Kassandra (interplanetary compact ship) v3.01, gravity turn? automatic once again!

[H2O.]

Thanks for that man, I wasn't even asking for so much !
So, point per point :

10 hours ago, Majorjim said:

I am in a parking orbit of 64x64. You need to change the instructions as it mentions aerobraking, this cannot be done now without a shield. Good thing too because the solar panels where changed recently and cannot be retracted.

I will change that today, thank for the imput.

10 hours ago, Majorjim said:

My transfer burn was quite good I still have half my fuel left for the nukes. And if you allowed the transfer stage to be re-docked to the crew pod you can get rid of the ion stage. There is more than enough fuel to get there and back. Also, you need to add chutes to the lander. I know it is cool to do a powered descent, which you can still do after chutes. It would allow the lander to be smaller, and you can add more 'toys' for the surface crew.

Actually, and it is my fault that it is not very clear, this ship is not just for Duna but for the Jool system too. So it explains the high quantity of delta-v and the lack of parachutes. So on Valls a parachute descent is out of the question and I thought: "hey, if the ship can go to Valls and land there it can do it on Duna too" and so went the chutes.An other reason for the ion stage is for beginners: if they fail to dock they can still transfer Kerbals and go home.

On the other hand, I feel like I am very close to a Laythe capable spacecraft so I might take your advice (and other people have talked to me about chutes in the past). It would be for the next version (after 1.1 is released).

10 hours ago, Majorjim said:

How did you engineer the auto ascent?

To understand what is hapening here you need KER on your install.

The engine is slightly offset to give a torque in the 90° direction. I have also added a little fuel tank (clipped in the first stage, but with flow deactivated) that allows me to fine tune the center of mass of the rocket. I have also put fins on it so the air flow cancel the engine torque once you reach a certain speed.

Then I spend days fine-tuning the whole stuff (and finding the best first stage/second stage ratio) to approach an "ideal" trajectory. Quite an endeavour but very rewarding.

 

Once again, thank you for your imput. I am quite happy that my rocket is popular. It is an iteration process and it is not over yet.

edit : manuel changed. What do you think of it ? (I am not a native english speaker, I always think that I write very unclear things)

Edited January 10, 2016 by H2O.

[Majorjim!]

5 hours ago, H2O. said:

Thanks for that man, I wasn't even asking for so much !
So, point per point :

I will change that today, thank for the imput.

Actually, and it is my fault that it is not very clear, this ship is not just for Duna but for the Jool system too. So it explains the high quantity of delta-v and the lack of parachutes. So on Valls a parachute descent is out of the question and I thought: "hey, if the ship can go to Valls and land there it can do it on Duna too" and so went the chutes.An other reason for the ion stage is for beginners: if they fail to dock they can still transfer Kerbals and go home.

On the other hand, I feel like I am very close to a Laythe capable spacecraft so I might take your advice (and other people have talked to me about chutes in the past). It would be for the next version (after 1.1 is released).

To understand what is hapening here you need KER on your install.

The engine is slightly offset to give a torque in the 90° direction. I have also added a little fuel tank (clipped in the first stage, but with flow deactivated) that allows me to fine tune the center of mass of the rocket. I have also put fins on it so the air flow cancel the engine torque once you reach a certain speed.

Then I spend days fine-tuning the whole stuff (and finding the best first stage/second stage ratio) to approach an "ideal" trajectory. Quite an endeavour but very rewarding.

 

Once again, thank you for your imput. I am quite happy that my rocket is popular. It is an iteration process and it is not over yet.

edit : manuel changed. What do you think of it ? (I am not a native english speaker, I always think that I write very unclear things)

Right ok that makes sense, You can always add one of the upcoming inflatable shields, to save dv at Duna or especially Jool.

 The auto ascent is very clever man, i imagine it took some trial and error. I will have a peek at the instructions later. It was a pleasure to test.

 Oh yes I should add, I don't think the fuel cells are needed, or at least not as large a one. I had it off with panels extended and never had power issues.

[H2O.]

17 minutes ago, Majorjim said:

inflatable shields

Ah yes, the inflatable shields, I am very interested in those. I have a few ideas and I am pretty eager to test them.

The auto gravity turn : I had the idea after a few people had troubles putting previous rockets into LKO. I thought: "that is kinda silly, there are no winds or randomness of any sort in the game, something can surely be done". And after a bit of reffinement here it is!

Fuel Cells : weird, you can power 2 ions engines with 4 simple solar panels on Duna ? That doesn't seems to add up.

Edited January 10, 2016 by H2O.

[Majorjim!]

Just now, H2O. said:

Ah yes, the inflatable shields, I am very interested in those. I have a few ideas and I am pretty eager to test them.

The auto gravity turn : I had the idea after a few people had troubles putting previous rockets into LKO. I thought: "that is kinda silly, there are no winds or randomness of any sort in the game, something can surely be done". And after a bit of reffinement here it is!

Fuel Cells : weird, you can power 2 ions engines with 4 simple solar panels on Duna ? That doesn't seems to add up.

Riight, sorry, I was thinking of the craft minus the ions. Yes that makes sense now.

[Kevin Kyle]

On 1/10/2016 at 3:54 AM, H2O. said:

edit : manuel changed. What do you think of it ? (I am not a native english speaker, I always think that I write very unclear things)

Well, I guess I never looked at where you were from. I had no idea so I guess your English is doing just fine. lol

As always,looking forward to what ever you do. I like your stuff for how neat it is and how well it performs. It has that real world look. Performs real world like and has everything a manned mission could want. It seems its whats needed to make a trip to Mars just like Nasa and everyone else wants to do. I need to take this to Jool :).

[H2O.]

Thanks, it is always hard to know those things by yourself !

13 hours ago, Kevin Kyle said:

It has that real world look.

Funny you mention that. That was my basis for reflection at the very start : "if we had access to that kind of technology, what spacecraft would we build ?". So I tried making the ship smaller and smaller. Gaining weight, then reducing engine, etc. When I first had the idea of using ion engines, that was the real breakthrough. I realized that you can make something really compact with a lot of delta-v.

Edited January 14, 2016 by H2O.

[reking]

Cool ship! 

I just have one question. How did you make it?!? 

I checked it out extensively in the editor to teach myself new things, and there are some crazy ways things are connected together that I cannot reproduce. Did you use an external editor or some other mods to put it together in a way that isn't possible in stock?

[H2O.]

5 hours ago, reking said:

some other mods to put it together?

Hello reking!
Thank you ! Indeed, to build the Kassandra I did use the NoOffsetLimit mod. But I want to point out that all but one of the "crazy ways things are connected together" are doable in a stock editor. However, it was such a pain to do and to modify that I went with this mod. The only one that is not doable is actualy useless : it is the link between the 2nd stage and the spaceship. Here a regular link and two struts would have worked just as good. But I didn't want to wait another day for release.

Those "crazy connection" help with the wobble, and with physic time warp.

PS : go and install the NoOffsetLimit, such a pleasure to build with it.

Edited March 25, 2016 by H2O.

[KingPhantom]

i still love this ship! since yeeeaaars!

 

but i miss a little bit the optics of the earlier versions

[tab]

this thread should be pinned

[KingPhantom]

abso-f**k-alutley!

[kBob]

So I guess this needs to be updated for 1.1?  After launch it seems to be almost parallel to the ground somewhere around 8,000m (about 15 on navball).  I was at full throttle but could never make it to the point where sas should be turned on.  If I let it go on it tops out around 12km. 

Interesting project though, be interesting to play around with it.

[H2O.]

Yes it would be updated. But I have no time for me those days (lots of work). Don't except any updates before Bastille Day.

Besides it would be quite a major update, I want to use the inflatable shield .

[Somtaaw]

Was using this back when it was just version 1.61, quit KSP for a while, came back.... MRW seeing Kassandra updated = I MUST HAVE THIS!

 

Great little craft, might not be the greatest for career because it uses such wildly varying parts, but if you've unlocked everything in career without really getting out of Kerbin SOI, Kassandra makes it easy to get your science everywhere nice and easy.

[AeroAviation]

Just would like to thank you for this marvel of KSP engineering, honestly makes interplanetary travel feel routine like a trip to the Mun and you have fulfilled Jeb and Bobs dream of walking on Duna

[AeroAviation]

3 hours ago, AeroAviation said:

 

Edited June 26, 2016 by AeroAviation

[H2O.]

AeroAviation, I don't know if you still have that problem but the explication is the following :

On small ship, the sas is buggy when you use the "follow marker" mode. Simply use the "hold attitude mode" and make manual correction for trajectory. You will not use as much electricity.

[NSEP]

Awesome! I like it! I like your style.

[septemberWaves]

This is a very impressive vessel. I feel like the fact that it's so versatile counteracts the lack of a modular design (I am the sort of person who likes to make just about everything modular). And I very much enjoy the idea of an automatic gravity turn; I usually (always) play with MechJeb installed, and I avoid manual gravity turns as much as possible, but designing the rocket so that it does a gravity turn without any control input (even from MechJeb) is something that I really like the idea of.

[tab]

man, need to update the ship to make gravity turn compatible with 1.1.3

[ZBanG]

Hello !

First of all I would like to thank you for this huge ship ! It works really good !

There is only one problem with mine :/ Arrived on Duna I'm not abble to make an EVA. The game say me that my ship don't have an hatch :/ Can you help me with that? I Maybe miss something.

Thx for all

[KingPhantom]

is it on the capsule or on the lander?

 try to click manually on the hatch. mouseover and wait for the "hatch"-info. then click and choose EVA on the kerbal you want. probalby this will work... 

 

[tab]

so? an update for the last version of the game?

automatic gravity turn doesnt work anymore

[H2O.]

Finally I have some free time.

Expect a update (a very minor one though) in the coming days.

[H2O.]

So here comes the fixed version for 1.13. Enjoy

3.01 version

• 119 parts instead of 120
• automatic gravity turn works once again
• fairing tweaked for clamsell effect

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/0tsouvltmmb44a8/2iyqt5_5a4

Edited August 31, 2016 by H2O.