SSTOs! Post your pictures here~

[Red Dwarf]

I'm not going to use 2 or 3, I'm trying out 6 of them. That way they shut off in pairs as it gains altitude until it reaches apoapsis, where the nukes kick in. We'll see how it goes. Say, do you have an experience working with these wings? They tend to heat up quite a bit on reentry.

Yeah, I do a little. My normal descent to KSC from LKO is deorbit burn roughly above the desert temple, peri in line with the big island to the northeast of the KSC, at an... altitude. I am to tired to remember exact numbers right now. I'll do some testing tomorrow and see what sort of info I can get for you. Also, most of my rocket planes are built with flyback engines and a generous fuel budget for getting home in airbreathing mode. That descent probably isn't the best for gliders.

[Dakitess]

Mmh, radiators are good heat transfer system, not only good cooler, things are working in both ways so... Expose a radiator to huge temperature, it will transfer the thermal energy to the parts from the exterior, really not what ya aiming for I think ^^

Dunno if KSP is modeling this, but I'm pretty sure he does (and hope so) since it already calculate the heat receive from Kerbol Radiation. So incoming heat is a reality ^^

[Red Dwarf]

Also, maybe throw up the craft file so I can test it out myself? It makes more sense to test on your design than one of mine, and the data would be more valuable.

[DCWarHound]

Not sure why you guys are having problems with re-entry for those wings.

1.make sure apoapsis is not higher then 80km but not lower then 71km

2.drop periapsis to 50km

3.face the planes nose toward the prograde marker and make sure the plane belly is facing towards the planet

5.pull the nose up toward 45 degrees (think of a skydiver drying to slow his descend) and keep it there until your speed drops below 1000m/s

6.You can mount airbrakes or the fuel powered rcs thrusters controlled via action groups below the nose (for rcs thrusters) or on top (for airbrakes) to help you.

7.Once you have dropped below 1000 m/s speed,start up the engines to start gaining horizontal speed which will allow you to glide and save fuel (if your plane is designed well enough)

You can take advantage of your speed to make "jumps" or "dips" into the upper atmostphere if the KSP is far away to save fuel.

BTW you don't even need radiators.

[eddiew]

What is the highest orbit it can get and return?

I'm not entirely sure... it has about 700m/s in LKO without a refuel, but you could stuff another tank into the cargo bay instead of the satellite and probably get another 300.

My guess would be somewhere around 500-600km circular, and certainly enough to qualify as high orbit, if you were thinking about lab placement

[Rune]

Not sure why you guys are having problems with re-entry for those wings.

1.make sure apoapsis is not higher then 80km but not lower then 71km

2.drop periapsis to 50km

3.face the planes nose toward the prograde marker and make sure the plane belly is facing towards the planet

5.pull the nose up toward 45 degrees (think of a skydiver drying to slow his descend) and keep it there until your speed drops below 1000m/s

6.You can mount airbrakes or the fuel powered rcs thrusters controlled via action groups below the nose (for rcs thrusters) or on top (for airbrakes) to help you.

7.Once you have dropped below 1000 m/s speed,start up the engines to start gaining horizontal speed which will allow you to glide and save fuel (if your plane is designed well enough)

You can take advantage of your speed to make "jumps" or "dips" into the upper atmostphere if the KSP is far away to save fuel.

BTW you don't even need radiators.

In order to do that, you need enough control authority to keep your SSTO at a ~45º attack angle through the toughest part of reentry, when you start biting the air but are still going insanely fast (say, 40-20 kms up). Mind you, can be done, but many, many designs, while flyable, don't have that kind of maneuvering power. AND those wings overheat at the ridiculously low temperature of 1200º (compared with 2000º for rocket parts, and 2400º for spaceplane parts), which doesn't help at all.

Rune. A shame.

[DCWarHound]

In order to do that, you need enough control authority to keep your SSTO at a ~45º attack angle through the toughest part of reentry, when you start biting the air but are still going insanely fast (say, 40-20 kms up). Mind you, can be done, but many, many designs, while flyable, don't have that kind of maneuvering power. AND those wings overheat at the ridiculously low temperature of 1200º (compared with 2000º for rocket parts, and 2400º for spaceplane parts), which doesn't help at all.

Rune. A shame.

Well i posted my modded SSTO a few pages back,it also uses those wings with no modded attributes (i also had trouble with them burning up before figuring out a good descend provide).Puting airbrakes at the front or RCS thrusters below the nose is more then good enough to give you enough control to keep your nose up to 45º

If you want,i can post a video later today (hopefully after work) of me doing an ascend to 80km and then doing a descend and landing with stock parts and those wings.

Edited August 20, 2015 by DCWarHound

[Rune]

Well i posted my modded SSTO a few pages back,it also uses those wings with no modded attributes (i also had trouble with them burning up before figuring out a good descend provide).Puting airbrakes at the front or RCS thrusters below the nose is more then good enough to give you enough control to keep your nose up to 45º

If you want,i can post a video later today (hopefully after work) of me doing an ascend to 80km and then doing a descend and landing with stock parts and those wings.

Oh, don't worry, I know perfectly well how to do it, thanks! I was just pointing out why it wasn't the most optimal way to do it. But hey, to each their own, sometimes we all build stuff in an illogical way for the looks alone.

Rune. But if you plan on doing interplanetary aerocaptures...

[Jett_Quasar]

Oh, don't worry, I know perfectly well how to do it, thanks! I was just pointing out why it wasn't the most optimal way to do it. But hey, to each their own, sometimes we all build stuff in an illogical way for the looks alone.

Rune. But if you plan on doing interplanetary aerocaptures...

Yeah, I've moved on since that last failed experiment. I'm now working on the next illogical but aesthetically pleasing design. This one can go directly to Minmus for refueling.

JR

[Quarky]

The way I get my spaceplanes to handle up to 45 degree AoA on re-entry is balancing them so that the CoL is right on top of the CoM, feels a bit cheaty though especially since I use KJR.

[Majorjim!]

Yeah, I've moved on since that last failed experiment. I'm now working on the next illogical but aesthetically pleasing design. This one can go directly to Minmus for refueling.

http://i.imgur.com/LJoAesu.png

JR

No such thing as being Illogical in a video game. It's your own personal playground!

[Rune]

Yeah, I've moved on since that last failed experiment. I'm now working on the next illogical but aesthetically pleasing design. This one can go directly to Minmus for refueling.

http://i.imgur.com/LJoAesu.png

JR

You forgot to add one thing: and it looks gorgeous doing so.

No such thing as being Illogical in a video game. It's your own personal playground!

That was clearly a wrong choice of words, since I am of the same opinion. Let's call it suboptimal?

Rune. You guys should stop showcasing so much and make dedicated threads so I can compile them tomorrow!

[TeeGee]

[Hotaru]

I posted my mid-career SSTOs a couple months ago; here's the state of things in the same (1.0.2) career in the late-game, with all tech nodes unlocked:

The Starlet Mk III replaces the old T45 engine with an Aerospike and the ram inlets with shock cones, adds docking lights, and adds a Mk2 probe core in place of the SAS wheel, along with a few other minor changes. (The Mk IIIb also swaps the now-redundant avionics cone for a standard size-zero cone to save a bit of money.) There's also a light cargo version for deploying satellites and very small interplanetary payloads.

The Starlet is probably my favorite ship I've ever built in KSP, it's a very cheap (about 35,000 spacebucks per unit for a Mk IIIb), efficient way to deliver Kerbals and light cargo to LKO and personally I think it's pretty nice-looking to boot. May even try making a real-life model of it one of these days.

This is a medium cargo shuttle, mostly designed for retrieving payloads from LKO. I went with the TweakScale option to keep the part-count civilized, it's much less laggy (especially in atmo) than my attempts at a "proper" Mk3 SSTO have been. Although I ordered three of them, so far the type hasn't proved as useful as I'd expected. This is its only mission so far, to retrieve what turned out to be a Launch Escape System from LKO for a contract. In future the cargo bay may be swapped with extra fuel tanks to allow it to serve as a medium tanker.

This is the 3.75-meter version of my reusable lifter on the way up...

...and after landing. The three-tank version (so far only used twice) can put about 40 tons into LKO unassisted; this two-tank version can lift about 25 tons. Both can also use expendable boosters (solid or liquid) to carry heavier payloads. Between this, the old 2.5-meter reusable lifter, and the Starlet Cargo, my space program basically has no more use for expendable boosters.

[problemecium]

My new cargo spaceplane for 1.0.4. It still needs a bit of debugging before I post the .craft file in my ship thread.

[Mesklin]

Sporting SSTO "Protazan" - almost 1600 m/s on air in time of ascent, be carefully, do not burn

Download link: http://kerbalx.com/crafts/4821

[Nothalogh]

Sporting SSTO "Protazan" - almost 1600 m/s on air in time of ascent, be carefully, do not burn

Download link: http://kerbalx.com/crafts/4821

http://i.imgur.com/gIZI3Pnl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/yOXgQ8Kl.jpg

But where's the rocket fuel to make it orbital?

[PhylumCnidaria]

it is everywhere, but nowhere, it is existing, but it does not exist. in the infinitesimal darkness we call the Kraken.

[Mesklin]

But where's the rocket fuel to make it orbital?

One small tank was placed behind cabin, main tank was placed before cabin and hided by "Structural fuselage" for aesthetic purposes.

[CommanderSpock]

F-208 Starfighter II- Get to a 100km orbit with 100 LF and 300 O left, refuel for a lot more. It's actually really nice to fly.

[Bloody_looser]

For the very first time managed to build a Mk3 SSTO.

Definitely needs some tweaking, but hey, it got to orbit.

[kopapaka]

SSTO Clarion

Tantarés and Alchemy parts...

[Bekiekutmoar]

Qutflieg 20: able to reach LKO with about 10% of fuel left, a little bit more if ascent profile is ideal.

[eddiew]

Qutflieg 20: able to reach LKO with about 10% of fuel left, a little bit more if ascent profile is ideal.

Always respectable without rapiers ^^ I suspect you might have more fuel in LKO if you dumped some intakes though... one shock per turbojet is all you need, anything else is just extra drag and weight

- - - Updated - - -

SSTO Clarion

Tantarés and Alchemy parts...

Unconventional, I like it

[Bekiekutmoar]

Always respectable without rapiers ^^ I suspect you might have more fuel in LKO if you dumped some intakes though... one shock per turbojet is all you need, anything else is just extra drag and weight

Yeah, two Ramjets and one Aerospike in this case. Gonna cut down on intakes ... !; )