Leafbaron

Thank you both for the comments! I will try. I was expecting my planes to fail in FAR and they did, i just don't have the knowledge of FAR to fix the issues and both youre comments have set me in the right direction, much appreciated!

Friends, I tried one of my SSTO spaceplanes from stock aero model in FAR this weekend (yes i have the dev version), and no I don't think its a bug, I believe it is related to supersonic aerodynamics and my lack of understanding them. Everything was going fine until about mach 1.5 when the craft started to pitch up and down slightly. progressively getting worse until about mach 2+ 700-800m/s at an altitude of about 10km pitching up and down turned into sideslipping until catastrophic unplanned destruction. Without knowing anything else. what can you veterans tell me about super sonic aerodynamics to aid in my designs? I can post a pic of the design when I get home, and if this is the wrong place to ask, please let me know.

I figured out how to get the dev version of FAR. All you gotta do is...Wait a second someones at the door.... Hello? how can I.... wait oh god what are your doing!? please no! *muffled screams* *loud thud* .......

I didn't quickload. I crashed in stage two. recoverd the vehicle and started again from stage 1 with a new vehicle. Thats why i made a second post. My first one was from last weekend.

It would be very interesting to see Dakar Summer 2017 come with a stock vehicle in which every opting for that division would use. This would really determine who has more skills behind the wheel not just achieving an "upper hand" from design alone. I also assume the stock vehicle would have its various quirks to contend with. Naturally. I assume individual design and entries would be welcome.

Do to a hiccup during stage 2 i had to restart. Electric wheel power only. Stage 1 start time 0:02:00. End time 00:17:19 Waited till daytime to start stage 2.... start time 03:12:00 End time stage 2 03:23:48 Stage 3 Start 03:26:00 Stage 3 End time 03:39:03 Stage 4 start time 03:40:00 Stage 4 end time 03:53:07 Stage 5 start time 03:54:00 Stage 5 End time 04:08:36 Stage 6 start time 04:13:00 Stage 6 end time 04:26:30 Stage 7 start time 04:27:00 Stage 7 end time 04:37:49 Stage 1 total time: 15 minutes 19 seconds. Stage 2 total time: 11 minutes 48 seconds. Stage 3 Total Time : 13 minutes 3 seconds. Stage 4 Total Time : 13 minutes 7 seconds. Stage 5 Total time 14 minutes 36 seconds. Stage 6 Total time 13 minutes 30 seconds. Stage 7 Total time 10 minutes 49 seconds TOTAL TIME : 1 hour 32 minutes 12 seconds

"Heehee well them duke boys were up excrements creek with out a paddle this time."

As atmospheric pressure decreases, and speed increase to past Mach 3 the whiplash engines start to decrease in performance seeing as mach 3 is about 1029 m/s at 1500 ms they would suffer considerable performance loss. They are also the most air hungry.

I concur. The RAPIER is not the end all be all. But you can achieve significant velocities in the atmosphere up to 1600-1800 ms with it up to a ceiling of 24-26km maybe higher, although I have not achieved this. Which makes getting to space that much easier and 3500 ISP over 310-350 to reach these velocities? yes please. I will say though that using the RAPIER in conjunction with a higher efficiency closed cycle engine is advantageous and can increase dv. But not always. If the craft is light and the additional weight of the closed cycle engine is a significant % of total vehicle mass then you wont see dv increasing from higher ISP. However on large crafts where the additional weight is 1 ton on a 140 ton craft, then yes, ISP will over come the difference in mass.

its also available on CKAN.

Haha well thanks I appreciate it.

Will avoid in the future. Truck was completely wrecked after falling face first from 100m fall. I guess ill have to restart from stage 1?

Had a hiccup during stage 2, Hit a seam or something, truck went about 100 meters in the air straight up and Bill fell into the core of the planet. Please advise.

Stage one complete Start time 3:00 minutes, End time 18:18 minutes. Total time Stage 1: 15 minutes 18 seconds. Wheel power only, Vehicle weight is 8.7 tons. I plan to finish every stage with this vehicle. no swaps or new vehicles waiting for Jeb and Bill at the end of each stage. I forgot to switch the velocity indicator to surface. That is 0 m/s surface. Here I am at the beginning of stage 2. Flag is 40 m underground?

Here she is Ladies and Gentlemen, My Dakar 2017 submission. WHEEL POWER ONLY, stocked with all the necessities to complete each stage back to back. No pit stops, no bringing in new vehicles for damage. She'll make it all in one go. Stage one complete, posting pics and results on results forum. -Leafy

I can't wait to get started!

Might I suggest having different vehicle categories? such as Wheel powered ONLY, wheel powered w/ jet engine augmentation, and finally hovercraft.

Eagerly waiting to get off work so I can start practicing the Kerbal Dakar 2017 race!

Honestly, When i was making taking my first baby steps with SSTO's I built rocket planes. only used the swivel or thud's as the engine, as its isp and thrust in atmosphere is "acceptable". They couldn't do much except get to orbit and shuttle maybe 2 kerbals, No cargo capabilities. But it was extremely easy, relatively speaking. Maybe try making a rocket but adding wings and launching it like a plane. you'll need about 3700-4000 m/s of dv to reach orbit with a rocket plane.

I pretty much agree with what everyone is saying. SSTO space planes are a very efficient way to deliver cargo/vehicles to LKO. Some folks like Wanderfound, are ridiculously good and make space planes that can travel the entire system. However, I think they are much more at home making trips to LKO and back. It took me a long time to before i was able to start making successful SSTO planes.

For landing at the ksc with a spaceplane I will lower my periapsis to about 30-32km above the peninsula to the east of the KSC. I hold at roughly 30 degrees and watch my orbit. Pitching down if I'm decelerating to quickly or pitching up if I'm not decelerating fast enough. I try to aim to be around 1500 m/s or less @ and altitude of 20-26km when coming over the top of the mountains to the west of the KSC. For your pitch problem, being nose heavy is good for a space plane i have found, because even if you CoL is behind your CoM slightly, its not enough to keep you nose forward during reentry. Before you try to adjust anything on your plane, the first thing I would try is increasing the authority control limit on your control surfaces for pitch. As for my flight profiles, they differ from spaceplane to spaceplane because of drag characteristics and TWR's. But climbing at 10-15 degrees until about 9-12000m then leveling out and building speed to about 18-22km is usually what i aim for. When i switch to closed cycle engines i like to pitch up and get to 30-40km as quickly as I can without decreasing my speed. At this point gravity losses are negligble because of the speed you have and also the wings on the craft, What your really fighting is drag, so the quicker you can reduce drag the more fuel you'll have and also it decreases the amount of heating you experience. Staying at 10 degrees until orbit means youre pushing through a lot of thicker atmosphere at quick speeds, burning a lot of fuel to over come drag as well as cooking your kerbals. However some of my designs, because of low TWR and "high" drag must climb to about 13-14km level out and actually slowly fall back down to 10-11 km before over coming mach 1 and building serious speed. All it takes is just regular flying of the craft and you will tease out all of its idiosyncrasies and learn what it's best flight profile is. But all you can do is fly fly fly and try different things. -Leafy

With air space around KSC restricted to spaceplane development and testing, The boys at Steadler Engineering Corps, C7 aerospace, EEG, and Kerbodyne needed to use another facility to launch from in order to test their new equipment. Here at Trehus Propulsion Laboratories can only assume the old Inland KSC. While testing an SSTO with 50 ton payload capabilities was being tested on a suborbital trajectory. A distress signal was received. 4 Kerbals were stranded in Munar orbit, presumably from the joint venture between Steadler, C7, EEG, and Kerbodyne. TPL tracked 3 pieces of debris in Munar orbit pinging with vital signs. 2 in an inclined, high altitude retro grade orbit and one in a low altitude circular orbit. The fourth was from the munar surface. The rescue mission is daring and will require a lucrative delta v budget. Work was started immediately on a rescue craft capable of such requirements while also being fitting into the 40 ton capable, proven, and tested SSTO. The aptly name Condor set off to LKO with payload in tow. The rescue mission was to planned to enter a retrograde Munar orbit and pick up the two stranded kerbals. Land on the Mun and pickup the third. Finally. enter a prograde orbit to pick up the last kerbal. All efforts went smoothly and according to design. Mission control was relieved and so were the stranded Astronauts. A full mission debriefing confirmed they were part of the wreckage from the joint engineering venture and that during landing just before touchdown, a catastrophic plumbing failure occurred. Spraying liquid fuel and oxidizer into a combustible cloud that sparked upon contact with the ignited landing engines. this sent debris into retro and prograde orbits and thanks to the lumpy gravity field around the moon inclined and heightened the altitude of two of the command pods. Lets just say Trehus Propulsion Labs will be getting huge discounts from Steadler, C7, EEG, and Kerbodyne in the future for rescuing their astronauts.

WOW!

I think a simple work around would be the option to merge all parts to one when saving sub assemblies. When saving you could be prompted to save as one part or save as indivdual parts. This way you could make wings and save them as one part or other various structures and save them as one part. Then when using them from the sub assembly it would only add one part. This would also limit the cheatyness of infinite stiffness to a point.

"... junkyard space program where everything is jury- rigged and highly suspect." - @GoSlash27