Project Korolev - The Hanging Base Journal

The victory of tomorrow was
forged from the trials and errors of

yesterday.

Contents
Part I: Prologue/Introduction

Part II: The Holder
Part III: The Tether
Part IV: The Habitation module

Part V: Epilogue



Part I Prologue/Introduction

Hanging base:
A special kind of artificial structure, which can be built on
the surface of the Mün and probably on Tylo`s cave. The
basic idea of a hanging base is, that it attaches itself
somehow to one of the three Münar Arches, and hangs
down from there. It doesn't really fit in the categories of the
surface base or the space station, so it „hangs” between
them.

However in the Tracking Station from the gathered data, the
tracking computer says it's „Landed”, but in fact – as the
name suggests – it hangs over the surface, from the top of
the Arch. This kind of base doesn't have more benefits than
the „normal” bases or space stations, but it's a great
challenge to build one. In the next coming parts I'll show
you how I built my own, very first stock Hang-O-Base. But
I also admit that I'm not the only one who ever built a base
like this. If you look up TheSpacePirate on YouTube,
you'll find that he also built a hanging base, a year earlier
(14.04.2018 ) than me (10.02.2019), but both of us used the
KIS/KAS mods. We also used different ways to build our
bases. He used SSTO's and docked all the parts together in
LKO, meanwhile I used one single rocket to launch the
whole in one.

Hanging base design of TheSpacePirate

My earlier hanging base design

Now, when the 2 DLC's are ready to support any kind of
mad things you want to build, I decided to do it once again,

without mods, fully stock.
With 3 launches, 375 parts, almost 83,5 t, 30 t more than

my original base, this beast is ready to operate.
Let's start it!

Part II: The Holder

To build the hanging base we need to build a Holder
first. But that's not that simple as it seems. First, you have
to figure out the diameter of the Arch.

For that, I used cheats to put an experimental craft on the
stone structure, also sent a 3-kerbaled expedition there,

It was enough to realize that building the Holder will not be
as simple as I thought for the first time. I wanted more or
less accurate parameters to figure out the dimensions of the
future Holder. For this I sent a kerbal to measure the
thinnest part of the arch. As far as I could measure it, even

the thinnest part has a diameter about 20 meters, so the
Holder must have at least that big. For this I'll use the
robotic parts from the Breaking Ground dlc in the future.
The next step was the weight-stress of the Holder, because
this would determine the size and the weight of my base.
So I attached some fuel tanks to my structure to see what is
the maximum weight that it still can handle without
breaking or exploding. The result: a little more than 130 t.

The Holder became more complex and heavier at the same
time with every change. The final iteration had a mass of
37.3 t

The next logical step, to create the Holder, was to add some
robotic parts, like hinges to the structure.
Then, step by step I made some changes to make the Holder
work properly and also some docking-redocking test was
made.

Then, when I thought, that the Holder is ready, I assembled
the base in the VAB, and put it on the top of a smaller
rocket to see if it could handle that kind of stress.
Succesfully I've managed to lift the whole structure to about

10 Km height or so, so next time I went a level higher.

The next day I put the base on a much faster and stronger
rocket to see if i could leave the atmosphere behind.The

main plan was – as I did with my original, very first Hang-
O-Base – to launch it as a whole. The result couldn't have
been worse. As the rocket ascended, the Holder opened up,
and made the whole rocket unstabe.

The result: CATASTROPHIC FAILURE.

But from the debris of the Holder a new idea rose...

At that point I decided to leave the idea to send the base in
one. The preparations for the „Holder phase” were just
behind the corner.

The first thing that I wanted to know, is the actual
parameters of the arch, to figure out, what kind of

modifications I should do to complete the task.
I've built an experimental „proto-Holder”, just to get an
idea, what am I facing with. I used cheats again, just to give
it a try. Because of the structural attributes, the CoM of the
craft was in the center of the „circle”. So even with infinite
fuel it was kinda hard to land it safely on the surface of the

Mün. I remembered
as well, that in the
vertical position I
could not launch the
Holder, so I was
started to thinking,
how could I put this
stuff into orbit
without cheats.
With even more
modified structure,

the Holder already had some pistons, to make it bigger, if
needed. In closed, „shrinked” form it had a width of 29 m,
while in fully expanded form it had a rate of 39 m.
I only had to figure out, how I will lift it off the ground.
For benninig I used a simple rocket design, and put the
Holder simply on top of it on that way that I turned it 90°,
on the side.

No surprise, the first tries were catastrophic ones. After
liftoff everything went according to plan, but then the
rocket slowly started to lose it's stability. As I found out
later, because of the structure, the whole vehicle became
unstable at a height around 10 Km, then, because of the
speed and the bad aerodynamic attributes, the rocket
exploded and severly damaged the Holder as well.

The main reason was
that the locking system
(the picture on the left),
what I built in the
Holder, was a bit heavier
and generated more
aerodynamic resistance
than the other parts, so
that part bent always
more than the rest.

The locking system

This unstabe configuration, together with the whole
construction held the fate of the mission from the start.
I had to came up with a new idea to launch the Holder
without losing the stability and control, or the whole project
would turn into ash before anything I could do...

This happened a lot of times...

The next logical step, what came to my mind, was that I

need to lower the Holder somehow, to reduce the
aerodynamic drag. With this decision – without knowing it
– I stepped on that way which could take me over the
atmosphere of Kerbin...and more.
So I built a brand new launcher for the Holder, which could
fly much better than the original design.
Of course the first try was catastrophic as well, but that
happenned after that I left the atmosphere and went
suborbital over Kerbin.

The brand new launcher design

Because I messed up the staging, the separation wasn't clear
and the core stage was still active, the core probe – which
was connected to the Holder – exploded, left the Holder
without any kind of propulsion, so it flew silently through
the space in a suborbital trajectory, until it entered the
atmosphere once again and burned up by the extreme heat.

When you forget to „Check Yo' Stagin'”

After some iteration, and some tries as well I finally
managed to safely decouple the core stage and went orbital
around Kerbin for the very first time. But because the
gravity turn wasn't very optimal, I managed to go orbit with
the nuclear engine, so after the burn I was short in dV, and
could not reach the Mün. But the launcher proved itself!

The very first, clear separation from the launcher

With some smaller modifications on the launcher and a
more rational gravity turn finally I arrived to the Mün with
the Holder. I was so excited about it that even I forgot to put
some solar panels on it. So I gained EC from the engines
which foreshadowed a coming disaster, again.

Finally achived the first Münar orbit with the Holder

As I descended
towards the Mün
and went
suborbital, I had
to balance
between speed,
trajectory and
EC. This,
culmulated with
the high level of stress and messeing up the staging again,
led the Holder fell helplessly towards it's fate and crashed
into the Münar surface.

Some iterations and a succesful landing later I added some
wheels to the Holder so I could navigate myself to the arch.
After the succesfull landing I had to realize – since the Arch
stands not on a flat surface – that the Holder slides down
the slope, and to compensate, I burned all my RCS fuel. So
I left the wheeled-one.

Landing of the wheeled Holder (left this design later)

The main goal with the Holder was to „hug” the arch with
it somehow, so the construction could continue later. But
until I could assembly the Holder on it's destined place, I
had some serious head
aches, because lift the
Holder, turn it carefuly and
redock it without any
damage was

Fail after fail...every

time...one of the hardest
thing I' had to do in KSP.

Attempts after attempts, every time something went
wrong, out of control or just simply exploded on contact. I
really started to think about that this project will lead me to
nowhere, because I had only failure every time I tried to lift
and reassembly the Holder. I started to lost my faith in it.

But of course time after time I could handle the Holder
better and better. I also tried different strategies to see
which one could lead me to success. It may seems evident
to you but to figure out how I should do it properly without
any help – since this is the very first stock Hang-O-Base -,
it was really hard.

And the very first successed one wasn't very successful at
all, because the main probe core exploded on a hard
contact, so a part of my structure just simply fell off.

But at least I saw a very dim light at the end of the road
and regained my faith that I can do it. The last, but very
important change was made on the locker. As you saw
earlier, the original locker was a one-sided system. This
worked fine on Kerbin, but when I elevated the Holder
towards the arch, opened and later wanted to close it, it
generated a one-
directional torque, so it
turned the ends of the
Holder out of position.
To cancel this force out,
I had to redesign the
whole locker.
Also, I observed, that
the docking ports didn't

want to redock once I've managed to „hug” the arch. The
reason left unclear for me, because I had enough EC, I
managed to close them as close as I could, but still...
Huge change was made, when I built in a pair of claw into
the locker. Also doubled up the locking arms, so they won't
turn the Holder out of position, and they will hold better
than the original one. My plan worked! However one of the
docking ports exploded again, I would not use them
anyway. The new locker system, the Dual Locker and the
two claw should be more than enough for the base.

The Dual-lock system

Now we can move on to the next step...

Part III: The Tether

After the Holder was installed,
the hardest part of the project
was done. The next step, the
assembly and launch of the
Tether was in front of me. But
before launch I did a stress-
test with the Tether to figure
out the maximum weight of
the future living module.
The test was done, so I could
start to prepare the connector
for the launch.

I built a quite simple rocket
design, with a pair of liquid
fuel strap-on boosters and that
was more than enough to eject
the Tether out of the SOI of
Kerbin, towards the Mün. My
only fear was, that as for the
Holder, for the Tether the
docking ports would not work.
In this case I prepared myself
to use the claw once again.

After I arrived to the Mün, I carefully planned my
descending trajectory, so if everything goes well, I could

immediately start the docking process. The other fear I had
is, when I reach the 5 Km distance limit, would the Holder
appear/load normally or will it explode, load outside of the
arch, or so. But for my biggest surprise the Holder with it's
204 parts, and
37,3 t mass
loaded just fine.
Only the
performance
dropped from
15 to 4-5 FPS.
But I managed
to land the
Tether right
next to the arch.

With the installation of the Holder the hardest part of the
projekt was done, and all the experience I gained from it, I
could use to try to install the Tether. It took me only a few
tries to get really close to the lower, large docking port.

To reach it carefully, I couldn't use any bigger or stronger
propulsion system, so I used only the RCS and 4 Vernor
engines. With these I gently pushed myself away from the
Münar surface. towards the targeted docking port,
accurately adjusted my prograde vector to match with the
target and kept slowly ascending until I reached it.
The moment of truth arrived. If the docking ports doesn't
want to connect to each other for some reason, I'd have to
find a different way to make them one. After some
wiggiling the two suddenly docked to one. So the fear, that
the docking ports will not work, was gone. The Hang-O-
Base slowly grew. To complete it, still one thing needed...

Part IV: The Habitation Module

To complete the hanging base, I sill had to assembly and
launch the Habitation Module. Which wasn't as simple as it
seems, mostly because the HM had even worse
aerodynamic attributes
than the Holder had. I
had to redesign it too,
because researches
showed that it could
not weight more than
45 t. The final design
were just under the
limit, 44.720 t. The

launcher was the next
I had to design. I tried
with the casual
designs again (with
some little iterations
between each try) to
put the HM on the top
of a rocket. But I had
to change the design
again, because the
rocket lost it's
stability, turned sideways and exploded every time it
reached the 10 Km line. I could not use the same design as
for the Holder, so I had to be creative to build the HM's
own launcher.

The final
iteration had a
cross-like
booster design,
with two SRB's
on each one.
Dropping the
SRB's wasn't a
simple thing
either, because
they almost
collided with the Habitat, but finally I left the atmosohere
with the HM too, and after dropping the liquid boosters as
well, I could push myself towards the Mün with the nuclear
engine, which was placed on the top of the Habitat, so after

leaving Kerbin I had to fly the final part of my base
backwards.

After a quite basic Mün maneuver I succesfully landed the
HM next to the half-finished base. While descending, I
recognised that somehow in the hangar Jeb occupied one
of the Cupola Module. Maybe the launch and the landing
that's why was so smooth. Before the landing I had to mase
sure to put the HM as close to the Arch as just possible, so I
could burn as little fuel from the last tanks – which fed the
8 Vernor propulsion system.
The final phase begun. After I maneuvered the Habitation
Module under the Arch, I reignited all the Vernor thrusters.
The 44.7 t module elevated very slowly from the surface,

towards the lower end of the Tether. I had a very limited
fuel level to lift the sturcture. It means I could try only
once.

Failed a couple of times, because I usually burned up my
last drop of
fuel for the
Vernors just
before I could
dock to the
Tether, so I had
to watch every
time as the
fragile module
falls back and
crashes to the
surface,
exploding into
many pieces,
usually without
Jeb, because he
immediately

died after the impact.

But after a couple of tries I managed to dock the last part of
my Hang-O-Base. Every drop of sweat was needed to stay
on focus, and keep my head cool. After I assembled the
base, the first thing was to redone the asutostrut system.

So after every loading the base would stay in place, without
any explosion.

Part V: Epilogue

With docking the Habitation Module to the rest, the very
first fully stock Hang-O-Base, later renamed as the S. P.
Korolev with it's85.4 t is earned it's final form.

To make the base self-sustaining, I designed and installed a
fuel depot/mining base next to the arch, with a docking
platform for the RCS bikes which I brought together with
the Habitation Module.
With this little extension, the S. P. Korolev is now fully

self-sustaining, ready to gather and analyse all the data,
gathered from the deployed scientific instruments and from
the nearby biomes in it's Science Lab, meanwhile it offers
the most unique view at the home of the Kerbalkind.

The completed S.P Korolev Hanging Base Mk I

Some „in-progress”collages