Kerbal Space Program, Revisited.

[TimothyC]

Having tested the Orion, I was able to lift a 100 ton NERVA mapping probe to about 40k km and roughly circularize it with just under 2/3rds of my devices left in the Orion stage.

This sucker is powerful.

[Imperial528]

Rescue rover!











Also, orbital tug docked with my orbital kethane refinery and fuel depot. At least, it will be that, once KAS is fixed so the radial re-mountable connectors work in Munar orbit:

[Vanas]

All of this is looking far too sensible and practical.



There, now, that's much better.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Does that thing fly? I mean, like something that could actually return in one piece, rather than become an expanding cloud of debris several klicks wide?

[Vanas]

I need to find a way of attaching the wheels more securely. And possibly add some more wings. However, I can't see any reason at all it shouldn't work.

Y'know, beyond the fact it's an Orion-powered aircraft.

[Marko Dash]

every time i try using the big wheels they have a habit of stopping instantly where the runway meets the ground and breaking something.

[Grumman]

I've finally managed to buy the full game, while it's on sale through Steam ($15). Unfortunately, actually downloading it might have to wait.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Anyone had any experiences with airships? I'm thinking of making one as a launch platform for SSTO spaceplanes, since the runway hates my undercarriage. I'm considering balloons, but also nuclear powered helicarrier ideas. Think Avengers or the Valiant from DW.

[PeZook]

Anyone had any experiences with airships? I'm thinking of making one as a launch platform for SSTO spaceplanes, since the runway hates my undercarriage. I'm considering balloons, but also nuclear powered helicarrier ideas. Think Avengers or the Valiant from DW.

I am using a set of buyoancy parachutes to both land and lift off my Eve surface return craft. They can land a 50 or so ton rocket on the surface at 0.1 m/s, and lift it off to...uh, can't remember, something like 15km or thereabouts.

The airships mod also has a wide variety of baloons to choose from and I am toying with the idea of setting up a high-atmosphere station on Eve, where airship rockets could dock to deliver supplies/crew. It could rise into the higher atmosphere to receive carg and offload samples, and then descend back to the surface to commence SCIENCE!

EDIT:

Here's the bastard on ascent from the surface so that you can see the baloons and their configuration: they are jettisoned after their lift begins to balance out, the engine is ignited and woosh off it goes.

[Admiral Valdemar]

That's pretty damn spiffy. I'm looking into that as well as just having a flying airfield for Kerbin. Is there a way to keep these things flying around via autopilot when not doing manual control? I'd hate for it to drift to the other side of the planet when I'm getting my spaceplane or rocket sorted out. I need to look at the max laden lift capacity of some of the Hooligan airships. I don't make small SSTOs, but at least if you overshoot the runway, you'll have several klicks fall to recover from.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Well, finally succumbed to this thread and acquired the game. It is indeed great fun, although I'm going to have to get MechJeb pretty quickly. I did manage to get a Kerbal into Munar orbit with fuel to spare though.

I have two main questions. First, whereabouts can I find the mod that lets you build Orion drives?

And two, I have my stack of five Jumbo-64 fuel tanks held together with girders, each with a Mainsail engine, with upper stages on top. I tested this exact stack and it flew just fine. Now, I've placed my prototype deep-space manned probe ship on tope and the thing wont fly. By that I mean, the Mainsail engines won't ignite at all. I can't seem to find any explanation at all.

Help!

[Imperial528]

Firstly, on page 11 or 10 the Orion is linked. Secondly, you probably snapped the engine off from weight. Try using the launch support moorings to suspend it above the pad. They're the big red girder things in the structural pieces tab.

[Serafina]

Yes, always use those. Lots of rockets can support themselves, but theres no point in not using support moorings. Just put them on the initial stage.

And also, yay for struts. Always strut liberally, it costs nothing but the effort to do so since struts have zero weight and drag.

[Zaune]

There's actually a known bug with Mainsails and the big orange tanks. The primary workaround is to put a small tank on the bottom, reinforce the joint with struts and stick the Mainsail on underneath.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Well, downloaded the Orion mod and the same curse is hitting me. Even with plenty of supports on the pad the engines still wont fire. I also tried my Jumbo-64 tanked designs with liberal supports and the engines still don't fire.

And yet, my earlier design, still using the Jumbo tanks and Mainsails, worked just fine.

Also, what site are you hosting screenshots on to post them here?

[Zaune]

The Orion requires you to hold down the Z key to dump bombs, I think.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Ok I've got the Orion working now. Good lord that thing is insane. I currently have a prototype seeing how close I can get to lightspeed. I'm using the 400 MN bombs and the whole stack is magazines and a single basic capsule. And Jebediah of course.

[Vanas]

It's been a long time since SeffTech's been up to much, owing to various hearings regarding certain devices that may or may not have been liberated from KerboNük's scrapyard.

Still, some of those RTGs caused an increase in brain for our brave SCIENtists. The Interplanetary Probulator that gained such success on its Evil mission has been determined to be good, but perhaps ill-suited for operations outside of Duna's orbit owing to the Ion engine.

So, a hasty re-design of the Probulator took place, replacing the ion drive with a hosepipe and the Xenon tanks with some balloons. The entire thing was perched on top of a rocket that certainly did not contain any uranium and fired into space.

Seeing it was successful, Mission Control decided to hang a left and see if the basic Kerbin-Eve rocket could punt the Probulator to Duna anyway.

To many people's suprise, it *did* successfully get there, despite two orbits of Kerbol before lining up correctly with Duna, and Mission Control's drunken insistence that Duna was the grey one.

Next; to see how solid Duna is.

[TimothyC]

Seeing it was successful, Mission Control decided to hang a left and see if the basic Kerbin-Eve rocket could punt the Probulator to Duna anyway.

The deltaV for a mission to Eve and a mission to Duna are remarkably similar, it's when you try to come back from the surface that Eve becomes a pain.

[PeZook]

The deltaV for a mission to Eve and a mission to Duna are remarkably similar, it's when you try to come back from the surface that Eve becomes a pain.

Just you wait...

[GuppyShark]

I'm now on my third attempt at a Duna return.

Turns out when I built the initial design, the lander had enough Delta-V to enter a Dunar orbit... if you look at the Vacuum Delta-V and not the Atmosphere Delta-V.

:facepalm:

I have to admit, I did enjoy the heroic moment when one of the Kerbal astronauts in the return vehicle EVA'd in order to repack the parachutes while the entire thing was falling back to the surface. Unfortunately he did not survive, but his sacrifice ensured his companion astronaut lived to return to Kerbal.

[PeZook]

While I was launching Eve surface return hardware, Jeb had to briefly go EVA.



He seems pretty excited.

[GuppyShark]

Oh GOOD GOD

How did the frigging MUN end up directly in my Mars transfer trajectory

Gah

[Zaune]

I have to admit, I did enjoy the heroic moment when one of the Kerbal astronauts in the return vehicle EVA'd in order to repack the parachutes while the entire thing was falling back to the surface. Unfortunately he did not survive, but his sacrifice ensured his companion astronaut lived to return to Kerbal.

For future reference, you may wish to look up the EVA Parachutes mod.

[GuppyShark]

I don't believe in mods.