how do you burn to the mun?

[hellobro]

i dont understand how to make a ship that can get to the mun and back

[Vanamonde]

If you are asking how to fly to Mun here is a walkthrough I wrote. If you are asking what kind of ship will do it, the walkthrough comes with one you can download.

[xcorps]

For some reason your thread title has me thinking...Does he really mean BURN to the moon? Cause..you can't.

[asb3pe]

I'm doing it right now, I'm following along with Scott Manley's youtubes. Episode 8 he builds a Mun lander, and Episode 9 he rescues Jebediah from the Mun where he apparently had crashed between episodes. I think Scott messed up his staging and ended up crashing on the Mun after episode 8 ended because my staging is different from his and I don't see how his could possibly work correctly.

Here is episode 8.

The Mun part begins about halfway thru, after the discussion of installing Engineer Redux mod.

By the way, episodes 6 and 7 are about landing on Minimus. The reason he goes to Minimus before Mun, even tho its a lot farther, is because the gravity on Minimus is very low compared to Mun, which makes actually landing there and returning home in one piece much easier.

Edited June 10, 2014 by asb3pe

[Taki117]

I'm doing it right now, I'm following along with Scott Manley's youtubes. Episode 8 he builds a Mun lander, and Episode 9 he rescues Jebediah from the Mun where he apparently had crashed between episodes. I think Scott messed up his staging and ended up crashing on the Mun after episode 8 ended because my staging is different from his and I don't see how his could possibly work correctly.

SNIP

The reason Scott's Staging is off is he tends to right-click things a lot. (He also doesn't like action groups) so it is very likely that the engine he is using is not on the lowest stage, but that's beside the point. The reason he did the "Rescue" mission was because he figured a newer player (Like yourself) has a very high potential of crashing and known how to land with precision so that your Kerbal doesn't have to travel over the entire surface of the Mun just to get to a lander.

[Tortoise]

Set a node to burn prograde to somewhere slightly infront of the moon until you get an encounter then slow down your velocity when you reach the mun periapsis

[asb3pe]

The reason Scott's Staging is off is he tends to right-click things a lot. (He also doesn't like action groups) so it is very likely that the engine he is using is not on the lowest stage, but that's beside the point. The reason he did the "Rescue" mission was because he figured a newer player (Like yourself) has a very high potential of crashing and known how to land with precision so that your Kerbal doesn't have to travel over the entire surface of the Mun just to get to a lander.

He figured correctly. I just started playing KSP, and one of my first posts here was about a crash, and the possibility of rescue. Little did I know that a few episodes later, Scott would come to the rescue.

He put the parachute in the same stage as the capsule engine. So if you used that engine in space, the chute would pop open. Or if you opened the chute in Kerbin atmosphere, then (and only then) would that engine ignite. Not sure that's exactly what he wanted. hehe Perhaps he left it for us as a test, to see if we were paying attention? I felt very proud of myself for realizing the staging was wrong before I launched, but I'm not exactly the most confident noob just yet at KSP so I need all the self-confidence I can get.

Edited June 11, 2014 by asb3pe

[asb3pe]

I think the hardest part is realizing that, in order to plot an orbit to intercept a planet or moon, you have to "fish" for it somewhere way out ahead of where it currently is located... because by the time your rocketship gets out there, the target will have moved quite a bit. Scott explained this very well in episode 6 where he plots a course out to Minimus and shows how it's done.

[Taki117]

He figured correctly. I just started playing KSP, and one of my first posts here was about a crash, and the possibility of rescue. Little did I know that a few episodes later, Scott would come to the rescue.

He put the parachute in the same stage as the capsule engine. So if you used that engine in space, the chute would pop open. Or if you opened the chute in Kerbin atmosphere, then (and only then) would that engine ignite. Not sure that's exactly what he wanted. hehe Perhaps he left it for us as a test, to see if we were paying attention? I felt very proud of myself for realizing the staging was wrong before I launched, but I'm not exactly the most confident noob just yet at KSP so I need all the self-confidence I can get.

Like I said, he does lots of right clicking, so he probably decoupled the decoupler and activated the engine with the right click menu.

[HafCoJoe]

Here's a nice way to get to the mun. go into a regular eastward orbit (from pad going in the direction of the island). After that timewarp until you get mun rise (that is when the mun just begins to appear from behind kerbin. So like a sunrise but from orbit and with the mun ). As soon as the mun begins to show behind kerbin, burn full prograde until you enter its SOI. To return burn the opposite direction of the mun's orbit so if the mun is rotating clockwise, burn counter clockwise. Hope this helps!

[Commander Zoom]

Avera9eJoe's way is the simplest, and the one I've been using since before we had maneuver nodes.

[asb3pe]

Does it make any difference which side of the Mun we "intercept" when we make a transit or a transfer or whatever you call it?

In other words, we always have an unlimited variety of ways we can approach a target... so is it better to orbit a planet or moon in a particular direction (relative to that planet or moons orbital direction around Kerbol)? Let's say that, as seen from a view far above a planet or moon, it's circling Kerbol in counter-clockwise fashion. Does it matter whether we enter our orbit going "clockwise" or "counterclockwise"?

[Pecan]

The direction in which the planets and moons orbit doesn't matter but the direction in which they rotate (their day/night cycle) does, a bit, if you intend to land. Just as you normally gravity-turn to the East at launch from Kerbin to take advantage of the surface's orbital velocity, land and launching into orbit around other bodies takes a little less deltaV in the direction of their rotation.

Chapter 5 of the link in my signature deals with manned lunar missions (and return). Chapter 4 for unmanned satellite-placement - in polar orbits - around the moons and easier-to-reach planets.