Constellation Space Program: Space commercialized - Mission 12

[Redhaze]

After the end of the first Kerbal Space Program, where funds were merely a formality and the only limit to a rocket was science and sheer Dv, things changed. The official space program of the species was disbanded and √ became the key to everything. Even the mere junkyard owner who wants to launch a simple comsat would have to scrounge the funds from ever nook and cranny to get it of the ground.

This is when the Constellation Space Program is started. 'Negotiating contracts to fund launches' becomes the new 'landing on Duna to research bigger rocket engines'. With almost all there is to research completed, the question is not "Is it physically possible with our technology?" but "Does this bankrupt us?"

The organization started out with nothing but a half-incomplete space-center, an advertisement folder for rocket and spaceplane parts, some old trusted employees from the last program, and an empty wallet. Contacts with part manufacturers were laid and the first funds were scraped together for Kerbalkind's first commercial launch.

OOC:

Spoiler

For real: This is my new, virgin 0.90 career save. I decided to start anew so I could document my whole space program with glamour screenshots for your enjoyment and inspiration. Oftentimes I'm using (variations and updates of) tried and dependable configurations from previous games and versions, so things may go more blooper- and explosion free than they should.

The only parts mod used is Mechjeb, both to reduce my workload and to serve as my engineer-in-chief. No physics-altering mods are present, only some eyecandy, final frontier and KAC. With some SFS-editing All parts are researched apart from the MK3 spaceplanes, nuclear and ion drives. Well, and the mechjeb pod, but i don't use that one anyway. The spacecenter is half-upgraded, with the VAB and SPH at lvl3 and the runway at lvl1. The rest is lvl2. Both science, funds and rep are set to 0.

 

Table of contents:

Constellation 1: Rising Star 1

Constellation 2: Rising Sun 1

Constellation 3: Icarus 1

Constellation 4: Classic 1&2 - Labrador station

Constellation 5: Icarus 1

Constellation 6: Icarus 2

Constellation 7: Icarus 1

Constellation 8: Icarus 2 - Labrador station

Constellation 9: Iolani 1B - Labrador station - Classic 1

Constellation 10: Iolani 1A - GooSat

Constellation 11: Iolani 1A/B - GooSat

Constellation 12: Classic 2 - Terok Nor station

 

Constellation Space Program is proud to present the first three galleries of glamour shots with commentary of the first commercial space operations:

Constellation mission 1: The ritual first expendable launch of a satellite to an inclined Kerbin orbit, proving to all Kerbalkind that commerce can fund space programs.

Constellation mission 2: Jeb, Bill and Bob go to space! An expendable launch to LKO to give them their first training in commercial flight. Reentry shots sadly didn't survive the heat, but the service module did

Constellation mission 3: While Constellation 2 lazes around in LKO two of the three new recruits, Gushat and Jermal, fly a new aircraft for an atmospheric temperature contract and get hot.

Stay tuned for more! Making these albums and posts actually often costs more time than flying the missions themselves.

Edited January 27, 2016 by Redhaze
Updated for the new forum software. Ugh.

[Wabbit]

This is really cool! As for the poll, simply click at the top of your post "Thread Options". Will stay tuned!

[Redhaze]

Apologies for the slight delay, I had to (re-)design two new launch vehicles and it proved to be a rather complicated mission. Regardless, here it is.

Constellation mission 4: A two-part mission in preparation of a space station contract, involving new reusable launch vehicles and some dancing.

Up next: I have a couple of options. I could immediately continue Labrador station, or do one of the two Kerbin survey missions that have appeared in the available contracts, one involving a set of seismographic readings on the KSC continent, and one set of temperature readings near the northern arctic circle. Especially the last one might be interesting, because I'm not quite sure the current Icarus 1 has the range for it. If so I might have to design a new plane and upgrade the runway as well, which will likely take some time.

Edited January 27, 2016 by Redhaze
Edited for new forum software

[Redhaze]

Whelp, apologies for the doublepost, but I didn't expect to have some new missions done again so soon. Just a couple of short ones with aircraft. As a little intermission I decided to do a couple of survey missions instead of continuing to build Labrador station, because they provide a little more variation and contract funds.

Constellation mission 5: A seismographic survey by two new recruits in an updated Icarus 1.

 

Constellation mission 6: Jeb and Bob conduct an important engine test for C7 Aerospace with the Icarus 2.

 

Constellation mission 7: Jeb and Ronnand fly a double Icarus 1 mission to the northern ice caps.

 

Edited January 27, 2016 by Redhaze
Edited for new forum software

[Redhaze]

Considering Brotoro managed to get out 2 (TWO!) episodes out since I last posted a mission, I should probably take it as a sign to get cracking. Therefore:

Constellation mission 8: Jeb, Bill and Bob succesfully launch another Classic 2 to finish up the Labrador contract for Winter Owl Aircraft Emporium, but suffer a financial loss.

Lessons learned: 1. Divide module mass for crafts to be assembled in orbit more evenly for easier launching, 2. Make sure OMS engines for tugs and such have an action group toggle for maneuvering combined vessels and 3. Make sure crafts are really aligned before finishing with docking.

Edited January 27, 2016 by Redhaze
Edited for new forum software

[Redhaze]

Constellation mission 9: Ronnand takes a newfangled kind of winged SSTO with two friends out to Labrador to relieve Jeb, Bill and Bob.

I kinda feel guilty for being the only one posting in my own thread. Oh well.

I'm wondering if anybody else has noticed the MK2 docking port alignment? When selecting 'control from here' it takes the docking port's orientation, but the position of the vessel's root part. The result is that I butted into the target docking port with the forward MK2 crew tank (The vessel root) instead of neatly docking. The way it looks like to me this would happen with the inline clampotron as well.

Edited January 27, 2016 by Redhaze
Edited for new forum software

[Nitrous Oxide]

I kinda feel guilty for being the only one posting in my own thread. Oh well.

Don't let it get to you, keep it up. I always enjoy seeing what others do.

[JAD_Interplanetary]

I kinda feel guilty for being the only one posting in my own thread. Oh well.

Lots of lurkers, I guess. But this is great stuff. I'm crap at spaceplances, so I always enjoy seeing how other people do it. Good stuff!

[Redhaze]

Constellation mission 10: Jeb and Bill pretend to be spacetruckers and deliver two sattelites for contracts. Bob is sad not to be included.

Thanks for all the feedback, fellows!

I agree, spaceplanes are hard. It's truly an art, taking ages to master. I would know, I've been fooling around with them since they first were included in the game...

Next up: the reason why Jeb and Bill returned to KSC so soon.

Edited January 27, 2016 by Redhaze
Edited for new forum software

[NormalAxis]

Nice work! Keep it up

[Snarfster]

Very nice space plane!

[Redhaze]

Whoops. I just realized I already had a finished mission sitting around. I was waiting with posting it until I came up with some more story to add outside of the album, but I'm not being struck by inspiration so far.

Constellation mission 11: The boys go on another GooSat delivery mission, this time to a polar orbit. Bob gets to go too, so everybody's happy.

 

Edited January 27, 2016 by Redhaze
Edited for new forum software

[Rath]

I see the long term on laythe reference you made there with the 'goo dudes'!

[Redhaze]

OOC: (Pre-1.00 rant)

Spoiler

I kinda neglected my work, didn't I. Apologies.

Well, there's good news and there's bad news:

The good news is, I still intend on continuing Constellation Space Program.

I've been busy doing other stuff in life lately, (cough cough -GTA-V and mapping for UT4- cough cough) but my attention is back to KSP again. I suppose the update's a good thing for that.

The bad news, is that there's more bad news than good news. In short:

- 1.00 is making it hard to continue in the latest version. I think I can make it work, but not without butchering up Squad's stock configs to at least restore a bit of the vacuum engine's ISPs.

- As for my 'Classic' series of SSTOs, I think I can make (variants of) those work, because the base TWR of jets and such doesn't seem to have changed much. Thankfully I never relied on a lot of airhogging, so adaptations could be minimal. It'll be a fun challenge to learn how to handle the new atmosphere and the jets' new thrust curves, though. The real but is of course re-entry. I'm not only not sure they'll be able to survive re-entry, preferably in a stable attitude, but accurately re-entering those without wings is going to be a bit of a bother. An expensive one, to be exact, which is of course a bit of an issue in a commercial operation.

- Precision deorbits will be a thing of the past for now, as long as mechjeb's atmospheric trajectory prediction isn't fixed. Not exactly a game-stopping thing, but due to that I'll probably stick to expendable rockets, winged SSTOs and aircraft for a while.

- Imgur's new embedded albums are kinda terrible in my opinion. Far too small, unreadable text, especially if it's more than a couple of words, and the colours contrast far too bright against the images. I'm not quite sure how to fix this, but for now, if you want to see my imgur albums in their full glory, just click 'read more' and/or open it in a new tab.

For now: please enjoy this small bit of narrative accompanied by a 0.90 mission album to foreshadow the new update, and introduce the new style of more detailed narrative - as promised.

Constellation mission 12: A new station is launched for FLOOYD Dynamics Research Labs on the road towards mun missions and deep space missions.

Bill, Bob and Jebediah were working in the crew can of a new space station module in the VAB, giving it the last checks for launch. It would be an construction engineer's job, normally, but after somebody once went up into orbit without any snacks it's been a tradition to have at least one astronaut give it the last checks before rolling any vessels with kerbal capacity onto the pad.

 

"Hold on." Bob was confused. "Don't get me wrong, I'm all for sending more sciencey stuff up, being an engineer and all, but who's going to man it?"

"Nobody," Jeb said. "I'm not going to sit in that station doing nothing interesting for who-knows-how-long."

"Then what's the point of an unmanned space station? Seems like a waste to me." Asked Bob.

"A profitable waste," Bill corrected. "C7 Aerospace Division is paying us for a space station, but the contract says nothing about needing anybody aboard."

"So, we're just going to let it sit there in LKO, doing nothing." Bob concluded, not quite convinced yet.

"Not quite, Bob. It's going to orbit at around a thousand km, testing systems in high orbit before we're actually going to trust it with lives."

"Yeah, about those lives," Jebediah interrupted. "What's with the recruiting stop, anyway? I mean, We've got tons of talented and trained candidates ready, but we don't use them."

Bob actually knew the answer to that question. "Balance, Jeb. We're too awesome compared to our new hires. Management wants to introduce a new kind of kerbalnauts to provide a fresh influx of talent and skill besides just the same old recruits we've been having. Unfortunately, they're still in basic training, and there's that issue with their helmets not fitting."

"Wait, you mean those girls that have been hanging round the astronaut complex lately?"

"Yeap. Those are the ones." Bob nodded.

"Huh. I thought those were just the orbital mechanics interns being toured around." Bill said. "It's not that I mind it, I mean space has too many squares in it as far as I'm concerned,bBut that's going to be one blue hell of a change."

"Likely," Jeb agreed. "That's why the first crew of ladies will be going to Labrador station, with all the station for themselves. Three of the guys currently there will be going to this one then, and the other, more experienced ones will be brought back home, available for more advanced missions alongside of us."

"So," Bill said, "We don't have to be afraid of Jeb getting distracted by ...round faces while flying just yet."

Bob sighed relieved. "Yeah, Jeb's piloting is terrible enough as it is already!"

"Hey, not my fault you simply can't handle those advanced manoeuvring Gs!" Countered Jeb. "Anyway, this cabinet is properly stocked with freshly preserved snacks too. As far as i'm concerned, It's good to go, guys."

"Okay," Bob said, "Then lets get out before they accidentally launch with us still in it. 1000km orbit sounds like a boring place to be stuck at."

 

Surprisingly enough launch control didn't decide to ban to ban Jeb to 1000km for botching up their precious flight plans on a regular basis, so not long after the station, newly minted 'Terok Nor', went up to high orbit in a blaze of jet exhaust.

Edited February 9, 2016 by Redhaze
Edited for new forum software, retconning and language improvements.