Jump to content

Mountain lake landing challenge


Recommended Posts

I now have a 30-tonne stock Mk3 electric cargo seaplane I feel is worthy of this challenge. She has gigantic spoilers that allow her to land without messing with engine settings at all. Full power landings on both land and sea are possible. All that's required to take off again is to disable the spoiler. Even with a damaged engine or outrigger float, she will still fly and land well in any situation.
For a flying boat, she has excellent acceleration and maneuverability, although it's best to fly with trim or she will slowly pull up, and of course the V-tail has its typical peculiarities.
8AdRGdD.png

In case anyone wonders, no, this is not even remotely a related development to the turbo-powered prop in my PFP. That thing was monstrous (it weighed 250 tonnes fully-fueled and with a lower fuel load could fly straight up at over 100 m/s) and much more capable, albeit being a fragile laggy mess. Sadly the turbo engines on that plane no longer work. A seaplane powered by those things would also need to be absolutely huge.

Edited by Pds314
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Landing attempt #1:
Result: stranded after a crash-landing.
I have landed in the second lake, but I was in the middle of a strongly banked turn while landing and two prop strikes occurred on landing. I doubt I will be able to return to the air in this condition since it has no rudder underwater and this is more than a minor malfunction.
The nose cone also broke because of the hard impact.
PAjLTQA.png

Edited by Pds314
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Take 2:
Result: Stranded, plane totaled.
Turned too sharp before landing and ended up pointed straight at the wall. Hit nose-on and level and smashed the nosecone. Wings sheered off and 3/4 engines and all props were destroyed on impact.
ivJKR4Q.png

Edited by Pds314
Link to comment
Share on other sites

So, I have this super maneuverable plane that I made a few versions ago, and I thought I'd give it a try.

Spoiler

Z01EFCl.jpg

Approaching...

 

A5TOEKH.jpg

Since I crashed on the first, normal landing, I tried a new approach, based on an acrobatic figure I already did many times with this plane: going vertically down !

 

DQ5rEWQ.jpg

Success !

 

VxsSosO.jpg

aHTAx5y.jpg

PnUHFty.jpg

Wohoo !

 

3aluHVO.jpg

The ABX-04, landed a little further away.

Had to do a different kind of landing since I couldn't slow down enough for a normal one, main reason being no reverse. But hey, it works !

EDIT: And by reading the whole thread, I found out that my landing wasn't really in the 'rules', so I'll have to try that again.

Edited by ValCab33
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
Spoiler

 

I did Part 2 so I figured, why not do this one as well? My entry, The  "Trident1" with landing and take off!

I did a quick video of it, sorry about the quality; didn't want the upload to take forever but I might have overdone it lol. Oh well, you get the gist of it.

Edited by Rocket In My Pocket
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Finally got round to attempting this

My internet connection is poor so it'll be an hour or two before part 2 uploads - and i'll drop the craft file too :-)

Quite a learning curve,  i had to learn how to make a hydrofoil,  then graft that on the bottom of an airplane and have it ride stably though water AND air.

As regards the lake itself,  key seems to be getting a high rate of descent.    Reverse thrust alone isn't enough (it's a heavy bird),  I've got to use the induced drag from flying slow at high angle of attack to be able to descend steep enough, without gathering a load of speed.   But , if I fly too slow,  there won't be enough energy to flare and put down intact.      It looked like being a long night, but I got really lucky on my fourth try.

I repeatedly failed to get out of the lake again.   I'd  just about get airborne (12m) but hit the cliff face before i could rotate into a climb.    Eventually,  I found that by pumping fuel out of the forward most tanks i was able to make it - just !

.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

...and here's part 2.   

 

 I kept adding more hydrofoils and angling the front ones up more to try and not have it bury its nose on a water landing - this sometimes, as here, lead to problems holding the nose down in a controlled enough way to hit our top speed.    She really, really wants to climb above airbreathing altitudes a bit earlier than is optimal.    Eventually i stopped trying to hold her down and it bounces out of the atmosphere like a champagne cork.

As you can see,  I'm absolutely terrible at orbital maneuvers,  was completely confused by our high latitude launch and there were numerous corrections.       Full disclosure,  i wanted a stylish rolling horizontal landing at the end,  but either wheel physics have changed for the worse in the last patch,  or this thing is too big for the small landing gear hence the ludicrous bouncing.   It continued to dance around even after stopping.    So,  in the end i cheated and turned on  " no crash damage " for the flats landing.   It's not part of the challenge and i was disinclined to redesign then refly the whole mission at this point !

Craft file here, if anyone else wants to go to space under the incredible power of the Wheesley engine.

https://kerbalx.com/AeroGav/Puffin

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, AeroGav said:

 

Quite a learning curve,  i had to learn how to make a hydrofoil,  then graft that on the bottom of an airplane and have it ride stably though water AND air.

As regards the lake itself,  key seems to be getting a high rate of descent.    Reverse thrust alone isn't enough (it's a heavy bird),  I've got to use the induced drag from flying slow at high angle of attack to be able to descend steep enough, without gathering a load of speed.   But , if I fly too slow,  there won't be enough energy to flare and put down intact.      It looked like being a long night, but I got really lucky on my fourth try.

I repeatedly failed to get out of the lake again.   I'd  just about get airborne (12m) but hit the cliff face before i could rotate into a climb.    Eventually,  I found that by pumping fuel out of the forward most tanks i was able to make it - just !

.

Wow, that was cool.   I had my stomach in my throat at 3:40!  And a trip to Minmus afterwards, that was an very new twist. Awesome.

On one of my early attempts I had to get rid of fuel as well, but I had no way to pump it so I had to nose my plane up to the wall and run the engine flat out until I had used up more than half the tank. You can find the post on the first page of this thread about halfway down.

I hope you'll try Part II at some point.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, sturmhauke said:

Hey @Klapaucius, there's no badge for this challenge, is there? I had some ideas for one if you're interested, and part II also.

Yes there is. @cratercracker made a nice one. You will find it about halfway down on page 2 of this thread.  I don't have one for part II yet, however.  I've been relearning Illustrator, and it has been on my to-do list, but if you have an idea, go for it!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This thread is quite old. Please consider starting a new thread rather than reviving this one.

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...