Eve - A ground based circumnavigation @ 13 m/s

[Fengist]

Day Unknown - Debris Field

From KSC Kerbin:

Images returned from the remote drone Target have spotted what appears to be a debris field. Engineers at the command center will be attempting to land Target in the vicinity.

Update: Upon landing Target at the debris field location, it's external camera returned this image. Immediately after capturing that image, it's batteries mysteriously went dead and we have been unable to regain control of Target.

At this point, we're uncertain if there are survivors who are glad to see us... or if we landed on one of their bodies.

---

As you may have guessed from these images, all five of the crew members are very much alive. Though it took me some 20 odd attempts to get Walkabout loaded, once I did, the first step was to get everyone out (sorry to disappoint here but me and these boys have been through a lot in the past couple of weeks. I was determined to at least get them on the ground). Once I had them out, the next question was, what do I do now? While I was thinking about an answer, Bill decided it was time to scuttle Walkabout. Anything and everything, within reason, he began grabbing and stuffing into the KAS boxes. And while he was up there stripping parts off, I realized... he was telling me what to do...

You see, I had 3 choices.

1. I could send a mission to rescue and take them back to Kerbin.

2. I could of course, strand them there and terminate them. Now I've killed LOTS of Kerbals in the past couple of years. Even vaporized a few. My wife tells me that I'm not a very nice omnipotent deity. I keep telling her, it's physics, not me. But these 5 clowns, for whatever reason, I've become attached to. Termination was out of the question.

3. Continue what we started out to accomplish.

Bill wasn't saving parts for any rescue. And he wasn't creating a collection of things to have buried with him.

The whole point of this circumnavigation was to have an adventure in KSP. To do something no one else had done, just to see if it could be done. And, to enjoy the ride. But the design flaws of Walkabout, yes it's mostly my fault for poor engineering, prevented it from going further. Bill was giving me two options. Either I send in a replacement, thus violating one of my self-imposed rules, or I restart this whole thing from Day 0.

To make my decisions even more precarious, I have another issue to consider. Looking at the number of views this thread has gotten in the two weeks or so of it's existence, it's obvious I've struck a chord with some of you. While many of you are remaining silent, and that's fine, as I write this we're approaching 1,500 views in roughly 11 days. If I were to terminate this mission now, not only would it be a huge letdown for me, I'm guessing some of you would be at least a little disappointed as well. And another big factor... being some 3 MILLION plus meters and well over 40 hours into this... and the thought of having to start over... is seriously influencing my decision.

While I am disappointed that Walkabout failed, and while I'll have my own demon to wrestle with for breaking my 'rule' and while some of you may be just as disappointed that I'm 'caving in'... I've decided to continue the mission with a replacement. My decision comes down to one... simple... fact. I've been having a blast on this little adventure and I've been having a blast telling you the tale. I'm not ready for it to end... not yet... not until it reaches the end.

And if you're disappointed in me... blame Bill.

And yes, there was another option which I decided was worse than breaking my self-imposed rules... while I could have simply edited those offending parts from the save file, that felt more like cheating just to win. A replacement vehicle, I could live with. Cheating my way across the finish line, I could not.

Edited January 30, 2015 by Fengist

[Stratzenblitz75]

No! Walkabout! You finally succumbed to the cruel purple planet and its glitch minions... RIP, you will be missed, brave adventurer...

I do hope you have another go at this or at least find a way to continue it. Eve circumnavigation must not be left unconquered!

[Fengist]

That's not a good sign. Save corruption?

This has been a good adventure so far, quite a feat of endurance.

An interesting choice, going with screw propulsion. Making a reliable Eve ampibious vehicle is tricky, my own was tested and revised for a long time.

I use a wide, catamaran design with a low COM for stability. It uses separate wheels and propellers, and sits in the water- the body is made of carefully chosen impact resistant parts. I didn't have the same limitations though, and mine was only for one Kerbal. I like how yours looks like a boat from side on. It is quite long, what sort of terrain steepness can it handle?

Thanks. Glad you're enjoying it. I looked at the props from boat parts and they violated one of the rules I won't break, infinite power. For now, the screws are handling propulsion. And in an upcoming post, you'll see that you don't really need props. As for steepness... I haven't really put it to the test, I know I've hit some inclines well in excess of 50 degrees (90 being vertical). The only problem is having to drop out of warp to keep from sliding backwards. I'm positive there's some point where it simply won't go up the hill but I mostly try to avoid that terrain.

Are the screws incompatible with mechjeb rover autopilot? I find that quite reliable, and being able to plan the route in detail in advanced is quite useful. Though, this autobutton thing looks useful. I might have a go myself, and see if it could help, should I return to my attempt to tour the Jool moons using a ladder engine.

I wouldn't know. While Jeb is a great mod, I decided after about a month of letting it teach me how to fly, that it was having all the fun. I now land, fly and dock faster and better than Jeb.

The Eve sunset is awesome, and your description of it, fantastic.

You haven't had much luck with those part placement glitches.

Interestingly, my experience with part position in the save file has suggested the opposite, with position being set relative to the Root.

I've adjusted parts of vessels using those parameters before.

My own Eve story is one that's more about Kerbals as characters and planets as environments than the mechanical battle to travel them, but then, it's a different genre. Each to his own.

I will be following this, if you get it working again. Otherwise, it was still quite the feat to read about.

Thanks, Eve was the first 'other' planet I landed on and for I guess, sentimental reasons, I keep going back to it. That and it's colors are pretty amazing. As for part locations. I only dug into it briefly in the save file. I have created a couple of mod parts from scratch so I'm aware of how they're supposed to attach, but however they do so, those are some very, very specific locations...

[Big Kerbie]

Well, I'm glad to hear that the crew has survived. I hope you deliver Walkabout II soon. The snacks are probably about gone!

[Space Peanut]

Glad to hear everybody is OK! Hope some of the developers have seen your great story, might be some bug fixes in order here.

[Tw1]

As for steepness... I haven't really put it to the test, I know I've hit some inclines well in excess of 50 degrees (90 being vertical). The only problem is having to drop out of warp to keep from sliding backwards. I'm positive there's some point where it simply won't go up the hill but I mostly try to avoid that terrain.

That's 1 in 0.8, very steep for a vehicle, those screw things must work well.

Nice to see a video of it in action. It's interesting how it has some flex to it- not a bad way for a long vehicle to respond to changes in terrain angle.

It will be interesting to see how your Walkabout II, or whatever you name it will differ from the original. You've got fair few things you'll be able to improve, and experience informing you how things could be better. My own Evepod rides much better with some tweaks informed by experience. I do think using a more catamaran style balance could be good for the watermode, should you still have water crossings in mind. I'm convinced it's better with KSP's "water physics".

You gave the one vehicle only approach pretty good bash, we'll look forward to seeing how long you can make the next one last. On with the adventure!

[Wallygator]

This adventure is one of the few mission reports which sparks my interest.

Please keep going regardless of the changes required to mission parameters. We all find the need to adapt to game bugs from time to time. Don't let it get you down. We all understand.

Keep going!!!

[2001kraft]

Looking forward to more chapters.

You're one of these "rare finds" that are increasingly entertaining to read and are hard to break away from.

[Fengist]

Day 7 - Rescued

Trailer for sale or rent

Rooms to let, fifty cents

No phone, no pool, no pets

ain't got no cigarettes

Two hours of pushin' broom

Buys a eight by twelve four-bit room

I'm a man of means, by no means

King of the road

-Roger Miller

Sorry it's taken me a few weeks to get back to this guys, I've been somewhat distracted.

With the apparent demise of Walkabout and nothing but what appears to be wreckage remaining, a rescue mission was diverted from it's intended destination to Eve. Walkabout II, with Podlock at the controls (who came up with that name?) was originally headed to Laythe for some serious water testing. Instead, he's been rerouted.

Landing on Eve with ANYTHING is a challenge. You can never quite predict what effect deorbiting is going to have, especially when your only method of control is parachutes. Walkabout's initial landing on Eve was well over 100km off of the intended target. Luckily, Podlock's skill equals Jeb's and he managed to come in only 7km away from Target's position. So, it only took him a few minutes to scrabble up the hill to find all five members of the Walkabout I crew staring at him. At first, he thought they were glad to see him, then he realized they were facing him because they'd all strapped solar panels to their backs and were facing away from the sun. True, the snacks were getting pretty low, but at least they had electricity. Which makes me wonder, what do Kerbals excrete? ... ummm nevermind.

Podlock got out, said he was glad to see them and the only reply was from Kirke (he's a captain ya know), "monsters, shiney spot monsters. They ate Walkabout." Bill smacked the back of his helmet and started grabbing the supplies he'd scuttled from Walkabout and loading them onto Walkabout II. His first action. Tossing the anchor overboard. As a tribute to the old Walkabout, each of the original crew mounted the solar panel they had on their back onto the roof of Walkabout II. Even though the first one didn't make it, parts of it would.

They let Kirke remove the old radial parachutes and this time... he didn't drop any.

After loading up and getting settled in, they decided to call it a day and head out in the morning.

---

Walkabout II

I'm sure you've noticed some rather drastic changes in the new Walkabout. Gone are the internally buried pistons. In their place, 4 IR sliding rails. One of the things that may have cause the previous Walkabout's demise was the fact that the pistons that were mounted on the sides actually touched each other. Internally, they formed an X shape. As for the old center mounted pistons, the problem I think there was that I had an LLL adapter mounted under Walkabout. The piston and the rear screws were all mounted to that adapter. Every time the ground caused the screws to flex, the adapter and thus the piston, flexed as well. Even though it's not nearly as pretty, with the rails mounted externally there should be NO conflict with part clipping.

The down side to this is, I had to give up the lifting effect created by the center mounted foils. This version is having to fully rely on those mounted radially. Another thing gone, the LLL solar panel modules. Originally, I had 3 Karbonite tanks on Walkabout. Fully loaded, it was over 60 tons. That made treading water a bit difficult. When I removed those tanks I wanted to keep the length so I just dropped in 2 solar panel modules. Yea. well... Since I never really used them and they may have added to the issues with the wandering pistons... they got axed. Instead, this Walkabout has 2 crew modules. Since they only hold 3 crew and the cab only holds 2, and I was going to have 6 Kerbals, I added a second crew module. The only other major difference is I mounted the screws directly to the vehicle rather than an adapter mounted on the bottom and there's only 4 of them. This means that this Walkabout sits much lower and has a much wider stance than the previous one. Otherwise, it's pretty much the same design. I went with 6 screws originally because they are in the parts list as 'test' screws. Not knowing exactly what to expect I over did it a bit. Now that I've seen them go millions of meters without a major malfunction (except for the twisting which I think was related to all the parts attached to that adapter) I'm more confident that 4 will suffice.

One thing to note, during testing on Kerbin, this Walkabout was hitting 60+ m/s on water without sploding. BUT, I forgot to close the air intakes when I lifted off so they're all sitting at empty. Not sure whether it's going to sink or swim on Eve.

Walkabout II preparing to deorbit.

Parachutes deployed - This landing wend much smoother. With the experience of the first landing being crooked due to misplaced chutes, I made sure this one was right.

The crew of Walkabout one greeting Walkabout II.

Ok, so it wasn't really a greeting, they were keeping their back to the sun.

Bill rearranging the loot he cabbaged from Wakabout I.

Seanbles placing his 'memorial' solar panel from Walkabout 1 on Walkabout II

Loaded and ready. Various extra parts will be left behind.

[Wabbit]

RIP Walkabout. Always in our parts.

I like the way you are doing memorials, because I always make memorials for fallen Kerbals or missions. Awesome story by the way!

[2001kraft]

Poor Walkabout

[nithelyth]

http://www.datainterlock.com/Kerbal/Walkabout/Day0-4.jpg

Major scientific discovery. Shiney Spots.

http://www.datainterlock.com/Kerbal/Walkabout/Day0-5.jpg

A trail of Shiney Spots.

How do they appear, whats the scientific explanation for it? Are they caused by bioluminescent micro-organisms or so?

[Brotoro]

They are caused by bugs.

Bioluminescent bugs, apparently.

[nithelyth]

They are caused by bugs.

Bioluminescent bugs, apparently.

ah, i see.. so there are insect lifeforms on eve.. btw. walkabout II looks a lot more capable and well constructed than its predecessor. good luck

[Fengist]

Day 8 - Sailing

Well, I was born in the sign of water

And it's there that I feel my best

The albatross and the whales

They are my brothers

It's kind of a special feeling

When you're out on the sea alone

Staring at the full moon like a lover

-Little River Band

Bill has officially declared himself as bored. With the multitude of failures that kept presenting themselves on the previous Walkabout, he's rather disgusted that this one is, thus far, not breaking. Now while that bodes well for the completion of this circumnavigation, it doesn't mean things are going perfectly.

This Walkabout seems to have a lot more problems with the warp physics vectoring. It prefers to drive sideways. Plus, this Walkabout doesn't have the extra set of reaction wheels behind the cab. It doesn't like to stay on course. Combine those two factors and then throw in the uneven terrain of the Eve Highlands and the boys have often found themselves going at 90 degree angles from their intended direction. And to make things even worse, with the reduced weight of fewer parts and fewer screws contacting the ground, this Walkabout has a habit of scrabbling around during warp physics rather than staying in solid contact. The net result, when moving at warp 4, it more-or-less bunny hops, reducing it's speed to 8 m/s.

The fact that nothing seems to be breaking also means that the new mounting system for the hydrofoils is keeping them in place. You'll notice from some of the screen shots that they're mounted radially. Each one is sitting on a triangular shaped 1/2 panel from the LLL pack. That was about the only part in my arsenal I could find that would keep the foils on the outside and still be able to lift them above the level of the screws. While it doesn't look very sturdy, or appealing for that matter, and the collision mesh for either the panel or the rails is a bit larger than it should be (there's a small gap you can see through between the rails and the panel) it seems to be working.

With everything apparently functioning normally, it was time to be certain. I mentioned in the previous post that I forgot to close the air intakes on launch from Kerbin. You'll notice in the first screen shot, it's sitting at a flat zero. With no air stored in them, would the intakes float Walkabout? It was time to find out. Coming down from the 5,000+ meter highlands, the boys aimed for a stretch of water that would allow them to parallel the land in the intended direction. While this would only be a test of perhaps 20 km, it would let us know if it was going to float. One minor concern was that all of the maps available indicated this was a pretty shallow area. If we didn't pay particular attention to what was ahead, it was possible the foils could strike land just under the surface and... well it wouldn't be pretty.

The foils extended perfectly and the screws started acting as props just as intended. With each pair of rails isolated I could adjust the forward and aft lift to get the perfect balance in the water. Initially, it didn't look terribly promising as a lot of wake was created by the foils. Each 'splash' slows the forward momentum a bit and there were a lot of splashes going on. But, with a few minor adjustments, the boys soon found themselves running at speeds of 25-30 m/s. The interesting part, there was less turbulence at warp 4. Plus, turning while moving at these speeds was completely smooth. This almost felt like cheating. To go from an effective speed of 35 m/s on land to over 100 m/s on water... While it wasn't the 60 m/s + that it had achieved on Kerbin, it was very acceptable. We completed the water test without incident, crawled back onto land and decided to call it a day.

Oh, and Kirke (he's a captain ya know), has already declared this attempt doomed. The shiney spots have appeared under this Walkabout as well.

Next post: The finish line is in sight.

A view from the Eve Highlands at 5,000m +

Heading down a cliff toward water. Good thing the brakes work.

Sailing - Foils extended, Walkabout II takes off across the water at 23 m/s

Adjusting the foils for minimum wake. While speed has increased to almost 25 m/s at warp 3, I was able to get a bit better balance and at warp 4, there was no wake at all. I'd show a screen shot but it's rather boring. Just looks like Walkabout sitting on water.

Water test completed, the boys crawled out of the water and named the spot 'Rescue Beach' and called it a day.

Progress thus far.

- - - Updated - - -

Thanks again everyone. Glad you're enjoying this, including the silent majority. We're rapidly approaching 3,000+ views of this thread in less than a month. Mebbe I should paint some advertising on the side of Walkabout... hummmm....

That's 1 in 0.8, very steep for a vehicle, those screw things must work well.

Nice to see a video of it in action. It's interesting how it has some flex to it- not a bad way for a long vehicle to respond to changes in terrain angle.

It will be interesting to see how your Walkabout II, or whatever you name it will differ from the original. You've got fair few things you'll be able to improve, and experience informing you how things could be better. My own Evepod rides much better with some tweaks informed by experience. I do think using a more catamaran style balance could be good for the watermode, should you still have water crossings in mind. I'm convinced it's better with KSP's "water physics".

You gave the one vehicle only approach pretty good bash, we'll look forward to seeing how long you can make the next one last. On with the adventure!

The screws are actually performing better than expected, except at warp speeds. While I don't have to constantly steer by using the Otto, if the terrain is uneven, I can't leave it at any warp speed and walk away.

This adventure is one of the few mission reports which sparks my interest.

Please keep going regardless of the changes required to mission parameters. We all find the need to adapt to game bugs from time to time. Don't let it get you down. We all understand.

Keep going!!!

Thanks Wally! We're under way again. BUT, I'm determined to eventually do a one vehicle circumnavigation of something, even if it's Minmus.

Looking forward to more chapters.

You're one of these "rare finds" that are increasingly entertaining to read and are hard to break away from.

Thanks Kraft. I spent a number of years as a journalist (I mean propaganda specialist) in the U.S. Navy. I do try to make it entertaining even if nothing really happens.

How do they appear, whats the scientific explanation for it? Are they caused by bioluminescent micro-organisms or so?

What I can tell you is this. They don't even appear until the vehicle passes over them. When they do appear, the entire screen goes briefly black (one or two frames) and then, you have a bright spot under the vehicle. If you stop and move around on top of one, you'll see pinpoints of light appear on the vehicle directly above the spot (Kirke says they're lazors). Their appearance seems to be distance, rather than time based. Roughly every 6 km one appears.

I'll have a screenshot of another one in the next post.

Edited January 30, 2015 by Fengist

[2001kraft]

Thanks Kraft. I spend a number of years as a journalist (I mean propaganda specialist) in the U.S. Navy. I do try to make it entertaining even if nothing really happens.

You definitely do a gr8 job.

[Wabbit]

They are caused by bugs.

Bioluminescent bugs, apparently.

I see what you did there. Apparently the shiny bioluminescent bugs enjoy eating vehicle parts.

Edited January 29, 2015 by Wabbit

[andruszkow]

This is definitely a mission to follow! Very inspiring.

[Fengist]

By the way, for those interested in the Shiney Spots, it seems I captured at least one on video. If you take a look at the video of Walkabout, you'll see one appear at 1:26 under it and then pass into the distance behind Walkabout.

[magico13]

The 6km repeat for the shiny spots makes me think they're related to Krakensbane, the code that resets the origin of the universe every 6km to be right where you are (thus avoiding loss of precision in floats). It's possible that the light spots are in fact a single light spot that is teleporting. Have you ever driven back one or two light spots to see if they're still there? I have a feeling they might not appear in exactly the same place if you go back, but that's just speculation.

Btw, this is a great read! Looking forward to the rest. You seem to be making good time. I don't think I could do it! Though it does make me want to try to do something similar using kOS, but that would be a lot of code to write.

[Wabbit]

The 6km repeat for the shiny spots makes me think they're related to Krakensbane, the code that resets the origin of the universe every 6km to be right where you are (thus avoiding loss of precision in floats). It's possible that the light spots are in fact a single light spot that is teleporting. Have you ever driven back one or two light spots to see if they're still there? I have a feeling they might not appear in exactly the same place if you go back, but that's just speculation.

Btw, this is a great read! Looking forward to the rest. You seem to be making good time. I don't think I could do it! Though it does make me want to try to do something similar using kOS, but that would be a lot of code to write.

An intriguing hypothesis...

[Fengist]

It's possible that the light spots are in fact a single light spot that is teleporting. Have you ever driven back one or two light spots to see if they're still there? I have a feeling they might not appear in exactly the same place if you go back, but that's just speculation.

I haven't gone back to check previous spots but I'm certain they wouldn't reappear in the same spot. They're always directly under the vessel. If you look at the very first screenshot in this post, the one with the labels describing Walkabout, there's even one under it and that was at launch.

And it wouldn't make sense if they were persistent and multiples because then, it would have to almost be in the save file. I'd bet you're correct.

Edited January 31, 2015 by Fengist

[Fengist]

Day 9 and 10 - End of the Line

Don't have to be ashamed of the car I drive (At the end of the line)

I'm just glad to be here, happy to be alive (At the end of the line)

It don't matter if you're by my side (At the end of the line)

I'm satisfied

- The Travelling Wilburys

Day 9 was so utterly thrilling (*cough*) I've decided to combine it with Day 10. Bob our engineer has become so bored with the fact that Walkabout II refuses to break that he's taken to smashing the F9 key with his fist at random just so see if anything will break. The only thing that went wrong was the winch came loose, just like with Walkabout I, which was a simple matter of retracting it, and, for whatever reason, the satellite big map died. It only produced a very unattractive tan picture. The BTDT (Been There Done That) scan still worked, just the big map went on the fritz. Either way, neither of those things impeded progress.

After yesterday's water test and the total lack of events on Day 9, it was decided to make a mad dash for the finish line via water on Day 10. Originally the plan was to do some island hopping. But, since unlike Walkabout I, this version was apparently more fish than rover, it only made sense to make the final leg purely on water. At the end of Day 9 we stopped at the bottom of a mountain and made preparations to go swimming.

I mentioned in the previous post that Walkabout at warp 4 on water made for some boring screen shots. Trust me, driving it was akin to watching paint dry. The Otto and cruise worked without issue on water. It pretty much drove itself. The only thing I needed to do was occasionally interact to steer it between various bits of land. One thing we did manage to do was get a much better image of the Shiney Spots. Shortly after entering the water, one appeared. We immediately did an about faced and got a pic of it. Because Eve's ocean are flat, we were also able to track the Shiney Spots that did appear. By zooming out, we discovered that, as magico13 predicted, they do vanish and another one appears to take it's place. Convincing Kirke that they're actually designed to prevent a Kraken rather than create one may take some time.

With Wakabout II running at 25-26 m/s at warp 4, making time across water was... well... boring but at least it was fast. It was several hours of just random splashes. I wish I could say the last day was full of drama and excitement just to make the conclusion of this entertaining but... reality had a different end in store. We navigated through a series of channels and before we even left the water, the Day 0 flag popped up on the HUD as being 100km away. Once we drove out of the ocean, it was a few big hills and we were finally back at the beginning.

I wish I could say there was applause and a sense of victory but, it was more a sense of relief. While Walkabout II performed it's duties well enough, it was, in the end, a let-down. Being somewhat ambidextrous, I prefer an elegant solution over just any solution. Walkabout II was anything but elegant. It's performance on land was lacking. Warp physics simply kicked it's ass. Whether this was due to a lack of mass or the fact that it had 2 fewer screws, I'm not certain. But it was so horrible driving it that it would often spin completely backwards before gaining traction. That and I really disliked the externally mounted pontoons... yea, they weren't exactly foils. Months ago I had toyed with the idea of mounting them externally and gave up because it simply looked horrid. Granted, they functioned better than I had hoped but I would have preferred something that didn't look glued on. I'm glad I completed the circumnavigation, don't get me wrong. There is a satisfaction in that. It's something I don't think anyone else has done on Eve. But, it was still a disappointment at the same time.

Either way, the mission is done. The boys performed most admirably and I'll be sending a mission to bring them home. I have plans for them in the future. But for now, I have another circumnavigation already in the works. For my next demonstration of utter stupidity, I intend to walk around the Mun.

Thanks to all of you who have followed this thread and given words of encouragement. With the exception of this less than spectacular grand finale, I do hope you enjoyed it.

A shiney spot reflecting off the rear of Walkabout

A rather boring day in the midlands of Eve

Heading down hill for the start of the final leg of this circumnavigation

The end of Day 9. Bob's description of this location is less than enthusiastic.

A shiney spot in the water.

Warp 4 on water... rougly 112m/s

A quicksave pit stop on a rather deserted island.

Day 0 in sight!

Back where it all began.

And a final map of our mission. The BTDT trace in the top left map shows the exact route we took.

An intentionally obscure preview of my next mission... any guesses???

Edited February 2, 2015 by Fengist

[ExplorerKlatt]

Glad you made it. Personally I am glad to hear that the last bit of the trek was uneventful. After all the problems that plagued the mission, it is good to see the guys make it.

[Space Peanut]

phew! bet you and crew never want to see /anything/ purple ever again!!!