SSTO 0.3 in 1.2 - On request

[WanderingKid]

Below find the SSTO 0.3 which I'm putting up on request from another thread.  The craft is 30 parts, 13.325 tons, and doesn't get to space, I know.  That's not why it's here.

The primary concern in this craft is the LY-01 fixed landing gear and their tendency to kaboom, which I fixed using spring strength in the 1.35 range.  1.25-1.3 was a bit iffy on spawn due to the landing gear occasionally nuking themselves when it bounced a bit on spawn up.

Craft File: https://www.dropbox.com/s/aejmqly904hfg66/SSTO 0_3.craft?dl=0

[Kerbal101]

Hey, just to compare to what I meant with similar design: https://kerbalx.com/Kerbal101/lolplane

 

[Leafbaron]

The LY01 and LY-05 landing gear was discussed extensively here. What it boils down to is that these landing gear cannot handle much more than 8 tonnes. 

[Kerbal101]

19 minutes ago, Leafbaron said:

 What it boils down to is that these landing gear cannot handle much more than 8 tonnes. 

More than 6 tonnes (3t/wheel)
My initial problematic craft had 7.7t weight.

[Leafbaron]

@Kerbal101 The reason I said 8 is because of your lolplane haha when I flew it as it was from the craft file I was able to land it just fine. but i don't disagree either. Anything over 6 tonnes is really outside their operating GVWR. 

[Kerbal101]

@Leafbaron Hence its called lolplane. It literally looses 0 to 4 LY-01 (always LY-01, never LY-06 ) wheels depending how and where you descend.  You might want to recheck that thread, I attached the ~4t craft that can land anywhere with those wheels (no mods as usual).

Edited October 26, 2016 by Kerbal101
them, spelling mistakes

[WanderingKid]

@Kerbal101 From the other thread:

Quote

 

Actually, I will gladly hijack this thread, because

OP does not respond to my question regarding part of his mission.

Your call, I won't.

Quote

 

Thanks for providing the craft, I have just tested it in 1.2 (unmodded) and

wheels reliably blow up, like they should.

Mods: KER, DPAI, KAC, Chatterer, Blizzy Toolbar, and Ambient Light.  None of these will adjust raw files.

Quote

 

Consider upgrading to next-size landing wheel, which has double impact and stress tolerances of LY-01 ($KSP/GameData/Squad/Parts/Wheel/LandingGear/GearSmall.cfg).

Career Mode, don't have the tech yet.

2 hours ago, Kerbal101 said:

More than 6 tonnes (3t/wheel)
My initial problematic craft had 7.7t weight.

As to the viability of the wheels, I have no problems, though you cannot be rough with them, and I agree that if you don't adjust spring strength the wheels will blow off.  At the beginning of the following video, I show you what I'm talking about, where 1.35 spring strength can handle the weight, 1.0 cannot.

Afterwards, I take it for a very short flight and land without burning off almost any of my fuel and proceed to land it.  You have to come in gentle, but it works fine.  The brakes well and truly suck though for overweight craft.

Edit: Apologies, the entire 'need a new kerbal' bit was supposed to have been edited out and the loop to landing was sped up.  I must have exported the raw instead of the edited version.  Whoops.  I've corrected the video.

Edited October 26, 2016 by WanderingKid
Wrong Video posted

[Kerbal101]

Kudos for the video!

However in original thread you said that:

Quote

I have to up the springiness though to ~1.25-1.35 to keep them from detonating on impact/spawn.  Makes it bouncy to land, but they don't kaboom.

on which I responded with:

Quote

"Springiness" is unrelated to bounciness.

In this video you show that wheels fragment rightaway unless Spring Strength is increased past 1.4, which does not relate to my response.

"Spring Strength" indeed increases the distance the wheel spring can travel (visually) and increased the amount of weight wheel can carry - including the weight*speed on landing.
By increasing the "Spring Strength" you've boosted the maximum weight by just enough for the wheels not to collapse just standing.

However to decrease bounciness - "Damper Strength" setting is used, higher value (move to the right) causes less bounciness.
I think we are saying the same thing here.

 

Then later in the video you landed at less than 2m/s vertical speed and less than 60m/s horizontal speed, which is impossible without KER and is not a normal type of landing.
It falls very well in the category of

Quote

very accurate, very slow landing at very low vertical speed.

which I described in:

simply everything below "--- outdated problem approach below --- ".
If you edit or replace the LY-01 with LY-05, which only differ in "crashTolerance" value, you'll not be needed to watch your speeds so extremely careful.
What happens by such extra-accurate landing, is that "crashTolerance" is not exceeded.

You can unload your plane from nearly all fuel to get near 8t value (which mine had) and then try the regular landing (deactivate KER stats) and you'll still be crash(crushing?) LY-01 (and never LY-05) 95% of the time, because that would behavior would constantly lead to exceed of "crashTolerance" value.

[WanderingKid]

Sadly I put the wrong video up, was supposed to be edited, I posted the raw, sorry about some of the time wasting.  *facepalm*  Fixing that now for future readers, however.

Either or:

5 minutes ago, Kerbal101 said:

In this video you show that wheels fragment rightaway unless Spring Strength is increased past 1.4, which does not relate to my response.

"Spring Strength" indeed increases the distance the wheel spring can travel (visually) and increased the amount of weight wheel can carry - including the weight*speed on landing.
By increasing the "Spring Strength" you've boosted the maximum weight by just enough for the wheels not to collapse just standing.

However to decrease bounciness - "Damper Strength" setting is used, higher value (move to the right) causes less bounciness.
I think we are saying the same thing here.

We are.  I don't typically play with Damper strength, however, so part of the confuzzlement for is my lack of playing with all the toys.  By increasing spring strength without mucking with the damper, I get a bit bouncy.

6 minutes ago, Kerbal101 said:

Then later in the video you landed at less than 2m/s vertical speed and less than 60m/s horizontal speed, which is impossible without KER and is not a normal type of landing.
It falls very well in the category of

What happens by such extra-accurate landing, is that "crashTolerance" is not exceeded.

You can unload your plane from nearly all fuel to get near 8t value (which mine had) and then try the regular landing (deactivate KER stats) and you'll still be crash(crushing?) LY-01 (and never LY-05) 95% of the time, because that would behavior would constantly lead to exceed of "crashTolerance" value.

I hadn't read your post on fixing the description of the LY-01 yet, so I'm playing catchup there.  While I agree that KER allows me to rather accurate with my shallow and light descents, I'll have to play with it a bit with that shut off.  I've gotten in the habit of using the readouts during orbital descents, so I don't think twice about them anymore.  However, that'll have to wait until later when I'm not taking a few minutes out of work and can actually play with it for a bit.

[WanderingKid]

53 minutes ago, Kerbal101 said:

Then later in the video you landed at less than 2m/s vertical speed and less than 60m/s horizontal speed, which is impossible without KER and is not a normal type of landing.

It's not impossible.  I just loaded it up and goofed off with it a bunch of times landing from 70-100 m/s horizontals.  Also speed checked it on the ground and the wheels are perfectly happy rolling at 150 m/s+.  It's all about watching the downward speed next to the altimeter.  Use gentle controls (usually CAPS LOCK) and it's easier to control nose pitch.  Anything under 5 kph downward I was fine with.

Now, was I perfect?  Hells no.  I'd say I'd get 7/10 landings down without an issue at full tanks.  A pilot ejection system for when I unicycle the plane by blowing off the back wheels would be a significant safety improvement.  The wheels could use some adjustment but I'm not finding them outrageous, however.

I DO however agree that they need a description adjustment for max expected weight, and perhaps additional adjustments explaining what spring strength and dampers are supposed to do for those of us who are uninitiated.

Edited October 26, 2016 by WanderingKid

[Kerbal101]

 

 

[WanderingKid]

@Kerbal101 Wow, ouch.  If you watch closely at the end you don't come down on your rear wheels though, you come down on the front one, which pivots the back down a lot harder.  That pivoting definitely overtaxes the wheels.  My biggest problem so far has been the braking.  Even at 200% it's weak.

[Kerbal101]

@WanderingKid Thats standard-ish landing, which all vanilla aircraft survives: rise above airfield to a meter, cut off power,  drop horiz. speed to edge of stall speed and attempt to land.
It simulates pretty well the typical careless landing. The rear wheels on "SSTO 0.3" always blow up however, for exact same reasons they blew on "lolplane".

I am not saying that your aircraft is bad, or incorrect, or how you should proceed or anything like that.
I am just stating what happens and why it happens and why "me" don't perceive it to be acceptable - but its me.

You said that its career aircraft and its SSTO - if you manage to get orbit with this type of tech, you should apply for KSP Caveman Challenge

[WanderingKid]

5 hours ago, Kerbal101 said:

@WanderingKid I am not saying that your aircraft is bad, or incorrect, or how you should proceed or anything like that.  I am just stating what happens and why it happens and why "me" don't perceive it to be acceptable - but its me.

You said that its career aircraft and its SSTO - if you manage to get orbit with this type of tech, you should apply for KSP Caveman Challenge

Ack, was I coming off defensively?  Sorry, that wasn't the intent.  I was trying to be helpful, actually, not realizing what you were showing me. 

I'm still waiting to open Tier 5 aero to try the Wheesley out, I've run into a part count problem on the 0.3 and I'm waiting for the FL-T800 and stronger low-altitude engines to cut down the part count, so I'm not sure I get to the caveman challenges, but I'll have to look into it some day.