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Detailed stock Curiosity MSL rover and Atlas V541 1.0 update

Majorjim!

By Majorjim!
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Majorjim!

Majorjim!

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PndYlvD.jpg

Hi all,

I am happy to be able to release my updated Curiosity rover and Atlas V541. Still the most accurate Curiosity replica on these forums, or anywhere to be honest. :D

I used the stock fairings for the payload to reduce the part count. They are horrible to work with but look good if done right.

I am using a mod that allows for clam-shell fairings. You will see that in the pictures and I recommend you use it. The fairings work fine without though.

Some more detail was added to the rover itself too. It's even more accurate now!

This is a very easy to fly rocket with a nice challenge at the end of safely landing the rover on Duna. You can see this in the video below.

Here are some pictures:

 

Flight instructions:

-SAS on, full throttle press space bar!

-At 300m/s turn east to 70degress or as close as possible

-stage the boosters and start a slow turn to 45 degrees when at 500m/s

-keep slowly turning as speed and altitude increases

-complete orbit with transfer stage

-shoot for Duna! on a collision course

-stage into cruise stage for trip to Duna

-adjust orbit for atmospheric entry to Duna at your chosen altitude

-Stage cruise stage and enter the atmosphere

-deploy chute and when open stage heatshield then the skycrane

-land on Duna! Yes, yes, I know that's easier said than done but there is plenty of fuel so take your time. You can hover, land then fire off the skycrane. As long as the rover is intact it doesn't matter. See video for example landing.

Thank you all for reading this, my old post is below.

MJ

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Hi all,

I am very happy to be able to share my newest stock craft with you.

This is a detailed recreation of the MSL Mars curiosity rover.

I have tried to stick as closely as possible to the real thing. I started by building the rover itself then the sky-crane then the rest of the rocket.

I have made one of these in the past but it was very basic, and as most people seem to do it was made from a rover body, which wasn't good enough for this replica.

I had to come up with a way to create a thin white part for the slim body of the real rover. I managed it with the trusty cubic strut and mirrored hard-points.

I managed to cram in a few other details like the rear antenna, RTG, sample probe and camera.

As I wanted to make the rover and sky-crane as compact as possible I had to turn part of the camera to accommodate the sky-crane arms. You will see that in the pics below.

So, it is a very compact unit now.

After that I spent many hours on testing various aeroshell fairings for the rover. I tried ailerons, they tumble in dunas atmos..

I made one from backwards solar panels but the part count was too high. So I used structural panels and managed to get a shape not unlike the real version.

The rest of the rocket came together nicely but the launcher was drifting. I have no idea why and anything I tried didn't work. I have largely fixed the issue now with some fiddling and swearing.

I find the rocket easy to fly, but as Rune said recently its tough to know if others will find it as easy. As I have launched this thing many times before its complete.

The landing of the Sky-crane is a bit tricky but nothing major.

So anyway, on to the pics and vid!

Here is a sequence of KVV shots showing each part of the craft.

And some shots during the mission.

I also made a video of a flown mission, nothing fancy just some dramatic music, beautiful scenes and a rover delivered to Duna.

 

Even if you dont want to fly it you can DL to see how it was made.

Thanks again!

MJ

Edited by Majorjim
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Darth Lazarus

Darth Lazarus

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so you have a drift in your rocket too? i have this problem with my replicas as well. they tend to spin on gravity turn slightly or drift to one side and SAS and engine gimbal is fighting like hell. even completly rebuilding and caring for symetry do not help completly. best example: my proton third stage, it's tiny, haw lot of torgue BUT IT DRIFTS with SAS on ... frustrating. oh and SAS ist not stable anymore. just give your rocket a slight poke and it starts to wobble... only timewarp fixes this completly

i have the feeling that with 0.25, squad have broken some things. in 0.24 i don't have and of these troubles...

nevertheless a very awesome rocket :)

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Majorjim!

Majorjim!

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So detailed, so beautiful, so awesome. 10/10

:D So true. :wink:

Thank you Xoknight.

That's just awesome, Majorjim! Very detailed and clean-designed replicas as always! :)
Thanks man, i put a lot of effort into the aesthetics!
so you have a drift in your rocket too? i have this problem with my replicas as well. they tend to spin on gravity turn slightly or drift to one side and SAS and engine gimbal is fighting like hell. even completly rebuilding and caring for symetry do not help completly. best example: my proton third stage, it's tiny, haw lot of torgue BUT IT DRIFTS with SAS on ... frustrating. oh and SAS ist not stable anymore. just give your rocket a slight poke and it starts to wobble... only timewarp fixes this completly i have the feeling that with 0.25, squad have broken some things. in 0.24 i don't have and of these troubles... nevertheless a very awesome rocket :)
Yeah it was drifting but I managed to reduce it so it holds course well now. It wants to spin ever so slightly during the turn, but again its very minor. There is definitely something amiss with the game code. As GusTurbo said in another post, the connections are still too weak for tall rockets. Oh well, it works so I'm happy! And thanks for the kind words mate!
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Capt Snuggler

Capt Snuggler

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Great work as always dude. going to have fun messing about with this one.

9.5/10 - I would give you ten out of ten but I know you will raise the bar again next time so I'm giving my self a margin. :P

edit* just a wild hunch, try applying the breaks during launch and see if that fixes your phantom torque. you never know.

Edited by Capt Snuggler
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Majorjim!

Majorjim!

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Great work as always dude. going to have fun messing about with this one.

9.5/10 - I would give you ten out of ten but I know you will raise the bar again next time so I'm giving my self a margin. :P

edit* just a wild hunch, try applying the breaks during launch and see if that fixes your phantom torque. you never know.

LOL cheers dude. :)

Hmm, the brakes on the rover? Might be that. But, for me the launcher is quite controllable as long as you don't gravity turn too fast.

Give it a go and let me know how you get on matey.

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Capt Snuggler

Capt Snuggler

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LOL cheers dude. :)

Hmm, the brakes on the rover? Might be that.

the reason I suggest it, I had a vehicle once where the rover wheels were touching another part during flight. my directional inputs were causing the wheels to turn and pushing and twisting the part they were contacting, sending wobbles and vibrations through the craft.

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Majorjim!

Majorjim!

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This is a stunningly beautiful craft! It reminds me of the Curiosity rover when it was just landing, and being on the edge of my seat during the 7 minutes of hell. This is a great ship! 11/10

Thank you so much Prof! It's a really fun mission to fly.

the reason I suggest it, I had a vehicle once where the rover wheels were touching another part during flight. my directional inputs were causing the wheels to turn and pushing and twisting the part they were contacting, sending wobbles and vibrations through the craft.

I will definitely check this after work today. The rover wheels are in contact with the heatshield.

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Majorjim!

Majorjim!

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wow, that is spot on! Some of the pics looked like they where from the NASA animation. +1 Sir, awesome work.

High praise indeed! Thanks man. I watched your curiosity video a few times before making this.

And yeah, I was trying to make a definitive stock curiosity!

Now, all I need is movie making skills like yours!

MJ

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Rune

Rune

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Yup, superbly done. It is a beauty to behold, and details like the staggered SRB staging are just icing on the cake.

Rune. I might have to start a save to timewarp to a Duna launch window just to try this at some point!

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Majorjim!

Majorjim!

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Hi all,

Thank you so much for the great feedback, kind words and the rep!

I have now added some flight instructions that should be easy to follow.

Yup, superbly done. It is a beauty to behold, and details like the staggered SRB staging are just icing on the cake.

Rune. I might have to start a save to timewarp to a Duna launch window just to try this at some point!

Thanks Rune, I would love you to try it!

I'm still too ocd to use it without a working arm.

You mean without a cable to lower the rover? Yeah stock parts that do that would be ace!

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astropapi1

astropapi1

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Oh man, this was a thing of beauty indeed. I love the way you did the skycrane! :D

I've always seen skycranes done with the radial orange engines in an X-like configuration, but you managed to recreate the flat-X shape of Curiosity's skycrane and even did the "cameras" on its head.

You've got an amazing attention to detail. If the forum had an equivalent of reddit gold, I'd give you all of it.

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Majorjim!

Majorjim!

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Oh man, this was a thing of beauty indeed. I love the way you did the skycrane! :D

I've always seen skycranes done with the radial orange engines in an X-like configuration, but you managed to recreate the flat-X shape of Curiosity's skycrane and even did the "cameras" on its head.

You've got an amazing attention to detail. If the forum had an equivalent of reddit gold, I'd give you all of it.

Yeah I'm really happy with the skycrane. I discovered that the central support of the real skycrane is a Hexagon, seen here:

skycranefromabove.jpeg

So the Probodobodyne HECS core is perfect for that part as its the only small Hexagonal part.

I think with those engines, it could deliver much larger/heavier payloads. Will do some testing.

MJ

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