Y18-D295 - A crew of 7 kerbals is leaving Kerbin to travel to the Mun and plant the first flag in the Midlands. Robotic rovers and surface harvesters have paved the way, the transfer vehicle is in orbit, the lander is orbiting around the Mun, and ‘Bravo’ station is prepared. Now it is time to risk kerbals. Seven of them in a Mk4-1 capsule.

The first launch was aborted just prior to lift-off due to technical issues with the pod. That incurred about a 60-day delay due to having to roll the rocket back to the VAB for rework. Unofficially, it is because Jendos attempted to stowaway in the snacks compartment.

  • Jeb (P)
  • Val (P)
  • Lugee (E)
  • Ludcan (E)
  • Defen (S)
  • Kendos (S)
  • Lotop (Quartermaster)

Defen, Lugee and Kendos will be stationed at ‘Alpha’ station on the return journey, and the existing crew will return home. The two scientists will remain in orbit to do research of the biomes of Kerbin.

Mission goals:

  • Plant a flag on the Mun.
  • Disassemble old and outdated surface harvesters in the Mun’s Midlands.
  • Check out the stats of the Mun Midlands pioneer base.
  • Return to ‘Alpha’ station at Kerbin, swap out crew.
  • Return to Kerbin.

Well, turns out that there are serious flaws with the current CRV7A design. The launch was a near-disaster, vectoring wildly out of control within 100m of altitude. The abort button was pushed at 28km. The CRV7A fleet has been grounded until at least year 19, pending further tests and refinements of the design.

The mission profile be switched to using the CRV3A (Kane capsule) design. It will take two launches to get the crew into orbit and Lotop(Q) is going to get left behind.

Y18-D369 - After even more delays, the first capsule will be launched today, with the second capsule launching tomorrow.

KSP: Docking with transfer vehicle in year 18 KSP: Docking with transfer vehicle in year 18

Y18-D373 - The Transfer Vehicle (TV6A) arrives at Mun station ‘Bravo’. I’m not trilled with the RCS performance on it, the TV6A is very sluggish. So I’ll need to upgrade to stronger RCS, plus add some at the tail of the 2nd stage (which stays attached until it’s empty of fuel). Some lights on both the CRV3A and TV6A for assisting in docking during darkness would be good too.

KSP: Tipped over Lynx rover in year 18

Y18-D374 - While moving one of the Lynx rovers over to the landing area in the Mun’s Midlands, I tipped it over. This was one of the ‘breaker’ series with a bunch of MaterialKits bays for recycling of components. Damage is minor, but I’ll need to use KIS/KAS winches in order to move it back to vertical. Meanwhile, the kerbals are chilling out on station ‘Bravo’ above the Mun. They have about 1 year of life support, so there is plenty of time to move out additional ground equipment.

Current plan is to put a ground support Lynx (LX2-RS1) rover on the surface by the Midlands Pioneer module, then land the crew near both. First stop will be the flipped over rover, second stop will then be the primary mining field with all the excess hardware to be disassembled into MaterialKits.

Y18-D404 - The ground support Lynx is down on the Mun, but trapped in its package. I’m missing a probe core on the LX2-RS1 design.

Ergh… having severe issues with KSP, need to troubleshoot.