Realism Overhaul Discussion Thread

[NathanKell]

ColKlonk: It does indeed vary with craft min and max TWR per stage. A craft with a number of stages, where burnout TWRs never go beyond 3Gs, and liftoff TWR is only 1.2 or so--well, 100m/s sounds about right for that, maybe even 120m/s. If you're zooming off the pad at >2G, and your burnout TWR hits 10 and your second stage starts >1G and climbs rapidly again...well, 60m/s or even lower might be correct.

[ColKlonk]

@ColKlonk - If your waiting until 10km to perform any pitching I don't know how your even making orbit. Your increasing your DV needed to LKO by thousands. It's best to start pitching as early as possible so you can get the most out of the first stage. You need to be thrown as far downrange as possible.

You're not thinking of 'stock' Kerbin are you..? whereas in RSS 'Kerbin' the atmosphere is 130Km.

Here's a recording that I've patched together.. It's from multiple launches as I don't have a complete sequence recorded, but the methods are the same, minus some 'concentration gaps'

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2x27p8dhcmx5xbb/Mother_1.mp4?dl=0 (40MB)

Stage-1 => 6x RD-171M Kerosene Engines ( 33,000 thrust pushing 2,314,000 kgs)

Stage-2 => 6x RD-171M Kerosene Engines ( 33,000 thrust pushing 1,000,000 kgs)

Stage-3 => 4x RD-0120 Liquid Hydrogen/Oxygen Engines ( 5,000 thrust pushing 258,000 kgs)

The method I'm currently using is:-

Stage 1 - Get up to 50 Km+ while starting the slow turn, lining up orbital path (Orbit speed around a 1000ms)

Stage 2 - Chase Apoapsis bringing it to within 60 seconds, correcting orbital path (Orbit speed must be a min of 3500ms at the end of this stage)

Stage 3 - Final Orbit (250-300Km => not too high, as I would like to use the higher orbital speed for earth escape ), Try keep apoapsis within 20 seconds - sitting on top of it for altitude control and fuel efficiency.

Works like a charm.

I'll look at Liquid H and O engines later for stages 1+2, but at the moment they, even on a lighter load, don't have enough oomph!!. There is one engine pumping out 6K thrust but you can only have one per stage, and IIRC the ISP isn't too great either. (maybe these are just incorrect engine parameters, but Kerosene will do for the mo)

Edited April 21, 2015 by ColKlonk

[FennexFox]

It should work, but it would be better if you put volume = 300000, this would give you 300,000 liters to fill with whatever you wanted, not just the pre-defined set of supplies.

Argh, that`s what ModuleFuelTanks volume means! I`m gonna fix that this weekend.

[Laie]

(First off, I thought I had already posted this yesterday. But can't find it again. So here goes -- again?)

I just got myself Realism Overhaul. I was mostly interested in RSS, but doing the ckan install I got FAR, TAC and Real Fuels (as well as a few others) into the bargain. Which only makes sense, but it's a bit overwhelming. I think most of my getting started troubles are due to real fuels. The sheer number of engines is overwhelming. I started into career mode in the hopes that this might gradually introduce me, but that may have been a bad idea to begin with.

Trouble starts with small things. On my tank, it said 38% kerosene which I thought was fitting. Yet delta-V remained at zero. Figured out that this is a button that has to be pressed.

First rocket didn't take off. Even when I started looking for it, I took a while to notice the "SLT" field in MJ.

Second rocket still didn't take off. Apparently the rocket sinks into the launchpad and gets stuck. I kept the engine running, it eventually zoomed off when TWR went above 1.6 or something. Reached insane speed and disintegrated around 15km.

Still lacking launch clamps, I placed the third rocket on a decoupler. Took off as planned and even made orbit (on the first try! Hooray!). Doing silly challenges wasn't entirely worthless, I did learn a trick or two. Like how to circularize with a long, slow burn.

Still. As this is career mode, I now have tasks like launching a satellite into a specific orbit. Which I'd consider below me in stock KSP, but without throttling or restarting, this is quite a challenge. I don't even know how I should start to tackle the problem.

More generally, I also have no idea how I should launch into the plane of the Moon, or the ecliptic.

I don't know if a "getting started" guide would really help me, but I'd appreciate a "how not to get utterly lost" document. Because yeah, it's overwhelming.

[ColKlonk]

The sheer number of engines is overwhelming.

If you're using stages, depending on your rocket size, you want the first stage to get you 60km+ up. (I took this cue from the Apollo program)

For heavier rockets, this is usually only obtainable with inefficient engines (Low ISP) that have more 'grunt.. than sense' - just pure power.

The upper stages you can mix-n-match to suite your objective.

Although Kerosene engines and fuel are heavier, they compensate by having a nice ISP range compared to Liquid engines.. and when the tanks are running low be careful you don't wipe out Kerbils from the acceleration.

... but without throttling or restarting, this is quite a challenge. I don't even know how I should start to tackle the problem.

That engine start mod gave me a few problems so I removed it. It's only 'troublesome' in the launch to orbit stages, but I got around this by never switching off my engines during this time.

From what I've read, I think RL throttling in the game is not right as 75% seemed to be the minimum - This in itself is not a real problem as I can still remove an engine or two - just will require more concentration though:cool:

Beyond orbit I've settled for Liquid Fuel nuclear engines - They say they're safe and radiation is minimal

More generally, I also have no idea how I should launch into the plane of the Moon, or the ecliptic.

In the tracking station, select your target destination and zoom out so you can see it's orbital path - align the view so that you're in that orbital plane.

Zoom back into 'Kerbin' (Earth) making sure that the orbital path doesn't fade, select a launch site that's crossing this path - take note of the intersection angle as this will be the angle you have to rotate to, before doing any gravity turns.

Cape Canaveral is the best as when it intersects the moon's path the angle is a near perfect 90 degrees, requiring no adjustments on your part - this also saves fuel.

I'll post a pic or two later..

Here we go..

Zoom out into the moon orbital plane.. (Maybe this is an idea for a mod)

Zoom back in, keeping the orbital plane in the centre of the earth ( a mission but with a bit of practise = ok)

Select the launchpad closest to the plane (Brownsville), and when under it..... launch (take note of the orbital angle and direction wrt to the '4 corners' [NESW])

Although you can launch outside the plane, launching in the plane minimises your fuel usage

Before launch take a careful note of your actual orientation on the navball, and identify the direction of rotation.

... and you're good-to-go.

Edt: My lines are not properly aligned.. but the method is unchanged!

Edited April 22, 2015 by ColKlonk

[NathanKell]

Laie, welcome!

A large part of the problem you're encountering is that RO itself does not support career mode at all. You will need to also install Realistic Progression Zero to have career gameplay in RO. Note that the amount of part packs it supports is limited compared to sandbox-play RO.

[Laie]

A large part of the problem you're encountering is that RO itself does not support career mode at all.

Thanks for the hint, and thanks for the welcome.

I went for career not because I'm so fond of career mode, but because I hoped it would make it easier to find my way around the many many parts. If there is another (better?) way to get my bearings, career will become unnecessary.

Post #3 on the real fuels thread classifies engines as Orbital Maneuvering, Upper Stage, Lower Stage, and so on. That scheme makes a lot of sense to me -- is there a way of having them sorted like that in the game? I only see them sorted by fuels which gives a rough approximation (lower stages won't be found on the hydrolox tab, for example), but there's still a lot of tabs to be checked for any given task. I may be missing the obvious -- as mentioned before, it took me a while to spot the field for surface-level TWR even though I was expecting it to be there. As indeed it was, hiding in plain sight.

---

Edit to add: this probably just isn't the right mod for me. After doing the "Fastest Small Step" challenge, buzzing to Laythe in <40 days, I was looking for something that will give me a proper sense of scale. Some more realism overall wouldn't hurt, either. Life support? Yes please. Realistic engines? Well of course.

However, the way it's done... there's a host of upper stage engines in the 60-80kN range with no clear indication why I should chose one over the other (except for ISP of course, which beggars the question why the others even exist). 70kN is barely enough to make orbit as a second stage on my design. However, the next strongest engine is five times more powerful -- totally overpowered, uncontrollable.

I haven't even looked at the 212 different SRB's.

Every tank requires me to select the proper fuel. This requires some attention even if you have a combination of Kerosene and UMDH on your rocket; but when I was presented with a choice of either 41% or 43% UMDH, I was positively confused, double and triple-checking which needs to go where. I don't doubt that there's people who enjoy this, but I'm not one of them. Coming to think of it, why are tanks only 83% full by default?

I still wonder how I should make a nice circular orbit on engines I can't throttle. I guess that in real life they have a predetermined flight profile and some control system that follows it to a fraction of a degree. However, I wouldn't know how to compute a profile ahead of time, nor am I sure that I could execute it even with MJ assistance.

Is there a way to get the real solar system, but still have a more arcade-y set of engines? Realistic-like ISPs and boiloff, but with some throttling and only a few very distinct types of fuel? Where Kerolox is just Kerolox and I don't have to care about specific mass fractions?

Edited April 22, 2015 by Laie

[NathanKell]

Laie: Sure!

RP-0 will introduce mechanics at a similar rate to KSP, actually, so it's a fairly good choice for getting into RO; another option is following the tutorials here on the RO wiki[/ul] in sandbox mode. We have plans for some tutorial videos too, just everybody's always busy.

I did write up a quick RP-0 tutorial which should help you get started.

Regarding sorting, no, RF doesn't add a sort mode. Great idea though!

[Motokid600]

You're not thinking of 'stock' Kerbin are you..? whereas in RSS 'Kerbin' the atmosphere is 130Km.

Here's a recording that I've patched together.. It's from multiple launches as I don't have a complete sequence recorded, but the methods are the same, minus some 'concentration gaps'

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2x27p8dhcmx5xbb/Mother_1.mp4?dl=0 (40MB)

Stage-1 => 6x RD-171M Kerosene Engines ( 33,000 thrust pushing 2,314,000 kgs)

Stage-2 => 6x RD-171M Kerosene Engines ( 33,000 thrust pushing 1,000,000 kgs)

Stage-3 => 4x RD-0120 Liquid Hydrogen/Oxygen Engines ( 5,000 thrust pushing 258,000 kgs)

The method I'm currently using is:-

Stage 1 - Get up to 50 Km+ while starting the slow turn, lining up orbital path (Orbit speed around a 1000ms)

Stage 2 - Chase Apoapsis bringing it to within 60 seconds, correcting orbital path (Orbit speed must be a min of 3500ms at the end of this stage)

Stage 3 - Final Orbit (250-300Km => not too high, as I would like to use the higher orbital speed for earth escape ), Try keep apoapsis within 20 seconds - sitting on top of it for altitude control and fuel efficiency.

Works like a charm.

I'll look at Liquid H and O engines later for stages 1+2, but at the moment they, even on a lighter load, don't have enough oomph!!. There is one engine pumping out 6K thrust but you can only have one per stage, and IIRC the ISP isn't too great either. (maybe these are just incorrect engine parameters, but Kerosene will do for the mo)

I forgot about this post I made earlier. The way you made it sound in your previous post was your waiting until over 10km to start pitching. If I read that correctly.

If that's the case then that's a big no-no in both RSS and stock ( with FAR ). And your rocket would be under-performing.

What's your vertical velocity after stage separation? It's hard to say because of how much it varies, but I find nine times out of ten if my vertical speed is over 1250m/s after first stage sep I was too steep and could've went shallower to save the second stage some work.

Oh and then there's thrust to weight ratio. Which you've got ALOT of. That second stage your using the same six engine setup? That's why your not having trouble getting to orbit, but your overbuilding. You could get away with a smaller rocket.

Edited April 22, 2015 by Motokid600

[Laie]

We have plans for some tutorial videos too, just everybody's always busy.

I'm willing to help if I can.

Remains to be seen if it's really an option, though -- while you were penning your kind answer, I was updating my previous post with a rant. I've now uninstalled RO and will try RSS Stock Parts -- though at first glance, it seems as if this will swing the pendulum too far in the other direction. I probably wouldn't see it that way if I had gone with RSS-SP right away, but after a taste of real fuels, RSS-SP comes over as incredibly shallow. On the other hand, the RO approach is just too damn much: too many fuels, way too many engines (also too many that seem to be quite similar, while some large niches remain unfilled).

Some of this turns into a major UI problem. Other than that, my first impression is that RO requires too much planning. You have to design a rocket precisely to spec... and also fly it precisely to spec. I wasn't aware of this, but having a throttle is what allows one to just assemble a rocket of about the right delta-V and then make things up as you go.

This comes after I've put a whole six or eight hours into RO, so my comments should probably be taken with a whole bucket of salt. I expect that I will give RO another try, but for now, it's just too much that's coming at me all at once.

[Norcalplanner]

Laie,

It's definitely not for everyone. I've put about 20 hours into RO/RP-0, but it's now been on the back burner for a while. Here are the things that I learned:

1. Read the guides linked in the OP for RO on how to launch your first rocket, Ferram's tips for launch vehicle design, etc. They will help out a lot.

2. Use procedural tanks and procedural tanks only. Customize the tank sizes and shapes for that particular mission, taking into account fuel types and TWR from the beginning of the stage to the end of the stage.

3. Start with a lot lower TWR than stock, down around 1.2 or 1.3. Start your gravity turn early (1 km altitude or so) and make it a true gravity turn.

4. If you need to make fine adjustments to a satellite or orbiting pod, it works best to use hypergolic propellants and deep-throttling engines once you're in orbit (and be sure to use the service module tank type). The LM descent engine is a good one. I ended up making several 4-stage rockets. First two stages together were about 9 km/s delta V, (kerolox for stage 1 and hydrolox for stage 2 a la Saturn V) then the last two stages were both hypergolics to actually put the satellite where it needed to go.

5. For lunar transfer, put a small pathfinder satellite in an orbit that is coplanar with the Moon's orbit. Then for future launches you can then see exactly when the satellite's orbit crosses over KSC, and launch into that plane knowing you'll be lined up with the Moon.

6. Think tiny. Simple satellites shouldn't weigh more than half a ton, and should be able to be launched with a craft weighing 40 tons or less.

Good luck.

[ColKlonk]

I forgot about this post I made earlier. The way you made it sound in your previous post was your waiting until over 10km to start pitching. If I read that correctly.

If that's the case then that's a big no-no in both RSS and stock ( with FAR ). And your rocket would be under-performing.

What's your vertical velocity after stage separation? It's hard to say because of how much it varies, but I find nine times out of ten if my vertical speed is over 1250m/s after first stage sep I was too steep and could've went shallower to save the second stage some work.

Oh and then there's thrust to weight ratio. Which you've got ALOT of. That second stage your using the same six engine setup? That's why your not having trouble getting to orbit, but your overbuilding. You could get away with a smaller rocket.

It is overbuilt a bit .. I use this as a safety margin.

I could bring the weight down with Liquid HnO engines, but cannot attach enough engines at the mo.

1st stage separation is around 800ms Vertical (around 900 for orbit) at a height of 55Km

2nd stage is around 4000ms+ orbit at a height of 200+ km (not sure of vertical speed here)

3rd stage is the final rush to orbit on a smaller setup

I've found the stage-1 to be about right. Stage-2, I could reduce it to 4 engines, but then I'd have to really 'rev it'.

KSP orbit/surface lock introduces 'self-propelled oscillations' at high thrust (the PID control is not good)- The rockets start to look like a wriggly sausage, prior to tearing itself apart.

So I kept the 6 engines and run them throttled back.

The way I see it , is that you want to get out of the atmosphere asap, reducing resistance and heat losses.

On a winged rocket/shuttle one could use the wings for vertical lift component, so it makes sense for the shuttle to turn early.

On a rocket there's not much of that and you have to compensate by going faster, which increases aerodynamic resistances.

In aviation, there are two ways achieve altitude in a specified time - shallow angle and fast, or steep angle which is slower speed but requiring more power.

The energy consumption's usually the same, but the resultant mechanical and stress effects are different.

A quick squiz at Wiki (if it tells the truth )

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity_turn

As before a trade off exists between gravity drag from flying higher first to avoid the thicker atmosphere when accelerating; or accelerating more at lower altitude, resulting in a heavier launch vehicle because of a higher maximum dynamic pressure experienced on launch.

Edited April 23, 2015 by ColKlonk

[sploooshman]

ok so im gonna have another go at getting some clear information , so any answers would prefer to be helpful and informative rather than "it doesnt work"

So I am a massive RSS RO fan , only played stock for about a week , got to the mun , went for RSS and took a month to get back to same status , so was completely sold , active texture management and memory usage was always a puch but was ok , then came x64.

I never had a problem with 64 but have lost my 0.25 game , and now I am stuck with no working release of real fuels / modualarfuelsystem to be more correct - so i posed the question the other day of anyone out there who has done what the post says and purposefully fixed modularfuels to work with windows 64.

I was of course told that its not supported and its only good to use x32 and manage with a blurry earth as my reward for reaching orbit. There was of course the mestion to use linux and of course I do have linux already installed and now have a supported GPU , however , if the mods I require wont work with 64 bit windows , does that imply that they do with linux - I havent noticed and references to operating systems in the mods configs , so assumed they are OS irrelevant.

If anyone out there know the right answer , and can get me on a working version of x64 either linux or windows , with RO and all dependancies modified or supported alread , (bear in mind the modularfuelsystem and realfules is the only mod that is currently not working on win64) , does it work with 64 linux , or am i screwed with 32 bit blurry blue dot , cos carl sagan is pi**ed right now!!!

lol help guys , im not asking for 64 bit support , im aware its buggy , I just want to get real fuels/modulafuels working in 64 , either windows , or linux pleeeeeeeeese

some sound advice from Nathan is in need im a lost traveller in a sea of stars and my fuel mod is broken so my tanks are empty or incorrectly filled , I think Jebs been at it

[Hattivat]

Actually, you can ask for linux x64 support, as it is pretty much as stable as windows x86 if done right. All the mods should work without a hitch, they are only disabled for windows x64. What might not work is CKAN itself - try updating mono in that case.

Two hints:

1. Do read the linux thread, paying extra attention to the topics of segfaults (there should be a helpful script there to fix your KSP, without it it will crash once it gets over 4 gb or so of RAM usage) and potentially missing fonts.

2. If RSS fails to change the appearance of planets even though it says "Done!", or you experience other weird graphical glitches, the likely culprit is anti-aliasing, you may have to turn it off.

[NathanKell]

Linux x64 isn't just supported, it's recommended. But if you must run on Windows, use -force-opengl and that should cut your RAM usage markedly (I dropped from 3.3GB to 1.2GB, and adding part packs won't materially change ram usage).

[sploooshman]

Hattivat

thanks ive fought my way through the thread when I first fired up linux last time , however my graphics card didnt have correct proprietry drivers tried everything then etc , and then 64 came out for win and I was happy. thanks for the info about CKAN not working , that would have dome my head in had I not known - would have probably gave up on that too.

NathanKell

cutting ram would be awesome , but your 8k textures would be even better , time to put ultimate edition back on the drive , I had asked the same question a few days ago but in the wrong place and in a very frustrated manner , been waiting since september to fire my game up due to family commitments and found it all completely annoying. so was a little annoyed and sad lol , thanks for your replies and as usual the hard work you put in to RSS RO etc , my imgur is missing a few months worth of mission images.

ill check back in a few when im up and running

[Motokid600]

It is overbuilt a bit .. I use this as a safety margin.

I could bring the weight down with Liquid HnO engines, but cannot attach enough engines at the mo.

1st stage separation is around 800ms Vertical (around 900 for orbit) at a height of 55Km

2nd stage is around 4000ms+ orbit at a height of 200+ km (not sure of vertical speed here)

3rd stage is the final rush to orbit on a smaller setup

I've found the stage-1 to be about right. Stage-2, I could reduce it to 4 engines, but then I'd have to really 'rev it'.

KSP orbit/surface lock introduces 'self-propelled oscillations' at high thrust (the PID control is not good)- The rockets start to look like a wriggly sausage, prior to tearing itself apart.

So I kept the 6 engines and run them throttled back.

The way I see it , is that you want to get out of the atmosphere asap, reducing resistance and heat losses.

On a winged rocket/shuttle one could use the wings for vertical lift component, so it makes sense for the shuttle to turn early.

On a rocket there's not much of that and you have to compensate by going faster, which increases aerodynamic resistances.

In aviation, there are two ways achieve altitude in a specified time - shallow angle and fast, or steep angle which is slower speed but requiring more power.

The energy consumption's usually the same, but the resultant mechanical and stress effects are different.

A quick squiz at Wiki (if it tells the truth )

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity_turn

Well if it works for you then by all means. But "you want to get out of the atmosphere asap"

Not the case. Atmospheric drag losses are negligible compared to gravity losses. Which you don't have much of because of that over powered second stage. Your essentially brute forcing your way to orbit. You could probably can get away with four engines on the second stage and two on the third. But your first stage has to do more work and throw you farther/faster down range with a shollower ascent. If all your first stage is doing is getting you above the atmosphere then your second stage has to do 90% of the horizontal thrusting. And if you have a twr under 1 ( which in this case I don't think you do ) then your going to fall right back down before you hit that 7.5km/s.

Most rockets start pitching the second they leave the ground. With KSP it's not long after you clear the tower because as you said KSP doesn't have fine enough control.

And again I'm not trying to tell you how to play it's just interesting to me how diverse some methods can be. So call me curious, how much DeltaV does the first two stages of that rocket have?

Edited April 23, 2015 by Motokid600

[ColKlonk]

And again I'm not trying to tell you how to play it's just interesting to me how diverse some methods can be. So call me curious, how much DeltaV does the first two stages of that rocket have?

NP

Not sure of the actual Stage1+2 Delta-Vs as I don't use Kerbal engineer or FAR 'engineering' (FAR is installed though)

At Stage-3 (250 tons including payload [70 Tons]) I'm at 4000ms, approx 250Km altitude, 420 seconds into flight and sitting close to apoapsis (approx 30 seconds if I get it right), flying about 10 degrees above horizon.

I'll end up with somewhere between 5-10% fuel left in stage-3 on final orbit, but this is boiling away fast and I try get my planetary alignment done before the Liquid-H disappears.

I usually aim for about a 300Km 'parking' orbit - before getting excited.

Edited April 24, 2015 by ColKlonk

[Motokid600]

@ColKlonk - No MechJeb either? Oi vay more power to you lol. And that explains alot. If you dont have DV readouts in RSS then, well...whew.

[Laie]

There is a radiator part, I'm not sure what mod it comes from, that says "not supported by RO" in the description, but I was wondering if it might help slow down boil off anyway. Initial experiments with launching a tank of liquid hydrogen into orbit with a bunch of radiators on it were inconclusive.

There should be a way to stop it completely, or at least almost. The post-Apollo Mars Mission plan envisioned a nuclear tug to get the mission there and back again, with ten months in-between. Apparently they were confident that hydrogen reliquefaction would be very efficient and reliable.

---

I can now make orbit more often than not. I still wonder how to do it right.

Starting the turn a little sooner or later doesn't seem to be as all-important as it once may have been. Mechjeb's ability to keep the vessel slightly above or below prograde allows you to make up for early mistakes. But I still don't know what I'm aiming for; at any given time in the first few minutes, I couldn't tell you whether I'm too low or too high. All I know is that if I eventually make orbit, it can't have been too bad.

Later on, I try to control time-to-apoasis by adjusting my pitch. The ever-increasing TWR makes this tricky, but I think I'm getting the hang of this. But again, I'm not sure if it is the right way of doing it.

[Motokid600]

@Laie - What exactly makes you skeptical? Generally ( very generally ) if you can make it into orbit in under or around 9,000m/s Dv your doing okay.

If your pitching back up too high and for too long to fight gravity chances are you botched your initial ascent.

If your overheating your probably a little too low. Though some heating is okay. It's hard to say. It the general rule I personally go by is that it's best to fly the shallowest ascent possible with your rockets given TWR.

If you overheat and explode you started the turn too early. If your second stage is under performing you probably went too steep.

There is a butter zone that you'll get used too. I personally find RSS gives you far more room for error in the ascent. But you'll pay for it afterwards when it comes time to do work in orbit.

[NathanKell]

Laie: The various late 60s-early 70s Mars mission plans, like everything surrounding the Integrated Program Plan, were wildly optimistic. That said, if you're willing to spend electricity, you can use active refrigeration; RealFuels comes with a couple parts with heatpumps to do just that.

I'd say you're doing things exactly right, tbh; I certainly have no better approach than what you've described. There's no easy a priori way to know how to fly an LV (people write PhD theses on optimal launch trajectories) so it takes some testing to find out what early pitch angles lead to which apogees, and how high you have to pitch above prograde later to circularize in time.

[ColKlonk]

@ColKlonk - No MechJeb either? Oi vay more power to you lol. And that explains alot. If you dont have DV readouts in RSS then, well...whew.

Been thinking about what you said on over-designing.. and as it was the idea to make the rocket lighter, so back I went to the design studio.

My current mission is to 'dump' many re-supply rockets between earth and mars, at around 200million kms from the sun.

Scratching around 'my hanger', I found some nice Jool-V srb's so tried some configurations and came up with this..

I removed stage-1 of the old rocket and added some SRBs == 2000 tons and pushing 70-80 tons into orbit (~220Km). Finally cracked the 2K mark. :)

The payload on this film was 80 tons, although I used about 10 tons of mono-propellant from the payload.. so say 70 tons net.

Using my usual 10Km roll over, it worked fairly well.. did get a speed-wobble at 2nd stage but I quickly put an end to that.

The mono-prop engines are all but useless in efficiency, but hey! you can't argue with and endless supply from Kotysoft modules.. just add electricity.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/duyo5plqvbkwunt/Rock2000_1.mp4?dl=0(50MB)

Edited April 25, 2015 by ColKlonk

[Ravenchant]

Quick question! I've just begun using the 11D33 kerolox engine for an upper stage and the GUI always says "Fuel flow: very stable", even in orbit with RCS turned off for several minutes. What could be causing this?

[NathanKell]

It's possible there's an EngineIgnitor issue; try warping for a few hours and see if it goes unstable by then.