KSP - The Failed Soviet Moon Mission

Enjoy! See below for stuff.

Mods (who am I kidding you guys are still gonna ask in the comments anyway)
- Kerbal Engineer Redux
- Scatterer
- Planetshine

Craft File:

[MattLowne]

Enjoy! :-) Collaboration Station drops next Saturday at 5pm GMT

[ignemuton]

"dammit, our rocket isn't good to reach the moon, how should we fix it?"
"well we do have some extra 50 engines"
"this is going to work.

[algorithm]

Here's a challenge. Get a Kerbal in low kerbin orbit. But only use 'Ant' engines. Good luck.

[sagiksp]

Probably one of the most kerbal spacecraft is the israeli Shavit launcher, not because of it's design, but because of what it did. Because of the earth's spin, it's more efficient to launch rockets going west to east, because that gives you a ~500m/s boost, so almost all spacecraft launch like that. Almost. You see, Israel can't do that. Back when the launcher was developed in the 80s, the countries to the east of Israel were very hostile (Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia...), and a big concern was that most spacecraft failures happen at launch. The mission directors did not want their then classified advanced space technology falling into enemy hands, so they did the only thing they could. *Launch the spacecraft the wrong way.* Instead of it launching over enemy territory, it launched over the Mediterranean, going east to west. That meant that not only could they not use earths kick, they had to fight against it. The launcher includes over 1000m/s more Dv than would be required if they were flying west to east, but they did it anyway, and the launcher still launches like that today. *Going the wrong way*

[LeviJohansen]

SpaceX is building a rocket with 42 engines, hope it doesn't meet the same fate

[jackvalleli]

Well, it's important to consider that the Soviets didn't throw engines on just because. They were forced to use a large amount of small engines because programs that would have produced large engines to rival the F-1 used in the Saturn V were cancelled. These small engines, by the way, are the most efficient chemical rocket engines ever produced, and a quantity were bought by the US following the fall of the Iron Curtain.

[ravenclawtom]

soviet union was playing KSP IRL back in the 50s-70s

[MarcusHouse]

A most informative episode Mr Lowne! I havent done a lot or reading up on the Soviet vessels, so it was interesting to see a successful version of the mission. Nice one buddy! ... One week till Colaboration Station drops 😀

[joaqweri]

In Soviet Russia, you do not land on mun, mun lands on YOU.

[Nathaniel-qond]

"In Soviet Russia, you do not go into space. Space goes into you" - Boris

[fedor]

One of the other reasons Block A had so many engines, was the fact that if 1 or 2 failed, you still had a bunch left. With the Saturn V, it would be a bigger failure. It actually happened at the Apollo 13 launch, one engine failed but they could make it into orbit. Sadly the rest of the trip didn't go as planned as well.

[BradleyWhistance]

this is the possibly the most entertaining ksp video I've seen to date. thanks Matt =)

[wilboersma]

That footage of the Soviet (LK) lander at 9:00 is from the movie Apollo 18, which is a really cheesy movie about secret military moon missions and rock-aliens on the moon, however it has a Russian moon landing and it's really cool to see the LK lander, given some fair justice.

[-wenschow]

I'm hearing quite low frequenzy base around 12:30 and 13:00, is that ambient noise or music in the background? two bottles on my desk that were touching each other went nuts vibrating, ARE YOU TRYING TO SUBLIMINALLY MANIUPULATE US TO SUBSCRIBE?!

[connordalton]

As I watched this, I suddenly realized that the footage of the lander at around 9:00 was from the movie Apollo 18. I swear, that is probably the only movie to ever feature this lander.

[skinnyhedgehog]

соме, кегвал сомгадез! тодау, ше эо то зрасе!

[Spessforce]

Were there so many spherical shapes in the design because a sphere is excellent at holding pressure and being under stress?

[justanotherintrovert]

Actually the N1 rocket with an LOK craft on it used an extraction like maneuver similar to that of the Apollo missions, the LOK craft would be stored in an adapter from block V to the LOK service module, fairing, and escape tower, and the LOK capsule did indeed have solar panels along with fuel cells that would activate whenever the LK lander was not docked to it, and finally, the LOK craft broke into 3 pieces before re-entry, being the service module, capsule, and docking module, the capsule was the only part of the rocket to make it back to earth in one piece, and there were specialized hatches between the service module and docking module (the 2 pressurized parts of the LOK craft) to make this detachment possible, and the N1 was only partially intended to go to the moon, it was designed to go to mars or venus (and recent studies show that if an N1 rocket was assembled today with a lower chance of failure, that it would have enough Delta V to enter orbit around Mars (not venus, as the soviets forgot to calculate the gravity of the sun pulling them in past venus) land and return, anyways, hope this helps!

[mikhailiagacesa]

Sweet! I've always wanted to see this. Had to wait 37 years, but finally saw a Soviet flag planted on the moon by a Russian.

[maxwellmondo]

The 13th episode was by far my favorite of the collab station series. The way the music slowly starts up is hilarious.