably a prank by jeb.

So he moved up to the KERV and its more familiar surroundings.

He will have to deal with it while shuttling up and down from the surface but for now he can relax.

A small 70m/s correction burn at their respective descending nodes see's both ships on corse for an intercept with minmus in about 2 days. Both ships arrived with no difficulties. The KISSC adjusted to a 0 degree inclination at ~16km and Bob setup for a rendezvous to drop off the KERS.

Docking is successful and moves back to the lander to prepare for his decent.

The kethane miner remains undocked and will descend on auto pilot when it passes over a convenient patch and begin filling its tank. It reduces its orbit to 6km to facilitate this.

An equatorial patch just past the dawn terminator is targeted. Orbital scans seem to indicate it is located on a messa of sorts. Only attempting the landing will let us know for sure.

Target site looks good. Begining deorbit burn.

And we have contact. About a 10degree incline. Not bad but perhaps bill can land nearby and scout for a slightly better location on the same patch.

Drills deployed and we are positive for kethane. Refueling operations commencing. It turns out the solar panels are insufficient to run both drills at the same time. Close but not quite enough. However 1 drill and 1 conversion module is possible so it begins refilling its fuel tank. A better miner will be designed later but this will have to do for now.

As the station was passing over head bob planed to drop down near the miner and have a look around but discovered that the miner had drained his fuel tanks as he disconnected from the station. He had to redock on RCS and fill up. By the time that was done the opportunity had passed. May as well do other science in the mean time.

James and Camrin are sent down to the lab to begin processing the experiments.

With all experiments reset Bob once more initiates the landing procedures and aims for the area known as the greater flats. Touchdown.

Shortly there after Bob became the first kerbal to set foot on another heavenly body. He planted a flag and posed for the camera before getting on with the important science he'd traveled 11 thousand km to participate in.

This seems a good place to stop.

Chapter 6 results

Science transmitted from minmus 37.5 + 18 + 30+40+20+25 +170.5 (17.05 tons)

Time y1:d12: 12:00:00 (10 tons)

Balance 161.27+17.05+10= 188.32

[merendel]

Chapter 7 A Badass is born.

Bob: “ahh its nice to finaly get a chance to relax.â€Â

After a hard days work Bob was taking a break in the KISSC's hitchhiker module to grab some snacks and maybe take a short nap. He'd already been up and down from minmus 6 times over the last several hours. The trips had been relatively uneventful although the flying stressed him out each time but he did it anyway for the science which was piling up in the return pod. Once they had a chance to cart it all back to the KSP who knows what secrets it could unlock.

In addition to the shuttling up and down the Kethane 1 had finished filling up and had returned to the station. After processing the stations fuel tanks were full to the brim and the K1 returned back to the surface to top off again. It may handle like a lumbering... well rocket, but it got the job done.

While the interns were busy cleaning out the experiments once again was the perfect time for a break. Just as Bob was closed his eyes the station gave a slight shudder and a frantic yell could be heard over the coms.

“Buzz what do you think your doing? Get back here!â€Â

Another shudder accompanied by an awful scraping sound rocked the station. Looking out the window in time to see the lander scrape past the pod, clipping but thankfully not breaking one of the solar panel arrays before tumbling off into space.

Bob: “The hell?â€Â

Buzz:“*crackle* Oops sorry about that I think I've got it figured out nowâ€Â

Kennie: “Your not cleared to fly that thing. Get redocked before you break something!â€Â

Buzz: “To infinity and beyond! YEHAW!â€Â

Out the view ports the Minmus lander ignited its main drive, did a mostly graceful flip and rocket strait back down past the station at full burn headed for the surface.

Bob watched this all with morbid fascination “Well he's got balls... at least for now. If he breaks the lander and survives I'm going to feed them to him though. Kennie, any idea what got into him besides watching too many cartoons?â€Â

Kennie: “He was out cleaning out the pod and then noticed we were passing over an area not slated for a visit for a few more orbits. He just said I've got this, closed the canopy and undocked.â€Â

Bob: “well nothing to do but watch, we don’t have anything that could catch up to him in time to make a difference. Hmm, he's killed his horizontal velocity but if he does not burn soon he wont be able to slow down in time. Point of no return in 3...2...1... ah there’s the burn, he's cutting it awfully close.

Manic cackles of glee could be heard over the radio as the lander screeched to a halt scant meters over the surface then cut power and drooped to land with a light thump.

Bob shook his head with an exasperated sigh before depressing the transmit button “Buzz since your down there scrape up all the science you can and then get back up here.â€Â

Buzz: “Will do boss. *clang* owâ€Â

Bob: “Did you just try to salute through the radio? Never mind just get finished and back up here. And if you damage that ship I'm leaving you down there. We still need that thing for 2 more landings.â€Â

Buzz returned safely and ended up flying the remaining 2 and a half missions. Yes theres an extra half in there. It turns out he was so excited to go look at the poles that he forgot to let the other interns finish cleaning the goo and material bays so he had to make another trip. At least the poles are rather easy targets to hit even if it is fairly expensive on the dV. On the bright side this thing is way overengineered for minmus so it has dv to burn.

Still all good things must come to an end. After a full day of orbiting minmus they had extracted every drop of science their current equipment could from the frozen moon. 67 experiments were stuffed into the KERS with copies of 21 of them in the lab waiting for either transmission or for a drop pod to be sent up to retrieve them, whatever mission control decided. Bob was needed back at home to help design the next mission and to hopefully keep jeb under control. So despite the fact that the KERS could return on its own he climbed in and set a course for home. The interns had full tanks of gas and could handle getting the science equipment back to either kerbin or the mun on their own.

After double checking fuel levels in the pod Bob undocked and had one last look at the station with minmus as a backdrop befor burning for kerbin.

Like jeb he aimed for the KSP and missed although not as far as bill did. He ended up on the far side of reentry mountain. The recovery crew at least didnt have to drive too far to bring him back home.

And boy what a hero's welcome he received. 4373.8 science retrieved. The eggheads in the science lab were actually attempting to worship him until Jeb came along and bustled them back into their labs.

Chapter 7 results

Science 4373.8 (427.3tons)

time y1:d15:12:00:00 (3 days, 12 tons)

Balance: 188.32 + 12 + 427.3 = 627.62 tons

Incidentally the thing with buzz happened pretty much like I described. I'd swapped him out because I'd noticed he always seemed happy while flying and was curious if he had the baddass tag enabled (later checked persistent, he does) Unfortunately the station was under mechjeb SAS control when I undocked. The lander instantly tried to spin 90 degrees and it had its RCS on which is balanced around a half load of fuel so it drifted a bit right up into the solar array. I was also in a hurry as I was about to leave the targeted biome and I needed to get back to the kethane ship soon to launch so took an aggressive decent profile. Incidentally buzz also has nearly maxed stupidity so I decided to play it up a bit.

[merendel]

Chapter 8 Some assembly required part1

Bob: “Jeb. Jeb. I think we can do it!â€Â

Jeb: “Oh I agree but there is just one problem.â€Â

Bob: “Problem? But... The calculations are perfect.â€Â

Jeb: “I know but where are we going to get 4 tons of icecream, a rockomax X200-8 full of whiped cream, and a cherry the size of a flight helmet on such short notice?â€Â

Bob: “Uh what?â€Â

Jeb: “To make the worlds largest icecream sunday in the shape of a Mk2 Command pod. What did you think we were talking about.â€Â

Bob: “Oh I dont know, something serious like the latest windfall of science giving us what we need to launch a fully functional orbital shipyard.â€Â

Jeb: “... Thats cool and all but I think my idea is cooler.â€Â

Bob: “Fine, if you want cool go to minmus the whole thing is like one giant mint icecream sunday.â€Â

Jeb: “WHAT? That wasnt in any of the reports.â€Â

Bob: “Who are you going to believe the reports or the guy who went there?â€Â

Bill: “Didnt you right the reports?â€Â

Bob: “Shush... and whend they let you out of medical?â€Â

Bill: “Right after you got back and cleared medical in 5 minutes. Someone realized that you'd been out longer and they probably should release me at last.â€Â

Jeb: “Enough of that. Lets get back to the icecream.â€Â

Bob: “Sigh, thanks to the last mission we have the funds and techknowlagy to design and launch a system capable of scooping up chunks of minmus and turning it into new rockets.â€Â

Jeb: “Entire rockets made out of icecream? Well what are we waiting for lets get launching.†Jeb runs out the door heading to the VAB.

Bill: “Theres no icecream is there?â€Â

Bob: “Nope but if it keeps him on task what he does not know wont hurt him.â€Â

Bill: “He's going to be pissed when he realizes you tricked him.â€Â

Bob: “Meh put him in a rocket designed to spin wildly out of control and he'll be happy as a clam and forget all about this. Besides if it keeps him on task for now its worth it.â€Â

And so we have the launch of the Industrial Venture crewed by Matt Jedfry and Danlin kermin. Weighing in at 257.28T on the launchpad it consumes nearly half of our alloted tonage but it should be worth it. Too bad the fairing required to get it into the air looks silly on top of such a comparitively small rocket.

Once the external boosters drop away the fairing is discarded and we get the first glimps of the orbital construction yard with its attendant skycrane mounted on the front.

The larger booster below the main fuel tank is discarded as the skycrane tows the platform out inti minmus orbit. The tank on the end is still half full and is used for the transfer and will later be a small fuel depot for launching ships.

Once in orbit the skycrane docks to one of the lower ports and the space dock begins to unpack its equipment. First it deploys a workship with a small RCS attached. It moves itself to a docking port.

Next the mining and smeltery rig is deployed. Here we see the skycranes flight engineer Matt performing a brief spacewalk to secure the main winch to the central hardpoint.

Once landed ore is dredged up and is smelted into useable metal.

The skycrane goes back up to the shipyard. The last of the spair parts are used to construct a storage drum to haul the metal around in. We also get a good luck at the skycrane. 4 LV-N's provide thrust, a pair hung on each outrigger. Large structural panels help shield the engines from swaying loads and double as rather nice landing legs. The crane has 5 winches, a central stack winch underneath, 2 radials to assist the central one in securing larger loads, and 2 more mounted above the pod for whatever utility the kerbal pilots come up with.

So far its made a rather effective extension cord to transfer power and other supplies.

After its first successful trip back to orbit the kerbals decide that the first drum is not big enough and the skycrane has the thrust to carry more so they build a bigger one after the first shipment was processed.

It turns out that this was not one of their better ideas. They half filled the new container, a quantity more than 4 times the previous trip figureing it would be a good trial run.

As expected the crane had more than enough thrust to lift the cargo in minmus's weak gravity. Stearing on the other hand... not so much. Who knew that slinging 150 tons underneath a 20 ton ship would make it so hard to turn. Dispite how slow and wobbly the turn was they managed to achieve orbit thanks to liberal use of the RCS and setup an intercept for the venture. They actually managed to get withen 200 meeters with the relative velocity down to almost 0. However there was a problem. For one thing the crane was out of fuel and the kethane 1 had to be called over for a resupply run. Second that heavey weight under the crane started to occolate in very strange ways. In the time it took the kethane ship to dock with the crane strange forces had somehow boosted the orbit from the 15km orbit of the venture up to a 90km orbit dispite no reaction mass being expelled.

The scientists back at the KSP were baffled by this report. This could be a sorce of unlimited propultion if it could be harnessed. However that is a thought for another time. Matt had the bright idea to cut the 2 side lines helping ancor the container to the ship leaving only the central stack. This at least eliminated the phantom forces at work but made it even harder to controll. After 3 hours and many orbits attempting to rondevuse with the venture the decision was made to cut the load loose as fuel was getting dangerously low again. A new smaller bin was created and the crane simply farried back and forth to colect the cargo in more controllable chunks.

Meanwhile the Venture deployed a new storage pod to hold additional rocket parts so larger ships could be constructed. It also expanded the docking capacity should the need arise. The station was now capable of 26800 rocket part ships the equivalent of 42 tons of dry mass.

Sadly this was deemed insufficient by ground control so a second pod was deployed along with a new fangled 3D printer for rocket parts and some additional RCS storage. The printer made a nice spacer to make it so the docking ports were not too close together. It will also allow us to get rid of the old unsightly workshop. Its not really more efficient but its nice inline design makes it desirable. This brought the station up to 42800 units of rocket parts or

The crew obviously do not know how to draw a strait line. Luckily this station shouldn’t need to go anywhere. It can deploy a new yard to travel to a different orbit in the future. (seriously I have no idea how that bend got in there)

While our crew acomplished a lot since they arrived the work is still not done. Hours were spent trying to retrieve that oversized load which set back their schedule a bit. The rest of the construction will have to be detailed in another report.

Science

18 + 22.5 + 52.5 = 93 (9.3 tons) from a few quick science experiments near KSP

time y1:d18:15:00:00 3 days (12 tons)

Launches 257.28 tons

Balance 627.62+9.3+12-257.28= 391.64

The construction at minmus isn’t finished but due to RL being quite rude in not alowing me much time for KSP over the last week I'm posting what I have and will continue the rest of the mission in the next chapter.

[merendel]

Chapter 9 More assembly required.

Our crew acomplished much in seting up the minmus shipyards and some rudimentary mining. However there was much work to do yet. In particular they wanted to not only increase production capacity but they also needed better methods of moving the materials around. The first order of the day was fuel.

While the kethane 1 had served a need it simply could not mine and proccess kethane rapidly and was prone to depleting its power generation as well. The kerbal designers needed something that was powerful. Something that could dig through the ground rappidly for that sweet sweet kethane. It also needed to be able to work at night. One such designer happened to be watching a nature program at the same time. And so the designers created the Aardvark.

Fission powered and able to slurp and convert kethane at 30 units a second into LFO this behemoth is a one stop mobile refinery. A bit over 10k units of liquid fuel could be stored at any one time. Designers were also thrilled with the massive incandescent plume of smoke it emitted while in operation, best viewed at night.

While primarily intended to remain landed until a field had been depleted it could in a pinch be used as a fuel transport as well, able to just bairly lift off from Mun or lower gravity wells under a full load with nearly 9k dV. Not an ideal situation having to haul its heavy drills and refinery equipment along with it but it could be done. With this amount of throughput the lifting capacity of the skycrane was just not enough. It could haul 1 tank at a time but if it was too big it would have the same issue as the bigger metal bin, aka it couldnt stear. Realizing this Kerbal engineers came up with the Supremely Optimized Fuel Tanker (SOFT)

Able to haul 100 tons of fuel along with one kerbal to hook up the fuel lines this workhorse lives up to its name. Its acronym also serves as a warning to its pilot. As its literally nothing more than a flying gas can with engines strapped on land it softly or else. Its only downside is the positively anemic .2G's of acceleration with a full load. Still its efficient as long as gravity is low. Here we have the SOFT being fueld up by the Ardvark

After having conclusively proved with SOFT that bigger was in fact still bigger, the design team decided to up the anteejust to be sure. While the skycrane and its now infamous attempt at proving this was most entertaining it was decided that a more dedicated design was called for. One that they could keep pointed in the right direction even full. And so they designed the Highly Advanced Rock Deliverer. (HARD) the kerbal responsible for both the SOFT and HARD names was later found tied to the KSP flag pole with cling wrap.

The HARD is able to haul the same amount of metal into orbit as the test run of the skycrane with the big container. This time however proper placement of reaction wheels and RCS thrusters alows it to turn quite easily. Its still slow and lumbering but it wont spin out of control and crash. If it does the techs assure us that it is most definitely pilot error and not a design flaw.

Of course the cargo capacity of the HARD was pointless if they could not fill it in a reasonable time frame so the designers slapped together several smelters and a bigger drill with a set of engien pods and sent it down to the original refinery.

As uranium stocks were limited they elected to not include a reactor and instead pluged it into the origonal refinery's power grid. This somewhat limits future mobility as both vessles must be moved, one requireing a skycrane to do so but it will do for now

Next up it was decided to deal with the fissable material supply. After a small probe with instrumentation designed to detect the pressence of uranium had confirmed a viable dig site an IRSU was deployed. Insufficent uranium remained to power a larger reactor so they had to start small with only a single IRSU. (incidentally EL seems to for some reason alow the spawning of full reactors even without uranium on the station if they are full in the VAB tweakables. I'm tweeking them empty and then refueling manualy to keep it legit. Probably the no fuel transfer flag makes it ignore uranium)

The skycrane will be used to drop off Fuel pods for the IRSU to fill up with its mined goods. Here is Jeddfry after hooking the first pod up to the refinery's fuel line.

The Uranium mining operation will need to be expanded later but it will do for now. On a more pressing front the tech whinnies back at KSC sent up a reminder that new experiements that were not avalible on the initial Science expedition were now available. Thankfully some could be done from orbit so a small probe bristeling with science probes was launched. It would gather Magnetospheric and Gravitational data both near and far from minmus as well as on its way back down to kerbin. It would reenter and be picked up by ground crews in a couple days.

Next we needed to do some seismic experiments. Several probes would land with seismic sensors at various points around the planet. Nothing fancy is needed just enough of an engine to soft land, some attitude control and the sensors.

An accelerometer and antenna will be retrofitted to the skycrane to handle broadcast back to KSC. With Sensors deployed at 90 degree intervals around the equator, a 5th at the south pole and Jedfry takeing up position at the north it was time for the fun part. That would be the part where we crash bits into the surface at high speed.

Ahh the lovely atomizing effects of crashing into a planet at 450m/s

875 Science for the first probe crash. Not bad. Not bad at all. Took the better part of 3 minutes to transmit 8750 Mits back to base. Its a good thing this thing is powered by a nuke as otherwise power would be an issue.

Absolutly thrilled by the results the scientists decided to crash a few more probes into the surfface. They also remembered to turn on the probe stationed at the south pole. They are unsure if the lack of that sensor mattered but they sent the tech that forgot to flip the switch out to join the designer still tied to the flag pole.

Only 530.7 for impact 2 but well take it.

Hmm third impact didnt actually destroy everything the first time around. The Mechjeb module actually survived and got flung 13km strait up. Oh well waste not want not. The 321.9 Science was broadcast home while sensors were recalibrate to capture the modules inevitable return. Interestingly the point of impact was only a couple km from where bob first landed on minmus. 195.2 more science in the bank.

The fifth impact got weird. The impactor traveling at approximately 400m/s bounced. Yes bounced. No damage whatsoever. Undeterred they fired the engien again and plowed into the ground at a more modest 100m/s. The probe skidded to a halt with no damage once more.

Black magic is suspected. The scientists decided to look away for a moment and then ambush the rocket controls sending it back up and down for a 3rd attempt at crashing. Turns out 3rd time really was the charm and 118.4 more science rolled in

Impact 6 behaved more normally although by lucky happenstance the mechjeb module survived and the team got a 2 for one again. 71.8 and 43.6 science was transmitted for the impacts.

4 more probes were crashed into the surface generating 26.4, 16, 9.7, and 5.9 Science respectively before the scientists got bored with crashing the same ship over and over. Apparently there are diminishing returns on the enjoyment of the same explosion that is directly proportional to the diminishing returns on performing the same science experiment over and over. Who knew?

Still after 10 crashes the arcives had a wopping 2237 science in them. Considering there was only 22 science in there prior to this everybody was happy with the 2215 net gain of science from a hard day of crashing rockets into a moon.

Finished with what science could be done on minmus short of scrapeing the last dregs from each biome it was decided to at last send the KISSC home. There was no more need of it to process science experiments and in fact the venture could build a new module should the need arise. Still the Venture's crew couldnt send their fellow interns home without a parting gift. First a module to purify water and scrub CO2 was added to the KISSC followed by a shipyard module. No refining facilities were included but a sizeable supply of rocket parts were so smaller ships could be built as needed. Resupply ships would bring more parts as needed.

The 3 kerbals that remain in minmus orbit have about a months worth of supplies so they should be good until a supply run can be arranged. A salvage ship is deployed to begin cleaning up the left over probes and debris scattered around minmus.

Aside from salvage/cleanup operations there is not much for the crew to do. Being bored they decided to make better acomidations for themselves. The Venture was sort of an adhoc build as needed design. This time they built a proper habitation module and plenty of fuel/parts storage into the design. Here we have the Minmus Shipyard. Plenty of parts and fuel storage, room for 32 kerbals and the storage needed to keep them alive for 2 years if KSC ever ships up enough food to fill it. The skycrane is currently docked to one side and a drive cluster is on the back. It could be moved if the skycrane undocked but it would take forever, particularly with a full supply load (400tons at half stocked). On the bright side its only 129 parts with nothing docked.

A spaceport module, the same one attached to the KISSC before it left was deployed with a drive pod and sent down to Mun in preparation for the eventual mission to that body. Here it is inserting into Munar orbit around the same time as KISSC was finishing its aerobraking at kerbin.

The return pod with the gravioli and magnetomiters returned safely. Regretfuly nobody thought ahead to stick the extra science in the lab into the thing before sending it off. Another pod will have to be built and droped for that later. Still 481 science in the pod as it was. Lovely fireball as well.

Jeddfry while puttering around at various tasks took gravity readings and broadcast them back for another 224 science as well.

KISSC arrived and aerobreaked successfully. It took it 3 passes through the atmosphere before it circularized into a 120km orbit.

Long delay in this mission. Spent a week too sick to play and another week too busy trying to catch up with all that didnt get done while I was down. Twards the end of this mission I upgraded Extraplanetary launchpads to the new version which kinda throws a wrinkle in my spaceports that I'll have to deal with next mission.

Science gains.

2215 +481+ 224 = 2920 science (292 tons)

time Y1:D21: 17:21:00 (3.25 days 13 tons)

Balance 391.64 +292 + 13= 696.64

[Tw1]

Nice set of mission reports here.

You have some good designs.

Which mod is it that gives the impact science? That looks cool.

[merendel]

Nice set of mission reports here.

You have some good designs.

Which mod is it that gives the impact science? That looks cool.

KSP interstellar. It replaces the stock seismic experiment (uses the same part though). I could reenable it or just use the B9 packs sensors to do it but that would be kinda cheating. You get about as much science from geting all the impacts as you do from geting all the bioms with the stock experiment hence why fractalUK replaced it by default. Its not like I'm hurting for science right now. Once I get out to Mun I can probably upgrade my reactors by runing the impactor and finish out most of the tree once I go biome hopping.

One nice thing about the impact experiments however is it makes sense. An acceleromiter by itself wont tell you much if the world/moon is not geologicly active. On the other hand it can pick up impact events and you can figure out alot by raming objects of known mass and velocity into the planet. Does take more effort to setup though. you can get all the science from the pool with just 1 sensor but you'll need significantly more impacts to do it. Best case to maximize your return per impact you need sensors as widely spaced as possible hence why I had 6 all ~90degrees of seperation appart. 4 would probably be enough but I'm prety sure I hit maximum return with that deployment pattern.

Edited March 22, 2014 by merendel

[The Jedi Master]

What mod is the new IVA? It looks really awesome!

[merendel]

What mod is the new IVA? It looks really awesome!

Rastor prop monitor. It has basic revamps of the stock pods. Additionally I have the Aset ALCOR pod that I use for my primary ships once I unlocked it that has more detailed and full integration with rastor. The alcor pod is seriously nice you can prety much do everything from IVA but set/manipulate manuver nodes, you can easily follow them from the pannles however.

Edit 4/1 Steam decided to update KSP despite me setting it to not update automatically. It updated to 23.5 before I could stop it or make a backup. I am waiting on a few mod fixes before I can resume.

Edited April 2, 2014 by merendel