The Expanse - Solomon Epstein's Yacht (Replica)

[ScriptKitt3h]

I recently saw a post by @goduranus showcasing their way of replicating the (admittedly overpowered) fictional fusion rocket engine from the sci-fi series The Expanse, the "Epstein Drive".

This propulsion system, invented in the series' backstory by a Martian drive engineer named Solomon Epstein is a unique way to tackle the "torch ship" concept- a very high TWR fusion rocket engine with near-fantastical levels of delta-V and fuel efficiency allowing for long 1G or higher thrust burns, created as a stroke of dumb (and ultimately fatal) luck by a man tinkering with his personal spacecraft.

Now, with the capability to make Epstein Drive-propelled craft in KSP, I figured I'd tackle a replica of Mr. Epstein's infamous ship, his personal space yacht.

As the Sun rises over Duna, Solomon Kerman preps his ship for launch on the first test of his newly modified drive system...
...Little does he know that he's about to make history.

The ship utilizes a unique propulsion system, which features a group of spider engines (altered in the .craft file's values to have negative thrust % and thus mimic the high fuel efficiency and dV aspect of the Epstein Drive) and a single Vector (which mimics the high TWR and blue engine exhaust plume of the drive). This means that while you can indeed load it up in a vanilla, pure-stock game with no troubles, it is indeed "modded" in the context of having a tweaked craft file. However, this is only to accomplish the feat of replicating the insanely powerful features of the drive system without being forced to download or develop a custom part or part pack in order to do this.

^the speck in the background is Duna falling away!

Internally, there's space for up to 4 Kerbals, which can be transferred to other vessels via a docking port on the underside of the bow- docking is possible thanks to multiple RCS blocks across the ship's structure.

For reference, here is an image of this very same ship in the TV show, from Season 2:

Controls:

The ship stages to activate the engine, and you can press 4 to extend the radial antenna array (the larger one on the front section is manually raised). Light on/off toggling will not shut off the blue glow in the drive cone area.

DOWNLOAD HERE!

Hopefully other fans of the show and books will enjoy this ship as much as I have while making and testing it. If I can find the time and motivation, perhaps I'll use the same setup to make a Rocinante replica fitted with BDArmory vulcan turrets as PDCs...

Edited August 25, 2017 by ScriptKitt3h