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Scarab HLS Mk II

All stability problems I\'ve encountered so far in 0.16 have been related to thrust value vs amount of heavy/large parts still attached to the lifter. Spreading thrust value more gradually over staging (ie multi stage SRB/LFE activation) has alleviated a lot of stability issues for me. Also, cross bracing is your friend! :

Digging the R-7 style primary engine cluster. EDIT - I just realized that is stock parts - PRETTY!

I love anything that\'s enormous and spinning and in orbit. 8)

Call it OCD, but I tend to zip my .craft files as well. :

Ample cross-bracing is your friend.

The 'part instability' some are talking about in 0.16 seems to be an unintentional excuse for a lack of structural redundancy. This unreleased heavy rocket is rock solid all the way to orbit. It lifts 16 large fuel tanks, 12 small fuel tanks, 21 large SRBs and all the trimmings on launch without issue. The trick is effective cross-bracing at all critical points.

I don\'t know if that\'s meant as an aurora, but it sure looks cool. It would be awesome if Squad could add occasional and spectacular aurora events to the northern and southern hemispheres of Kerbin.

It just takes a quick trip to the launchpad to eyeball the extended struts and landing engines/ladders.

I also like the gameplay changes they have made in 0.16. KSP was becoming a bit too easy and run of the mill before. It has forced me to go back to the drawing board with my rocket designs, as the old ones either can\'t make orbit efficiently or have stability issues. The new designs I have found work best in 0.16 have much more similar staging/fuel proportions to real life rockets. That tells me the devs are on the right track. ;D

I second this idea. The spaceship exchange is way too busy with everything being lumped together. Sometimes people release new designs and they are shoved down a few pages before anyone notices them.

From a recent outing with my new Scarab HLS vehicle.

Could I get my new stock 0.16 Heavy Lifter System 'Scarab HLS' added to the list? (Click picture for main thread and downloads)

My lifters also tend to be rather large and complex - and I get slideshow framerates from launch till low orbit when I\'ve been able to jettison a few stages. So, in my experience, the framerate does seem directly linked to the number of parts the game engine has to keep track of at any given time. Since performance becomes much better the second I jettison my fairly complex launch stage, I get the notion the game dumps those parts from working memory, and just assigns it a coordinate as debris.

For stark and desolate beauty, it\'s gotta be the Mun!

kurtjmac

Excellent video! You\'re a pioneer!

This is the sort of smart design I like to see!

Here\'s something I came up with noodling around in photoshop - I can come up with more variations on this if I need to.

Who needs wings?

I\'ll take that into consideration for Mk II - also, I\'ll try to have that logo banged out by tomorrow.

Not sure where this design fits into the project, I started off making a light orbiter, but I think I ended up with a medium range craft. In any case, I give you the Sprinter Mk I - Download - http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2850668/sprinter/Sprinter%20Mk%20I.craft

I think the first goal should be to get together a light orbiter design, carrying enough fuel to get into stable orbit and then deorbit in a controlled manner - should also be as easy to pilot as possible. I\'d like to help as a test pilot, plus I can also create a project logo.

Well, with most missions, those 7-8 tanks are used for TMI, stabilizing Munar orbit and starting a decent to surface. In most cases, I get to the Mun with too much fuel, and I have to eject the remaining lifter stage with 1-1.5 tanks left in it right before landing (I don\'t think it could land very easily on the lifter stage). Polaris is a big platform, and it\'s about the opposite of economical when it comes to fuel consumption, it takes 48 SFBs and over 30 liquid fuel tanks to get that 7-8 (plus 2 in the lander stage) into orbit, about a 10 to 1 ratio. The only metric that guided the development was getting as much fuel as possible into orbit. It will be interesting to see how designs scale once managing program budgets is added to the game. Your lander is really neat looking, I\'ve seen a couple RCS-heavy lander designs, wondering, if you had to abort a Munar landing, could you make Munar orbit again and attempt a shot back to Kerbin on just RCS?

I\'ve had good results with the Polaris lifter getting into orbit with seven to more than eight tanks left in the second lifter stage. This I believe comes from front loading the propulsion scheme with as much SFBs as possible (if I added one more in the current design it would overheat at a given point and explode), as well as adding a long burning primary lifter stage w/at least 18-27 fuel tanks. You are welcome to take cues from my lifter design as well, let\'s work together to make Mun and back missions as easy as possible with stock parts! 8)