Kerbal Space Program (original)

[Sea Serpent]

Not sure how many people who play the combat flight simulators also play things like Kerbal, but I think it's just awesome.  I'm a very latecomer to this game.  I've been playing the same "career" on and off for about 2 years, and some of my vehicles are getting pretty sophisticated.  I've recently launched my first series of missions to the planet Duna.   It's extremely satisfying to create some of these vehicles, with hundreds of components, and then fly them to success.  If anyone else plays this game, feel free to post your own screenshots and tall tales here, as will I.  (I have KSP 2, but am not satisfied with it at this time and don't play it)

Duna main transit vehicle/orbiter section launch.  That is a big rocket.

Liquid Boosters coming off:

Assembled after rendezvous with Duna Lander.

"Trans-Duna Injection"

Finally, there is also a large Rover, arriving separately, and yet unmanned.  Here it is all packed up and tucked into its shell, which will only be jettisoned right before landing. 

[MustangMike]

I played a looooot of ksp back in highschool when I had more time, its a great game and mods can turn it into something really special. One day I want to get back into it.

That being said, I really don't see much of a point in buying ksp2.. Doesn't seem like it does anything that a modded ksp1 couldn't, and it certainly doesn't seem like it does any of it in a particularly more polished matter compared to ksp1. 

[wheelsup_cavu]

Still some activity over at SimHQ in their Kerbal Space Program forum.

https://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/forums/341/1/kerbal-space-program

 

Wheels

 

[Sea Serpent]

Also doing an asteroid capture mission.  So it started like this, some kind of base vehicle with 3 nuclear engines like this:

That could be folded up like this for launch:

And to skip a few orbital building steps with attachment modules and EVAs, eventually became this, a self-fueling propulsion unit and "base" for a captured 1700 ton asteroid.  This is one cool f***in game.

(Edit:  I anoint this ship with the name Her Kerbal Majesty’s Ship, Warningstar.  Being that this is strictly a Kerbin People’s Air Force affair, the civilian Kerbal Space Program, and their worn and weak leaders, Jedediah and Valentina, will be pleased to know that with the new ability to steer asteroids at will, the KPAF is now the most formidable force in the entire Kerbol System. Yours Truly, Col. Dodbro Kerman, Captain of the Warningstar, and the only senior pilot that didn’t get to go to Duna.  See you in about 4 Kerbin years, Jeb and Val, if you make it back!)

Edited September 29, 2023 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Asteroid was originally captured into Kerbin orbit by nudging it into an aerobraking situation, and then raising its periapsis again.  I don't know how I would have captured it if it didn't happen to pass very close to Kerbin in the first place, and without dipping into the atmosphere, because the capture vehicle barely had enough Dv.  The resulting apoapsis was outside the orbit of Minmus, with a period of about 40 days, and now I need to start reeling it in.  The end goal is actually to bring it into orbit around The Mun. 

So here is the situation.  Blue orbit is the current one, dotted gold orbit is the planned orbit.

Coming in fast.  Notice drills mining the surface:

Retrograde burn around the nightime side of Kerbin.  There was concern about thrust symmetry, because the big Mainsail engine on the original capture booster is a lot more powerful than those 3 Nerva engines on the base ("HKMS Warningstar"), but it stayed pointed where it should.

Good Burn.  Next periapsis, will change the inclination to same as Mun (equatorial), and then the plan is that The Mun should eventually just come around and pick it up.

 

 

Edited October 6, 2023 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Meanwhile, the decadent, and smug Jebediah and Valentina have a moment onboard the Gargantua-1 command ship's exclusive Disco lounge, bound for Duna.  They are so confident that they are using a KAL-1000 as a gaming table.  One hopes that the higher functions of the KAL-1000 have been deactivated.

[Feathered_IV]

I can't get past the bad artwork of the characters.

[Sea Serpent]

4 hours ago, Feathered_IV said:

I can't get past the bad artwork of the characters.

I think you might be kind of missing the point of the game.  Have you played it?

[Feathered_IV]

No. I’ve looked into it several times but always fall short when I see those creepy little dudes. Is there a mod out there that changes them to something else?

[Sea Serpent]

Valentina is a woman, you sexist pig.  Can’t you just let them be themselves, and not your preferred male ideal?

Edited October 9, 2023 by Sea Serpent
😂

[Sea Serpent]

Lagerlas Kerman is the newest Kerbonaut.  She must demonstrate that she has the right stuff.

Subsonic test flight, shown in crew spaces cutaway view.  "It flies really well!  Good balance and limiting in the controls, good stability so far.  Could benefit from KAL-1000 controlled drooping inboard elevons, and auto-coordinating yaw system."-Lagerlas.  Probably why this game draws me in so much, because you can actually do things like that, just limited by your stoned imagination, lol, and fly it in the cockpit first person...my other flight simulator.

Edited October 20, 2023 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Flight Director Gene Kerman:  “Because of our ‘Revert to Vehicle Assembly Building’ testing system, failure is never an option.”

 

 

Edited October 21, 2023 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Mite 1 to Kerbin:  Kerbin is setting, so comms will rely on relay from here on.  We are out of power to the solar arrays.  Cannot proceed further along Polar line.

—Mite one, Firebird with you, we have you supported all the way.  Currently in Mun polar orbit to assist you as necessary. Can land if required.

—Firebird, Mite One, negative on landing.  Currently have 1300 DV after fueling at MunBase 2;  Can launch and rendezvous if mission abort.  Will proceed as long as battery permits.

 

Edited January 15 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Docking seal is green, Mite One, welcome aboard:

(this is going to create a very bad thrust assymetry problem for any manuevers, that I'll have to work out "on the ground".

[Sea Serpent]

18 days later, these two vehicles meet each other on the surface of a different moon, Minmus.

"Enzor, is that what I think it is, just up ahead?

"Damned right it is, Raydun !!"

Better angle of same scene, to better show relative size of things:

Edited January 19 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

I see it's been over 6 months since I have played this game, and I have the urge.  There is a substantial amount of refamiliarization with what I'm doing in this game, because I have so many mission in play, and so many variants or versions of the same spacecraft, it's hard to keep track of.  At the beginning of this thread, I showed some of the vehicles that are going to Duna (the Mars equivalent in KSP).

In fact, there are 6 distinct spacecraft travelling to Duna, including 2 manned landers (Kerbaled landers?), an unmanned lander, a rover, a relay, and of course the big orbital mothership which has all the fuel to get back to Kerbin, plus a science laboratory.  Some of these have very complicated entry sequences. 

I'm not sure if I'm going to take a break from my normal fare of DCS, but I'm taking a look at all this stuff, and thinking....hmmm, time to carry on with it.  I think this is the same campaign game I've been playing since 2021 possibly.  My game is completely unmodded.

Here is the rover, still in it's shell, and with the airbrakes extended.  From the first post in this thread, you can see how it is packed in.  The airbrakes are necessary to maintain the proper entry attitude, or otherwise it will orient itself like a bullet, with the pointy end forward, and I need it to enter ass-end, because that's where the heatshield is.  There are several very time-sensitive steps that have to happen after that, after the aeroshell jettisons and the rover separates itself from the base and orients itself to the landing attitude.  It'll be interesting, and I can't wait to show what happens, success or failure!

Edited July 3 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

First mission to arrive at Duna, is the Relay sat.

Preparing for aerobraking and orbital capture:

Oh wow.  I must have not done my homework about a proper aerobraking attitude, and thought I'd be safe at a much lower altitude than I was. Pretty tense for a few moments there. The vehicle survived however, and only suffered two broken low gain attennas, even though everything was retracted.  It actually was a goal of mine to test the safe limits of the atmosphere, but I was not intending to go that deep into it!  I was expecting a light radiant glow, not a fireball. And at that point, it’s not like I can turn that big dish around into the wind, and burn out of there, without destroying it.   I’m relieved it didn’t go in, or suffer any mission-ending damage.  In the future, I'm not going to bring any of the other missions in under 28,000 m:

Established in intended relay orbit around Duna, 2 revs later.  The braking maneuver was so severe that I had to burn a quite a bit of fuel to get the orbit that far out again.   So here we are.  Main comsat for the entire mission is established, and some crucial information learned in the process:

Edited July 16 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Other ships in the mission are arriving:

(Rover)

(Mothership/Main Lander/Valentina Kerman)

There are some more things that need to be done in orbit before I will attempt a landing.  But this will come soon.

[Sea Serpent]

First landing on Duna is an unmanned lander, coming in over the poles, in a previously established low orbit.  The landing spot chosen is right on the edge of the ice area, in a crater, because of reasons, including comms availability, since the main antennas will need to be retracted during reentry.

 There was no drama during re-entry, which was a fairly steep descent to hit the right spot.  The lander was at a very low orbit (55k) and relatively slow at the beginning, and I used the retro rockets more aggresively than needed.  Wasted a bit of fuel.  There was zero problem decelerating to the chute deployment speed, and I hardly needed the heatshield.  I obviously overbuilt the vehicle, which is not a bad thing.  5 good Chutes:

Rockets firing moments before touchdown:

Descent speed on the chutes alone was about 10 m/s.  Touched down at less than 3 m/s.  Landing spot was a surprisingly steep slope, down into a crater, which I should have been more careful about.  It didn’t look so steep from orbit.  This lander has an extremely low CG, still heavy with fuel, so it didn't tip over, but it did slide down halfway to the bottom.  Finally stopped the slip by retracting two of the landing legs, and letting it drag to a stop with the heatshield.  Yes, that really worked...

Edited July 17 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Caution-Image Intensive.

Next in line for landing: "Voyager" Rover.

Close to burnout of insertion stage.  About 46K meters

Stage separation, freefall. 40K m. I kicked it away by manually pulling some back stick, and then letting it return to the retro attitude via the guidance system.

Drogues fully opened, 10,000 to 6000 m

Nosecone and aeroshell jettison sequence, gear starts to go down, vehicle will orient to retrograde attitude in a different ref frame, which is like what a cat would do.  All that stuff blows away very violently, so it’s not like it’s hanging around the vehicle, just got the screenshot at the very moment.  The debris does rain down in an area of several kilometers, before touchdown.  You can see the Separatron rockets firing to separate the baseplate from the rover mounting.  Otherwise it might get stuck in its socket because of the onrushing wind, so the vehicle and base (the draggy heatshield assembly) need to tilt away from each other.

Main Chutes deployed, vehicle stabilizes, around 3000 m

Touchdown.  A little bit of a bounce, but it's designed with heavy suspension.  Nothing broken.  Terminal descent rate on the parachutes was about 25 m/s.  Vehicle was well balanced on the chutes, and retro rocket thrust was perfectly symmetric, as designed.  Touchdown rate was < 4 m/s after retro rocket firing.

We have a Mining Rover on the Surface of Duna, and that’s a BIG deal for the mission.  This is a well designed vehicle, and entry system, at least by KSP standards, and represents a long line of iterations, as with everything else one creates in the game. Balance and landing tests were conducted on Kerbin, so again, it was overbuilt for Duna, but I really didn’t quite know what to expect from the atmosphere. Duna is pretty tame.  Didn’t even get a glow from the heatshield.  It landed without any problems, and I'm pleasantly surprised I pulled it off.  Also, I shouldn’t call them “retro rockets”.  This thing has a T/W of greater than one in the gravity of Duna.  It’s possible for it to “hop”, theoretically, but I’ve never tried it, because it wasn’t possible to test that in the gravity and atmosphere of Kerbin. It’s not very aerodynamic, obviously, and we aren’t in a vacuum. It’s fuel capacity, and ability to synthesize fuel, is so that it can refuel the manned lander, which has yet to land, not to take to the air again.  Nobody is in it yet, but it can drive autonomously to the manned lander landing site, and the engineer can work the mining rig.

Edited July 18 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

Vaya con Dios, Jebediah and crew!

"Pop the chutes NOW, Jeb, or we're dead!  (Bob and Bill go lights out from the Gs, ~400 m/s to < 30 in a second or two)

Static....................

Jebediah Kerman: "Nye Island, Insanity Base here.  The Runtz has landed."

Bob Kerman: “That's one fairly-large step for a Kerbal, one gigantic leap for Kerbalkind."

Ok, well thats that.  That was kind of a game milestone for me, so what I do next in the game, I really don't know...I drove the rover about 100 miles to find a good, resource rich spot for the landing, and I landed very close, so it can start mining, and synthesizing fuel on site. That makes the mission pretty open ended from here. I have to say, one of the most creative, and rewarding games I’ve ever played.

Edited July 19 by Sea Serpent

[Sea Serpent]

The sun is setting on Duna, so that mission is on hold for a while.  Lots of science received already allow me to advance along the tech tree.  So, meanwhile, back on Kerbin, I have a need for a single stage to orbit, fully reusable vehicle to ferry passengers and cargo back and forth from low Kerbin Orbit.  My vehicle's requirements are:  1) Must look like a Goose. 2) Must get to 95k orbit and dock with a combination of Ramjets and Rockets and monoprop engines. 3) Must reenter in a stable, nose up, draggy profile(like the space shuttle). 4) must be able to fly back to a runway with jets alone. This is the first "official" flight, meaning, I accept the results, and gameplay is for keeps, without any do-overs.

Launch:

Orbit:

Severe overshoot of landing runway at Kerbal Space Center, on reentry.  But a stable, good reentry:

We aren't going to make it back to the landing site, as we’re out of jet fuel, and now a glider.  We just don’t have the speed or altitude after that energy-sucking 180 turn.  We’re going to have to ditch:

Ditching:

In the next screenshots, I swear I didn't try to portray it as Gus Grissom getting out of the capsule badly, in the Right Stuff, but once landed, I wanted to do an EVA for screenshot.  Enzor Kerman fell out of the hatch, onto the back of the right canard, and became lifeless, and then eventually fell off the side:

He's fine now but the vehicle drifted quite a ways away...WILSON!... Vehicle and Enzor are safely recovered.  The cause of this was that the inebriated and stoned game player was hittings E,S,F,X on the keyboard instead of A,W,X,D.

Old Enzor, he did alright.

Edited Thursday at 04:08 AM by Sea Serpent