Post your best Space Plane

[Talisman]

I love space planes! I almost love making them more then regular rockets, so I decided to make this thread as I know you guys have some awesome space planes to showcase.

Post your favorite space plane made from ONLY STOCK PARTS and made by YOU only. And if you want to share your top secret design please upload the craft file. 8)

Here\'s a form to use when posting your spaceplane if you want one:

Spaceplane name:

Type of plane:

Maximum Speed:

Cruising Speed:

Cruising Altitude:

Maximum Altitude:

Maximum Range:

Maximum Flight Time:

Engine type:

Engine number:

Orbital capabilities:

Can escape kerbin:

Can escape the sun:

Landing capabilities:

Can reach the mun:

Can reach minimus:

Handling:

Gliding capability:

Special notes:

Here\'s mine to give an example, It\'s the biggest plane I\'ve made and surprisingly stable, just flew it for almost 30 minutes straight.

Spaceplane name: Megalith I

Type of plane: Long range high speed atmospheric

Maximum Speed: 600 m/s ( Mach 1.8 )

Cruising Speed: 450~ m/s

Cruising Altitude: 10000m-17000m

Maximum Altitude: 18000m

Maximum Range: 1/6th kerbins circumference

Maximum Flight Time: 30 minutes (At max thrust)

Engine type: Atmospheric only

Engine number: 7 (5 in MkII) (Extreme speed variants available in 11)

Orbital capabilities: No (Some in experimental model)

Can escape kerbin: No

Can escape the sun: No

Landing capabilities: Gliding water landing, or ground landing.

Can reach the mun: No

Can reach minimus: No

Handling: Good

Gliding capability: Excellent

Special notes: Can cross the kerbin sea in 13 minutes, is 12 Mk3 tanks in length, uses delta wing. Can fly on only 3 engines which can double/triple/quadruple max range at a slow cruising speed. Can stay in air for hours at low throttle sub-sonic travel.

Pictures:

More pictures:

Movie of ship:

Can\'t wait to see what you guys have.

[E. F. Kranz]

Are we talking about spaceplanes that take off from the runway? Or does a spaceplane that launches vertically from the launch pad count?

[thermobaric]

Are we talking about spaceplanes that take off from the runway? Or does a spaceplane that launches vertically from the launch pad count?

i don\'t think so i will give post my spaceplane later i\'m currently not home now gr8 idea to post only spaceplanes, i defenitely wanna see how other people get spaceplanes into a good orbit!

[Talisman]

Are we talking about spaceplanes that take off from the runway? Or does a spaceplane that launches vertically from the launch pad count?

I think I\'ll restrict this to runway only, If you really really think your vertical take off space plane can count then post it. 8)

[Tim_Barrett]

Space plane, or rocket with wings?

[E. F. Kranz]

I normally don\'t do the 'stock only' stuff - frankly, I don\'t see the point.

But I decided to see if I could make an orbital space plane out of stock parts.

This is what I got:

It ain\'t pretty, and I haven\'t tested it in full except to make orbit, which it will do.

Launch procedure: Hold brake, throttle to full, stage jets, let loose of brake as engines come up to power. As you approach the end of the runway, stage solid rocket assist. Pull up to about 55 degrees, jettison srb\'s as they run out. Proceed to ~18km altitude. When airspeed tops out, stage rocket engine. Pull up to 80 degrees. Watch airflow of jets, disable them when <10. Proceed to ~50km altitude. Push down to horizon, throttle at full, and hang on!

Note: the final decoupler will detach your rocket engine. I.... don\'t think you should do that.

[Maxed-Rockets]

Spaceplane name: Fun-1B

Type of plane: Space Shuttle

Maximum Speed: ~375m/s in atmosphere

Cruising Speed: Glide @ 50-150m/s

Cruising Altitude: Orbit up to 3,000km

Maximum Altitude: 5,000km orbit

Maximum Range: Orbit

Maximum Flight Time: Orbit

Engine type: 6x Atmospheric/stratolaunch, 1x aerospike

Orbital capabilities: Can go anywhere except Sun escape

Can escape kerbin: Yes

Can escape the sun: no

Landing capabilities: unpowered return glide

Can reach the mun: Yes

Can reach minimus: Yes

Handling: Excellent

Gliding capability: Excellent

Special notes: Engage and hold SAS on ground, run atmo engines at full and pull up to vertical ASAP. Remain at vertical ascent until a loss of speed is observed, at first loss of speed, eject atmo engines and engage the aerospike. Start gravity turn after aerospike is engaged. No further instructions.

[fowlplaychiken]

My best spaceplane is the X-15 Starfighter I. While a few minor parts I use are not stock, they can easily be replaced with uglier stock parts with no performance loss. It is a Kerbalized combination of the hypersonic X-15 and the supersonic F-104 Starfighter, borrowing the best design elements for each based on the relative usefulness of each at the speeds my craft will be traveling. The end result is perfectly balanced and easily flyable; it can also take off and land horizontally or vertically. Finally, it can take off, fly to the Mun, fly to Minmus, return to Kerbal, and land at the KSP. I also gave it a 'spartan crew compartment' from the Kosmos station kit; I felt bad sending my Kerbals (who are already squeezed into a tiny Mark II cockpit) on multi-day trips to other planetary bodies without some sort of crew compartment. The extra weight is worth Jeb getting a good nights sleep!

Note that the entire craft was assembled in the VAB; I have reason to believe that anything assembled in the SPH will be subject to uncontrollable rolling. See this thread for details:

http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/forum/index.php?topic=15739.0

Images:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/63807837@N02/7539222108/#

http://www.flickr.com/photos/63807837@N02/7539222206/#

http://www.flickr.com/photos/63807837@N02/7539222272/#

(How do I imbed these? IMG tags do not seem to work!)

EDIT: Oops! It seems that is an older version; the version capable of the above trip has a aerospike engine in place of the center jet engine. I also added an extra set of down-canted wings for looks, at the rear.

[FunkyNige]

This is my first real attempt at a space plane, I\'m still trying to figure out what all the parts do so no sniggering at the back! I\'m afraid I had to use the MechJob to fly it as a slow computer mixed with no joystick means I can\'t fly these things very well...

Spaceplane name: Delta-01 [i know, not very imaginative but I\'m still in my experimental phase]

Type of plane: Vulcan

Maximum Speed: 389 m/s over land, 30 degree dive

Cruising Speed: 360 m/s

Cruising Altitude: 10km

Maximum Altitude: 16km

Maximum Range: Not sure, as I managed to splash down without the crew dying! So I\'ve left them there bobbing around at 50 degrees W after taking off from the runway

Maximum Flight Time: about 15 mins I think

Engine type: 4 jets, 2 ramjets

Engine number: 6

Orbital capabilities: Nope

Can escape kerbin: Nope

Can escape the sun: No

Landing capabilities: Haven\'t tried

Can reach the mun: No

Can reach minimus: No

Handling: Awful, keeps tipping the nose up

Gliding capability: Well it stays flat, but does plummet rather

Special notes: I take off using the 4 jets then switch on the two ram jets and switch off two of the normal jets.

Any comments/critique gratefully received, I think the next step is to strap a couple more ramjets to it and see if it can break orbit.

[RedDwarfIV]

Spaceplane name: Summer Sky

Type of plane: Spaceplane

Maximum Speed: [unknown]

Cruising Speed: [unknown]

Cruising Altitude: [unknown]

Maximum Altitude: [N/A]

Maximum Range: [N/A]

Maximum Flight Time: [N/A]

Engine type: NS light rocket engine

Engine number: 3

Orbital capabilities: Kerbin, Munar, Minmus, Kerbol

Can escape kerbin: Yes.

Can escape the sun: [unknown]

Landing capabilities: This sucker can moonwalk.

Can reach the mun: Yes.

Can reach minimus: Yes.

Handling: Reasonable.

Gliding capability: Medium.

Special notes: Vessel has a Cart forward landing gear for roving.

Images:

[G Addict]

Spaceplane name: Cormorant Fully Reusable LKO Testship

Type of plane: Orbit capable spaceplane

Maximum speed: Unknown maximum orbital velocity, 600m/s atmospheric.

Cruising speed: 400m/s

Cruising altitude: 12000m

Maximum altitude: Orbital, ~1Mm(untested)

Maximum range: Orbital

Maximum flight time: N/A - orbital, unknown jet endurance.

Engine type: 4x Turbojet, 2x Aerospike Rocket.

Engine number: see above

Orbital capabilities: Kerbin

Can escapie Kerbin: Untested, unlikely.

Can escape the sun: no

Landing capabilities: Powered and unpowered, reasonably flat terrain.

Can reach the mun: Untested, unlikely.

Can reach Minmus: See above

Handling: Good

Gliding capability: Reasonable

Notes: Centre of mass is slightly above centre of thrust, so tends to nose up with rockets at full throttle. Can zoom climb to 10000m on turbojets only. Rocket and jet fuel is entirely separate, and those engines function independently. The craft is fully reusable, though testing with drop tanks and jettisonable orbit assist rockets is ongoing.

[SkyHook]

To OP: How were you able to stabilize the wing? When I try to make a larger delta wing, it droops and is unstable.

[Evilgene]

Spaceplane name: Megalith I

Type of plane: Long range high speed atmospheric

Maximum Speed: 600 m/s ( Mach 1.8 )

Cruising Speed: 450~ m/s

Cruising Altitude: 10000m-17000m

Maximum Altitude: 18000m

Maximum Range: 1/6th kerbins circumference

Maximum Flight Time: 30 minutes (At max thrust)

Engine type: Atmospheric only

Engine number: 7 (5 in MkII) (Extreme speed variants available in 11)

Orbital capabilities: No (Some in experimental model)

Can escape kerbin: No

Can escape the sun: No

Landing capabilities: Gliding water landing, or ground landing.

Can reach the mun: No

Can reach minimus: No

Handling: Good

Gliding capability: Excellent

Can you post a .craft file of this plane? I really need to make a plane that is stable but all mine just keep failing

In fact, would it be a good idea to encourage everyone to upload a .craft file of their plane just like \'The stock repository\'?

\'cause I need a stable plane to steal ideas from

[Talisman]

To OP: How were you able to stabilize the wing? When I try to make a larger delta wing, it droops and is unstable.

I don\'t know, the craft is completely strutless. However when you pull up very fast the back part of the wing does bend slightly, so I don\'t know.

Can you post a .craft file of this plane? I really need to make a plane that is stable but all mine just keep failing

In fact, would it be a good idea to encourage everyone to upload a .craft file of their plane just like \'The stock repository\'?

\'cause I need a stable plane to steal ideas from

Of course, I just now attached the craft file to the main post, I somehow forgot to when I posted.

[Maxed-Rockets]

More testing of the Fun-1B has indicated that the mun and mimmus are both easily reachable, and kerbin escape isn\'t hard at all.

[Vanamonde]

No, really. This IS my best spaceplane. You\'re looking at about 12 hours\' work right there, my friends.

Edited August 18, 2012 by Vanamonde

[RedDwarfIV]

Don\'t those front two engines make your wing asplode?

[Khrissetti]

No, really. This IS my best spaceplane. You\'re looking at about 12 hours\' work right there, my friends.

I think you just broke geometry.

[Tim_Barrett]

No, really. This IS my best spaceplane. You\'re looking at about 12 hours\' work right there, my friends.

The funny thing is, I thought it was going to look awesome before clicking on the thumbnail. Ended up it was just broken!

[HarvesteR]

I wouldn\'t call it my best, because it won\'t even reach orbit, but this little guy is certainly my favorite choice to buzz the launch tower with.

It\'s called Aeris 3A:

Cheers

[Vanamonde]

Don\'t those front two engines make your wing asplode?

Yes, but then, everything makes my planes explode. ???

[Dizzle]

I wouldn\'t call it my best, because it won\'t even reach orbit, but this little guy is certainly my favorite choice to buzz the launch tower with.

It\'s called Aeris 3A:

[images]

Cheers

...and now I\'m off to build one for myself.

[geb]

If by 'best' you mean most capable, then I have still not managed to do better than the Archer.

It can go pretty much anywhere and do anything. Takeoff and landing from any solid body in the game, with lots of fuel to spare.

On the other hand, if by 'best' you mean most fun, then you\'ll need to look at my less successful designs...

I call it the Munbrick. It is the most appallingly ugly spaceplane I have ever made. Launch procedure involves leaping out of the atmosphere on jets and SRBs then accelerating to orbital velocity using the vertically mounted hover rockets.

Number of successful launches with this thing: 0

Number of fun launches with it: 30 (approx)

[bremsy]

Anyhow after fooling around a bit I decided to give building a long range plane a chance. Keeping is short this is what I got. It's the Mk.2 (lot's of pictures!)

This is my plane it takes of from the runway like a plane. Not that pretty anyways. Notice the jetisoned fuel tanks on the rear of the airplane. It's cruising speed is 300-400 m/s at 10km-15km with the jetisoned fuel tank full and attached to the plane.

This is the same plane with the fuel tank jetisoned. It's cruising speed exceeds 500 m/s at an alttitued of 13-18km aprox. (Notice I lost my rear delta wings when I jetisoned the fuel tanks, oops! The plane was still very much controllable.

MORE PICTURES! On my last fuel tank.

Initiate GLIDING PRODECURE. Notice that the mission time is at 48 minutes and 7 seconds!

My position on the map when still airborne and gliding.

Approaching my landing spot! Notice the mission time is 1 hour 4 minutes and 1 second. I have been gliding for aproximatly 16 minutes!

Perfect landing without a single mishap! touched the ground going around 40 m/s at a 5ish degree angle. I almost made it half way around the planet and certainly 1/3 of the way

My final resting position on the map.

It was by far the most entertaining build and flight I ever went trough even tho it may seem booring flying a plane in a straight line for an hour :]

My goal now is to build a plane that is capable of taking of at Kerbal space station going at 90' angle and returning back to the station from the other direction. In essence circling the globe at the equator!

Will post a pic or two if I make it. Also, still on .16

[bremsy]

Double post....My bad...

Edited October 3, 2012 by bremsy