Post your most difficult contracts

[metaphor]

(Not including impossible ones involving launch clamps.)

I'll start:

The hardest one I've gotten so far was to test the largest SRB (S1 SRB-KD25k) while on a Mun escape orbit.

[Ikaneko]

Test the stack decoupler while on an escape trajectory from Kerbin.

[WillHop]

I've been offered testing the LES in flight on Eve. Not even gonna bother with it!

[electronicfox]

Launch clamps landed at the mun.

Test that huge SRB on an escape trajectory from Kerbin.

[Razor235]

Either testing a BACC splashed down, or testing the mk-16 parachute between 15000 and 17000 meters at 200-400 m/s. I never completed the second one. (Not that I really tried)

[Death Engineering]

Testing the TT-38K while at 430m/s and 2200m.

[Rhomphaia]

Mk 55 radial mount engine

In flight over Kerbin

7800m-9200m

460m/s-860m/s

... got at tech level 1

[DasShaker]

Last night I saw a contract to test an ion engine during an orbit of the mun.... 500 - 2600 meters... :/

Guess I'll have to find a very wide flat area... That's a dangerous orbit. It pays 135 science, 96 rep and 40k funds though.

Edited July 19, 2014 by DasShaker
Wanted to share the actual contract.

[metaphor]

Mk 55 radial mount engine

In flight over Kerbin

7800m-9200m

460m/s-860m/s

... got at tech level 1

That's a very difficult combination of altitude and speed. 460 m/s at 9200m is more than twice terminal velocity, so you need to have some serious thrust.

[Taki117]

That's a very difficult combination of altitude and speed. 460 m/s at 9200m is more than twice terminal velocity, so you need to have some serious thrust.

Or be on a reentry trajectory.

[Arran]

Testing the LV45 at 11500 too 16000 at 100 to 250 m/s..

It sounded easy enough, but it turned out one nightmarisch test..

Somehow i wanted trying to do this in a kinda hybrid-like plane, the test itself never as the issue, getting within the parameters wasnt that all to hard, but after the test the place became so unstable due the inbalances, it became pretty hard to land it (acutally it really DIDNT wanted to land at all ).. But after several attemps, pumping fuel around, sticking wings on the plane is all kind of angles, finnaly i had a design that could carry the weight all back and was stable enough to land..

And it also remined me why i never really bothered with Hybrid/space planes before

I would prolly had an easier time just to launch it as a rocket and just tested it...

[Rhomphaia]

That's a very difficult combination of altitude and speed. 460 m/s at 9200m is more than twice terminal velocity, so you need to have some serious thrust.

Or be on a reentry trajectory.

With the tech I had neither offered a good return. Luckily a contract to test turbojets early saved the day.

[Kerbart]

Either testing a BACC splashed down

...once you have wheels you can drive the thing to the ocean...

[Naten]

Minmus science. Deadline: 5 days. *facepalm*

Those Reaction Systems Ltd. people sure are impatient...

Well, I guess I could've just went to Minmus, accepted it after landing, then get the data... But I'd just came back from a manned Minmus landing. So, I was too bored to do it...

[Razor235]

...once you have wheels you can drive the thing to the ocean...

Ain't Nobody Got Time Fo Dat!

I did it by launching it with two smaller SRBs, 4 radial chutes, and a 1 man capsule with normal parachute on top. Jeb enjoyed.

[Foxster]

Just some ideas that are probably blindingly obvious but anyway...

The altitude/speed ones I do by getting close to the altitude with a rocket, then angle over to a flat trajectory to reach the speed then do whatever needs doing.

Testing of engines/SRBs can be done with them empty and stuck on top of a rocket. When in orbit or wherever just drag their position in the staging sequence to the next one and hit space.

You don't have to decouple anything for testing of decouplers. Just stick them on top of a rocket or on the side.

Testing of ion engines give lots of science. You don't need Xenon or power for the engine. Just activate it.

[Asmayus]

Ain't Nobody Got Time Fo Dat!

I did it by launching it with two smaller SRBs, 4 radial chutes, and a 1 man capsule with normal parachute on top. Jeb enjoyed.

It's probably just as well that you did - I was just watching the_lobster's ksptv stream and he drove into the ocean but didn't get the splashdown condition because he hadn't taken off.

Which, to be fair to the game, is the correct definition of a splashdown

[magnemoe]

That's a very difficult combination of altitude and speed. 460 m/s at 9200m is more than twice terminal velocity, so you need to have some serious thrust.

The 55 radial is pretty powerful, put them on a 180 liter tank with a probe and a battery. If you miss it on the way up do it going down.

All of my in flight tests are done with probes, added benefit is that if you burn straight up you end up back at KSC,

[Superfluous J]

Minmus science. Deadline: 5 days. *facepalm*

Those Reaction Systems Ltd. people sure are impatient...

Well, I guess I could've just went to Minmus, accepted it after landing, then get the data... But I'd just came back from a manned Minmus landing. So, I was too bored to do it...

There is no "Deadline" stat for contracts. There is "Expires" (which is usually short, something like 5 days) and "Duration" (which is long, 1 year or more usually).

"Expires" is how long you have to accept the contract before it vanishes, which incurs no penalty.

"Duration" is how long you have - once you accept the contract - to complete it.

[SpaceSphereOfDeath]

I've also got the dreaded 'Muner launchclamps' contract and completed it and I went NOPE and just did a science around kerbin one instead.

[SelectHalfling0]

With tier 3 parts I put landing gear onto escape trajectory out of kerbin. For being useless it payed off well.

[9Mikey1]

Test the mammoth engine flying over Duna at 16km to 18km above the surface between 2,310 and 2,350 m/s

[Atkara]

I wanted to mention solar orbit rescues, which I do every now and then, out of pity for the kerbal that hasn't even spawned yet (go me :p), but you guys have equally interesting stories to tell. Reminds me of the days I did those too.

Nowadays, I just take contracts concerning mining, asteroid detection and tourists, as long as they don't want to land on Eve, which I may start doing, once I'm done with my own goals.

 

[Archgeek]

The persistence of the existence of the munar launch clamp contracts makes me wonder if the contract system can generate even stupider things -- test launch clamps on solar escape trajectory, anyone?  

[bigcalm]