Question about station/base contracts.

[Whoozy]

Is it possible with the vanilla KSP to just keep adding onto an original base or station to fulfill a contract?

Say I put a previous station in orbit for a contract that required power, antenna, research station and 5 kerbals. I have another contract later to put a station up requiring a solar panel, antenna, research station and 9 kerbals. Could I just make up the difference by adding a module to support an additional four kerbals to the first station?

[lirg03]

It is possible to do that. But you have to first assign your old station as 'ship' or 'probe', and your new module as 'station'. When they docked together, the 'ship or 'probe' will be a part of your new 'station'.

[Whoozy]

Thank you, I'll try that next.

[Dr-Drunk]

No it's not possible. For you to complete a contract the station or base has to be completely new. As such, you can't dock it to old stations or bases to fulfill requirements since this will untick the new station part of the contract.

What you CAN do however is build a station that fulfills the requirements, get the contract money, and instead of de-orbiting or deleting it, hook it up to an excisting station of yours to expand it. You won't get any money for doing so but having some big stations around can be usefull in various ways.

[Alshain]

What might be more beneficial is to put them in different orbits and use them for refueling and science purposes. I don't think the station contracts have specific orbit requirements (at least the FinePrint mod didn't). So put one in low orbit, put one in high orbit, put one in polar orbit, etc.

That way any returning craft can stop at the nearest station.

It all depends on how you play though.

[Whoozy]

lirg03's suggestion worked for me. The new mission was satisfied with the new module added to an existing station re-marking the old station as a ship in it's renaming. I would have otherwise reverted the save and cancelled that mission and not waste any more time on those contracts.