setting up a plane change midway to Mun

[Drew Kerman]

If I push out to Mun from an equatorial orbit but I want to arrive at Mun say, 80 degrees inclined - how would I go about setting that up during transfer to save me some ÃŽâ€v? I can set up a maneuver node and fiddle with the toggles to get an highly-inclined but I can't see anything that would help me see what my orbital inclination is. I even tried setting a satellite I have in an equatorial orbit around Mun to a target hoping the An/Dn would pop up when the projected orbit appeared over Mun.

Edited July 13, 2014 by Gaiiden

[Master Tao]

If you click on the Mun and then "Focus View," you can zoom in to see the projected orbit while you fiddle with the maneuver node. It won't tell you the actual inclination, but if it looks perpendicular to the Mun's orbit, you're plenty close enough. With Minmus, I find I have to make that maneuver much closer, otherwise I just end up missing the encouter.

[Zephram Kerman]

To get a polar orbit, assuming your ship is a collision course with Mun, about midway through the transfer orbit, burn north or south a little bit until you get the right Pe. Simple as that!

In more detail, think of this as a right triangle with the base angle located at the center of Mun, and the base pointing towards Kerbin. The desired inclination is the base angle of the triangle. The base is the original predicted periapsis. The hypotenuse is the new periapsis.

So, for example, if you want to arrive at 25 km altitude and 80° inclination, allow 200 km for Mun radius, then:

Ά= 80°

Pe2 = 225 km

Pe1 = Pe2*Cos(ÃŽâ€)

= 39 km

Subtract 200 km from that, and we get -161 km. (Below the surface.)

In this case, you would do your equatorial transfer orbit until Mun periapsis is -161 km. Then, about midway through transfer, burn north or south until the projected periapsis is 25 km.

Edited July 9, 2014 by Zephram Kerman
remembered to include body radius

[kahlzun]

Make sure your CONICS is set to 0 in the cfg, and it will show your orbit around the actual body, not at the position you intercept.

[Drew Kerman]

you can focus the view on Mun and see your orbit around it as well, either way if you have another ship as a target you won't be able to get An/Dn because your orbit is hyperbolic

[cantab]

In stock you'll just have to eyeball it.