Hi All

I'm attempting to do the career mission to achieve a heliosynchronous orbit. With my current rocket I always seem to run out of fuel.

My first bunch of attempts I'd get into a circularised orbit around the 1,000km mark, but could only get to 25-30 degrees of inclination.

Then I started getting to low orbit, then trying to achieve the 100 degree inclination first. This way I've been able to get to 40-45 degrees of inclination and the apoapsis and periapsis drift out to around 700km before I run out of fuel once more.

Is it just a matter of packing on more fuel, or is there a specific sequence of tasks to achieve the orbit?

Cheers
Phil

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    I'm 2.5 years late but I wanted to let any others struggling with orbit inclinations that you're supposed to be using a formula to deduct the correct launch angle to achieve it, here, I'll explain. The launch inclination formula goes as follows, Cos(i)=Sin(A)Cos(O) where i will be the orbit inclination that you want, A will be the launch inclination (The angle that you launch at), And O will be the inclination of the launch pad.
    Now to the younger players don't get freaked out, I'll explain
    Say you want an orbit inclination of 30 degrees and you're launching at DCS pad which has an inclination of 0 degrees since it's situated on the equator, you'll plug these into the formula which will result in this: Cos(30)=Sin(A)Cos(0), you may recognize that this formula is basically just algebra, simply think of Sin(A) as x and solve, we bring sin(A) to the left of the formula and divide Cos(30) by Cos(0) which will look like this: Sin(A)=(Cos(30)/Cos0), (USE A CALCULATOR TO SOLVE THIS!!!), one this is solved you'll get the value of A which will most likely be a long string of random decimals, simply plug them into inverse sin (sin-1), this will look like
    sin-1(0.8860254038) which will result in an angle of 60 degrees meaning that in order to get an orbit inclination of 30 degrees whilst launching from DCS pad you'll need to make sure that your inclination of 60 degrees (on the orange circle in the nav ball).

    one month ago
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    Thanks all.
    Such a simple thing to start with the right direction.
    Had sooooo much fuel with the current rocket I almost achieved the mission before I activated the third stage. Did an undo then some redesign and mission achieved ... woo hoo.

    2.4 years ago
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    go up at less than full throttle if possible

    wait until you’re a few kilometers up

    tilt to 75 degrees towards where the sun rises (typically east)

    wait until you can see black when you look up

    tilt 45 degrees towards the rising sun

    go into map view and make sure your apoapsis is maybe 0.3 droo radii away from the ground

    point to the east, or west, depending on which way the play spins

    wait until you’re at the apoapsis

    full throttle until you have a circular orbit

    2.4 years ago
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    i just did the same mission, and launched with heading set to 335deg - once you start the gravity turn (and gaining lateral velocity), the inclination number starts ticking up - then as its getting close to 100 deg, small heading adjustments should set up the original low orbit with correct inclination, and normal pro grade burns to raise the orbit apo/peri - hope its a help, good luck 🚀

    2.4 years ago

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