STS-3: Fly Me To The Moon

[Orion]

Let me play among the stars (Payload):

And let me see what spring is like (Shuttle stack):

On Jupiter or Mars (Launchpad):

In other words... engine ignition and roll:

Booster detach:

Core stage 2nd burn - LEO injection:

Core Stage detach, Orbiter engines ignite to finish burn:

LEO Acheived:

Payload bay open:

Dummy payload released:

Payload:

Orbiter main engines ignite for deorbiting burn:

RCS orients shuttle for reentry:

Orbiter reentry:

Parachute deployment:
For some reason the screenshot didn't save, which is really annoying, so I redid the mission to show you they at least work (I just flew the shuttle up into space, then reentered):

Landing:

And per usual, my computer still won't show me mission logs:

Hope that's good.

 

[Lemniscate Biscuit]

Let me play among the stars (Payload):
View attachment 107907
And let me see what spring is like (Shuttle stack):

View attachment 107908
On Jupiter or Mars (Launchpad):
View attachment 107909
In other words... engine ignition and roll:
View attachment 107910
Booster detach:
View attachment 107911
Core stage 2nd burn - LEO injection:
View attachment 107912
Core Stage detach, Orbiter engines ignite to finish burn:
View attachment 107913
LEO Acheived:
View attachment 107914
Payload bay open:
View attachment 107915
Dummy payload released:
View attachment 107916
Payload:
View attachment 107917
Orbiter main engines ignite for deorbiting burn:
View attachment 107918
RCS orients shuttle for reentry:
View attachment 107919
Orbiter reentry:
View attachment 107920 Parachute deployment:
For some reason the screenshot didn't save, which is really annoying, so I redid the mission to show you they at least work (I just flew the shuttle up into space, then reentered):
View attachment 107921
Landing:
View attachment 107922
And per usual, my computer still won't show me mission logs:
View attachment 107923
Hope that's good.

Very good. I think the payload needs to be bigger though.

 

[Orion]

Shuttle is 1245.79t, minus payload is 1130.4. 1130.4*0.10 is 113.04t, and the payload is 115t. So a little more than 10 percent, which was what I'm supposed to launch?

 

[Lemniscate Biscuit]

Shuttle is 1245.79t, minus payload is 1130.4. 1130.4*0.10 is 113.04t, and the payload is 115t. So a little more than 10 percent, which was what I'm supposed to launch?

Oh. Ok. All good.

 

[Orion]

Who should I talk to about getting my badge? For this one and the atlas challenge.

 

[Lemniscate Biscuit]

Who should I talk to about getting my badge? For this one and the atlas challenge.

Mooncrasher

 

[Orion]

Mooncrasher, is this good? Sorry to bother you.

 

[Pink]

The payload is clipped, which feels like a bit of a "dodge" to avoid either properly slimming down the mass of your shuttle so the full unclipped payload fits, or increasing the size of your payload bay.
Otherwise it's quite nice though, so congratulations. You just need to unclip the payload.
If you unclip the payload and it can't fit, either put your shuttle and its booster on a diet so the payload is smaller, or make the payload bay larger.
How large are the two tanks that are almost full when you landed?
Maybe you can take fuel out of them on the payload bay? 125t is pretty heavy for a shuttle "almost empty" mass of that size. If you make your shuttle a bit lighter, you can make the booster a bunch lighter, it's an upwards cycle.
For comparison, I have a shuttle somewhere that weighs 150t when almost empty. But it's big enough that I can fit 300t in the payload bay unclipped.

Last comment, I recommend that you do not transfer fuel from the shuttle to the booster. You're wasting dV by not dropping off the booster when you're reaching space/1000 m/s, because the booster is heavy and fuel from the shuttle needs to be wasted to accelerate it in addition to the shuttle. If you don't do this, and redesign appropriately, it may make it easier to achieve what I'm talking about above.

Shuttle is 1245.79t, minus payload is 1130.4. 1130.4*0.10 is 113.04t, and the payload is 115t. So a little more than 10 percent, which was what I'm supposed to launch?

Your maths is slightly wrong.... We consider the lift-off mass for the 10% number.
Your mass without payload is 1130.4t? That's gonna be 90% of the lift-off mass at a minimum.
You can divide it by 9 to get the 10%, which in this case is 125.6t. That's the minimum payload mass.

To double-check, when we add it to 1130.4, we get approximately 1256.3t for the correct lift-off mass.
Indeed, 10% of that is the correct payload mass, and the remaining 90% matches the mass without payload of your rocket at present.

 

[Orion]

I don't think the payload is clipped. It's just 2 size 10 tanks. I'll look into that. And I'll add some fuel to the tanks and redo it.

 

[Pink]

Size 6, surely?

 

[Orion]

Oh yeah, I see now. It's been a while, I forgot how I built the thing

 

[Pink]

My bad for the delay.

 

[Orion]

No prob!

 

[Orion]

Here we go:

 

[Orion]

Mooncrasher is this better? I accidentally had the payload 0.54t less than what you said, but I also ended up having more fuel than I planned.

 

[Pink]

You need to calculate the payload mass yourself after changing the mass of your rocket.
The lift-off mass is now 1290t, 10% of that is 129t, 125t isn't enough anymore.
Just increase your payload to 140t to be sure (without making the actual rocket without payload heavier), I know you can do it. We don't need decimal places here, just approximately calculate the right value by moving the decimal point of the final number and add a few tonnes to be sure.

 

[Orion]

Alright, about 159t to the worst LEO I have ever done:

Shuttle mass w/o payload is still 1130t.

 

[Pink]

Perfect, nice job running on lower margins.
Badge granted.

If you want a challenge, try reaching 15% payload (≈200t at that mass of 1130t w/o payload) either with this shuttle suitably modified, or a new one. It's quite possible.

 

[Orion]

Perfect, nice job running on lower margins.
Badge granted.

If you want a challenge, try reaching 15% payload (≈200t at that mass of 1130t w/o payload) either with this shuttle suitably modified, or a new one. It's quite possible.

Thanks!