SSTOs! Post your pictures here~

[RoninFrog]

I don't know about all this airbreathing, aerodynamic, aerospike, airplane, aero-whatever stuff.  This is more my style:

The HMS Sauron can go single stage straight to Mun (yes, those are Saturn V tanks):

Ah yes, and it has to find ore and refuel itself:

I don't have mining gear deployed currently, but there are 8 big ISRU's and solar panels, 16 drills, and bazillions of radiators and fuel cells.  The use of 100% vector/mammoth (no nukes, rhinos, airbreathers, or aerospikes) gives me a full TWR of at least 1.5 anywhere except Eve.  The highest ore I've ever found with regular settings and a 5-star Bill in the mk3 passenger module allowed me to refuel in a couple Kerbin days.  Ready to go to Duna!

KerbalX: https://kerbalx.com/MunsterIII/HMS-Sauron

[Mars-Bound Hokie]

After being hit with several lawsuits concerning debris pollution, we were forced to cut back on the number of boosters we could jettison. Some opportunistic engineers at the SPH decided to take the main component of our standard three-man Gilly lander and put it in a modified Poseidon spacecraft.

 

• Current variant of the lander carrier in the SPH.
  • You'll see what's inside the cargo bay later.

 

• Congratulations, it's a lander
  • Delta-V: 3,475 m/s
  • Thrust: 60 kN
  • Mass: 24.933 tons

(DISCLAIMER: This picture shows the first prototype (has the Gigantor panels). Even so, the current variant could deploy the lander while in orbit with plenty of delta-V to spare)

 

The first prototype spun out of control after re-entry. I don't know if it was luck, skill, or by design, but I managed to regain control at 4 km above the surface. With some help from Lt_Duckweed, I redesigned the plane so that the NERVs would be on the wings rather than on the tail. His advice paid off well, and it would be put to the test later.

 

• I was coming in too hot and too fast for a direct landing at 0-9 KSC, so I had to turn around and land at 2-7 instead.

 

• MADE IT.

[Guest Space Cowboy]

Hey why has no Fhloston Shuttle been done yet?

<snip>






 

Edited April 29, 2020 by Geonovast
Let's not get carried away with font sizes, please.

[TheWanderer05]

Some of my older fleet models (front) and their better counterparts (back):

My favorite creation:

It has about 4,500 m/s dV in an 80x80 km orbit around Kerbin and has almost no thrust torque, which is why I love flying it so much. I've also got more images of the other planes in the fleet if anyone wants to see those.

Edited March 6, 2020 by TheWanderer05

[Guest]

Here's my latest -- career SSTO, fairly early, Making History parts, tier 1 tech only (haven't yet upgraded my science building). Power for the SSTO lifter stage is from twin Reliants. The pair makes orbit, the payload plane flies around the Mun, both re-enter and land separately. This is NOT the easiest or most efficient way to get to the Mun, but it works.

[Val]

On 3/4/2020 at 6:01 PM, Space Cowboy said:

Hey why has no Fhloston Shuttle been done yet?

I love that movie, but those big boxes on the wings kinda ruin the aesthetics for me.

Edited March 6, 2020 by Val
Too many pics

[Guest Space Cowboy]

3 hours ago, Val said:

I love that movie, but those big boxes on the wings kinda ruin the aesthetics for me.

Then fix it (?)

[Mars-Bound Hokie]

On 3/5/2020 at 10:12 PM, TheWanderer05 said:

It has about 4,500 m/s dV in an 80x80 km orbit around Kerbin

Impressive, but is that all you can do?

 

I built an SSTO that can carry another spaceplane to a 175-km orbit above Kerbin. I wanted a carrier because why waste your own fuel getting to LKO when someone else can do that for you.

• And no, I'm not talking about a shuttle rocket.

 

• Now that's what I call a spaceplane carrier.
  • The carrier only needs to get to LKO and back to the runway, while the spaceplane itself has 4,975 m/s of delta-V.

 

For more details, see my craft file for the Lazybird.

[TheWanderer05]

5 hours ago, Mars-Bound Hokie said:

Impressive, but is that all you can do?

I've made an attachment for the Stargazer that bolsters its range quite a bit. Instead of a carrier, I've made more of an auxiliary fuel tank with engines and wings. It uses its own supply of fuel and oxidizer in addition to a small portion of the Stargazer's maximum oxidizer supply to get up to orbit. Once the Stargazer has been deployed, the auxiliary craft uses RCS to return to the atmosphere and land. The final result: 6,455 m/s of dV.

I'm still working out some minor things with this system, mainly how much oxidizer I need to leave in the Stargazer to spare myself from the longer burn times of only using the Nerv to circularize the orbit.

 

Edited March 7, 2020 by TheWanderer05

[moar ssto]

A full stock part Earth ssto, based off Bradley Whistance's nerv only ssto. Requires a runway on the equator though.

https://imgur.com/a/yNc33du

[INPrint]

Mirazh SSTO ascend profile testing

Mirazh is my first career SSTO, capable of reaching LKO with 2500 dV while carrying up to 12 tourists onboard. Not designed to land anywhere but Kerbin, it is used, in fact, for Mun and Minmus flyby missions. Its ascend profile is somewhat complicated, as turbofans provide only 0.8-0.6 TWR even on subsonic speeds. This makes it necessary to fire NTRs early on, about 8000 m and 100 m/s. When I first made it to orbit, I was very surprized that there is enough fuel left to travel somewhere else.

[Mazlem]

The latest version of Courier:

 

[Mephisto81]

XS-07 Myrmidon: single stage to the Mun, Duna and back with Liquid Fuel only

No refueling. Has about 6.100 m/s dV after reaching low Kerbin orbit. 24t take off mass, single Rapier / single Nerv.

Kerbalx: https://kerbalx.com/Mephisto/XS-07-Myrmidon-Liquid-Fuel-only-SSTO-to-Mun-and-Duna

 

[SpacePixel]

Putting "spatiale" into "Aérospatiale Concorde", or your "thrust torque" has no power over me.

[Mathrilord]

17t payload to orbit

[TheWanderer05]

Super low-tech SSTO, gets into orbit with about 40 m/s dV left. Made to work with FAR.

[FleshJeb]

While we're waving around our dV numbers: 7328m/s on orbit, no drag exploits.

[Mathrilord]

Old craft. Actually 90t cargo to orbit, 100t maybe more if optimised.

[Orky Kultur]

Hey all, long time no see

Decided to try my hand at a cargo ssto (I know, super easy way to ease myself into the game after a year out right?). Back in the day I always wanted to do a liquid fuel-only Jool 5, so this was my draft at a lifter for assembling that:
 

Spoiler

 

This is the only time it got off the runway

 

So after that, I went back to the drawing board, and draft 2 made it all the way to ~25km... where it stayed, for like half an hour, until it ran out of fuel
 

Spoiler

 

at least this run told me where I need more parachutes

 

 

I knew that making SSTOs was hard, but I suspect I'm also lacking more than a little in the piloting sense. Anyone have any pointers for LF-only spaceplanes?

 

Edited July 3, 2020 by Orky Kultur
typo

[8bitgammers]

Here are my interplanetary cargo fully stock SSTOs. I have two but this is my first. It has 594 parts, and can carry a small space station anwhere in the kerbol system

Here is a video of it delivering its cargo to duna orbit:

Unfortunately, this SSTO didn't carry nearly enough ccargo to be impressive for me so I decided to start work on one which can carry a large section of a huge space station to anywhere in the kerbin system.

I can put out more pictures when I get them later.

[Nantares]

I just starting to make an SSTO for the K-Prize challenge(and I sucked at SSTO like @Mars-Bound Hokie in the past) but I finally make it to orbit

a flight of a small SSTO, but it's big step of my SSTO-kind 

 

[OutInSpace]

 

Behold, the Hope Light Shuttle! This is a perfected version of what I submitted to the K-Prize challenge, which was also my first SSTO. Using a Whiplash and two NERVs, I can haul six crew and/or a small payload into LKO with 800m/s of dV to spare. Unfortunately, the design doesn't take well to being scaled up - past a certain point, the NERVs simply don't provide enough oomph to break through the upper atmosphere.

Edited August 6, 2020 by OutInSpace

[Luch]

Solid fuel SSTO. Stock autopilot, no controls.

Payload: one satellite, one tourist.

 

 

[CalmLlama]

I made a plane with 4400 m/s dv in LKO, and rotating engines so it can land wheels down on low gravity objects.  It's fun landing a plane on Minmus.  

Download the craft

 

 

[Arugela]

On 7/3/2020 at 3:16 PM, Orky Kultur said:

Hey all, long time no see

Decided to try my hand at a cargo ssto (I know, super easy way to ease myself into the game after a year out right?). Back in the day I always wanted to do a liquid fuel-only Jool 5, so this was my draft at a lifter for assembling that:
 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

This is the only time it got off the runway

 

So after that, I went back to the drawing board, and draft 2 made it all the way to ~25km... where it stayed, for like half an hour, until it ran out of fuel
 

  Hide contents

 

at least this run told me where I need more parachutes

 

 

I knew that making SSTOs was hard, but I suspect I'm also lacking more than a little in the piloting sense. Anyone have any pointers for LF-only spaceplanes?

 

I know one trick. But it's very cheaty. It involves stacking engine in a way where the thrust doesn't hurt each other, but has full thrust. it can also get out of hand very quickly. but if don't care you can reduce engine nodes quickly and change around parts for part count efficiency and possibly better aero etc.

Edited August 28, 2020 by Arugela