fourfa

My feedback on looking at Rapier tail attachments for SSTOs - you will want to do a standardized test of an SSTO in mostly horizontal flight. The test in this thread is partially a test of simple mass, unless balanced with (for instance) dead weight in a cargo bay to make all tests have strictly the exact same mass. When I did some quick flight tests on a spaceplane of mine, the drag changes dominated over mass changes. Unfortunately these weren't scientific or well documented. Test a small spaceplane with minimal external drag, use mechjeb or similar pilot mod to hold a fixed AoA like 5-10 degrees from wheels-up, prevent the Rapier from switching mode, and look at max speed and altitude gained - should work as it did in my tests. Any pilot mods working in 1.2 yet?

OK? we do already have a 1.25m cargo bay; I'm just reporting how it is. If you want it different, submit a feedback report on the tracker. The devs don't read these forums.

All aboard the patience ferry

well done, thank you

I've been playing with a lot of spaceplanes lately. I started really diving into efficiency and drag, AeroGUI etc, and that led to designs that hide as much as possible inside cargo bays. The one exception has been the landing gear, which are always visible externally and exposed to drag. I wondered what a usable design that fixes that would look like? That led here: I call it the Pantsplane. I had tried out hiding gear on small SSTOs inside the inline docking ports, which doesn't actually occlude drag, and gives you a terribly narrow track width anyway. So I needed two side-by-side cargo bays, and that required a lot of the Mk2 bicouplers or 'pants.' Kind of a fun exercise. It ended up basically looking like my RaPTOR SSTO mainly because I think it's pretty. This thing is insanely overpowered - punch go, pull up to 30 degrees, and circularize - and way overcomplicated for a simple 6x crew transport. And (particularly in the new 1.2 aero) stowed landing gear drag is truly negligible. This is strictly a cosmetic exercise. But it's fun to fly!

Can't. You can just store stuff like batteries, fuel and fuel cells, RTGs, maybe science experiments?

Objects inside the structural fuselage have drag applied to them, just as if they were outside in the airstream. I just built a plane and checked with AeroGUI. This would be a good feedback submission on the bug tracker - no reason it shouldn't behave like a cargo bay for drag purposes.

You want the AeroGUI. Activate it from the Alt-F12 cheat/debug menu. There's one window for a global aero display, and another for a per-part aero display in that part's right-click menu. You'll probably want both up.

There must be a relevant challenge thread, surely

Prior to 1.1, there was flavor text in the Jr's right-click menu in the VAB saying exactly that - that you couldn't transfer crew. Funnily enough, you could transfer crew through them just fine. I don't know if that was just left over from the long-long-ago, from the before time. In 1.1 and later, that flavor text says they have to exhale hard to squeeze through, and crew transfer remains possible.

In 1.1.3, it doesn't matter how floppy the Jr ports are. if you put landing gear or landing legs on either side, it will be autostrutted into rigidity. The docking port could be made of cake frosting, autostruts can fix any structural shortcoming. You can make some really bizarre creations this way. You can also use it to make very creative large structures, which is why the autostrut has been expanded in 1.2. You can enable it in the game settings, use it on any part you like, and structure becomes kinda unimportant. I wouldn't take it out, and plan to use it strategically and sparingly. I'm already using the gear-autostrut in 1.1.3 to enable things that don't work in previous versions (basically a reusable strut that re-struts across docking ports, instead of single-use like traditional struts). And apparently each enabled autostrut has the same physics performance hit of regular struts, so most people won't want to spam them too widely. But we probably ought to develop some taste, and a sensible way of talking about it, because things will be a little confusing for a time after 1.2 hits.

You might be interested in Interplanetary Mountaineer

I see your beard metal, and raise you one lounge reggae cover: The Final Countdown

The magic antenna on the front of the Mk2 cockpit definitely works, but I've never had a shock cone overheat in any conditions, antenna or no. No need to buff the intakes in my experience.

ssssshhhhhhh

Unfortunately not true - I'm sure everyone would benefit if MJ could do what GT does. The main innovation in GT is using automatic dynamic throttle to maintain an arbitrary time to apoapsis (though there are others). That results in a flight profile that is very close to ideal, and very educational about how non-ideal MJ's profiles are. Not that it's impossible to get close with MJ - but you will have to spend a lot of time making dozens of runs tweaking its dozens of variables to get close. Then do it again if you change the design, or change to another ship, or another location. I have spent a lot of time trying to get MJ to match GT's results; it's not worth the time.

There is one currently in development - DasValdez featured it on his stream tonight. Not yet released but I'd expect it soon after 1.2 drops official

My face hurt while that was happening

and @juvilado. If you have less intake air than you need (which you can see by right-clicking the engines during flight), you will have reduced thrust. It's possible to have 100% intake air at launch, then starve for air at hypersonic speed when those Whiplash engines (also Rapiers) gain a huge thrust boost. But having more intake air than you need at peak does nothing. It doesn't increase ceiling or top speed. In fact as all intakes have mass and drag, ideally you want to have just enough intake air but no more. One shock cone can feed a pair of Whiplash/Rapier engines through all conditions. I believe you need one precooler per Whiplash/Rapier to cover the hypersonic thrust boost. Combining both would be way in excess in terms of air. However - despite its weight, the shock cone makes a very good nose (or tail) cone simply because it has low drag. Beyond that, lots of good advice in this thread so far. My advice would be to simplify as much as possible. Do you need 4 Whiplashes? For a payload of one pilot? I never have. You have those heavy nukes all the way at the back, so you get a big shift in CoM over the flight. Try two Whiplashes on precoolers on the back, and radial mount the pair of nukes near the center. RCS Build Aid is showing you how the full CoM (yellow) moves when you burn all the fuel (red). Try to move the nukes forward and back until the red ball is very close to the yellow ball. I believe this will put the CoM very close to the center of the ship, so then you should try mounting the wings near the center instead. You are currently very light on wing - try a total of 5-6 in wing area instead. Then get rid of everything you don't need - like the radiator sticking out creating drag. No need for radiators for nukes in the current version of KSP - at least not with a ship like this.

A lot better, honestly.

Apparently it's possible the cricket sounds have been there all along, but now the birds go to sleep at night? Investigating further

No one noticed this is a more than two years old necro?

Addendum: I didn't watch in the wee hours of the morning, by which time the physics of compressed landing legs (which apparently impart impulse with no physical constraints?) had produced an orbital bombardment cannon with 156km/s of delta-V. Try from about the 12 hour mark on https://www.twitch.tv/dasvaldez/v/89258144

and @Der Anfang KSP might be more advanced than you think. First of all, this discussion is only about the Rapier, because none of the other jets have a rear attachment node at all. The Rapier is actually four smaller jets inside the single piece (note that it can produce vectored roll all by itself). Each of these has a defined point in space where the exhaust and thrust originates (I hear people call this the 'thrust transform'). If your rear nose cone surface obstructs the actual thrust transform, it will be incinerated and/or you won't produce thrust. If you tuck the cone in just the right amount, it doesn't. Try it yourself - place a nose cone or shock cone intake on the back, watch it blow up. Then use the offset tool with angle snap on - five snaps is the sweet spot for the shock cone intake. It's not obvious why, but the shock cone seems to have the best overall drag reduction despite its somewhat large mass and higher drag numbers listed in its cfg, so it's the usual tail accessory for rapiers. The tiny nose cone in the video is actually not as good as the clipped shock cone. But without clipping, it sits just behind the thrust transform, so no incineration.

yes, let's not forget the "L" in the "STOL" of the original question