selfish_meme

I have not had any mods not work, a couple say they are incompatible, but really their version just has not been updated. The only one that I have doubts about is the official mechjeb, and only because the autoflying seems squirelly. Also hasn't had version updated for ckan.

The way to design a rocket for sustained atmospheric flight now in more realistic aero is first to make sure it is tall and slender. Second the front must be heavier than the rear. You are probably well up on these two. The third factor is it must be more aerodynamic at the top than at the end. Otherwise drag will pull the nose of the rocket around. There are two ways your nose gets more drag than the tail, by being un-aerodynamic to start with, and having no fins to create drag at the end, and second speed. If your rocket has a TWR higher than 2 and you start flying faster than the speed of sound (around 260m/s at SL I think) the drag on the nose rapidly increases, where the tail because it is occluded does not. Eventually the nose becomes more draggy than the tail and the rocket flips. Use the Kerbal Engineer mod, keep your TWR around 1.6 and stay slower than 300m/s until around 10000m.

I have not noticed whiplashes having a significant acceleration hump, unlike the rapiers, which is why I am confused. This has gone to orbit and returned, I am sorting out payload now (it turns out I probably no longer need so much room). It weighs around 80t wet and achieves 1250m/s at around 11-12k on just the whiplashes. It doesn't even need the nuke (in fact is a lot better balanced) without, it was just there for a mission idea I had which probably won't work out. This was based on my payload fraction challenge entry, just .....expanded. The frontmost fuel tank needs to be disabled during ascent to balance the nuke. Once in space transfer all fuel to the large tank in front of the cargo bay.

They are talking about the rapier, the whiplash is the turbojet engine. Two should have no trouble getting a small plane to 1000m/s at 10km in level flight. Are you talking about the whiplash or the rapier?

There are some command line options you might want to use see the Linux support thread

Been playing for two years, I wish I got more time to play, I have to snatch an hour here or there (young kids) maybe you play too long at a time.

Just built a 4 Whiplash, 4 Swivel and 1 nuke SSTO with the large mk3 cargo bay 77t. Got it to 71x93k orbit with 800 units of fuel left (after seriously messing up the ascent while changing a nappy, had to come back down from 20k), which with the nuke could get you pretty far or with the swivels some serious payload into orbit. It's even easier than with Rapiers as the ascent is just fly up till 10000m then go as fast as you can while climbing slowly at 1 or 2', engage the rockets, slowly tip up to 20' then follow the prograde marker until apoapsis. I didn't get a screenshot, but will provide one later if anyone needs it.

Linux binaries don't have an .exe extension, if you bought it through steam on linux just fire it up as normal, you need launcher options in steam to run the 64bit, see the linux support thread, if you want to launch it outside of steam double click the KSP.x86_64

You can get almost half your weight into orbit, what is difficult about that http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/116729-Stock-Payload-Fraction-Challenge-1-0-4-Edition

Like this, was taken with my phone in Melbourne, sorry for ....ty quality

It has brakes and a parachute and everything, International Rescue refueler!

My latest entry the SMA - Prototype B. 36.13t payload, 94.5t at launch giving a payload fraction of 38.23% Craft File Let it run to the end of the runway, keep the pitch just below 10' once off, you may have to get it as low as 5' till you reach 400m/s 900Kn then you can encourage it to pitch up to around 15'. At 10000m level out a bit and let the speed build towards 1200m/s then encourage it to pitch up again above 10'. Once you reach max speed around 1350m/s hit action group 1 to switch mode and follow the top of the prograde marker. There was literally no oxidiser left, but I overshot slightly. I think adding a touch more couldn't hurt. Now I am going to go forget about space planes and payload fractions for a while .

Micro balancing spaceplane for payload fraction challenge, once I get it right will then move to nearest equivalent single tank

Demo was updated to 1.0

Thank you, like you and Slugy I let it run off the end of the runway, getting as much speed as I can down low, pitch about 10', it naturally pitches up very slowly over time so at about 4700m its at about 12 or 13', I shallowed the Pitch to about 7' this got it into the power band, I let it just naturally fly from about 5000m to 11k. By now it's pushing 1000m/s and I shallow it again to 7' as the thrust has reached max and I want to go as fast as possible. From there I let it go by itself, top speed around 1348m/s on air at about 22-23k, pitch has increased to about 20', taking your hint, switch to closed and wait for apoapsis, instead of pitching up further. This attempt was just shy of orbit by a couple of hundred m/s at 39.5% PF. I'm sure a better pilot could do better. I am adding toroidal tanks in the bay to top up the LF to try and achieve orbit at this fraction, which may be replaced by a 100 soon. Then I am going to up the fraction again. Craft

That is awesome. If you want to flip the decoupler, use the a or d key then attach it to the end of a rapier, attach your cargo, detach and then you should be able to attach it to the front of the cargo bay. My latest effort (which has not quite obtained orbit yet) has been adjusting down from 50% Payload Fraction, now sadly i am already under your fraction, but I am still hopeful of beating Slugy's yet for second place. She is very light, 88t at start for 37.4t of cargo, i am balancing LF and O at the moment, plenty of performance, she rips through the power barrier without much more than a slight dip in AOA at about 7000m.

If you go straight up, you come straight down, that's suborbital and lethal, in real life too.

Yep, been in tech support for 20 years, people lie, "no I never dunked the computer in the Atlantic and recovered it six months later, it just happened on it's own".

My Payload Fraction challenge entry from last night (which is no record breaker) is at about 16.5t per Rapier.

It isn't stable for some people there is no overall bug. My macbook 2011 runs it perfectly and I can't even remember if I have had a crash to desktop, i run 10.10.3, even with mods (not visual ones or big parts packs). You may see an FPS increase because of using Directx 9 with Windows which seems faster than OpenGL

I noticed it as well, earlier, no one cared but it was in a fairing

OK here is my SSTO Spaceplane entry, bug or not, the Commite'. It was designed using every piece of advice I could find on the forums from Slashy's Post to small landing gear, and it looks like it. I had a small malfunction in orbit. I still had 198 fuel and plenty of oxidizer but had turned my torque off (some other advice), and run out of mono-propellent. My periapsis was 69,900m, I could have circularized to bring it above 70km but instead stupidly reverted thinking something was wrong before realising about the torque. Still I will include the craft file, I am sure you can verify it works. 15' from takeoff, 10' at 10km once over 600m/s start pulling up slowly, use action group 1 to switch to closed cycle when the thrust tails off, point to 40' and hold for 71km apoapsis. SMA Prototype A - Commite' 66.36t on the pad 17.1t of Cargo A payload Fraction of 25.79% not enough to displace anyone, but it's my first go Craft File Edit: Moved Craft File

You might need to redownload a fresh version, just to make sure you have no remnants, it probably won't fix it but good to know it's completely stock.

Nope, does not happen on my macbook, are you using latest versions?

You mean something like pick up Derwent from Minmus base, refuel and take him to relieve Bill at Duna base, bring Bill home safely. I can see how that would be appealing for empire builders.