Description

Design by Jett Quasar
Hot Keys:
1) Toggles main engines
2) Toggles NUKE engines
3) Toggles landing engines
4) Opens/deploys drills
5) Starts mining operations
6) Stops mining ops and retracts drills

A stock aircraft called Guardian-SSTO. Built with 188 of the finest parts, its root part is probeStackLarge.

Built in the SPH in KSP version 1.2.2.

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Getting to Orbit

1) Full throttle off the end of the runway (ensure the controller is facing forward - you can control from the grapplers at the front of the craft or the main controller just below the cockpit)
2) Gently pull the nose up past 45 degrees
3) Above 10 Km altitude ignite the Nukes by staging or Hot key #2
4) Above 35 Km altitude set auto-prograde marker
5) Once your apo-apsis is above 120 Km kill the main engines using Hot key #1 (leave the nukes running as you approach apo.
6) Reignite main engines for orbital insertion. Start the burn early and kill the main engines (Hot key #1) when the oxy drops below 1000 leaving the nukes running.
7) Use nukes to complete orbital insertion burn - this may take several minutes so allow this time for the burn.
8) Stop orbital insertion when peri-apsis gets above 70 Km (if you’re lucky the peri-apse will line up with the ascending node for Minmus)
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Getting to Minmus

1) The Minmus burn will take a total of 12 - 15 minutes using the nuclear engines so it is best to break it down into 3 - 4 smaller burns at periapsis.
2) On the way out activate the ISRU to process the on-board ore into liquid fuel (don’t forget to extend the solar panels and activate the radiator as well)
3) It is good to have about 1000 Oxy + Lf for the landing engines - the rest of the ore can be processed into liquid fuel.
4) Use nukes for all orbital maneuvers, and only use the landing engines for the final burn near the surface of the planet.
5) When landing, control from the docking port on top of the cockpit and then set the auto-retrograde marker to point the bottom of the ship toward the direction of travel.
6) Disable the nuclear engines (Hot key #2) and enable the landing engines (Hot key #3)
7) Slowly throttle up the landing engines, and ensure the craft isn’t nosing up or down on acceleration.
8) Adjust the thrust so that the craft remains stable by right-clicking on the center-rear aerospike landing engine and sliding the throttle up or down.
9) This craft is only rated to land on low-gravity moons - Minmus, Gilly, Pol and Bop)
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Mining Operations

1) Open bay doors and deploy drills by hitting Hot key #4
2) Start the ISRU (Liquid fuel, Oxygen and RCS fuel), fuel cells and radiators using Hot key #5 (the ladders will also extend automatically at this point)
3) Stop mining operations once all tanks are full then his Hot key #6 to retract all devices and stop all operations.
4) Before taking off you will need to adjust the throttle on the front aerospike vertical landing engine since the center of gravity of the craft shifts as the tanks fill up.
5) Due to the large fuel reserves this ship can fly anywhere but is only capable of landing on low-gravity worlds (smaller than the Mun) - but can be used as an all-in-one mining station & fuel tanker.
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Details

• Type: SPH
• Class: ship
• Part Count: 188
• Pure Stock