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I'm trying to build VTOL crafts using new helicopter blades from Breaking ground DLC. But always when I'm building it, these crafts start crazy rotation or even don't take off. I know that real helis requires propellers on a tail to kill rotation, but how the physics works in KSP?

FOREWORD After Reactor 4 of the Chernobyl NPP exploded, large amounts of rubble, graphite moderator and other radioactive material from the destroyed reactor were ejected onto the roofs of power plant facilities. Radiation on some parts of the roof was so severe that unprotected circuitry used in remote-controlled robots failed near-immediately. To continue cleanup works rubble needed to be removed from the rooftops. Since the radiation levels would give human workers lethal doses in a matter of minutes, robotic solutions were in high demand. One of such solutions was a repurposed lunar rover (named STR-1), a remnant of the Lunokhod program outfitted with dosimetry equipment and a bulldozer blade. It's circuitry was already hardened against cosmic radiation, and such it could be quickly modified and deployed into the containment zone. Even with this protection, it only managed to clean up a couple dozen square meters of the roof before succumbing to the extreme radiation. In this challenge, you will take on this exact task. You will develop a rover with limited operation time which will help remove graphite rubble from the power plant site along with a delivery method. THE CHALLENGE The cleanup operation will consist of four major phases. 1. Rover delivery Taking off the KSC airfield, you will need to deliver the rover to the disaster site. Time will be counted with the in-game clock from the mission start to the moment, where you come within 150m of the reactor (when the distance marker disappears). In this case, the quicker the better. Point assignment rules will be elaborated on in the next section. 2. Landing your rover on the roof Since the radiation levels near the core are extremely high, you will need to minimize your time in the proximity of the reactor. From the moment of your arrival within 150m of the reactor you will have two minutes in-game time to deploy the rover onto the roof and leave the 150m perimeter. 3. Retrieving the carrier craft This section will not be timed, albeit additional points will be awarded if you can return your carrier craft to the KSC unscathed. 4. Cleaning up the roof After your carrier vehicle has landed (or crashed horribly) you can begin your operation. This section is not timed - the only limit being your battery life (to simulate radiation exposure). Points will be awarded based on how many of the 10 graphite blocks (Oscar-B fuel tanks) situated on the roof you can remove before your battery dies. The blocks are supposed to be pushed off the edge of the roof into the destroyed reactor building where they will not pose a threat. The challenge ends after your rover battery dies. RULES As with all challenges, here are some rules: 1. Your carrier craft can be a VTOL aircraft, a helicopter or even a land-based vehicle. The choice is yours in that regard and creativity in the delivery method department is greatly encouraged! 2. Your rover's only power source can be a single Z-400 battery. All other power sources such as your control modules are prohibited and need to be emptied in the hangar. 3. You may not use any power producing parts such as solar panels, fuel cells and RTGs. 4. The rover has to be delivered onto the roof via the carrier craft, e.g. it may not be deployed outside of the 150m perimeter and flown or driven onto the roof. 5. Albeit the graphite blocks may explode after being dropped into the reactor, they may not be exploded directly on the roof as a mean of their removal. 6. Using kraken drives to propel your rover is prohibited, as the whole point of this challenge is dealing with the problems within time and resource constraints. 7. Please let me know if your submission is stock + DLC or uses some other mods for ease of organization 8. For obvious reasons, the rover must be unmanned. No Kerbals can come close to the reactor, they are already green enough as they are. The points for each section will be awarded according to these rules: Section 1 - Delivery Number of points is the value of the following function: ceil(max(300 - your_time [sec], 0) / 2) Section 2 - Landing the rover Number of points is the value of the following function ceil(max(120 - your_time [sec], 0) * 4) Section 3 - Returning the carrier craft Number of points awarded is 40 - if the carrier aircraft is landed undamaged at the KSC 0 - otherwise Section 4 - Clearing the roof Number of points is the value of the following function 100 * blocks_removed HOW TO SUBMIT YOUR ENTRY First, you should download the savefile containing the powerplant set up in the correct spot. It can be found here: https://filebin.net/h67zuoh36flmrfpz Afterwards, after creating your entry you should either film your run, or document it via screenshots. If you choose to go with the screenshot route, please provide the following: 1. Screenshot of your crafts on the KSC runway at the beginning of the mission 2. Screenshot of your arrival within the 150m perimeter with the HUD enabled 3. Screenshot of your carrier craft departure with HUD enabled (if you choose to retrieve it) with the rover on the roof visible in the shot, or just a picture of the rover on the roof if your delivery method is expendable 4. Screenshot of your carrier craft landed (if you choose to retrieve it) with HUD enabled 5. Screenshot of your rover on the roof with amount of electric charge remaining at the beginning of cleanup visible 6. Screenshot of the roof after your electric charge runs out with all remaining graphite blocks visible If you have any questions regarding this challenge, feel free to ask them via messages or here in the thread itself. Have fun and good luck on your journey. If you feel that any of the rules or point awarding mechanisms need tweaking please let me know! Be wary that the power plant building contains almost 1100 parts so you may experience quite a bit of lag. This is kind of offset by the fact that the model is static and the game does not seem to lag quite as much as with most mobile spawned high-partcount crafts. With a GTX1050 and 8GB of RAM I was able to keep the FPS at about 20-25 at all times and I could execute the mission without too many lag-related issues. I will prepare a proper badge for all participants and will post it here in a few hours. Cheers. c: STOCK LEADERBOARD 1. Cela1 - 1594 pts (134 + 420 + 40 + 1000) 2. jinnantonix - 1532 pts (140 + 352 + 40 + 1000) 3. ----------------------------------------------- 4. ----------------------------------------------- 5. ----------------------------------------------- 6. ----------------------------------------------- 7. ----------------------------------------------- MODDED LEADERBOARD 1. ----------------------------------------------- 2. ----------------------------------------------- 3. ----------------------------------------------- 4. ----------------------------------------------- 5. ----------------------------------------------- 6. ----------------------------------------------- 7. -----------------------------------------------

The Osprey VTOL Testbed is an experimental airplane built to test the amazing new invention, the hinge! It handles well in forward flight, but nobody cares about that. The engine tilting is controlled with the 1 and 0 keys. The 1 key reverses the movement and the 0 key plays/pauses the movement. The Osprey takes off best with a bit of forward cowbell and will tend to pitch up until aerodynamic control can be established, so be quick with the transition to forward thrust once you take off. The plane is unstable in the full down position, but it’s useful for slowing down. To get a true hover you need to adjust the position of the hinges by reversing and play/pausing until the perfect angle is achieved. If you develop any lateral or reverse movement at sub 20m/s airspeed, you will crash. For vertical landing it’s best to carry about 10-15m/s forward velocity just to keep the nose pointing the right way. At that point it’s just a matter of controlling descent rate with the throttle. Enjoy. KerbalX link

this take off looks amazing. i'm planning to add more features to the craft.

Level: Intermediate/Advanced: You need to be able to slap together a plane that flies reasonably well before attempting a VTOL. Background reading: Start with the fantastic Basic Aircraft Design tutorial in this very forum. Craft used to illustrate this tutorial: BAK Cyclone BAK Karmilla BAK Drakula BAK Zephyr BAK Bumblebee What's a VTOL aircraft? VTOL stands for "Vertical Take-Off and Landing." A VTOL aircraft as discussed here is a craft that's designed to fly aerodynamically, using lift produced by lifting surfaces, but take off and land vertically. That's what this guide is all about, so we're not talking about VTOL rockets that don't make use of wings to produce lift. We're also not discussing helicopters here, because stock kerbals have not invented the propeller, and stock propellers are a whole big topic of their own. So this guide is about atmospheric craft designed to fly by making use of lift generated by wings, which can take off and land vertically by use of downward-pointing jets or rockets. This guide also applies to STOL (Short Take-Off and Landing) aircraft which do their thing using downward-pointing jets or rockets, because they're pretty much the same thing. Their hoverjets just have a TWR of less than 1.0. Why VTOL? Because they're fun and educational and you can. Next question? No, seriously. Is there a point? There are a few missions for which a VTOL aircraft is ideal. Kerbin has some biomes that are difficult to reach any other way. The same applies to Laythe, although it has gentler topography. Finally, it is really difficult to land a HTOL atmospheric craft on Duna because of the thin air: you'll be going really fast and terrain is really bumpy, so there's a huge risk of ending up as a big ball of fire, whereas it's very hard to land a conventional rocket lander precisely, like when you're aiming for your surface base. On the other hand, atmospheric craft are superb for exploring it for the very same reason – you can scout for the perfect spot for your base, then land precisely there. A V/STOL atmospheric craft built for Duna can drop you on any dime, anywhere on the surface. But mostly, the answer is still "because they're fun and educational and you can." The BAK Cyclone hard at work on Duna. It's a flatbed freighter suitable for shuttling base modules to and from the surface. The cargo is near the centre of mass, but because it can shift, it's important to adjust the exact balance by tuning the power on the nose hoverjet... The basics At its core, a VTOL aircraft is a plain old aircraft, with downward-pointing jets that produce a TWR of > 1.0 with the vector centred on the craft's centre of mass, and some way of controlling its attitude when it is hovering, because control surfaces do nothing at an airspeed of zero. Getting all of this into one craft is a pretty intricate business, however. In particular, there's one constraint that needs special attention: centre of mass, and the invariance thereof, as you burn fuel. In other words, your fuel tanks need to be placed symmetrically around the centre of mass so it doesn't shift as the tanks dry, and you need to get your vertical thrust vector exactly aligned with said centre of mass. Regular HTOL aircraft can afford to be a bit sloppy with this because aerodynamic forces will effectively obliterate moderate shifts in CoM -- if your plane gets a bit more tail-happy as the tanks drain it's no problem, as long as your CoM stays ahead of your CoL. Mostly anyway. Not so with VTOLs: if the CoM shifts, you're not going to be able to land vertically anymore. Here's how you go about building a VTOL under these constraints. Build yourself a plane. However, don't put any fuel tanks on it yet, and empty any fuel-containing parts that you are using. Switch on the CoM and CoT overlays. Set the thrust limiter on your main engines to zero. Your CoT vector will disappear. Add enough downward-pointing jets to lift the plane, as symmetrically as you can around the CoM, in a minimum of two pods (fore and aft). (You can add more pods to the sides if your body plan permits it.) Adjust the thrust limiter on the fore (or aft) hoverjets until the thrust vector lines up with the CoM. Add fuel tanks symmetrically around the CoM. Add RCS jets to the bottom of the craft, at the nose, tail, and wingtips. Don't forget the fuel – Vernors need oxidant, the others need monoprop. (If you're building a very small craft, you can just use a reaction wheel instead. But that's less cool.) Set up your control scheme: one action group for toggling the hover jets, another action group for toggling the main jets, plus yet another one to toggle the hover jet bays, if you're using them (as you should). There, done. Simple, eh? Hoverjet design The first challenge you're likely to hit is choice of hoverjet. The second one is likely to be aerodynamics – if you just stick on some downward-pointing jets, you will find that they produce a lot of drag, which is going to be really inefficient. Your plane will be slow and have limited range, or you'll have to make it a lot bigger to brute-force your way around that limitation. The solution is to house the hoverjets in a cargo bay of some kind, with the doors opening downwards. That way you can tuck them away for normal flight, and expose them for hovering. There are lots of ways to make this work, but here are some designs I've used successfully: Juno in a Mk 1 utility bay. Stick it inside the utility bay, rotate it to point towards an opening, move it until it's completely inside. These are easy, pretty light, and you can add more of them – within reason – for more lifting power. Array of Junos in a Mk 2 cargo bay. This needs scaffolding: you need to put something in the cargo bay that lets you attach the Junos to it. A short Mk 2 bay will fit an array of 9 Junos, and a long Mk 2 bay will fit 18. That's a lot of lifting power – three Wheesleys' worth in the bigger bay! Also a lot of parts. I hope you have a fast computer. For rocket-powered hover, use Spark, Aerospike, or Vector (if you really need a lot of hover power). Terriers will also work on Duna. Sparks will fit in Mk 1 utility bays, the bigger ones will fit in the bigger cargo bays (Mk 2, 2.5m utility bay, Mk 3). Giving them air Air-breathing hoverjets need intakes. At this point you'll probably need to go back to the plane design you started with, because air intakes are dry mass and will shift the CoM as you add them. Hint: The engine pre-cooler and engine nacelle are fantastic air intakes, and they can be mounted in-line or combined with other elements. You don't have to use their fuel capacity – you might want to leave them dry if they're not symmetrical to the CoM. Hover control The main challenge for hover control is to keep the craft horizontal. If it starts tipping in one direction, you're really likely to flip over and crash dramatically, like a tree falling over. If additionally you can give it a controlled tilt and hold it there, then it'll start accelerating in that direction, like a helicopter. This can be most helpful when transitioning to or from level flight. Option 1: RCS RCS will get the job done nicely, and looks cool to boot. You will need more jets at the nose and tail than on the wingtips, as there will be more forces on pitch when transitioning to or from level flight. Your choice of RCS jet is the Place-Anywhere or the Vernor. You may need to add several on bigger craft. Option 2: Reaction wheels Reaction wheels will balance smaller craft just fine, but are probably insufficient for bigger ones. Managing centre of mass One of the most finicky problems with VTOL craft is managing centre of mass. In principle it's simple – just place your fuel symmetrically around the dry CoM, and centre your vertical thrust vector on it – but... how? Use wing-mounted engine pods on pylons. Engines are dry mass. Mount them on pylons on the wing, and it's easy to move them forward and back to fine-tune the CoM. Put fuel tanks outside your main stack. Wing-mounted tanks, wingtip tanks, drop tanks, and side-mounted tanks flush with the body all work, as long as they can be moved backwards and forwards relative to the dry CoM. If you don't mind a bit of clipping, you can even make the latter look pretty good by clipping them a bit in the body. It makes no functional difference, but if you consider it cheating, don't do it. Use a long, light tail section. Long tails are good for stability anyway. If you make a long, light tail, you can adjust the balance of the craft by making it slightly longer or shorter without adding a lot of weight or making big design changes. Body plans I've found a few body plans to be especially amenable to conversion to VTOL. They have in common that it's easy to tweak the balance by moving things around, rather than having to add or remove pieces. Twin-boom The twin-boom design is one of my favourites, largely because it looks cool. In a twin-boom design, you have one hoverjet at the nose, and one in each of the booms. Light craft have a single engine at the rear of the fuselage. Larger ones have additional wing-mounted pods. The BAK Karmilla. This one is balanced with reaction wheels. It uses six Mk 1 utility bay-mounted Junos for hovering. The BAK Drakula. A bigger twin-boom design using two arrays of 18 Junos on each boom and a single array of 9 on the nose. Twin-Pod A twin-pod design is similar to a twin-boom, except that it has a conventional tail extending from the fuselage. The hoverjets are housed in the big wing-mounted pods. The BAK Zephyr, a rocket-powered VTOL craft designed for conducting science missions on Duna. It is entirely powered by Terriers. The absurdly big wing and control surfaces make it highly economical for high-altitude supercruising. The BAK Cyclone, delivering a station module to Duna. Note the landing area markers. The Cyclone uses Aerospikes for propulsion. Rockets are much less efficient than air-breathers, so it needs to be much bigger than a Kerbin-bound craft performing the same mission! Control schemes and flight To fly a VTOL craft, you need to be able to perform the following actions, which must be bound to a an action group: Toggle the hover jets Toggle the forward jets Control attitude If you have full RCS control, you will additionally need control for that, and if your hoverjets are inside pods, you will want a control for toggling them too. Taking off The procedure for a vertical take-off is as follows: Hoverjet pods OPEN Forward jets OFF RCS ON SAS ON Hoverjets ON Throttle MAXIMUM When off the ground at a sufficient altitude to clear obstacles, main jets ON When at sufficient speed for aerodynamic flight, hoverjets OFF, pods CLOSED, gear UP The procedure for a short take-off is the same, except that forward jets and hoverjets will both be ON from the start. The craft will lift off once generated lift + hoverjet thrust overcome its mass. Landing To land a VTOL aircraft, approach the landing zone as you would with a regular HTOL craft, until on final approach. Then: Hoverjet pods OPEN Gear DOWN Throttle ZERO Main jets OFF Hoverjets ON Keep pitching up as you approach stall speed. When you're close to it, INCREASE THROTTLE until your rate of descent nears zero. Your airspeed will also fall. When your airspeed is low enough that aerodynamic control is getting sluggish, RCS ON, SAS ON. Control your vector primarily with pitch, and your descent rate with throttle. When your airspeed is near zero and you're above your landing spot, reduce throttle until you start descending. Touch down, CUT throttle, CUT engines, BRAKES ON. You've landed. ...and that's it really! I hope you've found this short tutorial useful. Have fun with your S/VTOL craft – and don't forget there are more ways to do them as well, including helicopter-like things that don't fly aerodynamically at all. My first VTOL craft was the Bumblebee, and it's still one of my favourites!

So someone recently challenged me to make a replica of the Quinjet from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It is a cargo VTOL aircraft with a similar purpose to Boeing's V-22 Osprey. I wanted to make my replica unique, so I decided to make some stock electric/jet powered propellors for the VTOL function. But I've never really delved into the world of stock propellers before. So I was wondering if any of you had any tips on building them, or which design would be most appropriate (are high TWR propellors even possible)? Preferably they need to be relatively low profile, although I acknowledge that I may have to lose some aesthetics for functionality. The design for the aircraft will probably use MK3 parts although I could switch to MK2 for lower mass. Any help/criticism is welcome!

Craft File: https://kerbalx.com/GillyMonster/WH40k-Valkyrie-VTOL I had to take a second swing at this aircraft with all the tricks I've learned in the last 8 months. Hope you all enjoy!

In the interest of creating a proper VTOL similar to the F-35C or Harrier, I've been trying to work on creating a powered, locking hinge assembly that would allow an engine to be undocked, rotated 90 degrees, and redocked, reversibly and repeatedly, using only action groups. I've worked on it for quite a while and I've never been able to get it perfect. Here's the closest I've come: So the challenge is this: create a rotating assembly, in stock, that uses action groups to complete a powered 90-degree rotation that can be repeated indefinitely. Level 1: Create and demonstrate only the assembly. Level 2. Demonstrate that engines can be affixed to your assembly. Level 3. Build a VTOL aircraft around your assembly and demonstrate liftoff, hovering, transition, translation, and vertical landing. Level 4. Build a VTOL SSTO around your assembly and demonstrate liftoff, hovering, transition, ascent, orbit, deorbit, re-entry, and vertical landing. Lowest-mass hinge assembly wins.

Duna presents particular challenges for spaceplane design. The low gravity and thin atmosphere means that you need big wings, but once you have them, you tend to keep going forward until you drift down low enough and smack into a dune. In other words, landing can be a nerve-wracking process and it is hard to do it at all precisely. Similarly, take-off can be very dangerous as you need to build up a significant amount of speed to have enough lift to un-stick, and sufficiently flat areas for this aren't easy to find. The Brikoleur Aerospace Kombine (BAK) Zephyr solves this problem with full (Duna) VTOL capability. It carries a full science payload, a retractable solar panel for orbital use, and has reasonable crew capacity. On-surface refuelling requires the Klaw; it has an inline docking port for in-orbit refuelling. If precise positioning is not important, it's easiest and cheapest to make rocket-assisted short landings, where your hover rockets provide the lift your forward velocity doesn't. The same applies to take-offs. Craft: https://kerbalx.com/Brikoleur/Zephyr NOTE: Since the Zephyr is optimised for Duna, it is not able to even take off from Kerbin under its own power. If you want to play with it at KSC, replace the Terriers with Darts. It won't have the dV to reach orbit, but you should be able to land on the heliport at the top of the VAB. Atmospheric entry and flight to destination Set your Pe to around 10,000 m above the destination. Enter at a moderate pitch, ca. 30 degrees, and once Pe reaches the surface, control your precise landing spot with pitch (steeper = slower). Aim for a spot a few km before the target. Approach When approaching your target, slow down by making S curves or holding a steep pitch and climbing. Maintain a nose-up attitude, lower gear (which also opens the hover thruster bays), shut down the forward jets (Action 1), and start the hover jets (Action 2). You should be able to get to about 100 m/s while maintaining normal aerodynamic flight. Short landing Maintain a nose-up attitude (10-20 degrees) and gradually apply throttle to control your descent rate. Once you're down to a safe touchdown speed (recommended 40 m/s or less), lower throttle, touch down, and brake to a halt. Hover and vertical landing Pitch up sharply and apply throttle to the hover jets to kill your horizontal speed, activate RCS. Use RCS retrograde if necessary. Then switch control to up (Action 9), level out (use SAS Surface/Radial Out if necessary), control your altitude/descent rate with throttle and your horizontal vector with RCS; to move forward toggle the main jets on and off briefly (Action 1). Lower yourself to the surface by controlling throttle. Short take-off Activate both forward and hover thrusters (Action 1, Action 2), switch on RCS, apply full throttle, and pull up. Once you have enough forward speed, kill the hover thrusters (Action 2), retract gear and close the hover thruster bays, and fly yourself to orbit. Vertical take-off Activate hover thrusters (Action 2), set control point to up (Action 9), SAS to Surface/Radial out, RCS on. Then apply throttle to lift yourself off the surface. When at a sufficient altitude, activate forward thrusters (Action 1). When you have built sufficient speed, set SAS to normal mode, control forward (Action 8), RCS off, deactivate hover thrusters (Action 2), raise gear and close bays, and you're off.

EDIT: I redesigned this to look much better and with a slightly improved control scheme. Pictures updated. Did you ever sigh wistfully as you admire the aerobatic antics of pilots piloting their magnificent machines through barrel rolls, hammerhead stalls, and the Immelmann turn, and finish off with a perfect vertical landing on a helipad at the top of a high building? You need the Brikoleur Aerospace Kombine (BAK) Karmilla. The Karmilla is the ultimate teach-yourself-to-fly (and hover) machine. It makes any kind of take-off or landing easy – horizontal, vertical, or just jet-assisted short – and is so easy to fly that it gives even a novice pilot the kind of confidence that will end in a smoking hole in the ground. Just remember: the hover jet bays have to be OPEN before using the hover jets! NOTE: Brikoleur Aerospace Kombine does not endorse the kind of hotdogging depicted in the publicity shots. Controls: Gear - Toggle gear and hover jet bays 1 - Toggle forward jet 2 - Toggle hover jets 3 - Toggle thrust reverser 6 - Toggle hover jet bays 8 - Control forward 9 - Control up The BAK Karmilla is inspired by the beautiful de Havilland Vampire, with which it bears a passing resemblance. Craft here: https://kerbalx.com/Brikoleur/Karmilla

First aircraft I have released in years on here. Just recently got in the mood of building interesting space and aircraft designs. Even managed to build a few new vehicles. Without further ado, here is the Spasho-I VTOL Aircraft: https://imgur.com/a/9csHn Download Link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/7rsehhtcvsl0bqr/Spasho-I.craft?dl=0 Few might remember of my earlier attempts at VTOL space/aircraft. A good majority of them failed and haven't really built many even after 1.0 came out. I might look into bringing back the challenge about VTOL that nobody really participated in due to the sheer difficulty (even with aerodynamics added) at the time.

Ok, guys, I did something especial for you. After the years of hard work - ummm, ok, months of hard work - I presented the "Fidget". It doesn't a spaceplane which broken dV barriers, which can fly to the Eeloo, or did something similar. No, it's a workhorse. Cabotage ship, to orbit and back. But - with style, comfort, and without any recovery. Just refuel it, and fly to orbit again. Characteristics Ship class Spaceplane Wet mass 31 494 kg Dry mass 19 994 kg Part count 73 Cost 79 807 ker$ Engines 2 JX-4 Whiplash 3 J-404 Panther 1 T-1 Aerospike Dart 1 LV-N Nerv Fuel mass fraction: 36.5% Crew 1 pilot, 2 passengers Max atmo speed on ramjets 1450 m/s For vertical takeoff and landing used a group of Panther's, no LFOx engines. Transfer of center of mass close to zero for all flight time. Powerful RCS, reaction wheel, and good classic aerodinamic scheme did it stable on reentry, stable on vertical takeoff and landing and highly maneuverable (for spaceplane, I mean). dV reserves on orbit - 150-200 m/s for Aerospike, plus 500-700 m/s for LV-N, so it more than enough to reach space station on low orbit, docks with it, and returns to Kerbin with good Lf (and Ox) reserve to vertical landing. Runway doesn't needed more. Of course, its pure stock. Some more pictures: Full album: Download craft from KerbalX: https://kerbalx.com/Ajiko/TA-28VN-Fidget Flight profile and some notifications on the page of craft on KerbalX.

I may potentially create another version of this craft with a more functional cargo bay (or passenger cabin as it's referred to in the video) that can contain an SRV or probe. Suggestions are always welcome, thanks!

After few days experimenting with mining spaceplanes, i've found this is not really suits my needs. 200t+ spaceplane with VTOL engines blocks that able to carry convert-o-tron 250 and few Nerv engines is too bulky and have not really good delta-v (so, requires refuelling at orbit with other ships often) with very slow acceleration rate and quite hard to operate. So, i've decided to switch to copter-style ships. Build simple one with 16x nerv engines (in 8x blocks with two engines), 28t Mk3 liquid tank, 14.57 Mk3-2.5m adapter with LF+OX, 4.57t Mk3 monopropellant tank, some Mk1 LF tanks, two large drills (one at top - for asteroids mining and one at bottom - for planets harvesting) 2700 ore capacity (had few contracts for mining and hauling ore around), RCS, grab unit, Sr docking port and full set of scientific stuff with 3 kerbals crew capacity (one engineer and two scientists in mobile lab). Also features many lamps to mine at dark places (well, wasn't really good idea as it kills my videocard at places like Duna when turned on, i guess because it tries to calculate atmosphere's light paths). The ship is quite self-sufficient, 5000+ delta-v with quite good push (so, less boring time while accelerating), able to land and take off Duna and smaller bodies, has ability to refuel other small ships on orbits. Because large ore tanks - it is able to get large bonus delta-v (about 20%, so it will have 6000+ dv!) as you can start from small bodies full of ore and convert it is to the fuel after taking off and finishing first maneuvers. Cost is about 1 million (with first two stages to get on orbit, could save a bit if have used vtol-landing stage but was a bit lazy to build such large pusher). Contains only stock stuff, except mechjeb (can be removed, of course). Launched the ship to 200km orbit, headed to Minmus to complete "get ore from Minmus to Kerbin's orbit" contract, flew to the Ike and brought 2700 ore to the Duna's surface (had 1.7mil contract on this), made atmosphere fly with copter-style flying to get closer to old Duna base, picked experienced crew there and went back to Ike (to finish "make EVA on Ike's orbit). At launch pad To 200km orbit Final separation at orbit Heading to the Minmus Landing at Ike Mining at Ike Hauling ore to Duna Landing at Duna Picking up crew at Duna Ugh, forgot to install ladders... Well, EVA jetpacks were enough... ...But a bit tricky Taking off from Duna

Zettai ryōiki (絶対領域, lit. "absolute territory") One Morning I woke up and felt like creating the coolest car I ever made. So I did Kerborghini! Lately, in the forums and in KerbalX there seem to be a crazed with realistic looking jet-power racecars elaborately constructed out wings and fuel cells stock parts, each made with hundreds of parts carefully placed and rotated in such a way that it resembles an artist forming his vision with delicate strokes of a paintbrush on a canvas. Except the vision of these artists were to create vehicles capable of outperforming one another, either in looks or in some sort of lap time or even both. What seems like a fad in a minor sect of the KSP community soon turn into a (somewhat) fierce but ultimately healthy competition. What a handful of dedicated builders did was greatly advanced the way cars should look and handle, with new designs and techniques to conquer the road. There was a flavor to each car, a distinct telltale style that makes it easy to tell which car was built by which person. With every new uploaded craft that somebody shared with the world was one that tried to outdo the one uploaded just before, each car you could see the work and soul put in it to be the very best. I used to believe that one of the weakest aspects about KSP was the rovers. Rovers were by far my least favorite thing to build and use ever since wheels were added to the game. Rover wheels were slow, they had to be slow else they would either pop on the slightest bumps and cracks or flip out the entire vehicle when making any turn above 20 m/s unless you abused some ridiculous looking exploit. I was a kid who grew up on racing video games~I have a natural craving for speed. All the rovers felt like driving Reliant Robins with skis instead of wheels, going downhill in a sand dune while it is raining. It is just not fun for me to drive a car that doesn't look like a car, doesn't feel like driving a car, and there aren't any streets in Kerbin to drive them on. Car building was something I consider obsolete and never was part of my focus. It was something I did not understand, did not care, and did not try. It wasn't until the newer updates like 1.2.1 were the more refined physics allow for greater building. This is why I found all the new types of cars that people were building recently to be so interesting. Cars that look and drive like cars should - It was thrilling. A new unknown side of this game reveals itself to me like exploring the dark side of the mun for the first time. I grabbed the hand offered to me and wanted to see what I can do myself. I too wanted to try to the very best myself. People have told that this car is unique in the way that it looks, that it is different in design from the others, but I disagree on a personal level. To me, this car was built with somebody who holds on to old ideas and designs rather use the new techniques. If you ask me in 2015 at version 1.0.5 of the game to build a car it would look identical, down to the decision of foreboding rover wheels with aircraft landing gear instead and the placement of the Juno engines and the nosecones would be the same. It would look and handle just the car you see now. I don’t feel like I truly did create a car that feels new, that uses the newer building styles, a craft that doesn't hold up with the craft of the artisans before me. I fail my job to evolve with the community. To call it unique feels like a cruel joke because it is like saying I am the only one who builds kerbal cars like this anymore. I feel outdated, however, I do find the idea of being an artifact also charming. Why am I writing this before the post? I personally do not know. Maybe I wanted to find meaning and fulfillment by concentrating my thoughts into the screen. Maybe I just wanted to share what goes through my mind at least in theory, because when you can make others understand you, you can understand yourself better. Nah dude I'm just talking out of my ass the entire page. I just wanted to build a cool car. What Do you expect some funny text here? I just want people to download my car Special mentions to @he_162 for getting me into kerbal cars and @azimech for probably single-handedly making cars in KSP better in general and special mentions to @LABindustries who started track times and races that made everything more competitive. Bless to anyone who I forgot to mention. Did you just watch Bladerunner for the 8th time? Do you have an Itch that can only be scratched by a futuristic hovercar that can rule both the air and the land? Boy do I have the car just for you! Boring details: [Type]: SPH. [Class]: rover. [Crew]: two (2) member inside isolated cockpits, can be operated unmanned with two probecores, one (1) probecore cube at root part of the vehicle and one (1) probecore flat facing upwards for VTOL controls located on the roof. [Powerplant]: four (4) Juno turbofan jet engines and a single (1) thrust vectoring afterburning panther turbofan jet engine for horizontal Thrust two (2) panther engines in S version), twelve (12) Juno turbofan jet engines divided in four (4) groups in subsets of three (3) located at the four (4) tire like nacelles and two (2) thrust vectoring afterburning panther turbofan jet engines located centerline radially from CoG. [Ground platform]: four (4) medium size aircraft grade landing gear and four (4) small size aircraft grade landing gear used for grounded driving and maneuvering. Settings depend on version. [Controlled]: four (4) large size reaction wheels, two (2) small control surfaces for yawing, three to four (3-4) thrust vectoring engines, eight (8) aircraft landing gear steering, four (4) airbrakes. : 5.36 x 2.8 x 8.78. [Role]: VTOL flying and driving in atmospheric bodies. From Left to Right, Grade B, Grade A, Grade S It is actually three slightly different versions of the same car this time. They differ in appearance and handling. It uses a Grade based naming system but no car is really much better or worse than the other. The difference is as follows: Grade A is the standard model version and Grade B and S are derivatives. Grade B sheds weight and drag by exposing most of the bodywork giving it unparalleled agility in the air and has the best VTOL Grade S has two panther engines instead of 1 for horizontal thrust making it the fastest version of the car on the ground. Has more weight and higher part count. Grade A details Class Rover Type SPH Mass 28.18t Cost 110,743.0 No. of Stages 1 Crew Capacity 2 Part Count 175 No. of Struts 0 Root Part probeCoreCube Built in KSP 1.3.0 Size 5.36 x 2.8 x 8.78 https://kerbalx.com/Colonel_Cbplayer/Zettai-Ryouiki-Grade-A Grade B details Class Rover Type SPH Mass 26.3t Cost 98,143.0 No. of Stages 2 Crew Capacity 2 Part Count 151 No. of Struts 0 Root Part probeCoreCube Built in KSP 1.3.0 Size 5.36 x 2.8 x 8.49 https://kerbalx.com/Colonel_Cbplayer/Zettai-Ryouiki-Grade-B Grade S details Class Rover Type SPH Mass 30.72t Cost 122,743.0 No. of Stages 2 Crew Capacity 2 Part Count 202 No. of Struts 0 Root Part probeCoreCube Built in KSP 1.3.0 Size 5.36 x 2.8 x 8.79 https://kerbalx.com/Colonel_Cbplayer/Zettai-Ryouiki-Grade-S https://kerbalx.com/Colonel_Cbplayer/Zettai-Ryouiki-Grade-A https://kerbalx.com/Colonel_Cbplayer/Zettai-Ryouiki-Grade-B https://kerbalx.com/Colonel_Cbplayer/Zettai-Ryouiki-Grade-S

I've been planning to establish a long-term colonization on Laythe for a while now, considering so far the only non-Kerbin planet I ever sent Kerbals to was Duna, with a very lackluster base. Because of it being long-term, I plan to have a space station orbiting Laythe with two landers on standby, which must be almost completely reusable and be able to ferry at minimum six Kerbals from the station to the base(s), with maximum efficiency. With those restrictions in mind, and considering that I plan to keep the space station at an altitude of 150-175km(to make the rendezvous easier for me), I managed to design a hefty lander packing 3.8 m/s of dV, space for seven Kerbals, and a jumbo docking port on the bottom, which also counts on being refueled when landing on Laythe by virtue of the base(s) being equipped with fuel refineries and rovers able to ferry the fuel: As you can see, the reason for the unusual placement of the docking port(below instead of on top) is in favour of a RealChute parachute, designed to work flawlessy(mostly) on Laythe - which is why the lander is not completely coated in 'chutes. Unfortunately, RealChute has a hardcoded limit of 10 uses per parachute part, after which it will no longer work; as it will have to be replaced by a new parachute part through KIS, this is why the lander is only 95% reusable - and not using parachutes at all is a terrible idea as the lander completely loses control when entering Laythe's atmosphere - being the very first craft I've seen that prefers to fly face-first when I intend it to fly butt-first, while it's normally the other way around. (Re-entry heating is disabled in my save file because I have barely mastered proper drag-friendly crafts, let alone drag-friendly heat-freindly crafts) Nevertheless, using HyperEdit, I did multiple simulation flights with Laythe and, despite those shortcomings, de-orbiting and landing in Laythe is something the lander can do(with some trouble regarding loss of control; it can end up flying sideways and therefore gliding far away from its intended destination). The true problem is taking off again and reaching orbit: It just doesn't have enough fuel. Sure, it can attain an apoapsis that's above the atmosphere(thanks to a planet pack, the atmo height is raised to 66km instead of 50km; pressure and grav are unchanged), but it will be left with just 900-800m/s of dV left, when over 1100m/s are needed to complete the circularization. And this is without accounting the fact that the lander would still need to rendezvous with the soon-to-be space station at 150-175km of altitude... Either the lander is fuel-inefficient, or I am doing a wrong ascent profile. And I did check a guide for ascent profiles, but when I tried that, it just resulted in the lander deciding to fly into the ground. (Considering that guide was aimed toward large Kerbin crafts, it's possible its advice just doesn't apply for this situation) Thus, I'm wondering if anyone is able to help me with either/both problems. I'm looking to try and optimize its fuel consumption as much as I can(the aerospikes are the most efficient engines available: the Terrier is too weak, and everything else is either too powerful/inefficient, or has a mismatching size) to be useful in case of an emergency, and find out a more efficient way to get the lander up into Laythe orbit. As well as possibly find out what's causing the lander to completely lose control when braking into Laythe, as that will definitely end up causing problems later on regarding landing precision and the time spent ferrying Kerbals and fuel. And yes, the Center of Mass is above the Center of Lift, which is above the Center of Thrust. And here is the lander's .craft file, in case you need it or just want it.

https://gfycat.com/BothCreativeInganue This is mostly based off of another F-35B I put together about 8 months ago, but it required extensive use of vessel switching to manually control the VTOL engine. Plus, it was rather difficult to fly. Comparison album: https://imgur.com/a/RcBz6 Now, it requires minimal effort to engage and disengage the VTOL system. In fact, here's the proper procedure: Engaging VTOL: 1. Press Action Group 4 Disengaging VTOL: 1. Press Action Group 2 ... That's it. Really. I mean, when switching back to CTOL you might want to have some spare altitude/velocity, but of course that's only a suggestion. Schematic View album: https://imgur.com/a/kLOOX KerbalX Download Link: https://kerbalx.com/JollyGreenGI/F-35B-Lightning-II-ver32 The download link has much more documentation on additional features and helpful tips for operation, check it out! ______________________________ Hey guys, this is my first actual post here on the forums! Any suggestions on anything, really, will be greatly appreciated!

Hello! As a new kerbal engineer with less than 100 hours played, it's a great honour to me to present you the first VTOL supersonic plane I've made that I think may be worth it. Inspired in the new-gen USA VTOL multirol plane F-35, the Diana MkII features two J-404 "Panther" Afterburning Turbofan for horizontal movement, as well as two T-1 Toroidal Aerospike "Dart" Liquid Fuel Engines to achieve the vertical take-off and landing. Some Vernor Engines have been installed to improve stabillity during the vertical take off and landing phase and counteract the variety in the mass center due to the fuel consumption. Featuring a great maneuverability as well as a very good speed, flying the Diana Mk II is a very fun experience you won't regret it. But be aware, the fuel consuption of the T-1 Engines is so large that it will deplete all your fuel in a blink of an eye if you are not careful. The plane is 100% stock! The action groups are configured as follow: AG1- On/Off J-404 Engine AG2- Dry mode/Wet mode J-404 Engine AG3- On/Off T-1 Engine AG4- None AG5- Deploy/Retract airbrakes I really hope you enjoy and love this little aircraft as much as I have creating it! Be absolutelly free to comment what you think about it, and what you think would be good to add/remove. Post your modifications in this very post if you want, and we will discuss it! See you in the skies! DOWNLOAD LINK: https://kerbalx.com/Hipocampo/Diana-MkII

Pytheas Class Explorer This is a fully function SSTO capable of a vertical take off and landing, and weighs a total of 558.445 tons. This is by far my largest successful SSTO, let alone VTOL Album Download

HUMMINGBIRD Stock propellor VTOL/HTOL Gyroplane* * I've no idea what this would be classified as, so I'm guessing it's that. A stock, 106 part turbo-jet powered dual propellor VTOL with the ability to fly like a plane too, so you don't just fall out of the sky when you run out of fuel. FLIGHT It's really like controlling a normal jet-engined craft, no vessel switching and with so little engine wobble as to make a brave kerbal weep. Simply stage, engage SAS, throttle up and fly. She does have a slight tendency to tilt backward (the CoM really should be shifted forwards) but meh, it keeps you on your toes this way. In forward flight, you can switch off the rotor engines and fly like a plane but getting those rotor engines started again can sometimes be a bit temperamental! Give the plane a little shake if one or both of the rotors fail to spool up. And do it quick! CONTROLS AG1 Toggle forward engines AG2 Toggle forward engines dry/wet AG3 Toggle rotor engines AG4 Toggle rotor engines dry/wet DOWNLOAD Hummingbird.craft 164Kb Hope you have fun with this. If you've got any questions about the craft, I'd be happy to answer them, most probably at great length and ksp-nerdiness.

i know i need to put the engines on equal sides of the center of mass but i cant seem to figure out where they are. i know where the center of mass is but i need 2 engines on either side of it to be equal.how do i figure this out?

Welcome to my thread(I'm new to the forums) and here I post my big, small and everything in between creations

I really have come to like Beriev aircraft. I've just made another one. It's one of those times where you spend days fiddling around and getting nowhere, then suddenly you throw the thing together in about an hour. BARTINI BERIEV VVA-14 VTOL STATS Parts - 244 Weight - 90.136t Height - 9.8m Width - 25.6m Length - 29.6m VTOL - 8 x J-33 Wheesley Turbofans Starter Engines (Blast air under the wing cavity to create lift - 2 x J-33 Wheesley Turbofans Cruising Engines - 2 J-90 Goliath Turbofan ACTION GROUPS 1 - Starter and Cruising Engines Toggle 2 - VTOL Engines Toggle 3. - VTOL Engine Bay Covers Toggle 4. - Reverse Thrusters (Goliath's Only) CRAFT FILE EXAMPLE MISSION REPORT SM

In a feat of Kerbal engineering, the boys at the SPH have devised a way to make fully stock hinges and pivots! Using this breakthrough, the technology has been incorporated into the design of a new SSTO to give it VTOL capabilities, as well as enough fuel to go to Laythe and back without refueling or need for mining! In order to rotate the wings, the tilt-wing section un-docks to become a separate craft that can move independently of the main ship. It's held in place by two rings of cubic octagonal struts around some of those Oscar-B fuel tanks as a sort of axle. Torque wheels are used to rotate the wing and lock it into position using the 'radial out' marker on the navball. Finally, 4 small docking ports lock the section back in place- rejoining it with the rest of the craft fairly securely in a quadruple seal! As a lot of you have found out, in order to get the craft working as intended the nuclear and RAPIER engines had to be modified by altering their config files. Here's the video I made that I have had in the works for a while now. A lot of time and effort went into making this but I am really happy with it so I hope you enjoy watching it!