What is your minimum orbit altitude?

[FishInferno]

Title says it all: What minimum altitude do you normally shoot for LKO/a parking orbit?

[Nemrav]

My parking orbit is ~75km, everyonce in a while I might park in a higher orbit of maybe ~85km-100 for interplanetary missions...

[problemecium]

We need two more options in this poll:

69.07-70km (the one I would have picked)

Below 69.07km (this can be done, it's just a bit cheaty)

[JacobT11]

I aim for around 75km usually, as fuel is pretty tight most of the time. Though if I have fuel to throw around a bit more, I'll sometimes shoot higher, maybe 80-90km

[goldenpeach]

Heavily depend of the mission.

I usually go for a 100km orbit, but I have to make a 75k orbit for some other missions because I can't add enough fuel to go higher.

[merendel]

I usualy aim for 80. Good hight for transfer burns that are not more than 3-4min long without hiting atmo as well as being high enough that if I launch another ship to meet up with a craft I still have a bit of room below it to catch up. I consider it a good compromize between effiency and convenience. I usualy have a fuel depot and assembly area a few KM higher for assembling the big interplanetary craft and geting a top off

[hellblazer]

Always 250km+ for warping. Having to rendezvous with my station at a lower elevation seems to be too time consuming. As well I like to approach from behind.

[metl]

Always 250km+ for warping. Having to rendezvous with my station at a lower elevation seems to be too time consuming. As well I like to approach from behind.

Why did I not think of this already? Mind=blown.

[rynak]

I'm not sure what is the purpose of this poll, and it also fails to mention an important distinction: Initial orbit vs. target orbit.

See, once you have established a circular orbit, raising or lowering it is cheap. So, changing the initial orbit is a non-issue.

For this reason, really only safety, timing and ressources matter. I could go for scraping the atmosphere, but there is no reason to do so. So, i just target an initial AP of somewhere around 75-85 AP.... more if the vessel will eventually go to hundreds of KM anyways.

Which brings me back to my initial question: What was the question again? Need more info.

[katateochi]

100km orbit is my standard orbit I aim for on ascent, but I don't stay there very long. If its something that needs assembly its moved up to 200km and then parked at 300km when ready. Stations hang out around 400km, satellites much further out. 200km and below is my (precious) debris zone, its not a safe place to hang around in for too long! I do assembly at that alt and any debris left over from assembly remains there and I then shunt the assembled craft above the debris zone.

So most of my logic around alt in this save is to do with debris (I'm playing to create as much LKO junk as possible atm, nearly been hit during an ascent, almost there.) If I was playing a no-debris game then I'd still park around 200km mostly just to get more timewarp.

Out of curiosity (and cos I'm not near KSP right now) can anyone say of the top of their head how much dV is needed to raise a 100km Kerbin orbit to 400km?

[lolstock]

Jeeze... and here I am, not considering my spaceplanes to be SSTO unless they can reach a 250km orbit and return.

[Rithsom]

It used to be 70-80 km for me, but now it's almost always 100 km.

[carlpilot]

Depends on the craft I'm launching. Something that just needs LKO, like a ScanSAT, gets 72km. Just above the atmosphere, minimised ÃŽâ€v.

Anything that is designed for Mun/Minmus goes to 100km.

Anything else gets 150 (to get around the 120k time warp limit), like Duna ships and space stations.

-Carlpilot

[Valley]

My minimum is 80 but my current stations are between 90 to 100. It gives rockets room to approach and dock. That makes it a good place for craft heading to the Mun to refuel, say farewell to fellow co-workers, use the toilet for the last time, and then take off.

[numerobis]

I aim for a periapsis of 69.5 km and apoapsis as high as jets will take me -- which just depends how many intakes I slapped on.

[AbacusWizard]

As with most questions, it depends on what I'll be doing with it.

Is it a satellite that I just need to put in orbit and then forget about? Then just past the atmosphere is fine.

Is it a partially assembled massive interplanetary craft that smaller vessels will need to visit? Then I'll put it somewhat higher, maybe 150-300 km up, so the visitors have some room to maneuver.

Is it a refueling station for a complete interplanetary craft to dock at between missions? Then it goes much higher than that; no sense dipping further into the gravity well than I have to.

[(PA)Reaper]

My average orbit is usually around 100km. I like having some room to maneuver if i screw up.

[sedativechunk]

I like to orbit AT LEAST 80km. Mainly for docking purposes, if you have to slow your orbit to catch up with your target and you are in the 70km zone, there's a chance you could accidentally deorbit your craft!

[RainDreamer]

Minimum orbit? 71km. I put my refueling drones around 75km for karbonite collector to function, and they doesn't work higher than 77km, and lower than that is kind of hard to rendezvous. So my initial orbit would be 71, then moving up to rendezvous with refueling drone, then go somewhere else.

[cicatrix]

I tend to aim higher. My parking orbits may get as high as 260 km (warp speed limit). It's not a big deal to pack some extra dV and I tend to overbuild my rockets anyway (still pack 4500 dV minimum though I use FAR) and it's much more convenient having to plan rendezvous between 80km and 260km orbits than from 75 km to 80 km. My LKO has tons of last stages filled with fuel.

[eddiew]

I put my stations and fuel depots at 100km, so that anything I want to meet them can be at 75km and not wait years to make the manoeuvre

Though if I'm sending something interplanetary, 200-300km because it seems to help with burn accuracy.

[KerBlam]

I use 100kms as my initial orbit, I build at 250 and I have a refuelling station at 300kms, transfer burns are done from 350kms.

[mordin86]

I allways go 90-100 minimum.

[Janos1986]

I usually cruise at about 85km to have a bit of tolerance for wrong burns or trivial mistakes (i.e. throttle accidentally left open at 1% for a couple seconds before noticing).

[Frozen_Heart]

I park at 100km. Easy to get to but docking ships can both catch up and slow down.

I park larger ships at 250km.