Being playing with propeller and helicopter parts from spaceport ("f" to auto hover, by the way) and god damn I hate bloody spaceplanes! Balance is so god damned hard! Anyone seen any really good tutorials for planes? The more detailed the better. I am tempted to also use the hack tool to put things at/around, say, Duna so I can experiment with craft without having to fly multiple missions (waiting five minutes for a launch window each time). The margins of error involved in spaceplanes is so slight it would drive me crazy to have to repeat a whole flight just because the balance is slightly off.
I've been experimenting with the envelope/airship mod, trying to see what can be done on Duna. I've used HyperEdit to move crafts there to test weights and whatnot. Here's a shot of a 7-ton craft - about the maximum a single envelope can lift - tethered (via sandbag) to the surface of Duna.
Been thinking about airships some more. With knowledge of the weight limit I set about designing a science laboratory and exploration probe for Duna. Here it is in simulation. Those are two electric propellers, and in the middle, a rover that can be winched to the surface. At the back, another winch and sandbag is ready to act as a tether should one wish to anchor the airship. It's hard to see in the below shot but I have dropped the sandbag, largely immobilizing the airship, and now I'm lowering the rover to the surface. Rover on the surface. The rover is still attached to the airship by electromagnet. I can click to turn it off and then winch it back to the ship, if need be. This frees the rover to explore and do !!SCIENCE!! Winching the magnet back up, and I've lowered the craft a little by winching in on the sandbag tether. Both vehicles. Fun fact - if the airship is landed I can drive the rover right between the engine pylons, lower the magnet onto the roof of the rover, re-magnetize and winch the rover back into the craft, ready for deployment to another survey site. It doesn't fly particularly fast (the envelope causes too much drag) but it is quite manageable. It goes without saying that I'm FIERCELY PROUD of this work. I feel like GOD DAMNED NASA designing and building this kinda stuff. Next step is to try and get this to Duna. ...hmm.. and I really should do something about all those stranded Kerbals!
Been trying to get my bloody airship into orbit. 200m up the rocket topples over so badly I doubt SAS can save it. This is with a mechjeb launch. Add two solid boosters on the lean side and it helped only a little, still get a catastrophic failure. I am not sure if it is the wing surfaces on the craft or some slight weight imbalance causing the toppling - in any case, HIGHLY annoying and I am unsure how to fix. Might try tacking weight on the other side (that can be shed) or.... I don't know. Grrr!
The last time I had unsolvable toppling without any apparent, it was because I was only draining two of my three fuel tanks.
Shouldn't be a problem, I have asparagus fuel lined the system. It is either the balance of the rover or the lift surfaces on the rover. May have to launch the rover vertically, perhaps send two (one each side of a central rocket) to sort out balance issues. That will be a big beasty!
I am going to have to add MORE ROCKETS I think. Send up two rovers, vertically orientated and on each side of the core, and then strap a lot more boosters on down below. The challenge will be in getting both probes to the surface in one piece. If I get down to 5k, inflate the bags, and then decouple each airship in turn I should be ok. Alternately, send two entire Kerbin-Duna transfer units (stacked around an EVEN BIGGER central core and individually land each rover.
This is basically the launcher I am going for. I managed to rotate my rover and then glue it to the top using a docking port 6-way cube thing. I couldn't find another way to do it what with the rover part the 'root' of the construction and I didn't want to start from scratch. Nonetheless, with an offset coupler thing between the four-way and the interplanetary stage the center of mass is fine and all the problems are removed with the wing elements lined up vertical. I'm going to take a few coms probes with me for good luck and to deploy around Duna. Because... why not make life extra hard and try and run the whole mission through Remote Tech. This will mean rejiggling my comms satellites as they all fell out of place with the massive time shifts I've been doing waiting for planets to align. My fear is that even if I use MechJeb to perfectly circularize their orbits that the comsats will still drift, which would be... annoying. This also means I probably will be making that RemoteTech video I promised looonggg ago!
Er, just about all of the ones on Kerbalspaceport. In the airship I'm using mostly Hooligan Labs airship stuff, the recently released plane parts mod, the Kerbal Attachment System and no doubt NovaPunch and other "bits" mods for struts and whatnot. Ta. Will keep going then!
Just spent an entire evening (post baby sleeping time) trying to get my bloody airship up into a stable orbit the basic problem remains that the airship throws the rocket slightly off balance - this isn't noticeable when the rocket is 300 tons, but in the planetary stage that off-centre 7 tons most definitely is, and it makes the ship impossible for the SmartSAS to keep on track. Conclusion: I need to glue a balancing 7t on the opposite side from the rover. Problem: A fuel tank would make the most sense, but I am pretty sure it would be drained first, thus leaving it empty and a pointless counterbalance. If I ran a pipe to it from the first stack tank it might never drain (also, arguably, pointless or cause problems. Or something. Maybe I will shove some RCS fuel there or something. Anyone got any good ideas? Another rover would be pretty tough to build (have to build it side on, symmetry is messed up by the core being side on, etc) - so, not doing that.
I FINALLY got my crap to a stable 80k orbit with the ability to go to Duna without spiralling out of balance all over the universe. This took all night to work out as I had: - the top section break off at the decoupler, requiring more struts, and more struts, and more struts! - to add side-mounted engines as the balance was still a little off and causing issues. - move those bloody engines around a bit to reduce problems. Dear god. What a lot of rigmarole. In my test flight to Duna I discovered that it is a BAD idea to drop the counterbalance weight in orbit (mapping satellite. Thought it might be) as then the unbalanced re-entry vessel becomes impossible to land. Instead, I think I will try and drag a habitation module down to the stranded Kerbals as a "hey, we'd love to rescue you, but we're too busy with this awesome rover! Have a house for now" kind of gesture. It is going to take me a other night to put something like that together that is reliable, I expect! Arg! Haha.
Today I learned three important things. 1) ALWAYS build and test your lander BEFORE you builder your launcher. I'm going to have to re-do the "get junk into orbit" stages now as I had to rebuild the lander for balance (made it a lot wider at the base so it would be more stable on landing and less top heavy). Here's a shot of it coming in for a simulated landing with a Bobcat Industries rover+habitation module which I will deliver to the stranded Kerbals on one side, and the airship on the other. 2) MechJeb's landing assistant has a landing velocity set to something like 0.5m/s by default, which on a big ship is very hard for MehJeb to pull off. When I set it up to 5m/s (I am going to set it to 7m/s for improved stability) my final landing went a lot better. Previous ones would go well until the last 5m and then it would all get off balance and fail. 3) NEVER land on a slope!
Once you learn how to glue girders together and that the little cube girders can stick to anything (and then can, in turn, have other things snapped to them) construction gets a lot easier! ...although I will never again attempt an off-balance craft of any kind. It is simply crazy! I would have been better to learn how to make a spaceplane and attached the rover to the top, shuttle transport style!
More revision. More testing. Here's the lander coming in: Here's the lander tipped over, post landing, with the rover disconnected and the airship ready to decouple. Still got issues: - Craft becomes unstable when it gets low on fuel because it's so top heavy. Have added heavier engines to the bottom but they seem to be introducing their own balance/thrust issues. - Can't reliably get to the surface without something going quite wrong as the atmosphere thickens. Never mind! I will soldier on! Oh, did I mention that my envelope, inexplicably, no longer lifts the rover's weight when it did so in the past?! I'm going to edit some config because I'm fucked if I'm going to rejig everything to try and bug fix that.
If anyone has any good ideas on how to stabilize the lander on its way down, let me know. I am at a loss for why it goes bonkers at about 5k (mechjeb can't point at the retrograde and only when the parachutes pop open does it have a chance at a stable descent). I suspect fuel is draining out of the core and with only a little left at the bottom the weight of the engines isn't enough to stop the thing basically being way too top heavy. Switched engines and somehow the thrust got all out of alignment. Am considering flipping the engines and making the bottom of the craft the top and building a wide landing frame on the new bottom to get the thing down safely. It might be what it takes, annoyingly enough.
Yeah, I expect that what you've built is basically a giant shuttlecock, and you're trying to drop it from the sky so that it lands on its tail. Maybe you could do it if you spun the rocket up a bit. :P
I think I have it! Took weight of the top side (changed the side rover - realised it was quite unbalancing - a lot heavier than the airship) and added weight to the bottom (MOAR FUEL!). I also added sepratrons (little rockets) to help the thing tip over and I think, if it's low enough on fuel (hard to test) that it will tip over without causing tooooo much havoc. I had a few explosions testing it, but I just can't be forked re-engineering everything to make it work 100% well. I'd have to do it from scratch. Even better, the thing re-enters pretty smoothly. I managed a manual landing without issues! Only oddity, I switched from 2.5m engines to 1.25m engines and the thing is rock-solid on holding a bearing now. With the heavier engines it was tending to drift, despite RCS. Very odd. In the shot I dropped off the little rover, uncoupled the drivable rover (no crew nearby tho) and then tethered the airship to the wreckage by way of the magnet on a string that held the mini rover. Here's another shot with everything landed.
And then crushing defeat. To cut a long story short; no amount of struts, supports or rejiggering is preventing the launcher body you have seen above from crushing some piece of itself when sitting on top of a orbital booster unit on the launch pad. It can sit just on a decoupler at its bottom just fine, but NOT on anything else - then random parts break. It almost seems buggy. I might have to cheat and start my unit in orbit already or else go right back to square one, which I am not prepared to do!
Well I'm kinda proud of this little guy. This is the smallest thing I've managed to get into orbit. It starts with the little mini SRBs, then the small SRB, then the single engine. Then Xenon Power FTW. The little Nosecone thing stands in for a full fairing and works pretty well.
EUREKA! Solved the problem. Basically, structural elements are strong, fuel tanks were wobbling underneath them and I couldn't work out a way to get struts to glue the bloody tanks to the bloody structural elements. So, I tried a big NovaPunch 5-plate thing and then stuck a small cube truss around the edges and glued the tanks to those cubes - and it is solid as a rock! The launcher below is the central piece of a ton of boosters - getting 150t into orbit is not terribly easy - but I think tomorrow I'll be able to do a proper "live" flight! Ta for the support :D
I really believe that one of the most significant things that's lacking from the mod scene are more types of cargo bays. There is one good pack but it can be tricky to use.
Calistas, the rover science package is pretty rad. This must be a really open game system, if mods of such caliber are possible.
Ta, and yup, it really is quite modable. It really does add a lot to the game as finding a great new mod is a lot of fun and can add whole new features to the game.
Some news about the upcoming (TBD) 0.19 patch.. Highlights include a resource system, a 64bit multithreaded exe being tested, reentry heat, and a drivers seat for rovers so you can see your kerbin navigating the dusty wastes of Duna. Alas my most desired feature won't make it in this patch or the next - the ability to design rovers etc separately and then import and attach them. Check out the interview. upcoming features not ready for 0.19 are also discussed. Edit: No info one whether the multithreaded 64bit exe will be for this version or later. Don't want to confuse anyone.
I did a clean install for .184 and reinstalled my favorite mods as well as mechjab. I designed a unmanned Munar lander that I would have been able to test out but mechjab's Munar injection command just launched me straight into the Mun. I guess I need to set Munar orbit or landing but it was fastforwarding everything so I figured I'd let it do it's thing -- which is to suicide into the Mun. I also lost all my good ship designs and have forgotten all my orbit all the things know-how. At least I can fly a plane and only crash it while trying to land. From now on all planes I design will have detachable cockpits with parachutes. It's the least I can do after sending a dozen Kerbonauts into solar orbit two months back.
JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, MECHJAB! REALLY? I got within 1km of the Mun's surface with the landing command. At km up I'm descending at 8m/s. Not bad at all. I try to switch to manual control when things start getting werid and it jettisons the mechjab module from my lander. FFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU. I got some screens. Looking good. Why am I speeding up? Damnit sheez b0lls.
And now this has been repeating for 3 minutes. Looks like it blew itself up by the time I posted this.
Shake At the bottom of the landing autopilot the speed is set at 0.5m/s. I find MJ has a really hard time getting ships to that speed. Try putting in 4 or 5m/s and seeing if you land better. I'm guessing it will be much neater.
Now that the new version is out it's time for new plans and new goals. First up though, two awesome mods. One makes building rockets easier, another makes it possible to speed up time beyond the usual limits, and to slow down time so you can spot precisely which bit of a rocket is failing when (and probably make super nice and smooth vids too!) Have a look. So, I've decided to open up the "what to do" to you lot. These are the options: 1) Make a video talking about how to set up a geostationary satellite network. 2) Build some space station. Themes/ideas accepted. 3) Build a base on another world. Suggestions welcome. PM me or put in your vote here (tho just voting here would get a bit spammy and annoying, I fear.
Build a geostationary satellite network around another world. But they're not needed for coms yet are they?
Using the addon RemoteTech this actually works and allows you to control things without kerbs on board.
My favourite. Perhaps go for a simple science platform first, with the option to turn it into a re-fulling point later, or even a space port. If there are mods making this possible... ?
