XB-70A

Wow, just W-O-W! Impressive appearance. The kind of craft which gives you the feeling that every star systems now is too small.

The Comet proved satisfactory at docking. The crew of four will remain here for some days, as the laboratory is working again (?!). Meanwhile the launch window to Eve opened : Eve Explorer I slowly leaves the ground under the thrust of the six Mainsails. The Neutron launcher was a bit underpowered for the job but keep on accelerating smoothly. There was a problem with the ducts and fuel transfert was not correct, everything has to be made manually. Most of the work is done. The second stage thanksfully did not made the first explode. The four "Twitch" engines reveal to be good Vernier thruster. Last kick to circularize at 350 km. The rover will wait here for some days until a good transfert window opens.

I today reconfigured my first SSTO project, about two years old now, the Comet. Fast and unlogic, she's now totally made of stock parts : Will share it soon.

Absolutely true but like all delta configuration she was pretty unstable at lower speed and when I was close to stall speed, tending to stall on starboard and changing the vertical surfaces has like cured the problem. For the outboard engines configuration it's cool to have proposed a solution but... I don't want to change it, this thing was the first single stage flying brick I ever made like ten days after having started to play KSP and want to keep her in this crazy unlogic style, like many of us rookie players has made at first

I'm waiting a good launch window for my first Eve mission. To past the time I decided to take a look at my first SSTO built like a year and half ago, the XC-70 Comet (named not for the small body but in memory of the splendid deHavilland Comet) : But it was powered by two fusion engines from Impossible Innovation, in my actual way of "stockalize" everything now it need a bit of refresh and the result was surprising! New vertical surfaces (the old ones were tweakscaled) and two stock aerospikes engines to replace the fusion engines : Not too expensive and made with less than 80 parts. She accelerates pretty fast, rotating before the control tower. Flies pretty well and is surprisingly stable despite this delta configuration, reaching more than 1500 m/s on turbo-ramjets only. Solely the payload is not interesting with 5 tons max (a full FL-T800 tank). I just need to qualify her on the classical 200 x 200 km orbital rendez-vous, no-refuel and back to KSC.

Everything seems really great! I particularly love this characters creation possibility and will definitely wait a new, more powerful computer to fully enjoy it. But, to me, the other side of the coin is how fragile the Com 16 has become. I use it since a long time for style, using it as a pitot tube in the nose of nearly all my spacecraft but much more importantly as an aerospike like on the French M51 or U.S. Trident II SLBM : It was pretty important for drag reduction and heat management to me during re-entry. Just like it can be seen of this screenshot where the plasma developps a bit before the nose :

A lot of parts mods for a long time, then I got enough of re-updating at each new KSP installations or having to erase all the craft made with and more important, I discovered a LOT of things were possible with the stock parts, even while staying under 120-150 parts. So now apart of graphics like clouds and reentry particles effects no more, plus the Outer Planet Mod and Mike-NZ's Space Shuttle, none. Was about to forget... MechJeb. It was just like in aviation, a lot of young people and I learned to fly on old tincans (or wood plus canvas) with every instruments being analog. Then one day someone give me the chance to go onbaord a new carbon-made ultralight with Dynon Skyview inside. I made about ten hours inside fully manual and finally try the autopilot onboard... I wasn't able to divorce of it for the more than 1H navigation... it's a drug, laziness combined to ease.

I have ended preparations for my first flight to Eve. This time I don't want to "cheat" with fusion engines and futurist mods, so everything is full stock. It will be a one-way travel with a rover nammed Eve Explorer I. I re-used my old medium/heavy launcher Neutron for this occasion, Electron was too weak to support the 3rd and 4th stages. Can't wait to test it on Monday!

I finally got an occasion during the last month to send a new crewed mission to another planet after Duna. Eve seems not to be a good choice for my underpowered vehicle and Jool's system devoid of a good launching window for the next days, so remained Moho. The complex first launcher used for Duna needs some rework, being to heavy and having to much parts : So the Duna Lander I gives its place to the second generation, simpler, cheaper and... not really more efficient... Anyway, the liquid boosters and their Mainsail were recoverable. That still is a good point. And the lander also get a new styling to fit in the thinner fairing A first test flight to the Mun : This live experiment was concluded as satisfactory. ----- So cames the time for the mission! See you next year Dear. ----- 134 days after the encounter with Moho is just a question of hours : The brown spot is hard to distinguish on this shot as just a small arc of its surface appears a bit high and on the right of the vessel. Time for the circularization. 135 days, 45 minutes. Probably one of the community worst performances. The huge amount of science experiments will compensate a bit the cost of this flight. Here Sergei enjoys his first extra-vehicular sortie out of Kerbin Sphere of Influence. (Green skins problems not covered by the KSP insurance). De-orbit goes smoothly, this huge crater being selected as the landing site. Seconds aaaannnnnd... We did it!!! Like on Duna a year before, nobody escape the traditional picture of "La Famiglia". Free sunbath for all! Don Kermanone and his sons enjoy some peaceful time before going back to the ship for experiments. (Take your time... the next launch window is not before some months) ----- Time to go back home! See you Moho, don't know when we will come back, but not too soon for sure. ----- Back, finally. Not enough time and fuel for a proper circularization. ... it will not be a 100% recover mission. Anyway, I was too tired at this time to make a good job. Speed brakes extended, the craft still weighs 29 t at the moment. Seems like the pilot team enjoys this re-entry. It will be closer of the KSC than what was expected. Drague chute deployed. But still falling at more than 260 m/s... Fiiieeeww, I really should start to conceive a new craft fully made of stock part and much more important : LIGHTER. Travel completed in 357 days. Next step : EVE!

Thanks Alshain, this picture perfectly summarize what I was thinking about. Pretty true, after all a quote said the main difference between a genius and a madman is the genius is recognized. Here the team we made this wonder stays in the shadow. Apart for some rocketry addicts. I hope so... honestly I still don't have use the Puff and Twin Boar more for their appearances than usefulness... I should re-use this picture as the profile one.

To me the H-1 aspirator part just got a small difference of curves with the nozzle and is still round. At the opposite I see the Swivel aspirator mades with three different angles. Something like 30 degrees, 90 then and a rounded end. Alas, if the concept of beauty and ugliness were not individual, fewer conflicts here would occured... a some of us who got bored by some philosophers would have more good times without these boring band like Hegel, Kant or even this dark prince of Nietzsche sometimes. HOW DARE YOU ?! You should be roasted by an RS-25 as a punishment

Again, for the second time, I am not against the choice of placing an aspirator but its shape. I don't like the form it got on the Swivel, it brakes the lines of the nozzle. To be more precise here is what I talk about : Even the RL-105 got this curve with the aspirator. Now here is what I see with this new LV-T45 : This aesthetic does not suit to me.

I guess it should be fuel tank imitating the Fregat upper stage. Could be cool as it will make it an engine-tank hybrid like the Twin-Boar.

Don't worry, it was not about "Why did they place it?" but much more "Why did it got this look?". I mean even if we look at the LR-105 taken as an example, the shape is much more I would say pure. With the aspirator following the bell curves. Here I find the change of curves too brutal.

I join the family. The Reliant seems pretty good, a bit like a Viking/Vikas : And the 303 reminds the Fregat upper stage : But the new Swivel with this... I don't know, this is not a nozzle, it's a "roll of fat".

Not so bad about the temp'. I tried a fully manual ascent at full thrust, starting to turn at 700 m (can't remember the speed) at full thrust and a MechJeb controlled climb with a turn shape of 45 degrees, starting the turn at 300 m and limiting the acceleration at 50 m/s. In both cases there was not enough fuel to reach a dangerous temperature level for the fins before the stage shut down. But the Vector gimbal really had to be put at 0.

Agree, I got a single seat cheap launcher for the tourists and unexperienced kerbonauts with 2xReliant as side boosters and a Swivel for the core made to reach 400x400 km then some months ago I decided to try a simpler single core variant with the Vector. Pretty fun and accelerating, mmmh... crazily.

To me a famous French aircraft engineer and industrialist perfectly summarize my thinks in one of his quotes : For a plane to fly well, it must be beautiful. Marcel Bloch I use to mix aesthetic and usefulness as most as it is possible. Like here on my old Comet design : Now the problem is that beauty remains a personal and abstract perception for each. Personally my favorite military aircraft ever is in my account name even if I have not yet had the chance to see 62-0001 by my own. The 757-200 and the Tu-154 for the civilians. The first one due to her lines, this old but thin 707 fuselage mixed with this nose and this stature on gears deployed who gives her this powerful and agressive looking, a feeling strengthened when you are onboard and fixed to your seat by the RR or PW screaming at full thrust. And on the other hand I ever have find the Guppy family attracting and interesting, just like the Conroy Skymonster or Airbus A300ST. But really, how many peoples find these beautiful ? We are not so many.

Seems like there is a Mammoth and a pair of Vector.

Thanks for the helps Sharpy. In fact this spacecraft was a try to make a "cheap" version of a more complete one with a duo of NERVs which was supposed to reach Duna with a small rover : I think I will stop with the rear ramp as it's finally totally useless for a LKO transfert-only craft. And will probably start a new one, just keeping the wing, their nacelles and the T-tail. The cargo bay will be directly linked to the cockpit, the fuel stored in the rear section and probably one/two weak rocket engine placed in a more traditional fuselage end.

Tried to make a new full stock medium/heavy S.S.T.O. in what I called Project Talos : But it's another failure by far. It's easy to handle, pretty stable during the climb with its T-tail and there is enough fuel for orbiting to 200 x 200. Just the center of thrust is so shifted the craft can't complete the circularization. Even with just two R.A.P.I.E.R. engaged it will rise its nose crazily if I go over 40-45% of thrust.

I am still running under 1.0.5 and these tanks are the 2H ones from Impossible Innovations (I think there was an update recently for 1.1.3).

Personally I find the Rockomax X-200 familly much more horrible than the Kerbodyne tanks. I mean, when I look at that : I think about that :

Have completed my first flight to Moho. I'll try to share a mission report.

This new Typ VII seems breathtaking! Will it receive the modern bridge with Flakzwilling mounts like the VIIC/41 photo you use?