Rendezvous Problems

[Alshain]

I'm trying to learn to Rendezvous and Dock and I'm having trouble. I can close to within ~200m but when I go to stop my movement to the target, I can't seem to get it below 2 m/s. It's like I'm flying circles around the target. I know I must have missed a step but I've watched tons of videos on this and can't figure out what I did wrong. If I turn on mech jeb to get me there I can dock just fine without help, I just can't figure out this last little bit of the Rendezvous. I really want to be able to do this on my own. Any suggestions?

Edited June 7, 2014 by Alshain

[Specialist290]

First, do you think you could provide us with screenshots of the craft and its target? That might help us be able to diagnose specific issues with the craft design, if there are any that might be causing you problems.

You don't have to zero out your velocity perfectly, as such -- 2 m/s is actually fairly decent. The important part at this stage is to make sure that you're lined up with the target docking port, which you can achieve largely with your RCS thrusters and the Navball. Use your RCS to "push" or "pull" the prograde marker (i.e. the open yellow marker) onto the target indicator (i.e. the pink circle with the dot in the middle). Putting the camera into Chase mode by hitting the "V" key a few times and positioning it behind the tail of your craft will also orient your view so that up, down, etc. on the keyboard automatically match those directions on the camera as well.

Hope this helps

[allmhuran]

You mean when you're close to the target?

If you want to stop all relative velocity for some reason make sure the velocity on the navball is in "target" mode, point your chevron (centre of the navball: http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/File:Level_indicator.svg) at retrograde ( http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/w/images/thumb/0/02/Retrograde.svg/120px-Retrograde.svg.png ) and accelerate forwards. For small changes like 2ms you can use RCS to do this, or right click on your engine and limit the thrust.

Edited June 7, 2014 by allmhuran

[Alshain]

Well I just watched Scott Manley's video for whats gotta be the 100th time and realized my mistake. When I wanted to slow down relative to the target I was pointing at the pink marker instead of the green marker. I'm pretty sure that is what I did wrong. Thanks for the help though.

[Claw]

Well I just watched Scott Manley's video for whats gotta be the 100th time and realized my mistake. When I wanted to slow down relative to the target I was pointing at the pink marker instead of the green marker. I'm pretty sure that is what I did wrong. Thanks for the help though.

Glad you got it figured out. Eventually you'll want to force the green marker to be on top of the pink marker. Then you're headed directly at (or away from) your target. Sounds like you are on the right track.

Edited June 7, 2014 by Claw

[Alshain]

So, now I'm trying to figure out how to change the prefix on the thread... EDIT: Ah found it.

[Alshain]

Success! Completely unassisted rendezvous and orange fuel tank transfer to my station! (in hindsight I probably should have practiced on something more maneuverable, but I don't care cause I did it!)