Wanderfound

Some recent highlights: Plenty more at the design thread in my .sig

I too, endorse this hoped-for possibility. It's very frustrating that I can't get a proper view of my best crashes because I was too busy trying to avoid them at the time. Having post-fireworks replays would be way cool, especially if you could still reposition the camera during them. It would only need to capture a few seconds either side of the bang; hopefully it's doable without overstressing RAM. It would be useful for diagnosing problems, but mostly I just like to watch stuff blow up.

I do admit that I didn't read all of the flight instructions. I did have a look at them, but my response was "holy hell, that's long and seems unnecessarily complicated for a fairly simple plane; I'll just take it for a spin and see how it goes". Will re-test after a good look at your instructions and report back. It deserves to be flown as intended. I fly by keyboard, BTW, with fine controls off (I dislike the inconsistency in response that the fine controls create). Tap tap tap. What mod are you using for that cool flight data display?

Speaking of FAR in vacuum... I've been playing around with a ridiculously overpowered (KR-2L on a medium-sized plane; ~10G acceleration) raceplane on Minmus, and the rudders (AV-R8’s and Delta Deluxe winglets) keep tearing off for no apparent reason. Is this a possible bit of screwyness with aerodynamic failures, or is it more likely to just be a pure G-force issue?

As a mostly-tabletop gamer, Silent Hunter is one of the only computer games I've got into apart from KSP. There aren't many things that are more fun than sneaking through a destroyer screen and sending a few fish into a carrier. Crank that up to hard mode and it makes KSP look easy; compulsory trigonometry before every shot. I haven't played it for years, though; I think my last was SHIII. Apart from the "needs mods" thing, what are the current versions like?

If your early landings don't create a crater, then you're well ahead of the curve. I had twenty Kerbals on the Mun before I managed to get one back off again.

Just in case you think that the 50% thrust nerf on turbojets and RAPIERs makes them underpowered in FAR, see http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/90747-Kerbodyne-SSTO-Division-Omnibus-Thread?p=1370535&viewfull=1#post1370535 Mach 11, escape velocity, in atmosphere. RAPIERs and Aerospikes on a practical bulk-passenger cargo plane. If Ferram hadn't nerfed 'em, we'd probably have to start looking for mods to simulate relativistic time dilation effects.

MINMUS UPDATE - KR-2L: Engine or Suicide Pact? New footage from the Minmus crime scene reveals a shocking truth about the Kerbodyne engine department. Recent surveillance images from Minmus reveal shocking details about the so-called KR-2L "engine". As can be seen below, this supposedly reliable "rocket" "motor" is in fact nothing less than a cunning plan to exterminate the entire Kerbal species. What properly green-blooded Kerbal could resist such a beauty? Really, an engine like this is just begging to be throttled. (anyone who attempts to apply this turn of phrase to anything remotely approaching real life also deserves to be throttled. Consent: not just a catchphrase) Unfortunately, the temptations of a Kerbal can often lead kim astray. How long will it take for the entirety of Kerbalkind to be exterminated by this irresistable menace? More news to come.

Incidentally, the Goblin makes the Velociraptor ​seem like a slug. That thing is insane.

Hadfield is back on Youtube, BTW: http://youtu.be/Q_RB1ENTayU

While we're mentioning Bowie...y'all know that he's a genuine chimera? One blue eye, one hazel eye; two DNA strands tangled up in each other. Dude has biocred. And since we're throwing covers around, the best ever non-Bowie Bowie:

BREAKING NEWS! KERBODYNE RACING TEAM FINALLY SETS A TIME! (KINDA) After a ridiculously prolonged build up, the Team Kerbodyne (renegade) Racing organisation has finally posted a time in the heats of the Minmus Ice Racing Championship. Well, kinda. Despite only posting the pathetic time of 152m/s, the first run of the Team Kerbodyne (renegade) Racing team has been disqualified due to bodywork damage. Although the still anonymous pilots attempted to claim that "she's always looked like that, asymmetry is in this year", the judges nevertheless ruled that the time claimed by Team Kerbodyne (renegade) Racing was invalid due to the loss of substantial amounts of wing during the run. Speaking on condition of anonymity, a spokeskerbal for Team Kerbodyne (renegade) Racing insisted that Kerbin race fans had not heard the last of their team. "Those are our snacks! Touch them and die!" declared the Team Kerbodyne (renegade) Racing spokeskerbal. Stay tuned; more exciting race news to come.

Reinforced: pleeeeeeze, Squad? Kerbpaint makes my laptop cry, but I must have racing livery for the Minmus championships. Make it happen?

Flight testing of the Laythe Wing. First up: this is a very well-built plane. It takes off easily, and is absolutely rock solid once it's in the air. If you can't get this to orbit, the fault is in the pilot, not the plane. However: there are a few niggles. Firstly, speed; although it has plenty enough grunt to crack Mach 4 and go to orbit, it takes a while to get there. Of course, this doesn't mean that you can't get it up to serious speed if you want: Secondly: aesthetics. It looks okay for a mostly stock-parts plane, but the impending stockiness of SP+ has illustrated just how aesthetically weak the stock parts are. The full-width wing works well, but it's essentially an old kludge that was used to overcome the lack of stock-parts lifting bodies; not really needed with SP+ parts. The Laythe Wing is highly functional, but only its Mum would claim that it's pretty. Overall: a very well built plane, but competent rather than exceptional. A worthy addition to any garage looking for an economical workhorse, but not quite up to elite standards.

Fly sensibly and you're all cool. Try to pull the sort of handbrake turns that stock permits and you're going to die. That's all there is to it, really. So long as you fly in a manner that a real plane could possibly survive, you'll be fine.

Tougher wings do make sense, though. At present, you have to strut the wings if you want a reasonably usable aircraft. Making the struts a given would be a good change.

No matter what I do, attempting to pitch up with Skathi makes the elevons aim downwards. Anyone else want to try?

Hmmn...replaced the elevons on Skathi, and it was still sending the control surfaces the wrong way. Might be a bug at my end. Anyone else had a go?

And we can't ignore the Carpenters: http://youtu.be/ry1jxEmtgVg Dammit, Karen. Still upset about that one.

Full revised B9 package due to be released "any day now". Fighting with the broken pre-.24 versions is probably a wasted effort.

Reinforcing Northstar: the design priorities for a combat dogfighter are radically different to that of a spaceplane. Dogfighters are all about manoeuvrability, usually created by deliberate aerodynamic instability. Speed as well is a bonus. Spaceplanes are all about straight-line speed; so long as you have enough manoeuvrability to keep the nose up at 30,000m, you're all good. Instability is lethal. It's sportscar vs dragster; they're radically different things. You can do a dogfighting spaceplane if you want, but that's an advanced design trick. Get the speed sorted first.

Not to forget Laurie Anderson's "Oh Superman":

"Ashes to ashes, funk to funky; We know Major Tom's a junkie. Strung out in Heaven's high, hitting an all-time low"

Make sure that you hear the sequel: http://youtu.be/CMThz7eQ6K0 You get that Major Tom is about drug addiction rather than spaceflight, yes? Regardless: three cheers for Bowie. The only decent thing to come out of glam rock.

Okay... I've been trying to take Skathi for a test flight. Unfortunately, there appear to be some serious issues. The major one is that it appears that the maximum authority values on the control surfaces have been wound down to extremely low values (15 is default, 30 is my standard for rear surfaces): Because of this, I've been unable to get it off the runway, even with the flaps set to maximum: And, really, a plane this small shouldn't need flaps to take off at all. Fortunately, there's an easy fix: crank the rear surfaces to 30, and bring the forward ones back up to 15. Other early impressions: the pre-loaded spacecraft in the cargo bay is cool. It would be nice to have an action group to toggle the RAPIERs separately from the O-10s. Aesthetics...not too bad for a drone plane, but I'd prefer a cockpit, personally. There doesn't seem to be a solid reason not to have one. Will crank up the control authority and report back later. -- Also: the only control surfaces set to influence pitch at all were the forward canards. This is...not optimal. Resetting the elevons to affect pitch. -- Control surfaces appear to deflect in the opposite direction to what is desired. Stripping and replacing.