SSTOs! Post your pictures here~

[AeroGav]

13 minutes ago, Korsakovski said:

still think you should ditch the radial intakes atleast, all they do is slow you down. But well, pretty much all my Mk2 rapier-only designs are just Mk2 main fuselage with twin rapiers and shock cones attached to radial mk1 tanks, like this one I posted earlier. Sure they are fast and sleek, but the shape does get a little monotonous after a while. So I do understand the decision to use mk2 radial tanks, they do look really nice when slanted like that.

@JadeOfMaar Honestly I imagine the drag of the intakes is going to be a drop in the ocean next to the raging torrent of wind resistance coming from all the mk2 fuselage pieces.     Which is why I normally try to avoid putting any fuel in mk2 parts and use wings and strakes wherever possible.   Because of this drag problem, adding incidence angle to the wings is more necessary on a mk2 than on other designs, but this screws up the nice wing/body blending which gives mk2 much of their sleek look.    So,  I guess you're just limited to brute forcing your way to space with a really high TWR to overcome drag.        Also BTW those pointy cockpits don't allow the highest airbreathing speeds, or leisurely mesosphere skimming NERV powered  ascents to orbit

[JadeOfMaar]

@Korsakovski I'll remove the radial intakes then. It's not an issue at all to me.

@AeroGav You would be surprised. I happened to get far more lift than drag in this design. It cuts the air fairly cleanly on ascent and works very well with the shallowest of AoA. I'd much rather use a mod engine (in addition if not all/only mod engines) and brute force to orbit because stock drag's cement slippers will always clothe my feet in this game. The last thing I worry about with parts and drag is the cockpit. If it's very draggy I ignore it but I do tend to see a hellspawn of drag from the 1st through 4th parts behind the cockpit and that gets me annoyed.

What drag I did experience with this plane was very tolerable. I'm concerned for you and the suggestion of empty Mk2 tanks. If ever I have to drain fuel from some, my mind is firstly on what dV I'm going to lose to wasted volume.

[AeroGav]

4 minutes ago, JadeOfMaar said:

What drag I did experience with this plane was very tolerable. I'm concerned for you and the suggestion of empty Mk2 tanks. If ever I have to drain fuel from some, my mind is firstly on what dV I'm going to lose to wasted volume.

No, if you got mk2 fuel tanks then of course fill them, because full/empty is the same drag.   But these days, fuselages are only for Kerbals , cargo and amenities.

A recent Minmus shuttle of mine - 

Mk2 fuselage pieces hold - 360 LF (and 440 ox - mainly for landing engines)

Mk 1 fuselage pieces hold - 2400 LF (but the real reason they are there is to hide the incidence angle on the wings, which creates awful wing/body misalign from front to back)

Wings and Strakes hold - 1600LF

 

[MustaKotka]

Well, I assume there's a million of these, but who cares. It takes a full large Kerbodyne tank up.

This Super Refuel LKO makes it to LKO 70x70 with around 800m/s remaining + leftovers from the Lf for short cruising in atmosphere too. It's actually quite nice to fly.

Spoiler

 

[Shadow dream]

I have a question:

Recently I have built a lot of larger SSTOs, the kind that take ISRU with them, Scan modules for ground analysis (ISRU) and a Rover for driving arround. My favourite one was made with OPT spaceplane parts and I am happy with it. It's just capable of reaching Minmus to refuel and since it's pure LF the dV is fantastic on NERVs. Here some pics:

Spoiler

That's the Malemut Rover, it does the job.

http://imgur.com/EA9AJpy

Here's the SSTO, 310t

http://imgur.com/Fpx4x3b

Beauty shot after take off

http://imgur.com/M4CVfBx

ISRU and orbital Scanners (both), whereas the docking jr is used to dock the large scanner outside to unfold without clipping. The only major clipping on the entire ship is the second ISRU converter I slammed inside. It still looks natural though. Oh and the Radar Dish (100G one) is clipping out a bit......

http://imgur.com/VDJEEpg

Now I haven't left the Kerbin System like 4-ever. Just building, testing, fixing, testing more, etc. While I get my crafts off from Kerbin onto Minmus, thinking I got myself a nice SSTA (Single Stage to Anywhere), I noticed a huge flaw in the term "Anywhere": Eve and Tylo. *dun dun dun*. This week I have tried a little playing on those two (Alt-F12). I placed a small SSTO into Eve Orbit, deorbited and noticed the crazy atmosphere. I'm using environmental mods, lots of clouds, and I thought it was pretty awesome descending, but heat and then brick-mosphere spoiled it. Using infinite fuel allowed me to run my perfectly fine Kerbin Air Engines and try to move, but I barely reached 100m/s. There was no way I was going to leave Eve. So I tried a bigger caliber, my OPT SSTO, but I ran into pretty much the same issues, not enough thrust and therefore not enogh dV. I couldn't even get her into climbing, even slight pitches caused me to lose speed. Now just thinking about a ship with Oxidizer Engines makes me pass out; The weight, the fuel,... --- Then I went on onto Tylo, also using my OPT SSTO. But unfortunately I couldn't even go below 1000m/s orbit speed when the ground decided to kiss me, all because of lacking TWR.

I have searched YouTube for help, but the best attempt I could find was a single Mamoth powered balistic missile. So yes, it's possible to SSTO Eve, but I want to do exploration missions with that craft too and ISRU my way through the Kerbol system, not get stranded in a 92km by 92 km Eve Orbit. My craft shall be golden, just like that crazy beast Scott Manley built in his Interstellar Missions.

Now, what kind of hints and tipps can you give me to try stuff? I'm pretty sure I will need Aerospikes, or at least Rapiers to save on engine-weight and mounting points. How important are wings? On Eve ground they might be useful, but I actualy think it's way more important to gain height fast and leave brick-mosphere asap. The dV requirement is somewhere above 8K, right?

[AeroGav]

5 hours ago, MustaKotka said:

Well, I assume there's a million of these, but who cares. It takes a full large Kerbodyne tank up.

+Rep for using AeroData GUI !

[AeroGav]

1 hour ago, Shadow dream said:

have searched YouTube for help, but the best attempt I could find was a single Mamoth powered balistic missile. So yes, it's possible to SSTO Eve, but I want to do exploration missions with that craft too and ISRU my way through the Kerbol system, not get stranded in a 92km by 92 km Eve Orbit. My craft shall be golden, just like that crazy beast Scott Manley built in his Interstellar Missions.

Now, what kind of hints and tipps can you give me to try stuff? I'm pretty sure I will need Aerospikes, or at least Rapiers to save on engine-weight and mounting points. How important are wings? On Eve ground they might be useful, but I actualy think it's way more important to gain height fast and leave brick-mosphere asap. The dV requirement is somewhere above 8K, right?

Wings are absolutely crucial for making a liquid fuel only ship work, because nukes are so heavy.    Basically your lift/drag ratio and thrust / weight ratio combined are what keeps you up,  if one is weak the other has to compensate.  With NERVs weighing so much,  increasing your thrust/weight above 0.4 : 1 starts to get very costly in terms of dry mass, which  then quickly eats away the delta V advantage you get from the high ISP.

A full explanation would  run to a very long post i don't have time to make, but here's a picture -

The vast majority of the drag comes from the fuselage, so having more wing means you fly higher for a given speed which makes fuselage drag less.   This is true even if you put an incidence angle on the wings so they hit the airstream at 5 degrees for lift while the fuselage flies prograde (which is what i do in my designs).

Lift:Drag ratio of 4.237 to 1,  TWR of 0.51 to 1.    Bye bye Kerbin.

Now , regarding EVE - I say forget it with stock parts.    At minimum , you need a mod that gives you a nuclear turbojet, eg. Atomic Age, so the dense atmosphere can work for you.  Better yet,   Interstellar gives you a nuclear turbojet that can switch to closed cycle mode and run as a nuclear thermal rocket when the atmosphere gets too thin.    But it's a very amibitious modpack that has a few balance issues and glitches.    With these kind of engines you can climb steadily to 10km , where Eve's atmosphere is like Kerbin's at sea level,  then to 20km where it's like Kerbin at 10km and go supersonic.    

As regards to Tylo,  I think the best thing is to build a small Tylo lander rocket and carry it on your large spaceplane.  I used that approach on my Jool 5 mission and it worked well.

However, I'd ditch the rover if i were you.   Any rover you build will have a shorter wheelbase, less ground clearance, and flimsier wheels than the plane that carries it.  If you try too hard to solve the ground clearance problem it will have a high CG and keep flipping.  If you keep CG low to stop it flipping,  then bits of it will keep striking bumps leading to R.U.D. and dead  Kerbals.    Waste of mass.   Just taxy the plane over the ground instead.   Or like, use your wings and take off if you're going far.

Also, that ISRU setup sounds like overkill.    So long as it doesn't run out of power overnight, you can just go to max timewarp and fill a vessel of almost any size with one small drill, one small converter and one small radiator system (important, has to be the deployable version not the fixed panel as that won't pull heat from parts other than what it is directly connected to).  Do bring an Engineer though.    I don't bother with resource scanners now - who cares about mining rate?  At max timewarp,  your vessel will be full before you can prepare yourself a hot beverage.

I'd rather spend the mass on giving my motherplane decent living accomodation for my Kerbals, and maybe a lab for the cool-factor.

[Rune]

17 hours ago, Shadow dream said:

Now, what kind of hints and tipps can you give me to try stuff? I'm pretty sure I will need Aerospikes, or at least Rapiers to save on engine-weight and mounting points. How important are wings? On Eve ground they might be useful, but I actualy think it's way more important to gain height fast and leave brick-mosphere asap. The dV requirement is somewhere above 8K, right?

Tips? Well, I have one: abandon all hope of SSTOing Eve with an ISRU payload. And even if you did (because yes, it is possible to SSTO Eve, just amazingly difficult), no freaking way in heck you can then reach Gilly to refuel. That is with stock parts, of course, mods are as unlimited as the cheat menu. Other than that, if you want to reach Tylo (which is in itself quite the achievement), go with an all-rocket SSTA. They are surprisingly easy to design, once you realize what you need is a Kerbin chemical SSTO with enough nuke oomph to get itself to Minmus afterwards as a payload, plus the mining equipment, of course. Can be done with a single nuke and just two Vectors, which is a plus since the size (=part count) doesn't have to be ginormous. Mine looks like this, but VTVL could be even more efficient, since TWR is more than one at takeoff, I just wanted to be able to nail precision landings on rocks with atmosphere, easily.

 

Rune. And yes, that thing has made the Kerbin-Tylo trip for realsies.

Edited September 2, 2017 by Rune

[Shadow dream]

So seems like LF only SSTOs will by design fail to be a SSTA due to TWR missing. I like them for their fantastic dV which does 90% of the job. So time for some extended LFO designs.

I also noticed how inefficient my ISRU bay is. I designed it to be fast and look like super duty, ending up with a few wasted / dead tons. I will absolutely keep that in mind with my next design. The only time I used the small ISRU was when building a SSTO out of MK2 plane parts. However I got liquided with the small drill, which doesn't supply me with the amount of Ore I'd like. I used to put 4x min. on my craft (which was hard enough to seamlessly fit onto the ship) and still found the large drill to be worth the weight. Now I just couldn't run one inside the MK2 bay, the drill would refuse to dig due to the horizontal angle on surface. Mk3 bays on the other hand are perfect, but in return quite scream for the 2.5m Converter.

Also the idea of exchanging the rover for a small lander sounds appealing. Actualy I like rovers for their ease of driving arround. Usualy I make small ones, just perfect for the Mk2 bay, just like this one: https://imgur.com/F1Pj4ol  (I used a plane for most of the way up there). A craft the size of a big Malemut should no doubt be able to reach Tylo with some science on board.

Thank you so far for your hints and ideas, I will try to get something working :-)

[Exothermos]

16 hours ago, Rune said:

Rune. And yes, that thing has made the Kerbin-Tylo trip for realsies.

I've been playing with Tylo capable ISRU SSTOs lately.  I know you've had this one out for a while, but I have gained a lot of perspective from doing the Tylo run.  That makes this design doubly impressive.  AND it looks good!

[Rune]

15 hours ago, Shadow dream said:

I also noticed how inefficient my ISRU bay is. I designed it to be fast and look like super duty, ending up with a few wasted / dead tons. I will absolutely keep that in mind with my next design. The only time I used the small ISRU was when building a SSTO out of MK2 plane parts. However I got liquided with the small drill, which doesn't supply me with the amount of Ore I'd like. I used to put 4x min. on my craft (which was hard enough to seamlessly fit onto the ship) and still found the large drill to be worth the weight. Now I just couldn't run one inside the MK2 bay, the drill would refuse to dig due to the horizontal angle on surface. Mk3 bays on the other hand are perfect, but in return quite scream for the 2.5m Converter.

Yeah, the big drill is a must, since it's the only one that will work anywhere, not just regions of high ore concentration (so you don't really have to scan for ore and have global access), plus it allows you a decent ground clearance. OTOH, no reason to bring the heavy ISRU unless you are interested on 100% efficient ore conversion (i.e: you store fuel as ore to save tankage weight, which can be done BTW on large ships where the 4mT of ISRU are a rounding error), or you want to power the ISRU equipment with the magic of very broken KSP thermodynamics (you can power a refinery with a tiny part of the LFO mix it produces, which is very not like that IRL). But if you are patient and/or nuclear-powered, the small one saves weight and works just as fine.

7 hours ago, Exothermos said:

I've been playing with Tylo capable ISRU SSTOs lately.  I know you've had this one out for a while, but I have gained a lot of perspective from doing the Tylo run.  That makes this design doubly impressive.  AND it looks good!

Thanks! I must tell you, I had an inspired afternoon on that one. It just short of fell together without me noticing, and then it was just a bit of polish... after having percolated a lot of info subconsciously in the background, for a long time, I imagine. Still, I have taken much longer to come up with airbreathing birds... rockets are refreshingly simple by comparison.

 

Rune. Always glad to return the inspiration when I can.

[Aerospacer]

Another tiny low-tech SSTO from career - L1 spaceplane.

Tech level = science160  (2 technologies required)
Launch mass = 6.28 t
Parts = 25
Engines: 1P + 2Sp
LKO dV = 50-90 m/s.

Not so easy for beginners in ascend to orbit, but quite easy for reentry and final maneuvering before landing.

(more scrshots -

Spoiler

LKO:

After reentry and maneuring:

Landing successful

L-1 craft file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/1iye861tghslus6/Mini Spaceplane - L1.craft?dl=0

[MustaKotka]

On 10/05/2017 at 2:33 PM, MustaKotka said:

This will be the last entry in the now-miniseries of super light SSTOs. The margins are getting thin and I don't think I can do much more in the realm of superlight SSTOs after this. As always, completely stock game.

Hello again!

I promised I wouldn't be able to do much regarding these...so we're not stock anymore and we're sticking to mods that say they're fairly stock friendly. You be the judge of that. They mostly fill holes in the stock part catalogue: Modular Rocket Systems and RLA Stockalike Recontinued! Because who would want to see a tweakscaled Rapier, the most OP thing ever?

Anyway, enjoy!

So what is this? It is the Tiny Speedbird:

• 0.625m turbojet
• 0.625m thermonuclear engine ×2
• 2.753t
• 98Lf

Spoiler

Two seats. Plenty of legroom. Hand luggage allowed this time!

So there's the short nuclear generator from RLA Recontinued. The Oscar B is actually empty of oxidizer, so you could replace the nuclear generator with a fuel cell and add a little oxidizer. The probe core serves two functions: I can take an engineer and a scientist and not care about their flying skills. Secondly, I'm too lazy to test the craft with Kerbals in it because it's tedious to put them there.

This is where the magic happens. The intake is a stock Shock Cone because it has really good drag values. The engines are not. I think the turbojet is based on Whiplash and the nukes are definitely Nerva derivatives. We fly to ~25km @1400m/s and then fire the nukes a little above 30km. Depending on your exact angle the craft circularizes almost on its own.

So you're left with a little over 7 units of fuel. How much is that?

It's almost 120m/s!

 

[Jett_Quasar]

Not yo mama's SSTO...

Download from my Star Wars Hangar on Kerbal-X now!

 - Jett

[Speed_Kerman]

2 hours ago, Jett_Quasar said:

Not yo mama's SSTO...

Download from my Star Wars Hangar on Kerbal-X now!

 - Jett

Was this an end product of that massive 7 hour live stream last night? It looks awesome!!

[MustaKotka]

I made a tiny SSTO plane, this time with a cockpit. Beautiful flying and also the smallest one crewed craft i've taken to orbit!

3.85 tonnes, 18 parts, 180 units of Lf

 

Spoiler

It actually flies really well. Two 1/10th size Nervas (0.625m), one turbojet (also 0.625m) and the cockpit called 'Pixie' from a legacy mod: Generic Inline Cockpits. Some if not all of the cockpits still seem to work.

When in doubt, add winglets.

 

[Andetch]

On 6/3/2013 at 1:31 AM, rtscaptain said:

Dumb question..... but what does SSTO stand for? I get that it is about space planes, but whats the acronym.

Single Stage To Orbit. So to be classed as a SSTO you fire the engines once, and it goes to orbit - yeah you can reduce throttle etc, but you can't fire up any other engines or drop any used fuel tanks etc. 100% of what is launched must reach orbit!

Top Secret Photos of Andetch Type X Shuttle Undergoing Initial Flight Test

Yes, it seems the new Shuttle can act as a SSTO.......But the final release will ride an external tank to orbit.

[AeroGav]

What should I name this ship ?

 

The usual themes (some sleek, usually carnivorous) bird, or mythological creature don't seem as appropriate because the appearance of this thing is neither sleek nor birdlike,  in fact with it's blunted nose it 's more like a lamb or a puppy that's trying to nuzzle you.    It actually looks cute?  Have I been watching too many cute animal videos today?

 

[Val]

15 hours ago, Andetch said:

So to be classed as a SSTO you fire the engines once, and it goes to orbit - yeah you can reduce throttle etc, but you can't fire up any other engines or drop any used fuel tanks etc. 100% of what is launched must reach orbit!

No. The only requirement to be classed as SSTO, is that you do not remove any hardware from your craft (staging) between launch and getting into orbit. How many times the engines are ignited is not a factor. Nor is reusability. Though, usually the whole point of avoiding staging, is to make it easier to reuse.

BTW the question you answered was posted in 2013

 

[agrasyuk]

19 hours ago, AeroGav said:

What should I name this ship ?

 

 

"Boomerang" . Add version, rev. mk. or block designations as needed. 

[Andetch]

11 hours ago, Val said:

No. The only requirement to be classed as SSTO, is that you do not remove any hardware from your craft (staging) between launch and getting into orbit. How many times the engines are ignited is not a factor. Nor is reusability. Though, usually the whole point of avoiding staging, is to make it easier to reuse.

BTW the question you answered was posted in 2013

 

Yeah I worded that wrong, and also go really confused as the "post" I was "answering" that seemed to be the most recent post just disappeared on me... Hahahaha, le fool moi!

Still the hump back looks pretty cool. Hard to fly, am working on the thrust balance

[AeroGav]

I'll post these here rather than clutter the challenge threads.

First up,  I participated in the Kerbal Express Airlines - Regional Airliner challenge (Reboot)

My entry was this thing , that could supercruise on 3 Panthers at high altitude, with good fuel economy.

It was however expensive, and the airline wanted me to develop a cheaper subsonic variant with Wheelsey engines.    Unfortunately,  we appointed Val as the chief test pilot and I think she may have subverted the design team

How's the fuel burn on the Wheesley's Val ?  BTW you're not showing on our radar, everything OK ?

The other one came about from the VAB roof horizontal landing challenge.    The goal is to land an aircraft horizontally, using only wing lift , on the VAB roof.   The higher the top speed of the  aircraft you're putting on the roof, the more points.     So  of course...

 

 

[Thor Wotansen]

Another case of What should I name this.  It SSTOs quite easily with 1300m/s remaining in a 80km orbit and it could easily carry a decent payload.  It would also be very easy to stick a NERV cluster on the back once you're in orbit and go wherever.

I don't know what I was thinking when I built it but I sure like how it turned out.

[Jarin]

On 9/11/2017 at 2:47 PM, AeroGav said:

What should I name this ship ?

 

The usual themes (some sleek, usually carnivorous) bird, or mythological creature don't seem as appropriate because the appearance of this thing is neither sleek nor birdlike,  in fact with it's blunted nose it 's more like a lamb or a puppy that's trying to nuzzle you.    It actually looks cute?  Have I been watching too many cute animal videos today?

 

The front reminds me of a duck for some reason. I vote naming it the "Mallard".

[AeroGav]

From a conversation earlier today,   Dark Lion wanted to know if I could make this Batwing aircraft into an SSTO, more efficiently

Dark Lion's is here -  https://kerbalx.com/DarkLion/Batwing-SSTO

I did two versions.    The first , leaves the oxidizer tanks empty.  Gets to orbit and has plenty of pep,  but a bit under fuelled.

There's a bit of clipping.   I used 4 nukes, 1 panther, 1 whiplash and 1 rapier.  I clipped all the jet engines together hoping to make pretty rainbow colours, but it wasn't really like that.  Goes though.   When spawning the craft, make sure to put your pilot in the last one in the list or you'll have to fly looking backwards with a reversed navball.    The view from there's novel though.

Version one , empty ox tanks - https://www.dropbox.com/s/ds1jlb1cxern2k4/Batwing SSTO1.craft?dl=0

Version two , i used configurable containers mod to swap two of the tanks over to store only liquid fuel, no ox.    Didn't bother doing it for the tanks ahead of CoM, that would have upset the balance.        https://www.dropbox.com/s/w4t2gv5fz2cnngt/Batwing SSTO2.craft?dl=0

 

Both craft have a novel feature called "self destruct".    It's on the Space Bar.    The shrouds on the nukes look cool but destroy the ship if you activate these engines via staging.   Use action group 1 instead !