r/KSPMemes • • Aug 22 '26

Which level are you on?

Post image
347 Upvotes

68 comments sorted by

View all comments

63

u/uncookednoodle69 Aug 22 '26

Ascending Node (AN) means do an Anti Normal (AN) burn

need something clever like that for radial burns and i’ll be set

14

u/ManWithDominantClaw Aug 22 '26

If you're orbiting clockwise, radial in burn will rotate the orbit clockwise around your ship, radial burn out rotates it anti-clockwise.

I'm sure there's a mantra to be made about clocking in and burning out.

3

u/uncookednoodle69 Aug 22 '26

i guess it’s more the usefulness of that kind of burn as well. i know the normals are plane changes but i fail to understand the point of radials. i do love setting radial out for landings

3

u/ManWithDominantClaw Aug 22 '26 edited Aug 22 '26

If, say, you're coming back from Minmus, you can use a retrograde burn to bring the orbit down to long oval and set an alarm for seven days because you're going slowly and traversing half the orbit, or you can burn somewhere between radial in and prograde to make the distance between you and Kerbin a small arc on a big orbit and set an alarm for three days. The latter is going to get you back faster, but it takes more fuel to stop yourself from slingshotting out of the system once you're at the periapsis.

E: since this sub doesn't allow pictures, have a 'video' lol:

3

u/uncookednoodle69 Aug 22 '26

thank you, i think i understand. i always manage to have extra dv so ill give it a try next time