Shep is going to love this little rocket game

[weemadando]

Tiger, tiger, burning bright / In the forests of the night, / What immortal hand or eye / Could frame thy fearful symmetry?


Symmetry is great and all, but I now have so many parts hanging off my rockets that it kills the editor.

[Bluewolf]

Pezook, Deathtrap two reminds me of a more dangerous version of the Phoenix from First Contact. Thank god we don't have to get warp drives right though.

[Falarica]

Jupiter V



Done in the old version (no mirroring). Surprisingly works quite well.

Jupiter VI will be coming soon...

[Bluewolf]

Found this on the SA forums. May be of help to some using SRB's:

So I looked the the cfgs for the first time and now I understand why Solid Fuel boosters are so useless. Unlike their real world counter parts, they just don't don't have a very high thrust:weight ratio. Their max thrust is only 130, where a liquid engine's max thrust is 200. There's just no good reason to use them. I tried using 6 to help boost a single engine, 3 fuel tank setup, and the difference between using 6 boosters and not using boosters at all is tiny. They barely lift their own weight.

On top of that, 8.3 has been released as an experimental version. Here is the changelog:

Bug Fixes:
* Fixed A TON of bugs with the symmetry and ship construction in general. Game is stable again.
* Fixed a bug where parts would lose staging info and revert to default when returning from flight to the VAB. (the staging reset bug)

You can get it here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?5528042dtin625l

Also Sunday Punch, one of the producers of those addon packs has now gotten to version 0.4 of his pack. Should have updated it in the link PeZook previously found but just in case, here is a mirror:

http://www.multiupload.com/6ESE32IAK9

[PeZook]

Gentlemen, this horrible, horrible slander against solid rockets requires a response.



They are God's most beautiful creations.



As you can see here, feeble liquid fuel tanks cannot support the mighty erect forms of the SRBs!



That is suboptimal and its all a fault of the liquid rockets! Totally!



At least the capsule survived...

In all seriousness, I love how wrong the SRBs can go

[Chardok]

I hesistate to ask this probably over-asked question, (PS - I'm enjoying PeZook, Norade, and Coffee's posts immensely! Excellent job, gentlemen) - But has anyone replicated actual rocket designs and tested them to see how they perform in-game? If so, how well did they work?

[weemadando]

In playing 0.8.2 last night, the staging bugs caused a great many spectacular launch pad mishaps as stages ignited before their time or failed to separate in sequence.

My favourite was when the parachute on the capsule would open way too early and the escape rocket would blow before capsule separation.

Many Kerbals died that day.

[weemadando]

I hesistate to ask this probably over-asked question, (PS - I'm enjoying PeZook, Norade, and Coffee's posts immensely! Excellent job, gentlemen) - But has anyone replicated actual rocket designs and tested them to see how they perform in-game? If so, how well did they work?

I've very roughly tried to make a Saturn V. But the component list is still very small and making direct analogues just about impossible.

[Mr. Coffee]

Whelp... I just made the Kerbals hit 217km/s. Turns out the Kerbals don't have a squish limit. They handles a max G load of around 489,000G without splattering. I think Jeb came, so KSP's janitorial staff is gonna have one hell of a clean up when they finally find the command module.

[Vanas]

My latest two designs, the first pre-update.

My own experiments with SRBs led to the christening of the Upper Atmosphere Explorer, a ship designed to launch Kerbals into the stratosphere. Intentionally.

Consisting of little more than a vast pile of SRBs, the UAE's launch was a sight to behold:



Still, in flight, it was suprisingly stable and capable of both vertical or horizontal flight.




Minor staging problems, however, abounded.



Still, no matter the combination, I couldn't get above 14km on SRBs. So, SCIENCE has been done.

Post-Patch, the RagnaRocket has been pruned down further to the Longship:



It was launched on an orbital mission, and everything started to go to plan.



Then we encountered the Terrible Secret of Space looming behind the ship and scrubbed the flight.



Next, as soon as we re-find it, we've scheduled a mission straight into the Terrible Secret of Space.

[LaCroix]

Hint: To ensure they never come back, angle your rocket a bit(10° or so). As soon as you have a good horizontal vector, escape velocity is possible. The straighter you get, the higher you need to get to exceed it.

BTW:

Anal Bead IV has been inserted into orbit at 52145-56480 altitude, at 2315.6-2330.9 speed. After 5 successful rounds with no decrease in perigee, I claim lowest stable orbit for now...

Bob and Bill have not stopped screaming ever since I ignited the engines, knowing they never set foot on their planet again, but Jep is happily waving at the spaceport every 29.change minutes...

When I get bored, I'll angle the capsule up a bit and hit the pedal until fuel runs out. At this height, escape velocity is a bit over 3200, and I'm sure that I can exceed that, getting them all lost in SPAAAAAACCCCEEEE, forever...

[Crossroads Inc.]

Ok so it is about 400,000Km from Earth to the Moon.
I propose to reach that distance using UNMODED parts!

[LaCroix]

Ok so it is about 400,000Km from Earth to the Moon.
I propose to reach that distance using UNMODED parts!

Should be doable...

After 10 orbits, Bob and Bill finally stopped screaming and gave in to silent resignation...
YOU WILL STAY UP THERE UNTIL YOU LIKE IT, BITCHES!
And then, I'll send you out to SPAAAAAAACE...

Jeb is still grinning like the idiot he is. I begin to wonder if he might have died on ascent, and nobody noticed the difference...

[Imperial528]

Barnest, I believe I has made records:



<1000km in 3:19, on what is literally one stage.



Here's the design, and yes, this is mods.

[Crossroads Inc.]

I have a capsule that just passed 3,000km at a rate of 3050mps.
The MPS is slowing at about 1 per second.
So I have close to an HOUR of acceleration before the craft begins to slow down.

EDIT: Passing 4700 at 2975 mps

[loomer]

Ok so it is about 400,000Km from Earth to the Moon.
I propose to reach that distance using UNMODED parts!

Been there, done that. We were still going at 2km/s by the time we'd made it three times the distance to the moon.

This game is the most fun when you have someone else sitting next to you and design it in conjunction with them. Been playing it for like a week now like that.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Yeah I'm 40,000km out and still going at 2700mps.
Realized that basically once you get out of orbit its only a mater of time and distance.
Now if we want a REAL challenge we should try to build a rocket to go out to the moon distance and then come BACK.

That would entail sending up enough rocket to slow down, fire engines and then head back to the planet.

[loomer]

Once they fix the liquid fuel bug, you're on. Now if only there was a swivel mount...

[Crossroads Inc.]

By liquid bug I assume you mean how currently liquid rockets REALLY Bog down your FPS rate?
I know that is the cause of a grate many mishaps because it makes balancing hard.
The rocket I used to break orbit earlier, I tried adding an additional stage with 3 SFR on to, in theory, turn around and go back to Earth.
Of course NOW the problem is the added weight means the same rocket wont break orbit...
So now I am back to trying to add more Lift to it without it shaking itself apart.

[PeZook]

Version 8.4 is out, and it has yet more improvements to the VAB. I am downloading it now.

Even if the game dies before all the other significant features get added, allow me to say it was one of the best indie games I've ever played, and I hope I can run crazy seat-of-the-pants lunar missions one days, using rockets that barely hold themselves together

(but only if there's a save feature during missions )

[loomer]

By liquid bug I assume you mean how currently liquid rockets REALLY Bog down your FPS rate?
I know that is the cause of a grate many mishaps because it makes balancing hard.
The rocket I used to break orbit earlier, I tried adding an additional stage with 3 SFR on to, in theory, turn around and go back to Earth.
Of course NOW the problem is the added weight means the same rocket wont break orbit...
So now I am back to trying to add more Lift to it without it shaking itself apart.

Nope, the one where you can't put anything underneath a liquid fuel tank.

[PeZook]

Ladies and gentlemangs, I present to you...



THE SMARMTURN V!

This marvel of modern engineering, constructed by the best hobos Kerbal has to offer, promises to take Kermangs to outer space AND BEYOND.

Technically reliable and proudly phallic! And its orange! And it ACTUALLY FLIES!



Also, the Fapollo stack on top tends to snap off during ascent ; But that's not a problem that can be solved within the known laws of physics.

No, really, it's not. What is this you're saying about aerodynamic payload shrouds? Poppycock! We know what we're doing! Shut up!

Also, my brilliant space agency had flown the newly improved Fatboy XL tank, now with increased drag,



It's so great even Bill is smiling, and without a working parachute no less!

[LaCroix]

Yeah I'm 40,000km out and still going at 2700mps.
Realized that basically once you get out of orbit its only a mater of time and distance.
Now if we want a REAL challenge we should try to build a rocket to go out to the moon distance and then come BACK.

That would entail sending up enough rocket to slow down, fire engines and then head back to the planet.

I just sent a two-stage rocket up, and on an orbit with what should be a bit more than Vesc. I have a little bit of fuel left for an deorbit. Given time, I can make it in about 74 hours...

Where is the kerbdamned time-lapse function? *sigh*

Edit: fuck.. messed up the math - It'll take <1 hour until I reach minimum speed (if I have really exceeded Vesc), and then it's a crawl... Theoretically, if I reach that point of stable velocity, and manage to deorbit, I'd have made it to the moon. Given time... With mummyfied kerbonauts... (Jeb would still be smiling... I love that guy!)

[LaCroix]

Yeah I'm 40,000km out and still going at 2700mps.
Realized that basically once you get out of orbit its only a mater of time and distance.
Now if we want a REAL challenge we should try to build a rocket to go out to the moon distance and then come BACK.

That would entail sending up enough rocket to slow down, fire engines and then head back to the planet.

I just sent a two-stage rocket up, and on an orbit with what should be a bit more than Vesc. I have a little bit of fuel left for an deorbit. Given time, I can make it in about 74 hours...

Where is the kerbdamned time-lapse function? *sigh*

Edit: fuck.. messed up the math - It'll take a couple of hours until I reach minimum speed (if I have really exceeded Vesc), and then it's a crawl... Theoretically, if I reach that point of stable velocity, and manage to deorbit, I'd have made it to the moon. Given time... With mummyfied kerbonauts... (Jeb would still be smiling... I love that guy!)

[Imperial528]

<1000km in 3:19, on what is literally one stage.

I only noticed this now, it's supposed to be >1000km.