totm june 2018 Work-in-Progress [WIP] Design Thread

[erasmusguy]

Experimenting with two engines.

counter-rotating engine.

[ScriptKitt3h]

After seeing the announcement of a program to develop a 6th-generation fighter to replace the F-22 Raptor from a USAF General in a new article today, I decided to work on a few prototype mock-ups of what a 6th-gen air superiority fighter might look like in KSP...

This one is by far my favorite, being medium weight+size out of the 3 and having good agility and speed, with a stealthy shape and good fuel load.

This one uses a RAPIER for better mid-high altitude performance (in place of the real-life multi-cycle turbine design(s) being researched by DARPA).

and finally, this design features extremely good speed, super-maneuverability, and a custom, Ace Combat COFFIN/British Aerospace p.125-inspired enclosed cockpit, complete with instrument panel.

Planning on doing some more testing and refinement and then releasing them as a pack complete with BDArmory-equipped, combat-ready variants.

[He_162]

15 minutes ago, ScriptKitt3h said:

After seeing the announcement of a program to develop a 6th-generation fighter to replace the F-22 Raptor from a USAF General in a new article today, I decided to work on a few prototype mock-ups of what a 6th-gen air superiority fighter might look like in KSP...

 

This one is by far my favorite, being medium weight+size out of the 3 and having good agility and speed, with a stealthy shape and good fuel load.

 

This one uses a RAPIER for better mid-high altitude performance (in place of the real-life multi-cycle turbine design(s) being researched by DARPA).

 

and finally, this design features extremely good speed, super-maneuverability, and a custom, Ace Combat COFFIN/British Aerospace p.125-inspired enclosed cockpit, complete with instrument panel.

 

Planning on doing some more testing and refinement and then releasing them as a pack complete with BDArmory-equipped, combat-ready variants.

Just for future reference, no stealth fighter will be all aspect stealth with Canards, they removed the rudders for the same reason, when they move, even slightly, a long enough radar wave can be used to pick up the tip of the rudder or canards leading edge and if the radar is trained to look for that specific signal, can track those craft with ease.

The exhausts create thermal heat that infrared sensors can easily pick up, so you have to embed the entire engine and exhaust inside the aircraft, and cool the air behind the engine, all stealth aircraft not including the Su-57 do this, the Su-57 does it in the exhaust of the actual engine itself, and it improves it's own performance by doing so as well. (engine fuel efficiency wise)

The front of the F-22 has no perfectly straight edge either, curved surfaces must be everywhere, and if it's flat, it has to be angled 35 degrees or more away from the incoming radar wave, and be planform aligned with anything else at the same degree and flat angle.

Look close at the front view, and try to find a "perfectly" straight line (all lines are straight), there is nothing but a curved angle, and no straight, directly flat surface (The air intakes are angled back).

That being said, the 6th gen fighter probably won't have canards, it won't have rudders, and every aspect of it will be to minimize the amount of angles, and all angles found on it will be parallel.

It's called "planform alignment"

Another form of stealth is to scatter the radio waves so much that they cannot come back in such a amount that they form a radar cross section larger than a small bird, or if it does form one at all, and that is achieved by doing things like this:
 

The F35 uses this quite a bit in it's airframe instead of going for a all aspect stealth design similar to the F-22, and critics say it isn't planform aligned and thus can't be stealth, they don't understand how the scattering works.
 

 

Not that your canard design is worse than the F-22, it's certainly better in KSP, but in real life it offers no advantage over the F-22 other than range as far as real life is concerned.

[ScriptKitt3h]

1 minute ago, He_162 said:

~snip~ (good breakdown though, thank you)
 

True, true- though I utilized canards for their added manueverability and balancing of CoL/CoM, something that I suspect might happen in potentially one contender for Navy's F/A-XX or the Air Force's PCA program(s), since just like with the ATF program that produced the F-22 there will likely be some demand for agility from the fighter in addition to stealth.

Those 3 designs are just prototypes, nonetheless, and I'll likely make some further modifications and maybe 1-2 more airframes prior to releasing them, as I *think* I may have some WiPs that might fit what you mentioned a bit better. The biggest challenge though, in all honesty, is working within the limitations of stock aero's drag modeling.

[He_162]

2 minutes ago, ScriptKitt3h said:

True, true- though I utilized canards for their added manueverability and balancing of CoL/CoM, something that I suspect might happen in potentially one contender for Navy's F/A-XX or the Air Force's PCA program(s), since just like with the ATF program that produced the F-22 there will likely be some demand for agility from the fighter in addition to stealth.

Those 3 designs are just prototypes, nonetheless, and I'll likely make some further modifications and maybe 1-2 more airframes prior to releasing them, as I *think* I may have some WiPs that might fit what you mentioned a bit better. The biggest challenge though, in all honesty, is working within the limitations of stock aero's drag modeling.

I agree, but I believe maneuverability could easily be provided with thrust vectoring, and exhaust ports providing thrust vertically down and up from above and below the exhaust of the engine at the expense of thermal invisibility, but if you need to maneuver like that, you've been spotted.

There are millions of options for stealth aircraft that will keep their stealth, and some that are only to be used at the expense of it, but canards lose your all aspect stealth immediately, so in my opinion, I doubt they will be added.

That is to say, there could be a canard shape that is stealthy, but a movable wing is easy to spot on radar since you can't keep the same planform angles as the moving wing, and the tail of the F-22 is one example of that, it's stealth in level flight, and hardly detectable while maneuvering.

[selfish_meme]

From what I read they are considering a larger aircraft than the f-22/f-35, with emphasis on electronics and range, it would be equipped with longer range weapons. The idea being to hit the enemy well before they even realize they have been fired on, and do it from anywhere in the world. They don't expect to dogfight over US skies.

[Castille7]

Omega 7 Phase II
Update 08.31.2017
 

I haven't been working on this project much lately so just to make a little headway I took the Station for a test run using the Mammoth Engines and this proved even with ridiculous amounts of fuel that these are not good on fuel for any amount of space travel. (I did say this was just a test ). I then used the Nerv Atomic Rocket Motors which I intended these to be used. I am now in Orbit at Minmus and decided to continue Phase II here, which is to fuel up before continuing to a distant Mun or Planet. This may turn out to be an Orbit Refuel then travel and repeat until I reach a desired location.

While at Minmus the plan is to continue adding other craft for the extended journey and refuel the Station to it's maximum capacity.

Any suggestions on a safe lowest Orbit at Minmus for these operations would be helpful and save me a little time. Right now I"m at an altitude of about 400,000m and I think this could be reduce quite a bit more due to Minmus' low gravity.

 

Enroute to Minmus

 

In Minmus Orbit @ 400,000m

[Azimech]

4 hours ago, erasmusguy said:

Ball bearing engine. 

The central shaft is only held in place by the ball bearings that surround it. 

https://kerbalx.com/erasmusguy/Ball-bearing-small-engine but its early days.

Interesting! I tried the concept a while ago but wasn't convinced. It was on a whole different scale though.

[ScriptKitt3h]

After some further tweaking and experimentation, that fighter dev program of mine has yielded a promising (though still using canards, but y'know what- it just makes it work) aircraft.

I call it the Gyrfalcon, and it's pretty darn fast and agile, while looking both very slick and very stealthy (save for the canards, but I suspect that they'd not be a deal-breaker with the extra agility they provide the plane).

And yes, I did see it dodge multiple BD AMRAAMs and Sidewinders, with the only confirmed kill thus far being a gun kill achieved by baiting the AI into a dive to dodge incoming missiles.

50 parts stock, 85 w/ a BDArmory kit, so I'm definitely giving it a proper testing run and release here on the Exchange.

[erasmusguy]

4 hours ago, Azimech said:

Interesting! I tried the concept a while ago but wasn't convinced. It was on a whole different scale though.

Ive used ball bearings before but never with as much success as these. I tried using z-200 batteries previously and they "sort of" worked but not reliably so.

[Thingymajigy]

Stealthy weapons test

[vossiewulf]

It may not be a plane but...

The Munge Meister 12 Gillion bis A.

DON'T MAKE HIM ANGRY

 

Designed for EL delivery, it features 10 tiny augurs, K&K smelter, K&K recycler, two Pathfinder inflated Wagons for metal ore and scrap metal, an MSV-2000 large metal storage can, enough solar EC to run it all, 45k battery storage, BTDT scanner, full science suite, 15G relay antenna, 12,000+ liters of storage, and still has plenty of surface acreage to festoon it with whatever you want.

Driving wise, it tops out on Kerbin at 28.5m/s and can do a max-G turn at that speed with a quite reasonable turning circle without lifting a wheel. It's been tested for turning at all speeds and does so forward and reverse extremely well, it drives more like a sports car than a tank.

And it snacks on innocent Packrat rovers.

[qzgy]

On 8/31/2017 at 7:23 PM, erasmusguy said:

Ball bearing engine. 

How well does it work as opposed to a normal engine?

[erasmusguy]

1 hour ago, qzgy said:

How well does it work as opposed to a normal engine?

It works well and is as reliable. It's a bit more limited than the normal bearing's as it's larger and it doesn't out perform an all rcs thruster bearing.

[erasmusguy]

A prototype for an Antonov An-2. Early days but it flies nicely. Top speed is around 59m/s in vanila atmosphere. 

https://kerbalx.com/erasmusguy/Bi-plane-prototype for the craft file but I'm going to keep working on it.

[PaperAviator]

Who says you need wings on a B-1B to fly it?

 

 

 

 

[EpicSpaceTroll139]

I don't remember whether I ever posted this

here. It kind of worked, but at the same time didn't. The pendulum and anchor escapement worked flawlessly, but there was too much backlash in the gear train so the hands went backwards nearly as much as they went forwards... as in bouncing forward and backwards quarters of a revolution constantly.

So I decided to make a new one using those RCS ball gears. Gear train works soooo much better now.

Currently need to add some more up gearing and attach the pendulum + escapement to that. Then I need to set up the drive mechanism and tune everything, and finish the case. 

 

[PaperAviator]

52 minutes ago, EpicSpaceTroll139 said:

I don't remember whether I ever posted this

<Snip>

Woaaah. How accurate is it? How did you make it so compact? What are the gear ratios? SO MANY QUESTIONS

 

Anyway, while I'm here:

I probably won't finish it for a while, not until I develop a compact turboprop

[EpicSpaceTroll139]

17 minutes ago, PaperAviator said:

Woaaah. How accurate is it? How did you make it so compact? What are the gear ratios? SO MANY QUESTIONS

Not accurate at all whatsoever. I don't think the hour hand rotated either (yah it definitely didn't now that I think about it, it wasn't even geared in). I don't know what the ratios are on that one, but on the new one, so far I've got a set of 4/1 and 3/1 going from the minute hand to the hour hand, for the proper 12 revolutions of the minute hand for every revolution of the hour hand.

[erasmusguy]

4 hours ago, PaperAviator said:

Anyway, while I'm here:

I probably won't finish it for a while, not until I develop a compact turboprop

http://imgur.com/XdY1o7P something like that? 

https://kerbalx.com/erasmusguy/ne-06 they aren't very powerful but I'm sure you could uprate them. 

[EpicSpaceTroll139]

Progress:

Just need to figure out how to set up the weight drive mechanism (probably will involve chains), and tune the pendulum. Because the whole thing's so big, the pendulum will have a 3 second swing, unlike real world types which usually have 1 second swings.

[Azimech]

4 hours ago, EpicSpaceTroll139 said:

Progress:

Just need to figure out how to set up the weight drive mechanism (probably will involve chains), and tune the pendulum. Because the whole thing's so big, the pendulum will have a 3 second swing, unlike real world types which usually have 1 second swings.

Chains might involve Moody Physics™ which is the irrational brother of the now deceased Errordynamics™. Every time I've made a chain and let it loose in the environment, it would slither like a snake eating itself. I can only imagine these forces might have an effect on timing. But I hope not because I think your idea is awesome!

 

[septemberWaves]

So is this now Kerbal Time Program?

[Castille7]

4 hours ago, EpicSpaceTroll139 said:

Progress:

Just need to figure out how to set up the weight drive mechanism (probably will involve chains), and tune the pendulum. Because the whole thing's so big, the pendulum will have a 3 second swing, unlike real world types which usually have 1 second swings.

Adding to what Azimech said, maybe 3 or 4 long links rather than many little ones? Just a thought to chew on.

[EpicSpaceTroll139]

55 minutes ago, Azimech said:

Chains might involve Moody Physics™ which is the irrational brother of the now deceased Errordynamics™. Every time I've made a chain and let it loose in the environment, it would slither like a snake eating itself. I can only imagine these forces might have an effect on timing. But I hope not because I think your idea is awesome!

 

43 minutes ago, Castille7 said:

Adding to what Azimech said, maybe 3 or 4 long links rather than many little ones? Just a thought to chew on.

Yep. The problem is that in order to get a reasonably consistent torque from the chain, the links need to be short. 

I'm considering perhaps using some kind of rack-and-pinion attachment for the weight instead of chains, because I'm worried about how much space a stock chain might take up.