Coga19000

So, basically, you want the Kerbal version of a Tomahawk? I do think I have some old designs on the shelf that I can make use of.

Its a matter of relative size. Those horizontal Stabilisers, as you can notice, are around half the size of the main wing, and for such a small plane you don't need a much pitch control. Now, if you want to keep them, try to balance them with a similar pair on the nose. They are called canards in this configuration (you will get some specialised Canard parts later) and in my opinion, they look GREAT

The simplest way you can go about it without modifying your spaceplane is to take advantage of the natural lift. Even at the tenuous air at the upper levels of the atmoshpere, your extreme speeds and your large wing area will give you enough Control to your vertical speed -to the point where you can start ascending again when things get to hot It might get you off track, but you can just cruise to base with your jets after reentry is over. If this is not enough, I saw airbrakes and S-Turns being suggested above. Properly implemented, these are also excellent solutions.

Don't get me wrong, I always love all your designs, these included, but your Saturn's seen to minimalistic for a proper Apollo Mission. It's a fresh and innovative approach, that's for sure -but how are you going to make the CSM and LEM? Are 1.25 meters even enough?

I did not even aknowledge of light-green bars until today. Now, this is the point I aspire to reach... Well, a second bar would be a start Anyways, I have a somewhat nutty idea; how about we all take some time off our days, aaand, rep every single post in the forum! Light green, we're, all coming to you!

I do realise that this is, well, KSP and not Super Realistic Orbit Simulator, but isn't it kind of realistic that aerobraking is so Damn hard? I mean, real life space programs never use aerocapture for a reason. Yeah, it is true that the situation is absurd for Laythe and Jool, things blowing up on the mere semblance of atmoshpere, but...

I've currently been unable to work on the Program, but as far as I had reached, eight LV-T30s were capable of barely getting the CSM to orbit in 1.0. However, it would require a sizable S-IVB stage (way to much fuel left when on my Saturn V,but it might depend on design), and it will have to fire twice at all launches except for when it has no payload.

Well, my contacts are evenly distributed between males and females.

It can still melt down-literally. The radioactive isotopes still create heart all the time, and if you cannot get rid of the excess heat, the case may melt. Anyways, this is not a bad idea. I'm not sure if it is practical to generate big enough temperature differentials, though.

Despite popular opinion, gliders are actually pretty practical in Eve's atmosphere; I love using them there. It is true that it takes much fuel to take off, however, so the best plan for SCIENCE! *ahem* is to get it off its fairing at around 10 kilometers (you can try reentering with the glider itself, but only if you feel REALLY confident about the design) and start cruising above the biomes until you find a high enough mountain to land on (I think they go up to 9 kilometers, so you can find some spots with sufferable air density) If you decide to land on some low plains, and your engines are not efficient enough, you should also give it some minor rover capability (I can feel you, bro, but sometimes the boring way is the way to go) Now, as regards design in general, Eve needs more powerful engines for takeoff but increased lift and drag means you need a smaller wingspan (but if you plan on reentering with it, you might need some extra area ruling to decelerate quicker... And lots more RCS RCS) On Duna, the opposite is generally true; you need much bigger wings than usual to induce sufficient lift, and more control sufaces to get the same torque, which will however produce more drag (you might aso opt out for RCS of you don't manage to strike a balance otherwise) Because of low gravity and air pressure, Sparks will work just fine, unless you need the plane for long ranges. Otherwise, go for Nervs or PB-IONs as mentioned by others. Reentering is a breeze on Duna, even more with lift surfaces, so just throw it in there (which is fortunate, because there is no way you can fit Duna capable wings in a fairing that doesn't look ridiculous) And your final target for gliders is of course Kerbin! Just kidding, just kidding... Except that I'm not. Laythe is the dream of every single green -skinned spaceplane engineer around. Reentry is very similar, so you should trust your plane for it only slightly less than you would for Kerbin entry (aerobrake at Jool velocities notwithstanding). The air density, terrain altitudes and gravity are so similar you don't even need a specialised craft; just get any Kerbal Airlines plane, stick it in top of a Jool-capable rocket, and cruise Laythe to your heart's content - even your bloody jet engines will work!

Well, I'm about to be the weirdo that actually knew that Fine Control provides RCS thrust balancing, but is still super happy to read that thread because he finally found out WHICH IS THE GODDAMN FINE CONTROL BUTTON! YAYYYYY OK, I'll just calm down now for a moment. Oh, and if you have slight rotation on the target craft, there is a (bit cheaty) way to solve this ;just turn on (non-physical) timewarpfor a split second, and it will be gone! This ability is a double -edged sword, though, because the reason it happens is the same reason you cannot fire Ion Engines in non -physical timewarp.

Squad generally seems to be trying to compensate for its unexpected and abrupt ISRU implementation by making it as user-friendly as balance will allow. The Scanner in a polar orbit would eventually scan the whole Kerbin anyways, so they decided to spare us the time-warping in expense of realism. Also, they got the Karbonite route instead of the Kethane route in that the resources are infinite. In exchange, they gave us a single, bulky Convertor to make Conversion Sites harder to make, but they also gave us the convenience of the new Ore resource being able to make literally any kind of fuel. Anyways, it all boils down to the casual rocketeer's convenience, and more-or-less balanced gameplay. This is also why more advanced plkayers are still free to download a more sophisticated mod and either never use the stock parts again, or outright delete them.

The marker is always on the CoM of the target object. The docking port you choose as target only dictates which side will be indicated as "Target Prograde".

I always wondered what's the deal with those. If a space company has the means to put a Kerbal on such an orbit (and then strand him there on one single part), why do they ask the KSC for help? And you know what, if you find out it's a spaceplane part, just tell them "duck you" and decline the contact.

Just something I noticed from page 3: That was a jab at the F-35, wasn't it?

Yeah, of course it is possible. It might take some practice, but is perfectly doable. Alternatively, if you're landing on a flat area and feeling lucky, you may try to keep some horizontal Velocity and land horizontally... You will have to land tail first, though.

Firstly, 11% if the population is more than enough to make humanity no longer the same. Secondly, other countries have a sizable amount of nukes, which are not enough to cripple humanity by themselves ,but will add to the total tally. Thirdly, people will still have to contend with the results of vast areas irradiated. And finally, nuclear winter. Just the ocean? People were worried about nukes igniting the goddamn atmosphere during the development of the Gadget.

Learn docking. Just do it. It is valuable knowledge. Now, if you still want a simple, single -launch station for cost saving, I do have a science design for you: 1 Science Jr. 1 Mystery Goo Whatever other experiments you have (1 each) 1 Probe Core 1 2.5m Battery Pack 2 Gigantors or 4 OX-1x6 Panels 1 Mobile Processing Lab 1 Docking Port Sr. You should be able to get quite some science from this setup, especially if combined with EVA reports. When you squeeze all the science out of it (preferably both low -and high -orbit, if you have enough fuel in the last stage), you can get a rescue for your Kerbals, and leave the module in orbit until you get good enough at docking to attach some more modules to it.

Hmmm, I see your concern. First of all, yes, I hadn't taken the mass ratio of air in account. Well, that would complicate the refueling process slightly, but we can liquify air can't we? (Well, at this point the handling difficulties and propellant inefficiency might be so large we might as well turn to specialised fuels as hudrogen, which beats the purpose a little -since the engine is now literally a NERVA in all ways possible. I'm not too sure, though ) And well, the whole point is that the Thermal energy is transferred to the propellant which is then expelled, simplifying the cooling system. Now, how different cooling systems are for liquids and gasses, I have no idea, so someone will have to indulge me on that. And a possible workaround for this would be liquidating the air from the Intakes on the fly -but at this point, again I think this is too similar to a proposed engine concept. I would think SABRE without being sure , but if that's the case, there is still the matter of the reactors presence to differentiate them. Actually... Yes, that's what I'm proposing And yes, I do agree on the air amount problem. So, would this work better with liquids? I can only assume it would, if I judge from the above post.

I have been searching for ways to construct not just an SSTO, but an SSTO that consumes no fuel at all. Being a huge KSP Interstellar fan, I obviously steered towards the Thermal Turbojet, but decided not to include a Quantum Vacuum engine, for its feasibility is anything but solidly proved. For those who don't know, a Thermal Turbojet is an engine which works by running the atmospheric air from the Intakes over the walls of a working reactor, which heats it to high velocities before it gets expelled from the nozzle. This allows an aircraft to fly (in theory) without consuming any fuel other than the reactor fuels, as long as it stays in the atmosphere. However, I realised that this kind of engine could work anywhere in deep space, as long as there is a gas flowing through the assembly. Obviously, this gas cannot come from the environment of the ship, but could be derived from gas stored on high pressure in internal tanks. This would consume the internally stored air, of course, but the propellant would still be an absurdly abundant resource that it could be refueled with on terrestrial (or other planet's with an atmosphere) soil for as long as humans have air to breathe. So, which are your opinions? Would such an assembly actually work? Would an element I did not know of prevent this? Would I need impracticably huge tanks to accomplish this? Am I missing something else? Am I ready for the funny farm after proposing such a concept? Whatever it is, let me know!

Well, what the others before me said is completely correct. But there are also many other reasons I did not see being mentioned , which are more or less these : 1) Engineering constraints- literally, the engines were a mess to work with. Most engines were unable to be throttled at almost any degree, and could only be fired once (The S-IV actually was designed to fire twice, but even that feat was stretching it) : both problems are still a major problem for the space industry. Therefore,each part of both the Saturn V and its payload was designed to meet certain Propulsion needs at specific times. The Decent Propulsion System (the LM's engine) managed to circumvent both problems at a certain degree, but with ways too experimental to be fully trusted, and the solution posed its own problems; the engine was pressure fed with helium gas, whose pressure would build up through the trip, until the system vented it into space- saving the engine from blowing up, but rendering it inoperable. This usually happened a while after the lander was safely on the Moon, which would not be a concern only if the Engine was not expected to fire again after that point. 2. Celestial body diameter. Both the Moon and Earth are HUGE compared to the Mun and Kerbin respectively. While they have the same respective gravitational forces, the Delta -V requirements to circularisation are give or take four times higher. In those ranges, and along with the distance between Earth and Moon, that's when the "every gram counts" rule really kicks in. 3) Redundancy. Oh yeah, that's the big one. See, manned spaceflight is nowhere as simple and reliable as stock KSP has lead us to believe -especially since NASA didn't have other space companies to ask which way they did it. Systems may break up, engines may fail, tanks may leak, guidance may go haywire, connection may be lost, accidents may happen -and let's face i: I don't care how bonded you are to your little green big headed (literally) suicidal maniacs, a humans life is worth much more than the life of a digital character, and much harder to preserve in space. And when something as grand as a round trip to the Moon is done for the first time in the history of forever, the risks are huge. Therefore, you have to provide your pioneers with only one way to complete the mission, but dozens of ways to walk on the Earth's crust again. Here are some major examples of necessary redundancy on the Lunar Orbital Rendevous Profile, as demonstrated throughout the Apollo Program itself : i) As demonstrated on Apollo 10, the distinction between the descent and ascent stage provided the astronauts with a way to Abort a Moon landing while it's done; if the descent engine failed for whatever reason, the ascent stage could be separated and ignited while still on a suborbital trajectory (which would obviously not be enough after a certain amount of Velocity was shed) and circularise again, with the useless descent stage fully embracing the regolith in all its glory. ii) Obviously, Apollo 13 is the greatest example of why redundancy was necessary. The Lunar Module served both as a lifeboat, providing communication and life support, and as a Propulsion System to head the whole Assembly back at home. iii) During the Apollo 15 landing, the DPS collided with the Lunar soil, which obviously is not as easy to get away with IRL as it is in KSP. The engine bell was designed to crumple harmlessly in such a turn of events, but an engine without a nozzle is extremely inefficient and totally gimbal-free, which would be a problem if the Engine had to fire again.

Well, I know for a fact that on Minmus gravity, the difference is going to be miniscule, in the order of like, fifths of meters. Now, if you want actual numbers, I'm not exactly sure if the Delta -v expended on circulation or direct ascent gravity losses are greate, but in all certainty, the difference will not leave you stranded above Minmus. If you want to be on the safe side, try the intermediate route ; launch vertically when facing towards Kerbin, then turn retrograde. You should avoid circularisation costs, AND burn perpendicular to the gravity well.

Oh, I see... I was interpreting it more than no matter what one does, the inevitable will happen anyways, so he might as well go for it.

The secret phone call that nobody back at NASA will admit to have on the records... "Hullo everyone, this is Scott Manley speaking. How can I help you? " "Hi. This is Gene Krantz speaking, from Houston . We seem to have a problem with a mission to the Moon." "What is the problem?" "An oxygen tank at the Service Module is busted. Our boss have found shelter on the Lunar Module, but they need to dispose of carbon dioxide, and the scrubbers from the Sm don't fit. " " Oh, that's a good one. Thing is, you'll have to jury rig it. First, you take the scrubbers..."

If I may be that harsh on the subject, what makes the hard science fiction community alienating for the other communities is that the hard science fiction community, because of a combination of knowing exactly what they want, being comprised of a small percentage of the world population, and having little material directed towards them, they do not feel as satisfied with someone throwing something not-too-dissimilar to their interests and waiting for their fans to throw money at them for nothing as do other communities.