Klapaucius

I love them. The first decent plane I built in KSP was a flying wing, and I have since built several, including some odd variants on the idea..

I don't understand why anyone would not part clip. It allows me to build very funky things and sculpt, as a real designer would. The Jaguar E-Type would never have existed if all the builders could do was bolt square fenders onto a chassis. It allows me to build insane craft, which is what I find most fun. Having said that, I do set some rules for myself. I never double up engines nor try to get ridiculous amounts of fuel by putting one tank inside the other. All my clipping is done for aesthetic and/or weight reasons. Never intentionally for fuel or power. I also once practiced the opposite. Extreme non-clipping. It is like flying an exploded diagram.

In addition to autostruts, rigid attachment works well with rockets (though never used it for planes).

As @bewing said, it only works in the mission builder menu--so you will not have that available in the standard game, but unless you are doing career, you can pretty much play the game right from there. You create a new mission and you can set a remote launch pad. I have to run out at the moment, but I will see if I can record a short video demo this evening or tomorrow which will probably be more clear than trying to explain it in words. In the meantime, go into Mission Builder and have a play around; it is a wonderful testing tool. In addition to the the portable launch pad, you can also place your ships anywhere, including the water. There is, in fact, a box you can tick to decide if you wish to place your craft on the surface of the bottom. The only catch to that is a buoyant craft will of course immediately start floating towards the surface. The launch pad is your only option if you want to hold it there without using ore tanks.

Do you have the Making History DLC? If you do, you can place a portable launch pad on the bottom of the sea (or pretty much anywhere, including the sides of mountains).

I really hope the yawn @ 0:45 makes it into the final game. It brings a whole boredom dynamic into the game. Imagine... after 2 years (because you are still learning about launch windows) you finally arrive at Duna safely and feeling pretty good about yourself only to have Val yawn as she exits the craft, implying that your lack of good planning has been noticed. It is a new kind of fail. In a perverse way, I like it. PS. Great choice of music.

You can also go into the tracking station and hide items. That can clean things up a bit.

Thank you. I won't be able to be a judge--at least for the next week, as we are heading away and I won't be online.

I'm sure this will be quickly beaten, but this is my submission on air breathers only. I can do better (did not line up well and had to make a course correction and did not maintain a consistent speed), but it is midnight, I just saw this, and we are heading away tomorrow. I wanted to sneak one in. I reused my Shirley plane, minus the drag chutes, which was originally built for my Aircraft Drag Race Challenge. 15 minutes, 57 seconds.

I was reading an article in the New York Times today talking about how Deimos is on track to escape Mars's orbit. Since all I know about orbital mechanics, I know from KSP, I am lacking in many departments. In the real world, how is this possible without an external agent? Is there some way in which Phobos's influence as they pass closer to each other changes its orbital path every so slightly so that over the course of loads of years the effect is cumulative?

5. The plane must takeoff and land horizontally. No VTOL. SSTO's welcome. 6. An exception to #5 will be made for helicopters Thus your entry qualifies. No VTOL was meant to keep folks from just stuffing a bunch of jets underneath. Not much challenge in that. I would LOVE to see video of this.

Creative accounting at its finest. Nope, it generates all its lift from the small flaps.

I'll submit this one. Uses no wings. https://kerbalx.com/Klapaucius/Petrov

Do the best you can. No strict requirements, but you should strive for a good landing on land.

Will this be available to watch after the fact for those of us in different timezones?