KSP Update

Hello there! It's been quite a while since I last posted on this blog, and I apologize if anybody that has actually been following and left because of the inactivity. Originally I was going to chronicle all of my KSP doings from the beginning of 0.21 or so, but I quickly realized that my ability to play vastly outpaced my motivation to write on this blog. So, from now on, I will post missions as individual clusters of posts at my own will, and not set up a large story that involves many characters. The following list recaps what has been done since my last post, more than six months ago.

The Unity series of space stations has now been completed and sent into orbits around Kerbin, Mun and Minmus. They provide refuelling and habitat capabilities for the three bodies, and act as hubs for journeys between the three. They are soon to be decomissioned as the time needed to refuel them simply takes too long and direct refuel missions are getting easier.

A Minmus base was established for exploration of the moon, and now is to be decomissioned for the main goal now is to shift emphasis on interplanetary missions.

A new interplanetary ship was designed and commissioned from the KSC and the Intellect and her sisters were conceived.



The Curiosity (one of Intellect's older sister ships) had completed its mission to Duna and successfully returned to Kerbin orbit and all of her crew diembarked without issue. She is now ready for refuelling and set to launch for Dres in 1 day (Kerbals have a very high turnaround for rockets!)

We will continue from here, where Kering sucessfully lands on Duna after his ship arrives first from an armada of ships heading to Duna.

Space Station Expansion Pack part 1

With the establishment of the Entity 2 space station, an expansion comes to mind for future bases on Mun and Minmus. I plan on adding a mining base on Mun while having a manned research base established on Minmus, and that means there has to be a way to transport large amounts of materials and equipment between the three bodies. This means I have to utilize the space tug; a vehicle capable of docking and moving large heavy objects with little fuel to keep fuel requiremens at a minimum and to save time. Since tugs are generally very heavy, a large rocket is used. Here the tug is boosting itself up to a higher orbit so it will be properly positioned to dock and move payloads. Note the dual nuclear engines for the highest possible efficiency without sacrificing power.

The next load is the space station Unity's docking module. Since Unity was too heavy to launch on the Delta 1 rocket, but would be too light to launched on the Delta 3, it was launched in two segments and assembled in orbit.

 Then the command section of the station, the section that is able to move on its own via RCS thrusters and reaction wheels, is boosted up on the same Delta 1 rocket as the docking section. It contains a medium sized mover tug that can attach to payloads and then move them to re-arrange the station or add more sections if needed. The mover tug serves the same purpose as the assembler on Entity, but is unmanned thanks to the new reaction wheel system.

 Since the command module of the Unity station is probe-controlled, it is able to maneuver itself to dock with the docking module of the station.

Now, with the space station complete, it is time for the tug, named Kopernicus, to boost the station into a higher orbit. This is so that trips to and from the two moons will take less delta-v, while still within reach of tanker ships from Kerbal Space Center to refuel the shuttle and tugs. This space station will also feature two more sister stations one each of the moons to form a transportation network using these three stations, or the Unity Triplets, allowing for fuel and kerbal transfers at centralized locations throughout the Kerbin system.

Currently, all of the tugs in use have both senior and regular docking ports, allowing for tugging of heavy loads and of small, light payloads that are too small or too light to need the senior docking port. These payloads are usually expansion parts for each individual space station, such as a small Kethane converter and tank, a couple of hitchhiker storage pods for kerbals, or even aesthetic touches such as a communications antenna or a science package.

With the station now in orbit, the unmanned tug now burns back into its parking orbit of 180 km to wait for its next load.

Space Station Madness

 

Previously, in 0.20.2, just after the save breaking was announced but the latest version had not been available, I started a solar system wide evacuation of all of my active bases and stations to only a couple stations near Kerbin. However, the evacuation proceeded at a rapid rate and I soon found myself with empty bases, and still no update. So, I decided to start preparing for the next version by developing a series of modular space stations that are launched into orbit on a single type of rocket for fast construction of the space stations. I also pre-built several space stations to test them so they would immediately ready when the new version came out.

And finally, version 0.21 of KSP finally was released to the public. Since I had already predesigned several space stations and the craft files were still compatible, I got to work assembling the space station. First to go up is the core of the space station, named Entity 2, as the first Entity was lost when 0.20 save games were broken.

Here we see the Delta 1 (creative name, I know) rocket lifting the core up. It uses 8 solid rocket boosters, 6 of which fire initially along with the Mainsail engines; when the boosters empty, the next two fire to provide more boost to a higher altitude.

Ejecting the last set of boosters to continue on just the Mainsail.

The final stage, composed of just a Skipper does the final push and moves the core into the final orbit.

And finally, the core is inserted into its 120km circular orbit, ready for the plethora of other parts to come.

Second to go up is the station assembler/inspector. It moves the various large modules around and makes assembling large space stations possible. It uses a cupola with some RCS tanks and a docking port at the back to move modules that either don't have their own command units or have no RCS, or are just too cumbersome to move on their own. Here we see the station being boosted on the standard Delta 1 rocket.

The mod procedural fairings allows me to create fairings that custom fit the payload automatically and reset themselves for every single load and allows for realistic rocket designs.

The final stage of the rocket is able to do the rendezvous to the station, while the assembler does the final docking to attach to the station core. The final stage of the rocket then deorbits and in the end leaves no trash in space, keeping the orbits around Kerbin clear of junk and preventing Kessler syndrome.

 Next to go up is the habitation module. This will hold the majority of the kerbals that visit and also allow it to act as a sort of hotel when the Mun/Minmus base program initiates. It lets kerbals to move between Kerbin, Mun and Minmus, with the aid of a shuttle ship for crew rotations.

It is made up of an RCS tank with three kerbal storage containers to hold up to 12 kerbals in orbit.

Now, the third piece of the station is about to be sent up. It is the docking hub, and expands the docking capabilities of the station, allowing for up to seven more vehicles to the station and allows the transfer of kerbals to the other stations much faster, as well as making the station look a lot cooler when multiple vehicles are docked.

Here, you might notice that this version of the Delta 1 rocket uses the fairing from the KW rocketry parts. This is because the version of procedural fairings I used to use rotated too much with longer loads and would collide and destroy the last stage of the rocket when ejected, meaning that the part would not reach orbit and can't be sent to the station. I must have destroyed at least 2 rockets like this. I can hear the accountants scribbling already.

As of this point, only the assembler has actually been docked to the station. Both the habitation module and the docking module are still in orbit, waiting for the window for the rendezvous (this was just because I didn't want to wait for the orbits to line up, so I launched the habitation and docking modules one right after each other).

 Here the assembler has just undocked from the station and is going to attach to the end of the docking module and then move it to the station.

Here (sorry for the dim lighting, I did this on the dark side of Kerbin so the only light source was on the station, and as a result gave horrible lighting conditions) the docking hub is finally docked to the station, with the assembler on the other side of the hub. 

And finally, the last large piece of the station is about to be attached. The large habitation module rendezvous and is moved to the station.

The space station is now fully assembled. But a space station would not look like a space station without those huge solar panels. Since this was a much lighter component than the other modules, and as an addon that was not in the original design, I had not considered the most efficient way to use the Delta 1 rocket to launch it. So, I had to use a smaller model of rocket that I had developed earlier to launch the component, Antares 4. So, is the space station more expensive now that two rockets are needed instead of one? No, actually. The Antares 4 rocket was developed as a crew vehicle to deliver kerbals to the station so the same two rocket designs are to be used over and over again, still making the space station relatively low cost.

 Again I used the fairings from the KW rocketry mod because, again, the payload was too long and I did not want to risk another rocket failure because of the fairings.

Here the assembler vehicle is at work moving the  new solar array to attach it to the station, and increase the cool level of the space station.

The solar array is docked and the assembler is moving to its position at the other end of the space station where it will stay there as an inspection vehicle to check for possible damages during docking and from small space rocks.

Finally, the space station is assembled, with Luger and Raysted ready to receive some guests.

Beginnings

This blog is about my various adventures and stuff in the game of Kerbal Space Program. This is a open-world sandbox style game that is currently in development, and as such my latest save was broken, allowing me to start fresh.

Now, starting from a blank slate, the first order of business, get a ship into orbit to make sure the conditions were alright for the re-establishment of my multi-body communications, fuelling and transportation network to start.

Doodeny, Johnbal and Sheplin thoroughly enjoying the flight

Thankfully, most of the mods that I had 0.20.2 still worked in 0.21, so I was still able to launch one of my Falcon 9 rocket replicas to check out the conditions. Note: I usually don't use this rocket as it is in now way re-usable.

 

Since this was a kind of test for blogging, this installment will be rather short, however the next post will be much longer, as the construction of the space station will commence.