The mysterious orange tank anomaly Eve heavy lift challenge

[Oafman]

From: Wernher von Kerman [4science@ksc.kom]

Sent: 39 Kaugust 3014 20:27

To: Engineering

Subject: URGENT - Orange tank anomaly

Dear Engineers,

A puzzling mystery has us tearing out what remains of our hair.

Earlier today, while conducting a revolutionary experiment on antimatter, an unexpected and startling reaction occurred. The experiment seemed to implode, severely damaging the laboratory. It was sheer luck that none of my science team were close enough to be harmed.

Soon afterwards, the Quartermaster came rushing in, obviously upset. He reported that a whole 2.5m orange fuel tank, which had been leaning against the wall in the stores adjacent to the lab, had simply vanished. Completely disappeared!

I was able to offer him no explanation. But later this afternoon, we realised that the tank had a probe core attached. So, in hope more than expectation, we sent it a message, and incredibly, it responded. And even more incredibly, it reported its location as being on the surface of the planet Eve!

What has happened today is entirely inexplicable, based on how we currently understand the universe to work, and we desperately need to examine this in great detail. To that end, I need you to go to Eve, pick up that tank, and bring it back to KSC. I need it back intact; completely undamaged, and completely full of the same fuel it currently contains.

I realise these tanks are heavy when full, and that Eve has a punishing atmosphere and gravity, but I have every confidence in your ability to complete this task. The whole of Kerbalkind is relying on you. Don't let them down.

Kind regards,

Wernher

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The Challenge:

- Place a full jumbo orange fuel tank, with a probe core attached, anywhere on Eve. No other parts can be attached. Hyperedit is acceptable for placing your tank..

- Send one or more ships to collect it, launch it into LEO, and land it safely at KSC.

The Rules:

- Absolutely no Alt+F12. At all.

- The tank must remain full of fuel at all times (please right-click it in your screenshots to prove its contents are intact)

- You can attach things to the side of the tank (eg KAS connectors and struts)

Mods:

- Hyperedit is allowed for placing the tank on Eve, and for putting your ship(s) in low Eve orbit. But you must show evidence that you landed any craft which you used to lift the tank or fly it into LEO (including any surface refuelers). This challenge requires heavy ships, and landing those safely and accurately can be almost as hard as getting them off the ground.

- Mechjeb/KER etc are fine.

- Pretty much any parts mods are fine (within reason) but will affect your scoring, as detailed in the section below, which is entitled 'Scoring'....

Scoring:

Start with 10,000 points

- 1 point for every metre of altitude shown on your main screen altimeter just before launch

- 1 point for every tonne of mass just before launch (not including the mass of the orange tank)

+ 1500 points if you do not use any modded parts (this challenge is way harder - maybe even impossible - without KAS/IR/5m tanks etc)

or +2500 points, if you use stock only, and you do not use the claw

There will be separate leaderboards for rockets and planes. If people submit entries which use really wacky mod stuff (like Project Orion drives etc) I may start a 3rd leaderboard for those. I certainly don't want to discourage use of those kinds of mods.

There will be no points for funny things, or things that are particularly Kerbal, or for cool videos etc, though undoubtedly there will be appreciation, and possibly reps...

.

Rockets:

1. Oafman (469 points)

2.

3.

4.

5.

Planes:

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Can this be done?

Yes. Somewhat clumsily in my case, and with close to minimum points, but still successfully:

Javascript is disabled. View full album

I had a huge amount of fun doing this. Launching so much dead weight off the surface of Eve is a big challenge of your VAB skills, and with the addition of the extra difficulty of having to somehow lift the tank into your ship before launch, it should be a test for even our most accomplished engineers. Especially given that there are points for altitude and starting mass to sort the wheat from the chaff.

Good luck!

Edited August 31, 2014 by Oafman

[vat21s]

So do I need to set up my own orange tank? with just a probecore and a fueltank or is there a savefile

[Ippo]

Indeed, I encourage you to provide a savefile with the tank in place so that everyone competes on the same scenario (otherwise the outcome will be dependent on the altitude where the tank was placed).

I have an exam coming but as soon as I'm free I'm SO going to try this.

[Oafman]

Well, the idea was that people could choose what altitude they recover it from. Set their own level of difficulty, with more points available to those who choose harder altitudes. I would not want to restrict that.

I hope placing the tank is not too onerous. I allowed hyperedit, for those who have it, to make this easier

[Ippo]

Well sure, I have no problem placing it myself... but I'm not going to place it near the pole at sea level, that's for sure

[James_Eh]

This is a very neat challenge. I enjoyed the writeup and pix immensely. Think I will give it a pass because I don't have the patience at the moment to install the mods I would need, but I would have given it a run if I already had them.

Well, and also because I have been beating my brains out at Eve for the past while already trying to do a 4-Kerbals-in-a-hitchhiker landing/ascent from sea level without using any of the 23.5 parts (except for the interplanetary drive) and I'm getting rather tired of purple, plus tired of results looking much like your picture #5...

PS - nice to find someone else with the same kind of quirky writeup and picture commenting style as I use ...

[Megalodon 720]

How are we supposed to do this stock without the claw?

Edited August 31, 2014 by Megalodon 720

[ratchet freak]

How are we supposed to do this stock without the claw?

unless we are allowed to attach a docking port you'd need to scoop it up and hold it in a cargobay unsecured

or are we allowed to claw the probe body?

[Ippo]

Well, if you can't claw the tank, then in stock I'd say it's pretty much impossible.

In my preliminary tests (all stock) it's nearly impossible to lift the tank unless it's raised vertically, because if it lays down on a side, then it screws your center of mass and the rocket becomes quickly uncontrollable.

This means that you need to raise it vertically, but if you can't use KAS to strut it to the rest of the ship, again you are going to have A LOT of problems (I had to disable mechjeb and finish the ascent manually, and that's using A LOT of RCS).

I'm going to try with IR and KAS first, and maybe later I'll try to come up with something stock... maybe.

[Oafman]

How are we supposed to do this stock without the claw?

Well, stock was always going to be super hard mode.

I guess I should allow the claw, as it opens up more ways of doing this. I'm still not convinced that this is impossible without the claw, but sure, very very hard. So I've changed the points structure slightly. If you use stock only including the claw, then +1500 points. If you use stock and no claw, +2500 points

But really, most points can be gained by lifting it from lower altitudes, or by building lighter lifting ships.

[Tw1]

That is a supper impresive display there in the OP. I Wonder if my Mega Wacklifter 3 could do it... but that thing lags like anything, and I have assignments and stuff....

[Oafman]

That is a supper impresive display there in the OP. I Wonder if my Mega Wacklifter 3 could do it... but that thing lags like anything, and I have assignments and stuff....

If you already have a ship which could do it, maybe with a little tweaking of the design, then you should definitely have a go. You can hyperedit it to Eve, so all you have to do is land it, load up the tank, and bring it home...

[chengong]

sounds more like a who's got more CPU and RAM challenge.

[Oafman]

Well I did it with a very basic i5 and 6GB RAM, so I would say it is achievable for most people.

The only time I had significant lag was when I was landing the fuel tanker, with hundreds of chutes etc. TBH I've had higher parts counts from ion gliders