It could've been an awesome rescue.

[Stargazer86]

So I managed to get a small spacecraft stuck in orbit around Duna. I had plenty of data stored within the capsule and didn't want to give it all up by reloading, so I decide that I shall mount a rescue attempt! And not just to save Jebediah, but to drag the entire capsule back to Kerbin with me so I can get all that sweet, sweet science. I build a ship made specifically for the purpose, stripping away all unnecessary items and adding in a cargo module so I can snatch the capsule up and transport it home. It took a number of attempts; getting the right interplanetary trajectory, making sure I arrived in a good spot, matching up orbits, slowly but surely bringing myself in close for a rendezvous with the other ship, detaching the command pod, and finally scooping it up neatly inside the cargo bay. It took quite some time, but I managed it, all this with plenty of fuel left to get it all back home. Yay!

The only problem left was that Kerbin was currently out of position. Okay, so I just need to time-warp so Duna and Kerbin are in the right positions for a good shot back. That's fine. I go to the spaceport, initiate maximum warp, wait, then stop when it's all set up. Time to switch back to the ships and start the journey...except, wait, why are the symbols for each ship so far apart? To my abject horror, I discover that somehow, the captured pod had phase-shifted through the closed cargo doors during warp drive and was now about 80000km behind the rescue ship. The doors had been closed. It was inside! And now it's outside and far away! Ffffff-

So at that point, after having gone through a rather heavy amount of trial and error to get to where I was, the thought of matching up docking alignments again and doing it all over just made me say "Screw it" and reload from a previous save.

And it could've been so awesome too...

[Norpo]

Yeah, warp mode and cargo bays without docking ports don't really mix. Since they're still two seperate craft (cargo carrier and the cargo itself), they're still both on their own trajectories on rails, and since collision detection doesn't work in warp..

(boom)

[7499275]

Real life? Yeah taht would work. However in KSP, always want to make sure 2 ships are connected via either docking ports, or KAS (Kerbal Attachment System) or else stuff like this happens... I'm not sure if the claw works or not though, might wanna try that later for the S and G's

EDIT: After almost 700 posts, I've been ninja'd for the first time!

[Merinsan]

Real life? Yeah taht would work. However in KSP, always want to make sure 2 ships are connected via either docking ports, or KAS (Kerbal Attachment System) or else stuff like this happens... I'm not sure if the claw works or not though, might wanna try that later for the S and G's

The claw definitely works.

Even better, the claw will allow fuel transfer, so you can just send a refueller instead (providing you have engines still), and transfer the fuel across.

[timsfitz]

Jeb could have just removed the science from the pod and deposited it in the rescue craft. No reason to bring back the original pod.

[jediwannabe]

I don't think the claw does fuel transfer anymore, it says no fuel crossfeed in the VAB. I had a pretty awesome almost rescue as well. I had a large rover-ish type science collecting ship stuck on minmus. I made a tug vessel with 4 nuke engines with a claw. The thing looked like a crab and was supposed to land on top of the rover and the claw would attach to the science processing lab on the rover. After a few tries I managed to get the tug attached and carried it into an escape of minmus. With the vehicles attached I hit the time warp and both ships exploded. I quick reloaded and tried again, and again both ships exploded. The third time I separated the vessels and time warped, they both exploded. After about 2 hours I gave up and loaded an old save.

[Stargazer86]

Jeb could have just removed the science from the pod and deposited it in the rescue craft. No reason to bring back the original pod.

Well. Shoot. That entirely skipped my mind.

But the story does have a happy ending! I decided to load up the first save and give it another go, this time with a second rescue craft equipped with a pair of claws. Did the whole go-around, getting to Duna, matching orbits, and bam! I snatched up the pods from the original craft as well as the first rescue ship, bringing them both back home safely with 2000 science to show for my efforts. And the claw does still transfer fuel, considering I topped off my tanks from the first rescue craft before abandoning it.

I am quite pleased.

Edited January 9, 2015 by Stargazer86

[Scotius]

Congratulations. Consider yourself awarded with NOGLB (No One Gets Left Behind) badge for bringing Jeb home

[pincushionman]

You can transfer fuel between any two tanks on the same ship - across decouplers even. You just need to do it with the fuel transfer right-click thingy. It can even go fast enough to power some engines. It just won't automatically feed in like a normal tank setup. I'm going to check a little later to see if you can use other connections like girders to do the same, but I think they will. My test went across a stack decoupler and a probe core.