swjr-swis

The offset gizmo (called 'Tool: Move' in the editor) is your friend. Connect the separator by itself first, then with the offset gizmo, pull it away from the node until it is outside of the node 'ball' (*). Now you can safely place the next part and it will attach only to the separator. Next select the offset gizmo again, select the separator, and hit space - voilá, it resets to its default location, and all parts are connected to the correct nodes. (*: note that sometimes, you cannot pull it out enough in the longitudinal direction, but that's ok, it works just the same pulling it sideways.

Precise control (caps lock on PC) also auto-balances RCS. A little not-very-advertised stock feature. If you're not controlling a vessel, any SAS hold of any kind it might've had is no longer applied. The slightest sneeze will start it tumbling.

Or hamsters kerbals in a giant wheel, running for their lives snacks.

I'm glad someone else has been trying their hand on the twin bomber, and confirming what I already stated. We ended up with very similar designs too, at least part and concept wise (although I like the 'backwards' placement of the main wings on yours). I'm not sure there is much better that can be done, other than assembling huge multi-part wings made entirely of the basic fin, which has by a tiny margin a better lift/weight ratio than any of the other lifting surfaces. The fit is one issue. A second issue is that the center of mass of the ore tanks -according to the game- is not where you would expect: it is located at the edge where the radial tanks attach, and not in the tank itself. This causes weird displacements of the entire plane's CoM and unexpected rotations when trying to release them in the tightly fitting space of the service bay. I did solve it the (a?) Kerbal way: not quite stamping on them, but by placing sepratrons (moar boosters!) on the top to make the release rocket-powered. Took some trial and error, but it's 100% reliable this way. Even then though, it proved impossible to meet the top speed and climb rate requirements. I only barely made the speed benchmark and while it was at level flight, it was only after pulling up from a loooong dive to build up enough excess speed that I could level out and still be over 250m/s. And the climb was only possible within the 10min mark by dropping all bombs. I finally gave in and made a version with drop tanks so I could drop most of the fuel immediately after take off but that was not enough by itself. Turns can be done very fast, well within 20 secs if you leave the pitch authority at 100%, but to make the craft stable and nice to fly at different speeds I find it requires managing those sliders carefully. Anyway, I don't consider mine a successful attempt, but you're free to take the service/bomb bay and see if it gives your version the edge it needs to make the mark. Craft files available here. The Mk2 was before I figured out the CoM issue and two of the four bays still need to be rotated 180 degrees to compensate for that. The Mk3 I think performs the best, and the Mk4 was an attempt with drop tanks, to get the climb and top speeds by dropping fuel and bombs right after take off. Craft files in this folder Screenshots in this folder

Make a small rover and launch it with Jeb on it Drive it off the runway in any random direction away from the KSC Return to Space Center (and leave Jeb out there) ... Prof I mean, enjoy playing the rest of your career without Jeb constantly getting into your new craft.

How did I miss this challenge until now? I've been doing tiny planes since they introduced the Juno. Although most of the ones I did were grounded by the 1.1 wheel disaster. Wondering now if and what to enter...

Are you kidding me? I'm envious! Sometimes I wish that starting a new career, I could go back to not knowing anything at all, and relive all those discoveries and small triumphs all over again, and feel that same satisfaction of a first achievement, or even better, discovering that it wasn't random and I could repeat that achievement with some predictability ("I.. I think I actually know how to orbit! Squeeee!*" <quick look around to check that no one saw me squee*>). There is nothing quite like your 'first time of ...'. Cherish those moments, and know that KSP has the potential to keep giving you moments like that for thousands of hours to come. And post your successes; you are right to be proud of them, this is actual rocket science after all! (*: Entirely hypothetical of course, just for illustrative purposes. I'm a grown man; grown men don't squee. Squee isn't even a real word. Mutter.)

The idea in principle is good, but seeing as lights in the VAB/SPH are one of the direct causes of CPU/GPU being pushed harder than in flight mode, I'd rather not have a day/night cycle that would force me to have lights on while editing a craft. A day/night toggle to do a quick check of what our craft looks like in the dark, like the mentioned mod does, now that I would be ok with being stock.

If anyone wonders why I like KerbalX: From problem report (right after a major update that undoubtedly cost quite a bit of energy and time)... .. to investigation and solution. 7 hours apart, in between which it was night time for the maintainer, one can hope he was getting some sleep during that interval. That is service, people. From a free site run by a single volunteer. You do good work, @katateochi. Props.

Any reason my 1730kg USC1b entry hasn't been listed?

Mutter and grumble... All very nice improvements. The best Kerbal craft-sharing site gets better with every update. Make it stock already, SQUAD!

Ok, following up with the USC1b, Manned category, 1730kg for a Kerbal to a 70x75km orbit, after tweaking the LF and LOX fuel loads and the placement of the spiders for more control. Almost a hands-off ascent, so should be easy to replicate if anyone wants to. I still had plenty of EVA fuel left, even after I clumsily fumbled the last part of the circularization (navigating on EVA is not made easy). I could still drop the fins probably, the ascent is almost perfectly into prograde and the jet gimbal might be enough to keep things in line. But other than that there doesn't seem to be much more to shave off for this design. Note that KSP was getting a bit weird a few times: it sometimes would not activate the jet when staging. Maybe too many retries and reverts got it a bit mixed up. craft file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/68t13bmd6dl4ydu/USC1b.craft?dl=0 video file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/n8nxvvadjtzua2s/KSP113-Lightest2Orbit-USC1b.mp4?dl=0 (several parts of the video have been sped up 4x so you don't have to watch 12+ mins)

(note: superseded by next post) I present the USC1 as the second entry for the Manned category: 1795kg injects a lone Kerbal into a 71x70km orbit, with a little EVA RCS assistance. Notice I kickstart the jet into (almost) full thrust right from staging, by locking the main LF tank and having it rev up off a tank that stays behind with the clamp when I release. This helps the jet climb in a more efficient ascent. I figure that since the jet does not move until I release the clamp, this is a valid method. Also, why bother with a fairing anymore... There's still room for improvement, I think I can shave the LF down to at least 25 for the jet lifter, and probably a notch or even two off the LOX, as I almost managed to fully inject into orbit without EVAing. I will be attempting to do so, but for now this is my entry. video file (Dropbox inline shows horrible quality, download it to see it at high quality, 53MB): https://www.dropbox.com/s/hwe1ecyzkotbzhe/KSP113-Lightest2Orbit-USC1.mp4?dl=0 craft file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/s3q7xi3bohsld7j/USC1.craft?dl=0 P.S.: I figured a video of the entire ascent would serve as full record, plus the craft file is there if you want to check... the ascent does need manual control but is almost as easy as could be. Let me know if you still require screenshots of specific things.

Minimum. You're free to pack more.

That part is clear, and I am not arguing this; it's your challenge, you set the rules. In the specific case of the twin bomber category, there is no one to beat, so that's not the issue. No one has yet entered a design that meets the requirements. What I'm trying to say is that this is not by chance: the combination of requirements do not appear feasible, because of the disproportionate weight of fuel and ore requested compared to the other three categories. The first two categories can be designed to a 1.1+ TWR and hardly any drag. Not enormously challenging, literally my first attempt already exceeded the requirements. The last category has a lot of drag due to the bombs and fuel, and starts at a low of 0.5 TWR with 4 junos, but by going up to 8 junos it can reach a 1.1+ TWR too. Challenging, but still feasible because there is room to play with optional extra engines. But the twin bomber is stuck with 2 junos at around a 0.4 TWR, with very little room to improve it, and it is far from meeting the requirements. At least in stock. Anyway, no harm done, I'll just skip the twin bomber category. Should be interesting to see what entries make it to that board. A question: what is considered 'turn time' for the purpose of this challenge? I've been wondering since Cunjo asked. I assumed it meant fully reversing the direction of travel (eg. going from a 90 to 270 degree heading), but I'm wondering if you actually mean it to be a full circle 360 degree turn that exits to the same heading as it was entered. I'll load up the craft and redo the turns to time a 360 full circle, just in case, as that obviously takes longer than just reversing the direction of travel.

See that's the thing: I think the amounts of fuel requested are way more than practically needed, especially for the twin fighter and bomber. The single juno fighter can cruise comfortably at 13 km using a pittance of fuel. The others would be able to as well, if the fuel amount was more proportional to their need. You know there's too much fuel on board when the flight range will actually improve by dumping part of it... I had to severely limit how hard I pitched to not end up backwards, as you say. It's hard to limit the authority to prevent over-turning, and still have enough pitch left for the climbs. In the turns, I did keep the prograde marker going along to make it a 'proper' turn. Not easy when flying on keyboard and mouse, and keeping an eye on the timer and the navball heading at the same time. These craft really turn very hard though. Found out while trying a tight loop that it's quite possible to end up in a stable and level glide backwards and basically braking on forward thrust and transition into forward flight again. But that actually takes longer than a good tight turn. The basic fins pack the most lift for weight, they are usually the most efficient for Juno-sized craft. I had some ideas to compete with you on that basis, but I wanted to try enter something very different so went with strakes instead. I love the look of them, have been doing all kinds of things with them since the Juno came out. It's a lot of lift and 'hull' to work with for not much weight, plus it packages fuel too if needed. Very efficient. Makes for some pretty and very flyable TIE-fighter designs too , I have some on my KerbalX page. Anyhow, I'll wait to see what @He_162 says about the fuel/ore and the moment of measuring performance, before trying to enter anything.

So, it only needs to have the capacity. I expected the requested performance requirements to actually be measured when at full load, but ok. So to be clear: the top/turn/climb speeds can be measured with minimal fuel? What about the bombs, do we have to have them still on or can we drop those too before measuring performance? The 4-8 engine entry is not the problem, I mentioned that. It's the twin-engine bomber. 40kN to push 7000kg of just the pure fuel and ore, and then add the parts and drag (although if we can drop fuel and bombs before measuring, the story may change a bit). @Cunjo Carl's single engine fighter entry does not have a crew, does it? The entries I mentioned before are without crew, since they are entirely 0.625m body, so they are out. I'm linking them here anyway just cause of the trouble I went to to make something to match Cunjo's entry: BTW: crew requirement rules out a single-Juno fighter with external command seat. The ECS/kerbal is too draggy in even the most basic tiniest configuration possible for a single Juno to reach 250m/s in level flight. Pure matter of the enormous drag of an external kerbal vs the max thrust of the Juno.

@He_162, two questions: Are you sure about those fuel amounts? I think perhaps you underestimate the effect of the fuel mass, plus the size and number of the tanks needed to add so much. One does not need to add n+1 (or more!) fuel to keep the same reach/flight time as the nr of engines increase, but the added weight quickly kills the performance. Junos are goodness in a nice tiny package, but they do have their limits at 20kN of thrust. When you say 'small ore tanks', I am assuming you actually mean the smallest tanks, the radial ones, right? Not the 1.25m ones that are named 'small ore tank'? Cause again, between the size (drag!) and the weight when fully loaded, on top of the fuel you already ask for... that's killing the possibilities. I have two entries ready for the first two categories, and I know I can make things work for the last one with 6-8 Junos. I haven't yet manage a twin engine bomber to get even near the specs you ask for due to the disproportional weight and drag of the fuel and ore requirements (7000 kg for 800 units of fuel + 4x75 units of ore). It's just 40 kN of thrust total at sea level, keep that in mind.

Visibly, yes. But the effective thrust will be decimated. Do a test with the exhaust going through the shield, and with the engines just sticking out so the exhaust is fully outside the shield... you'll see the difference.

Mods, please close this thread. I made my suggestion, there isn't an 'answer' to it, and the continuation of this thread has been derailed into all sorts of things that are exactly zero help for console players.

By the root of the wing. Or if by 'multipart' (aren't they all?) you mean several separate wing sections that do not share a root, but are placed very close together to *look* like a single wing: angling just one section by its root, can work just as well, and would even look more like real life wings. More complicated if you really want all the separate sections at the same angle, and something that might resonate with any OCD: even with snap off, the rotate gizmo still moves discrete units. So carefully do the same number of 'ticks' to all wing section roots. To know absolutely sure, one can overlap wing sections with the offset gizmo, switch to rotate, angle until visibly aligned, switch back to offset (gizmo will keep the same part selected the whole time, no danger of losing it because of clipping) then offset the now same-angled wing section back to where you mean it to be. If you only think you have OCD, you're not taking this seriously enough. It's practically a requirement in aerospace KSP engineering.

Oh my, that does sound very complicated indeed - practically defying the laws of physics to get such things to fly. Obviously way more complicated than getting a plane to lift off without needing to pitch up. My apologies for over-simplifying. I am not worthy.

Now have some of them do tricks while others score them...

It's made a bit hard by the difficulties of wheels getting blocked and/or huge discrepancies in sizes between nose wheel and rear wheels, but yes, you should try to aim for a plane that will lift off all by itself as soon as it gains enough speed, without having to touch the control surfaces at all. You can do this two ways: The easy way: make sure the nose wheel is just a notch lower than the rear wheels so the entire body of the plane is aimed slightly above the horizon as it rests on the tarmac. Better: give the wings a few degrees of angle of attack so they are generating lift even when you are pointed exactly at the horizon. This will allow your plane body to keep pointed much more prograde, lowering body drag by a lot, and making your plane have much better performance. As a side effect, it should also cause your plane to lift off pretty much by itself without having to pitch up, just as soon as you hit the right speed.

Except when it is not identical across all machines...