Box of Stardust

Well, that's why the Vulcan Howl is a thing.

Just a suggestion, put '[link to submission]' as part of the template since I also keep forgetting.

Do you all mean bouncing on spawn or something? Do you have WorldStabilizer installed?

I actually have a few manned fighters, but none of them can fight up against most of my drones. The drones are just too quick and small. I guess I'll throw them into the mix later, maybe start up the manned leaderboard again.

It looks like the side of a highway. Or pretty much a train that has too much propulsion.

If you mean AtmosphereAutopilot, then if you made your plane with it, the reviewer will be required to have AA installed, as any settings you have made on the control surfaces will not be read by a KSP install without AA, which means the reviewer will not necessarily be able to fly the plane as you intended it to be (though, we will generally constrain control surfaces to separate axes as we deem necessary). If you didn't have AtmosphereAutopilot installed when making the plane, then this is not an issue.

Test Pilot Review: @NightshineRecorralis's Jupiter SST Confidently sitting outside of the hangar... Figures as Tested (Jupiter SST, 176 passengers max): Price: 95,960,000 (empty) Fuel: 3,780 kallons Cruising speed: ~1,200m/s Cruising altitude: ~21,000m Fuel burn rate: measured at 0.6kal/s Range: 6,000km (approximate calculation) Review Notes: Twin Crown Aerospace Industries has managed to recover from its hangar fire incident to near-operational status, and so was willing to take on one more aircraft test outsourced by KEA. Habu Industries has designed a very sharp, confident-looking supersonic aircraft in the form of the Jupiter SST. Though, while walking around the exterior, TCA engineers could not help but note how it also looks like an enlarged version of a certain Belkan fighter prototype, in... almost all ways. The forward swept wing design was felt unnecessary by TCA engineers, as a commercial airliner shouldn't really need the flight characteristics of forward swept wings, but that's what Habu Industries designed the Jupiter with. (Meta note: forward sweep doesn't matter in stock KSP aero anyways...) Passenger capacity is very large thanks to the large amount of economy cabins, but some good thought was also put into adding in luxury cabins. The aircraft as a whole is put together very sensibly and fairly conventionally, from exterior examination. Very little extraneous parts seem to be on the aircraft; it seems to have only what is necessary, and everything has been integrated into the design of the Jupiter very cleanly. The only thing that really stuck out at first glance was the ventral aerodynamic control surface, which seemed to be a lift flap. Still, even this ventral flap was, overall, integrated cleanly into the design. Our test pilot got into the aircraft and rolled it out from the tarmac to the runway. The controls as wired were sufficient, though, the ventral flap controls were... a bit awkward to use- there were separate buttons for deploying and retracting. But, that's a minor complaint, one not really much of a complaint at all. Engines were started, and the Jupiter accelerated down the runway at a comfortable pace. The takeoff run was fairly short, and wheels-up was achieved at 57m/s, more than corroborating the 60m/s stated takeoff speed. There are no safeguards against a tail strike, but the possibility is highly unlikely anyways, and is therefore considered a non-issue. Initial impressions on the stability of the aircraft were good. Stability with SAS off flying in a straight line is not the most steady, but in no way a significant issue. The flight up to cruise altitude was uneventful, reaching cruise altitude within a reasonable timeframe. Once at cruise altitude, we found it difficult to maintain a constant cruise condition, but this is probably something inherent to hypersonic, high-altitude designs. An approximate cruise was attempted to be made, and these values were used for range calculation. Values used were: 1210m/s cruise speed and 0.6 burn rate at about 21,000m altitude, in roughly level flight with minimal vertical velocity. Range was calculated to be possibly around 6,000km, which is 1,000km more than the advertised range. During approximated cruise, the aircraft was able to fly with a level pitch. Overall, we found the Jupiter to be a very good aircraft in cruise. Engine failure testing came next. As per procedure, the outboard starboard engine was simulated to have an engine failure. This had minimal effect on stability, aircraft able to compensate. In fact, due to the nature of the engines, engine placement, and the cruise conditions- the thin atmosphere- the one engine failure didn't appear to hamper the aircraft's ability to maintain cruise significantly at all... The failure still did affect it, but was, as far as testing showed, still able to maintain approximate cruise conditions, if with minor sideslip angle and less fuel efficiency. Progressive failures, shutting down engines in succession from the outboard starboard engine, still did not result in any severe loss of stability or control at altitude. We decided to drop back lower into the atmosphere to investigate the effect of having a single remaining operational engine, the outboard port side engine. The Jupiter responded very well, remaining very controllable even without SAS, and never experiencing a severe loss of control. Next, we tested full power loss. The Jupiter maintains its favorable flight characteristics. Pitch control is very good, maintaining authority even down to 40m/s. We headed back to the airfield for flight dynamics testing. In mid-speed flight, ~90m/s - ~150m/s, the Jupiter displayed excellent flight characteristics in both stability and control authority in all axes. For low-speed flight, under 90m/s, we had to fully cut throttle, deploy the wing airbrakes, and deploy the ventral flap to slow down sufficiently (it was discovered somewhat accidentally that the ventral flap could also serve as an airbrake). Critical speed was determined to be ~50m/s with ventral flap active. Low-speed flight characteristics remained excellent up until the stall speed. The entirety of the flight dynamics test was done with SAS inactive. Landing was recommended at 50m/s, but found to be possible at lower speeds; ~40m/s. No complaints about ground handling. For the water landing test, touchdown was possible at 30m/s, though care must be taken to approach with minimal vertical velocity to minimize damage to airframe. One of the water landing tests touched down a little too hard and caused damage to the vertical stabilizers. However, generally, the Jupiter responded very well to a water landing emergency. Our findings show that the Jupiter passed the flight tests spectacularly, so we moved on to passenger testing. This is, unfortunately, a spot that the Jupiter has an issue in. Somewhat minor, but still be noted. The economy cabins have satisfactory views for the outboard seats. There is little outside disturbance transferred to the economy cabins for the most part. The rearmost cabins are deprived of views, due to being inboard of engine intakes and machinery, which does cause some sound and vibration. The luxury cabins, however, are where the test crews really wrote down notes. The forward luxury cabins were noted to be very good; first class, as to be expected. The rear luxury cabins, however, had slight issues. Though they are sectioned off from most of the aircraft, which does make them luxurious in that sense, the rear cabins are surrounded by sources of noise that affect the luxuriousness. Ducting passing from the intakes going to the engines in the back compromises some of the luxury, and the engines themselves are mounted fairly close, with only some fuel tank providing initial buffer from vibrations. The luxuriousness of the rear cabins are not completely compromised, but they are not as luxurious as they could be. Which is a shame, because their placement relative to the rest of the aircraft and passengers has potential. Lastly, a note on the construction of the aircraft. The entire aircraft shakes and wobbles through flight, which may be disconcerting. Production methods suggested to be inspected and improved. (Toggle rigid on everything except the wings...) The part count is on the fairly high end, over 90. A significant portion of this is in passenger cabins, however, as well as structural parts. 4 Whiplashes is within reasonable maintenance load for a supersonic airliner. Aerodynamic surfaces also do not present a significant maintenance load over average. Overall, maintenance is expected to be within reason. The Verdict: Habu Industries has designed an excellent high-capacity supersonic that doubles as a jumbo. The Jupiter's flight characteristics are near-flawless, which is a big step in designing an aircraft that will convince clients to purchase it. It's stable and maneuverable in all appropriate flight envelopes while being very cooperative to fly, and it has excellent range. It's also just a very clean, aesthetically pleasing design. Minor flaws do exist in the design, but most of these do not seem to threaten the operability of the aircraft significantly. If anything, we'd recommend Habu Industries figure out a possible fix to the situation of the rear luxury cabins, as it seems to be the biggest flaw present. As for construction... well, the welds between the components could use more rigidity, but that's a production line issue. To conclude, the Jupiter SST's economy and transport capabilities are excellent, and has no critical compromises in its design from an operational point of view. It's very economic, demanding only that an airline pay its dues through the somewhat above average maintenance of the aircraft, which TCA is of the opinion that such price to pay is very worth it.

I'll let you pick one more, since the Hunter was already in the queue.

@ZLM-Master ... how different are all of your planes from each other anyways? Sure, they're somewhat structurally different and therefore a little aerodynamically different, but... that's a lot of pretty similar aircraft. For me, even though PEGASys-D and Basilisk are mostly built similarly, Basilisk has more thrust and more guns, in addition to slightly different aerodynamics and flight programming on its control surfaces. I'm just saying... you might want to trim down your entry list of aircraft that are too similar to each other. I can't imagine that all of your aircraft perform that much differently from each other. Just pick the best ones.

In real world scenarios? Less drag. And I think, generally, insufficient lift isn't really a problem for aircraft anymore. As for tandem wings, probably production reasons and maintenance, and, again, the little perceived need for it.

To build on this, basically, the numbers on the judging sheet don't affect how we judge. We roughly quantify what we identify as judges into numbers we can put down on the sheet. All the judges post their reviews in a different style. Some judges are fairly quick and to the point. I do a little bit lengthier 'formal' report of the testing process. @hoioh does a drawn out narrative with lots of extraneous bits for entertainment. The judging sheet is a way to simplify and unify the presentation of an aircraft's determined attributes, free of the stylistic things a judge writes down in their review post.

You've discovered the need for the Pre-Routing Device! @goduranus invented it because our aircraft are all too thermally and radar stealthy, so now we use GPS-based launches to fire first. Have you watched the matches from the BDA 1.0 series? It was a big deal, because 'the merge' was a big killer in the old BDA, with the ultimate cheese strategy of going all guns, and by that, I mean all guns. @ZLM-Master has a few aircraft with PRDs, and one on my KerbalX is the Basilisk -C3 (which I'm working on a BDA 1.2 version, but it'll function enough for you to pick apart and learn).

Well, regardless of how they perform, you always build really cool looking ones.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it (too much), eh?

Okay everyone, your first big menace for BDA 1.2 is here. PEGASys-D6

http://bdarmory.wikia.com/wiki/AI_Pilot_Flight_Computer To be honest, I'm still trying to figure out BDA 1.2's AI myself. My original rule of thumb was to start with seeing how well it controls its roll (how hard does it overcorrect, or is it too hesitant in trying to roll), and to adjust the steer damping accordingly, then from there, adjust steer factor. I think this test might still be valid for a good AI tune. Also, tune weapon ranges. An aircraft's weapons and how they're used are, in my opinion, 30% of good BDA fighter design. 45% being the AI settings, and 25% actually building the plane.

That's a good point. I haven't used VSR in a while (only use it in career mode), but anything that modifies stock parts should be disallowed, because other entries not designed with it may not perform as intended.

ok ok ok ok ok Season break ends mid-July at the latest, hold ya'll horses. In the meantime, if any of you were curious about what I've been working on, I have two BDA 1.2 fighters on my own KerbalX, PEGASys-M1 and Super Basilisk -F2. They're not for this competition (I've already reserved my own spots in the queue), but they'll give you an idea of what my own drones perform like.

So does diving also count or no?...

I think a standardized altitude needs to be set for this. Fastest in level flight around x altitude.

This question has been asked before in this thread, but I still don't find the answer very clear: What does 'Pitch Ki' do in the Flight AI settings? What exactly does it define?

Hm. I was just used to everyone stating range since it would be a baseline to test against and as a selling point of the aircraft. Plus since range is one of the parameters per class, most people just say the range to either show they meet the requirement or how much they exceed it by.

That's your edit page. Publish the craft first. Also, state the range of the aircraft.

Just AIM-9s on fighter jet missile rails. Set to forward launch, 0 drop time, 10 decouple speed. It doesn't always happen. I think it's just the side effect of the flight AI being generally more maneuver-happy and the Weapon Manager being more missile-happy, that missiles end up colliding with something while being launched, if the missiles are mounted in a fairly tight space. I'm using the same design as initially built in BDA 1.2 though, where it didn't have much problems until recently.

Reporting in for BDA 1.2.1.3 (geez what a long patch designation). Missiles seem... a lot more explode-y when being launched. As in, there are times when firing a missile destroys parts of the launching craft. Part of that, I suspect, is due to plain proximity of parts around the missile, as well as launching during hard maneuvering by the AI, but I also wasn't having these problems in the original BDA 1.2.1.