Hornet

The latest Centauri Spaceworks ship is inspired by Julia Mao's Razorback from season 3 episode one of The Expanse. Like the Razorback, the Hornet is a small fast ship.

The Hornet only has three modules.  Two of the are for engines and fuel.  It needs to be fully stocked with an 02 tank, a CO2 scrubber, and two batteries before departing from its home base.
This gives it enough fuel and power to make a quick lap out and around a planet or two before returning to base or being resupplied.

Glomar Explorer

Digging even deeper into the archive of Centauri Spaceworks, here is another vehicle from the beginning of Centauri Spaceworks:  the Glomar Explorer.  The Glomar Explorer was the first major interplanetary vehicle constructed by Centauri Spaceworks.  It was designed for a long duration mission exploring planets.

The Glomar Explorer could carry a total of 4 planetary exploration vehicles, either the LOK, Apollo CSM, LK Lander, or Lunar Module.  These would be used to decent to the surface of different planets.  The photo above has been annotated to show where the two additional landing craft would be docked.

The Glomar Explorer was constructed prior to Centauri Spaceworks having a long term presence in space.  STA and MSS were still in their original configurations and no other stations had been constructed.  Without significant space infrastructure, the Glomar Explorer was stationed in HOMm orbit in between missions.   The crew would be sent in an Orion capsule that would dock at the rear of the ship.  This same capsule would then be used to return the crew to HOM when the mission was complete.

Hawkes Bio-Systems

Hawkes Bio-Systems, a sub division of Hawkes Industries has contracted with Centauri Spaceworks to create a research facility.

This facility is a state of the art space laboratory dedicated to researching germs.  Due to the potentially biologically hazardous nature,  the station is located in the far reaches of the solar system, past JOR.  Its location will prevent any contamination of the station with Earth germs.  It will also prevent the contamination of Earth from any germs, alien or  domestic, that are being researched on the station.

This distance from home makes it a one way trip for an Orion III without refueling.  The station lacks a large fuel silo.  The small refuel module provides enough fuel to the two Voyager X engines for station keeping, but lacks the capacity to to repeatedly refuel crew change missions.  Crews set to Hawkes Bio-Systems use the Orion-E and its extended fuel capacity to make the round trip.

Orion-E with extra fuel tanks.  The trip to Hawkes Bio-System requires only one extra fuel tank instead of the two show on this version of the Orion-E.

The station relies on CSgt reactors instead of solar panels to provide a reliable source of power at this distance from the SOL.

It is rumored that Harold Hawkes himself had located several specimens of alien germs while visiting the rings of YEL.  Being a notorious germaphobe it is also rumored that he immediately left YEL orbit and headed for JOR after discovering these germs.  He prefers to let his science team do the work of handling the germs and remain isolated in his Hermit II spacecraft.

Station XST

One of the archivists, working in the Centauri Spaceworks vaults, found this old photo.  This is Station XST.   It was constructed after Station One, but before Xerces Station.

It has four Apollo CSM lifeboats docked between the solar panels.  It also supports an antenna for communicating with HOM and fuel to resupply vehicles.  The twin column station design became the basis for Xerces Station.

Retiring the Apollo CSM

Centauri Spaceworks returned the last Apollo CSM, along with a crew from STA to earth.  The Apollo CSM is being phased out in favor of the Orion III.

The Apollo CSM was the original crew transport and lifeboat vehicle for Centauri Spaceworks.  It's use started before many of the vehicles and stations posted on this blog were constructed.  Its use was discontinued in favor of the Orion III.  The Orion III has a larger crew capacity, and is easier to service with its larger drop area for cargo.  Another advantage is that the engine ignition does not have the delay of the CSM main engine, which can provide much needed seconds in an emergency.

Here are photos from the crew transfer mission that replaced the last Apollo CSM vehicle.

Orion III on launch pad 39A

Orion III en-route to STA with replacement crew.

Orion III arriving at STA

Apollo CSM departing STA

Apollo CSM during coast back to HOM

Crew module separating from service module prior to re-entry.

Splashdown! 

The Problem with the LOK and Draco Trunk

If you have played Space Agency for a significant amount of time, you have probably come across a LOK vehicle docked to a station that has lost the atmosphere in the crew module section.  You can hook it up to a station with an oxygen garden, or resupply the docking module with fresh O2 and CO2 scrubbers but, the atmosphere won't refresh in the crew module.

In Space Agency you can only access one part of a vehicle, even if the vehicle is built up out of multiple parts.  Normally this isn't a problem for most vehicles, like the Orion, because the cargo is stored in the first part, not the second.  The service module just expands the fuel capacity and adds a main engine.  However, the LOK crew module and the Draco trunk are exceptions.  Both of these cargo carrying parts are used in multi-part vehicles,  and are typically not the top vehicle.  This means that their cargo area can't have items removed from it.  This makes the Draco trunk useless as a way to transport additional cargo, and the LOK will always have a limited atmosphere supply.

As a fix to this Centauri Spaceworks interface designers propose making the cargo panel scroll-able and adding in additional sections for each part that can contain cargo.  This would allow access to the Draco trunk and the LOK crew module.

The images below illustrate a potential solution.  The LOK modules only have three cargo slots but the images show eight to validate that this interface could handle any sized module.  The first image shows the first module in the vehicle.  You can see that there is an additional section below.  There up and down arrows that can be tapped or dragged to move between the sections.

The second image shows the cargo view of a subsequent module.  The initial module's cargo segment has been scrolled up.

All of the pilots and engineers at Centauri Spaceworks hope that Nooleus will implement this solution, or some solution to the problems with the LOK and Draco trunk in the next update.

Update:  The original post proposed scrolling left and right, but was later updated to scroll up and down.

Centauri Spaceworks Sandbox

The Centauri Spaceworks sandbox is starting to getting laggy so it is time to do a house cleaning before building any more creations.  Instead of just deleting stations and ships, I wanted to take this opportunity to share the sandbox with all the other Space Agency players.  However this is a pretty awesome sandbox so I felt there needed to be a challenge involved.  Check out the sandbox contents below if you have doubts about its fabulous nature.

The Challenge

The challenge is pretty simple.  I love seeing what other people are doing in the game.  To get a copy of the sandbox, all you need to do is show what you are doing in Space Agency.  You can do this in either of two ways:

• Tweet a photo of your Space Agency creation or mission in progress.  Include @CentauriSpace  and #spaceagencygame.   Follow @CentauriSpace and you will get a direct message with the link to the sandbox.
• Share a photo of your Space Agency creation on the Space Agency wiki.  You can write a blog, or post in the photo gallery, or add a comment on the syndicated copy of this post.  Send centaurispaceworks@gmail.com and email with the link to your post and your username and you will get a reply with the sandbox.

Sandbox Contents

Centauri Spaceworks Workshop @ CSW including:

• Double docking bay door prototype
• Trident
• Sea Turtle
• Desdemona II (sister ship to the ghost ship Desdemona)
• Granite
• Joycelyn E
• Diorite
• Mica Schist
• Pufferfish
• Two pylons with support vehicles

Xerces Station @ XCS

• Docked Slug Transport
• Space Shuttle

Palm Tree Hotel @  PTH

Sun Station Icarus @ ICS

Mars Prison Station @ MP2

• Hummingbird parked nearby

Base on BLU including orbiting supply station

Base on PUR including orbiting supply station

Modified STA @ STA

Modified MSS @MSS

• Big Gulp parked nearby

High Security Station @ HSS

Mars Outpost @ RED

Sprinter II @ 2.8M  from GOL

Super Lift Launch Systems

Centauri Spaceworks Research Department recently did some launches to evaluate some of the most powerful rockets in Space Agency:

• Saturn V + Proton
• Saturn V + N1 B
• SLS Core + Advanced Boosters

All three were tested with a heavy payload of a Habitation Module, and two Hubs (plus enough fairings and tugs glue them together).

To keep the first round of testing consistent all rockets were kept at full throttle until the fuel ran out.  It may be possible to get better results by shutting down the engines for parts of the launch.

The Saturn V + N1 B was then only rocket to achieve orbit from the first round of testing.  It just barely made orbit with fuel running out slightly before obit.  The SLS + boosters did the second best. It ran out of fuel in the upper atmosphere.  The Saturn V + Proton did the worst of the three rockets.  The Proton did not have enough power to lift the payload and stalled.  It burned up all of its fuel without adding any significant altitude.

Since the SLS was so close, a second round of testing was done with throttling the engine.  This time the main engine was used until the rocket cleared the tower.  Then the main engine was shut down and the rocket relied on the boosters until they ran out.  Then the main engine was throttled back up.  This allowed the rocket to reach orbit.    As with the Saturn V + N1 B this rocket ran out of fuel a few seconds before reaching orbit.

In all of these tests, the goal was only to get the payload to orbit.  To reduce weight, the payload was typically mounted directly to the rocket instead of an intermediate tug.  This limits the ability to deliver the payload outside of HOM orbit.  However, most of Centauri's launches require the payload be delivered to the workshop assembly area, which is 170 units from HOM.  Further research will be needed to determine if adding an additional tug to enable extra-orbit delivery will impact the results.

Little Gripper

Centauri Spaceworks in collaboration with York Space Agency has developed another part:  the Little Gripper.  The Little Gripper solves the problem of attaching parts that don't have a docking port, like the communication satellite.  It has two ways it can work.

Fairing Cap

The Little Gripper can be built as part of a rocket where it stacks docking port side up.  This way anything you can attach a small stage to can be attached to a space station.  This works similar to how you can dock a small stage with a crew capsule on top.

For example if you want to have a Soyuz second stage power your space ship, you can add a Little Gripper to the top of it instead of a crew capsule.

In this mode the Little Gripper can transfer power and fuel to the rocket.  These connections can get hooked up while vehicle is still on the ground.  It can't transfer atmosphere.

Mount

The other way the Little Gripper can be used is secure a part without a docking port (or just without one in the right place) to an existing structure. First, the Little Gripper is docked to an existing structure.  Then the Little Gripper is powered on.  The exterior face of the Little Gripper works similar to the tip of the CSgtarm.  It has magnetic and suction attachments to be able to securely hold on to anything it is touching when the power is turned on.

The limitation with this mode is that it doesn't support fuel, air, or power connections.  It just hold the part in place and allows cargo to be transferred.

Half Solar Panel

Large solar panels are great from producing a lot of power, but they also take up a lot of space.  This results in the panel potentially blocking several adjacent docking ports.  Alrik Fons and the Part Development Group at Centauri Spaceworks have created a solar panel which solves this problem.

The half solar panel produces 50 power and consumes 2 power giving it a net output of 48 power.  This makes it the least powerful dedicated solar panel (excluding the MSS Sensor module which also is a pressurized module).

The advantage of the half solar panel is that it has three docking ports, more than any other solar panel.  These allow it to be attached in a variety of configurations.  It can be positioned to open directly out from the attached docking port like the MSS Solar panel (but has a much smaller clearance when retracted).

It can also be positioned to open perpendicular to the attached docking port.  This leaves one side of the half solar panel still clear and available for other modules to be attached.  No other solar panel has this capability.