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Kadvent Kalender - 24 missions leading up to christmas


TJPrime

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On the 5th day of this challenge Jeb and Bill test out the manufacturing prototype for the Mun Lander project.

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And the following day the three heroes took the lander and command capsule into Kerbin orbit for additional testing. The lander worked flawlessly as Bob flew it around the capsule while Jeb and Bill watched intently.

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The crew learned that it would have been useful to have some monopropellant control jets on the command capsule. The next ship will address that shortcoming. Looking forward to Day 7 where we get to really kick the tires!

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And on Day 7 of this great challenge there was another launch, this time departing Kerbin orbit with a Mun flyby with free return trajectory, using only a single burn out of LKO. The command capsule has new lights as well as some mono prop control jets installed to make the Mun Lander docking simpler. This mission was again flown by our three heroes and they managed a flyby at ~27km from the surface. Unfortunately the return to Kerbin's atmosphere was quite high, ~50km so it took another eleven days of multiple aerobrake maneuvers before they managed to get enough drag to slow down for a proper reentry and landing. The crew kept themselves occupied by singing Kristmas karols to each other.

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Things I'd do differently: firstly, its clear that the Mun transfer stage doesn't have enough delta-v for achieving Mun orbit and return to Kerbin. It was lucky this was discovered on a free return trajectory. Second the crew shouldn't have ditched the extra gear on return to Kerbin (lander, transfer stage, return stage, etc) as the extra mass would have made the aerobrake more effective. Oh well, it worked out well enough as the crew survived and the challenge was completed.

Edited by bobcook
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Finished test orbit with low G reentry to the ocean West of KSP

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Added an SAS to the second stage. Handling was far better for the free return orbit.

On the launch pad

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Second stage to orbit.

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As there is enough delta V to intercept Mun, I will aim this stage to crash into it on the next flight.

Extremely difficult to set up and have both a close Mun encounter and a proper reentry free return. Therefore, I opted for the ideal reentry free return window.

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Slingshot figure eight around Mun.

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Landed and the stats.

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For the Mun landing mission, only the pod will be recovered on return.

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Day 7 was bitter sweet; the free return test was fairly successful but we lost Billy-Bobmon. Billy-Bobmon could have returned in the command module but elected to try to land the Mun lander on Kerbin. We had thought that Billy-Bobmon was just going to skim the upper atmosphere while Burmy Kerman landed the command module but Mission Control lost track of him at about that time. He is lost and presumed dead. RIP Billy-Bobmon.

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Finally finished up the Day 4 entry in its entirety:

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Both the Mun and Minmus sat constellations were supposed to be hexagonal. Still trying to figure out what the crap happened there, but as the challenge doesn't specify what all needs to be there, I'm satisfied enough with the final result. Maybe I'll ask the guys who gave me the advice for constellation building how I screwed that one up.

In any event, I'm now three days behind; I've got December 1-5 completed but I need to do the December 6th and 7th entries and I have no doubt Dec 8 will be up before I can get to either of thems. I did pull the Scorpio 7 crew module and Katapugon 7 lander out of 0.23's mothballs last night; will be redesigning their boosters and getting to cracking on the tests/initial landings as soon as I can remember what their operational profiles looked like...

Edited by capi3101
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December 8th is now up and running!

We're going to do something great today... also:

December 9th is also up and running!

To keep things on schedule again, I've put both challenges up. This doesn't mean you can do both in one go. You must post your December 8th post and then your December 9th.

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Here is my entry. Despite all the testing and planning something did go wrong. My stage 1 from my lander was activated when i left the mun and the lander was almost out of control. Good thing though i had two lander cans and i could control the ascent. At the end i had to correct my orbit for the final docking and the mission was a success. The hard mode did spice things up and my heart raced for a couple of seconds during the lander's touchdown at a steep crater side along with the ascent, something that happened very often when i first started playing KSP. Kudos to the OP

P.S. i had the cheat menu on at my screenshots in order to show i was at hard mode

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Dec 8th/9th: not a lot to say about the 8th since it's just a landing with the previously-shown vehicle.

I just couldn't attach a rover to that thing though - serves me right for using a design with almost all tolerances stripped out.

So I probably failed the challenge for the 9th, but had enough fun building a new vehicle that I thought it was worth several screenshots and put the whole lot in an album for simplicity:

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(Dec 9th starts at picture 6).

Edited by Pecan
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Landed on Mun in one of the best landing yet in the Highlands. I'm going to leave Jeb there to see if I can place Bob with a rover close by, then bring both home.

Pic staging the SRBs with the tweaked sepatrons. Staging them causes a random rotation easily corrected. Orbital turn is already under way when I stage the SRBs.

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Mun orbit.

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Landing sequence. On the suicide burn

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Staged to come down the last 500 feet;

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Contact Light. Note, all drift under control using SAS and the Navball to align the landing.

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Flag planted. Jeb has plenty of fuel left for return to Kerbal. He is going to wait to see if Bob can land close by with a rover.

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The rover that will sit on top of the pod in place of the current parachute. The Rover contains an RCS package to undock and land nearby. The present design should have enough delta v to handle the extra weight.

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Edit; Updated the rover to reduce weight. May tweak the fuel for undocking and landing to reduce weight even more.

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Edited by SRV Ron
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Day 8 brought our three heroes to the Mun again, this time they were "go" for landing. All of this is done on hard mode, of course. After the previous successful mission, more fuel was added to the transfer stage, and some Sepratrons were added to the second stage in order to deorbit it cleanly. The landing was straightforward, Jeb and Bob planted a flag, collected a couple of rocks, then launched back into Mun orbit to catch up with Bill and the command capsule. After docking they adjusted orbit to intentionally crash the lander and transfer stage into the Mun (leaving no debris in Mun orbit) prior to departing for Kerbin again. Overall it was a very uneventful trip.

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Four days behind - at least I finally have a redesigned booster for the crew capsule now:

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Saved myself some parts - the design's LES used to be a 20-part assembly of girders and Sepratrons. Fewer struts too. Looking forward to flying it. Still need to re-do the lander's booster; that's all I need to do before I should be able to catch up.

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Wow, didn't notice you posted the next challenge this quick. Anyway here is my entry. I had some trouble landing on the Mun since the one sided heavy lander fell down upon touchdown since i was at a slope but managed to save it with help of some RCS and leg deployment. The rover was a blast to drive since it could catch air very easily and in one case that it toppled i could easily bring it back to its wheel. The only downside is that only 3 wheels touched the ground but it didn't cause major difficulties at driving. At my return i managed to land at the KSC (2km form the landing pad) with some course corrections.

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Bill had a bad night.

In Orbit; Note where Jeb is in the night side already.

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Landing.

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Touchdown;

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Opps, too top heavy with the rover. It touched down OK then proceeded to slowly fall over on the steep slope.

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The rover is OK but Bill is stuck in the capsule.

Time to bring Jeb back so he can land on Minmus.

Edited by SRV Ron
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