Success! A completely reusable craft which takes off vertically, lands on wheels and can reach a stable orbit with a periapsis above 70km. I call her the 121 (yeh very imaginative) Take off using two tubojets located on the tip of each wing. The rocket engine isn\'t activated until about 13000m, and once the turbojets reach below .10 efficiency I turn them off. The fuel lines run the remaining fuel in the wings to the rocket since the jets are now not needed past this point. Soon after the gravity turn is started heading at 90 until the apoapsis is above 70k, then performing the usuall manoeuvres to raise the periapsis above the atmosphere. And here is the periapsis above 70k, at this point I have 421kg of fuel left in the last tank. Just a fuller close shot of her in space: I consider trying to land close to KSC but play it safe and aim for one of the larger flat continents. This is deorbiting: [imghttp://i280.photobucket.com/albums/kk186/dargie25/DEORBIT-1.png]http:// And landing, I found her very easy to control throughout the atmosphere right down to landing. And finally landed safely and compleatly in tact: I think that qualifies me for a K Prize Heres the craft file if anyone wants to check it out: http://fileflush.com/file/5703/121.craft.html EDIT: ah deer it seems the challenge was to take off horizontally, my mistake :/ Ill give it a bash with exactly the same design from the runway later.
