The Eve Rocks Challenge (v0.90 only)

[Kelderek]

One important tidbit which occurred to me this morning is that after landing on Eve I will have cut all the chutes except the ones for Kerbin return. So the lander will be over 30 tons lighter than I thought when leaving Eve. That will help.

Yeah, this is why I build the whole apparatus for both the parachutes and landing gear linked together so that it is separate from the rest of the lander and could easily be ejected immediately after liftoff from Eve. I had something like 144 landing struts and maybe 120 radial chutes + 12 drogue chutes -- that's a lot of mass that I could lose early on in the ascent. I think I landed at about 9.7 m/s at 209m altitude.

[Starlionblue]

Yeah, this is why I build the whole apparatus for both the parachutes and landing gear linked together so that it is separate from the rest of the lander and could easily be ejected immediately after liftoff from Eve. I had something like 144 landing struts and maybe 120 radial chutes + 12 drogue chutes -- that's a lot of mass that I could lose early on in the ascent. I think I landed at about 9.7 m/s at 209m altitude.

Ahaaa. Very clever. Next time.

[gm537]

Kelderek's Eve Rocks Submission

Design Philosophy:

* "Go big or go home"

* "Anything worth doing, is worth overdoing"

* Hide design flaws behind a sheer volume of vessel parts

* Use a single launch to help with vehicle stability (don't rely on docking ports to hold a ship together)

* Avoid refueling and using other vessels, mostly because I am lazy

Ah ha a man after my own heart. I have just finished my Eve Rocks challenge and I had many of the same goals as you. I wanted a craft that didn't just take one kerbal but a few and could do level 3 or Jeb level.

- - - Updated - - -

So I finally completed my Eve Rocks challenge. (Basically work, other games, and 0.9 stopped my 0.25 submission mid tracks)

This submission is for the Jeb level.

The craft was the Eve 4 Man Lander IV (and in all fairness is like the 3rd generation of Eve 4 man lander... Sea Level Eve is hard...)

On the Kerbin Launch pad this thing is 5,163 ton, 2.32 million funds, 803 part beast.

Once I land on Eve it's only 341 parts and about 668 tons. (I say "about" because I burn some fuel during landing and I'm not sure exactly how much)

I used game version 0.25 and the only Mod was KER, though I did use some online trajectory calculators to get my transfers right-ish.

Here are the pictures from Kerbin and the transfer:

http://imgur.com/a/A3jsh#0

Next set of pictures shows landing and take off from Eve. I tried to show all the science I got on Eve's surface and enough of the take off to be pretty sure of what was going on. (Basically I have an image for each stage) One picture I am missing is something near landing which I missed because "landing" is a suicide burn around 120m and is stressful. Haha

http://imgur.com/a/WIlET#0

And finally they return home:

http://imgur.com/a/acbmV#0

I'm definitely most proud of simply completing this mission but I'm also happy that I did it without a lick of space debris. All Kerbin lifter stages end up on Kerbin and the transfer stage along with all Eve lifter stages end up on Eve. Some things to be wary of with this craft are: one a true sea level launch will be very difficult, and two you need to take off at a time of day when the sun is mid morning or so that way when you hit apoapsis and are using your Ions to finish the orbit you will have maximum solar power.

My craft

Well that's it! Glad to be part of this challenge!

- - - Updated - - -

Oh that just updated my other post? Whatever...

- - - Updated - - -

The Heron II

To Sea Level on Eve and back, with a pod and a leave-behind science rover. I believe this was version 0.25. Weight on the launch pad was just 258t, all stock except MechJeb.

In addition to taking a science package, a kerbal, and a pod to sea level on Eve and returning them, the mission also carried a leave-behind remote science rover that stayed on Eve. Additionally, the mission landed on Gilly, made orbit around Duna, landed on Ike, and landed on Minmus before returning. Upon reaching Kerbin orbit, both parts of the transit vehicle and the vacuum lander were parked in orbit-- leaving a reusable 5-man habitat with multiple docking ports, a fuel tank, and two nuclear engines. It can serve as a space station or transit vehicle in future missions.

- weight and part count of the vessel on the launchpad

258.405t on the launchpad, exactly 500 parts

- weight and part count awaiting liftoff on Eve

24.1t, 182 parts

- the approximate price tag of your entire mission, if at all possible

$464,532 total price. Landed pieces may be recovered as well, but the all-in cost is just simpler.

Dang! I applaud you sir! That's one impressive craft, and is one of the few here that feels very elegant, even my own entry isn't elegant.

[Roger C]

Hi All,

I have been playing Kerbal for a while, but this is my first forum post. Please excuse any rookie mistakes.

A couple of weeks ago I decided to take on Eve. After successfully returning a Kerbal yesterday, I decided to see how many other people had accomplished this. When I came across this thread, I wanted to post my results.

First, some pics:

http://imgur.com/a/93pAK

KSP Version 0.9

Launch Vehicle:

Mass: 4,386 metric tons

Parts: 769

Cost: 3,332,142

Tanker Vehicle:

Mass:4,616 metric tons

Parts:579

Cost: 2,963,263

Approach:

The first launch was the lander. I spent a lot more time optimizing the lander than the launch vehicle, so it didn't fly overly well and could probably be made smaller. However, it got the job done. If you look closely at the lander on the launch pad, it has a ring of nuclear engines around it. These are used to get the lander from LKO to LEO, where it rendevous with the tanker. It takes about half of the large fuel tanks to get there.

The tanker is nothing special. It's just a large fuel can with a bunch of nuclear engines. It also carries an extra nuclear engine and fuel tank at the top, which is how the Kerbal gets home. Once in LKO, it travels to LEO under its own power, rendevous and then docks with the lander.

After docking, the lander can be refueled before final descent. When undocked, the nuclear engines provide the necessary deorbiting burn without depleting the main fuel tanks.

Once in Eve's atmosphere, the lander has a number of parachutes which slow descent to about 13 m/s. I went through the numbers, and figured out that landing by parachute alone simply isn't practical. At 40m or so I flared the main engine for a soft landing. The lander is touchy due to it's mass, but it does work.

My landing site was random. In fact, I landed it a couple of times hoping to hit something close to sea level. No such luck. My calculations show that it should be able to achieve orbit from sea level, but my landing sites were both in the 1000m - 2000 m range.

Once landed, it's a fairly straightforward hop back into orbit. From sea level, it should have just enough fuel to make a 107km orbit. From where I landed, I had between 400m/s and 500m/s of deltaV left over, and neither of my landing flares were very efficient. Final docking was done from the tanker, as the lander can doesn't have an RCS system.

After the second docking with the tanker, the lander is refueled and the nuclear engine extracted for the trip home.

My biggest mistake in this mission was forgetting to put parachutes on the lander can. In an effort to save mass, I didn't put a decoupling ring between the lander can and the last fuel tank. This saved the mission. Fortunately, the two small engines had enough TWR that if I undocked from the nuclear engine and fuel tank, I could actively land the can on Kerbin. It ended up being a splash down, but the lander and Kerbal survived without difficulty.

I had three mods installed. The first was MecJeb, the second was KerbalEngineer, and the third was HyperEdit. I never used KE, but I was too lazy to uninstall it. HyperEdit was used in the design phase, but the actual mission was flown from start to finish. I figure HyperEdit isn't much different than a NASA computer simulation prior to an actual launch. I did use MechJeb for a number of operations, notably for calculating the Kerbin-Eve-Kerbin transfers. All parts were stock.

I'm happy to provide craft files if needed.

Roger

[Xannari Ferrows]

Wow. Only now did I reflect on my mission entry. I totally overdid it in the name of wasting fuel. Could I get another go? Of course, it will be entirely exhibition, but it'll make me feel better.

I'll try not to make something absolutely absurd.

[Laie]

Oh man, I don't know how I missed this thread-- I was building my Eve Missions right around the time this started! If it's not too late for a late submission, I'll toss mine in. It definitely satisfies the requirements for levels one and two.

The Heron II

Well, strictly speaking this doesn't satisfy the challenge requirements. No resource panel, some parts are just missing or pics from another mission have been pasted in. Then again, it's plain obvious that you're habitually going to Eve and know what you're doing. I do trust you that the mission played out as you say it did. Congratulations, you made it! -- Plenty of times, as it seems.

Stats: http://i.imgur.com/KC0EvWJ.png

Cost: 330,451 C

Mass: 731t

Parts: 272

Let me know if you want to .craft file Laie

No craft file needed, thanks. The footage is great and basically sufficient, but what was that you said? You'd need a better mic and/or newsspeaker training, for me to be able and follow. So if you could please just fill in the questionnaire, and what was that about you've copied the craft? Cheapest vessel? Huh? My understanding is good enough to know that I missed a lot.

[Right]

No craft file needed, thanks. The footage is great and basically sufficient, but what was that you said? You'd need a better mic and/or newsspeaker training, for me to be able and follow. So if you could please just fill in the questionnaire, and what was that about you've copied the craft? Cheapest vessel? Huh? My understanding is good enough to know that I missed a lot.

Sure thing, updated my original post with the requested information. Oh no, the craft wasn't coppied. The craft ascending from Eve at ~7,500m altitude was largely inspired by Tavert about a year ago. Just wanted to say thanks to him for motivating that part of the design.

[raygundan]

Well, strictly speaking this doesn't satisfy the challenge requirements. No resource panel, some parts are just missing or pics from another mission have been pasted in. Then again, it's plain obvious that you're habitually going to Eve and know what you're doing. I do trust you that the mission played out as you say it did. Congratulations, you made it! -- Plenty of times, as it seems.

I feel like a complete and total imbecile asking this question, but what is a resource panel? Everybody else in the thread seems to know exactly what it means... so I gather I probably should. Alas, I am apparently a moron.

Also, if it doesn't satisfy the requirements, it doesn't satisfy the requirements. Your challenge, your rules-- even if I've been to Eve a bazillion times, I don't want a badge I didn't really earn! I will probably not fly the entire multi-landing mission again because it took sometime like two and a half weeks of real life... but I would be happy to update the ship for 0.90 and make the Eve run again. But I clearly have some terminology gaps and don't fully understand what I need to provide-- if you could elaborate a bit on what you need to see, I'll make sure the next iteration is up-to-snuff. Particularly where this mysterious panel is concerned. Is it a mod part I need to have on the ship?

And finally, before I go building the Heron III... is the rover/lander concept sufficient to meet the bar for your Level 3? Or is driving the first 6500m of the ascent from sea level a disqualifier?

[Kelderek]

The resource panel is the little window in the upper right corner that pops up when you click the fuel icon there. It shows, liquid fuel, oxidizer, monopropellant, electric charge, etc. - whatever consumables your ship uses.

[raygundan]

The resource panel is the little window in the upper right corner that pops up when you click the fuel icon there. It shows, liquid fuel, oxidizer, monopropellant, electric charge, etc. - whatever consumables your ship uses.

That settles it... I *am* a moron. Thanks!

[Laie]

Sure thing, updated my original post with the requested information. Oh no, the craft wasn't coppied. The craft ascending from Eve at ~7,500m altitude was largely inspired by Tavert about a year ago. Just wanted to say thanks to him for motivating that part of the design.

In that case, congratulations! You've completed the Eve Rocks Challenge on... Jebediah's Level, is it? I've seen no chutes.

That wobbly engine, have you tried disabling the gimbal? I've recently been dangling a much heavier load from a series of tiny connections, and it didn't swing as badly as your engine. I guess the gimballing made it a lot worse.

Also, about weight, I'd like to point you to my own mission. 667 tons on Eve, but only because I had 55t of excess fuel (and the tanks to hold it). See the gallery (2nd post in this thread) for why I couldn't get rid of the stuff until later. Anyhoo, that vessel was designed for a takeoff mass under 600t. Now you may say that this is nearly three times as heavy as your vessel, but I've also been taking three times as many Kerbals.

Also, if it doesn't satisfy the requirements, it doesn't satisfy the requirements. Your challenge, your rules-- even if I've been to Eve a bazillion times, I don't want a badge I didn't really earn!

And I want this challenge to be about returning from Eve, not about crossing all t's and dotting all i's. The latter is often necessary, especially when I have doubts. Which in this case I don't. Take that badge, you earned it.

However, Jebediah's level is supposed to be about taking off from sea level. I didn't expect that people would bring their own crawler-transporters.

[raygundan]

[quote name=Laie;1692231And I want this challenge to be about returning from Eve' date=' not about crossing all t's and dotting all i's. The latter is often necessary, especially when I have doubts. Which in this case I don't. Take that badge, you earned it.

However, Jebediah's level is supposed to be about taking off from sea level. I didn't expect that people would bring their own crawler-transporters.

[Kelderek]

Hey Laie, go take a look at page 33

Edited January 24, 2015 by Kelderek
...Please

[raygundan]

I want this challenge to be about returning from Eve, not about crossing all t's and dotting all i's. The latter is often necessary, especially when I have doubts. Which in this case I don't. Take that badge, you earned it.

I felt like I was cheating, so I went ahead and built and flew the Heron III to Eve and back this afternoon, to make sure I was dotting and crossing all the things I needed to, even though you were nice enough to give me a pass. Besides... it gave me something new to do, and I was in a bit of an out-of-new-things-to-do dry spell with KSP anyway.

The big differences are launch weight (The Heron III is 192.95t on the pad, while the Heron II was 258.405t), part count (334 vs. 500), and cost ($202,872 vs. $464,532).

It sacrifices the vacuum lander and the 4-man habitat module, so it's a much more Eve-focused and optimized design. Nearly 70 tons lighter, 156 fewer parts, and less than half the price of the Heron II-- but still capable of visiting sea level on Eve and returning (although still not in the way this challenge requires... so it's only a Level 2 entry).

The lander module is identical, and weighs 24.1t with 182 parts when ready for Eve ascent. The updated Heron III was built and flown in 0.90, and uses the latest MechJeb.

Photo log of the mission, with the resource panel and MechJeb delta-V stats onscreen is below-- and the entire mission is present, with no lost-to-a-hard-drive-crash photos substituted with shots of a different mission this time.

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.craft file

Takeoff point coordinates on Eve: 2* 49' 57" S, 171* 24' 03" W, about 6500m altitude and just 30km south of the equator.

(note: landing point was on the equator about 30km north of the takeoff point, but these coordinates could certainly be used as an efficient landing site)

Edited January 25, 2015 by raygundan
Added link to .craft file

[gm537]

Well, strictly speaking this doesn't satisfy the challenge requirements. No resource panel, some parts are just missing or pics from another mission have been pasted in.

Oh dear I just went back through my pictures and it seems I too generally don't have the resource panel shown. I have provided the craft file so that you feel a bit more comfortable about my submission. I apologize about that I get very used to doing things just for myself and so I tend to try and hide as much hud info as I can unless I need it right then. That's my bad for sure if there is anymore info I can provide to make my submission valid let me know and I will see what I can do.

I have been thinking about reworking the craft for 0.90 so maybe when I do that I will remember to have the resource panel while flying...

[totalitor]

Hi all!

I have completed this challenge but I wanted to construct a rocket style lander, using no asparagus and no fueling pipes. So here it is. I just wanted to show you my design.

I tried to keep it simple, so this lander has 134 parts. Mass on the surface of Eve is 319 t and it has delta-V 12867 m/s. And it can go to orbit from sea level. Once I realized KS-25x4 engine cluster is very strong for impact I used that only for landing, ship has no landing legs at all. It was very difficult to land becouse I had to find totally flat area. I made a new version of the ship and it landed nicely with four engine clusters but it didn't go to orbit even it had more delta-V. But I made a landing near that and the narrow ship finally didn't capsize.

Landing place is 3 degree 28´14" N and 26 degree 30´18" W, small flat island.

Totally stock, Mechjeb is used only for info.

I had to refuel once in orbit, that was a little painful...

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Edited January 25, 2015 by totalitor

[Laie]

* There are probably a million things wrong with how I handled this mission, and as ugly as it was at times, I got it done in the end. I am still fairly new to the game (only a couple months so far) and I found this to be a considerable challenge to complete, so kudos to Laie for the idea.

There's nothing "wrong". Yes, I wondered why you pieced together the transfer section from x16 tanks, rather than simply tanking the x64 orange ones -- this drives up the part count, but is there any benefit? Also, with a bit of shifting around, the aerospikes on your upper stage could have fired through the gaps between your decouplers, making the lower spikes unecessary. But that's small things. Your vessel worked, and nothing succeeds like success.

* I had never used MechJeb prior to doing this challenge. I had avoided installing it because I worried that it would do too much of the work for me and dumb down the game too much.

MJ is a powerful tool, and how you use it is up to you. Personally, I'd be licked without Smart A.S.S. and the node editor. Of the higher-level functions, "hohmann transfer" and "match velocities" are probably the ones I use the most. You can piece together a rendezvous from these, and I find the results to be better than when using the RV autopilot (although the latter is basically doing the same).

If the "transfer to planet" thing is confusing, I assume you're not familiar with porkchop plots? You should try http://alexmoon.github.io/ksp/ -- it's basically the same thing, but with a bit more context around it to help you make sense of it. I don't think I'd ever have gone to another planet without it.

* I had trouble several times with my lander sitting on the ground at Eve wanting to rebalance every time I switched my focus away from it and back (like going back to the Space Center, or exiting the game and coming back). It acted like it had to land all over again and on a few occasions it would start wobbling and tear itself apart.

Emphasized for it's importance. That's one of the nastier surprises Eve has in stock for you.

Congratulations, you have completed the Eve Rocks Challenge on Level 3! I'm glad that you liked the challenge, and I think landing an entire hitchhiker container is something hitherto unheard of.

- - - Updated - - -

I have been playing Kerbal for a while, but this is my first forum post. Please excuse any rookie mistakes.

That's one sweet ship, however, your submission doesn't even take the most basic threshold. Please see the first post of this thread for what should go into a submission. We've recently been talking about how it's not necessary to cross all t's and so on, but that I need to see how the mission played out is non-negotiable.

Please bring your pictures into order in which things happened, and provide at least some basic hints about what they're showing (like, "this is the tanker docking with the lander in Eve orbit"). Also, more pics. Especially from Eve ascent, but a few more of how vessels looked like at different stages of the flight wouldn't be amiss, either.

[Kelderek]

There's nothing "wrong". Yes, I wondered why you pieced together the transfer section from x16 tanks, rather than simply tanking the x64 orange ones -- this drives up the part count, but is there any benefit?

This is a case of starting with fewer tanks and finding the need to add more later, but not wanting to have to redo all of the various struts and things - I had noticed this myself but decided against messing with it just to save time.

MJ is a powerful tool, and how you use it is up to you. Personally, I'd be licked without Smart A.S.S. and the node editor. Of the higher-level functions, "hohmann transfer" and "match velocities" are probably the ones I use the most. You can piece together a rendezvous from these, and I find the results to be better than when using the RV autopilot (although the latter is basically doing the same).

If the "transfer to planet" thing is confusing, I assume you're not familiar with porkchop plots? You should try http://alexmoon.github.io/ksp/ -- it's basically the same thing, but with a bit more context around it to help you make sense of it. I don't think I'd ever have gone to another planet without it.

Thanks for the link, I hadn't used that one before. Mostly with MJ it was simply new to me, but I had never heard of Porkchop plots before. It didn't take me long to get the gist of it though. It seems only natural that there would be more complex ways to plotting new orbits and transfers.

[Roger C]

Ok, here's my second attempt at a mission report. Again, I'm new at this, so your patience is appreciated.

I added a number of more pictures and organized them. Apparently I didn't save the changes the first time around.

First, the pics:

http://imgur.com/a/93pAK

KSP Version 0.9

Launch Vehicle:

Mass: 4,386 metric tons

Parts: 769

Cost: 3,332,142

Tanker Vehicle:

Mass:4,616 metric tons

Parts:579

Cost: 2,963,263

Approach:

I designed a lander which flew to Eve using auxiliary nuclear engines. It docked with a fuel tanker in Eve orbit, before using the auxiliary nuclear engines to do a deorbit burn. Landing was accomplished with parachutes and a last second burst from the main engines. The landing site was random. I was just happy to find somewhere dry and flat.

Return to Kerbin was accomlished by docking with the tanker a second time and extracting a nuclear engine and fuel canister. Landing on Kerbin was accomplished without parachutes using the last stage conventional engines.

Craft files available if needed.

Roger

[Right]

...Now you may say that this is nearly three times as heavy as your vessel, but I've also been taking three times as many Kerbals.

Very true, an impressive feat to be sure. I've never taken more than 1 kerbal to Eve lol

[manni01]

*Morgan Freeman voice* And now, for another entree, to the

Eve Rocks Challenge!

As the mission, I have compiled a video of short events that conclude my entree. I hope this is alright, I really don't like taking bagillion of screen shots at specific times, besides, I'm a better video editor than picture taker. If this doesn't suffice, I'm okay with redoing the mission, it'll just bug me a bit.

To the important stuff:

- I'm entering for Jebediah Level (also lowest mass)

- Mass: 550.2 t Part count: 257

- Mass: 64.8 t Part count: 132

- 347,840 Funds

- 0.90.0

- Ambient light adjustment, and Kerbal alarm clock

- I sort of aimed for a laky area, and there was one, and I landed sort of near it, which I was fine with

- Its a pretty compact, low-mass, and fairly cheap for an eve landing and return vehicle, that can get back from under 500m. I like minimality

- I had to quickload twice because the game glitched and weird part colliding into launchpad in eve orbit stuff

Here's the most important part, THE VIDEO:

I hope I'm eligible for the badge now. I did this mission just for the reason because it looks cool, and purpley, like eve, which I like too.

[WeeBabyStevo]

This is my Level 1 Submission.

(0.90, $1.2M, 312 Parts, Single Lift, One Kerbal to Eve Surface)

I have been playing the game for a few weeks, just before 0.90 dropped. When I got on the forums and saw this challenge, I figured I was just about ready for it. Sometimes it is good that you don't know what you don't know. For example, I didn't know what asparagus staging was when I started this challenge! I went through a lot of designs both before and after I learned about asparagus.

I tried to find a region on Eve that was fairly flat using MechJeb's predictor. My final landing drifted a bit and was only 650m high, lower than I would have liked, but flat enough. This was my second mission to Eve. The first mission had a lot more f5/f9 landing runs and then my ascent didn't have enough go to make orbit, anyway! Back to the drawing board!

On my return to the Kerbal Space Center I was almost too accurate. My nuke-powered tug nearly smashed into the pad. Probably bad form bringing home the nukes like that anyway...

Wow, I learned a lot by taking this challenge. I am ready to do another! Or maybe take this one to the next level!

One other tip for those of you using KSP on more than one computer. I used a tiny program called SymLink Creator to make a "hard link" of the save folder to a dropbox folder. I did the same on my computer at work. The game sees a hard link as tho it is seeing the save folder in its actual location. This is invaluable if you want to pick up right where you left off between 2 computers with no fuss.

Minerva.craft

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[Starhawk]

My dreams are filled with purple and wreckage and lag. Eve loves me and holds me tight. Her embrace is like steel bands.

I've been to Eve before. In 0.24 I landed one Kerbal at about 6200 m and brought back some purple dirt.

In 0.90 I've gotten used taking the original three everywhere, so I've finally been making use of the Mark1-2 pod. Then I joined the forums and saw this challenge.

Well, I thought, I've got to go all the way. With the Mark1-2 pod. After all, if Bill, Bob, and Jeb are going to spend that long in space, they should at least be able to keep each other company! This will be a good challenge, I thought.

I had believed that I was learning the engineering side of the game fairly well, but this quickly disabused me of that notion. I tried and tried, but in the end the vehicle I had created could only work with three Mk1 Lander Cans, and, in desperation, I added another ring of huge rockets to my lifter assembly which made it much too big for the circle rule. Then I landed at 602m rather than below 500. So I started over.

I was originally going to do this in career mode, but it would have bankrupted my program, so I used sanbox. I am still of the mind that my creation is a bastardization of engineering. On the other hand, I just looked at the preceding couple of pages in this thread, and maybe I should feel right at home.

The lander alone is 727.8 tonnes and 385 parts. Oh yeah, and we actually tested the ladder on this one.

The entire single launch is 9033.7 tonnes and 1171 parts, and the cost is 4205541 kurrency. I built the lifter/IP stage with extra docking ports in case I needed to refuel in LKO. My margins were razor thin, but I got away with a single launch.

Getting to LKO was painful only because of the lag. Time was running at about 6 or 7 to 1. Waited a long time for a transfer window because I thought the second one looked a little better than the first.

Because my margins were so thin, the aerocapture was followed by separation and circularization for the IP stage, and right back around to aerobrake and land for the lander. Thus, the night landing. At least you can see at night on Eve. It took several tries to get a good landing site with minimal fuel use.

No surprises on the ascent, since I had tested the crap out of the lander. The joy of shedding parts and lag was glorious. Almost as glorious as the joy of successful reorbiting, rendezvous, and docking. The IP stage had only wisps of fuel left after adjusting it's initial Eve orbit, but plenty to get the tiny return stage home.

I originally thought that I could make it much smaller and more efficient than this, but I'm still climbing that learning wall.

I realized that I had missed taking screenshots at a couple of points, so I had to go back to my named quicksaves and run a couple of sections of the mission over to get the pics. There might be time/location mismatches due to this, but the mission was completed successfully.

[EDIT] She was 699.058 tonnes waiting for liftoff from Eve. The only mod used was KER. Version was 0.90.

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Thanks for the challenge!

Edited February 6, 2015 by Starhawk
moar details

[2001kraft]

I feel sorry for Starhawk.

My ion plane "lag" is just not even comparable to this massive thing of a thing.

[Starlionblue]

Sure, my brave Kerbalnauts had to ride the whole way in external command chairs, but I made it with more than 2000 delta-v to spare!

Pics here.

The vehicle was 5500 tons, but under 1000 pieces. Asparagus staging which included using the lower lander engines on Kerbin liftoff. Nukes only for midcourse correction.