sgt_flyer

here i have a SSTO demonstrator for my brand new KRABE engine (Kerbal Rocket Air Breathing Engine) (yes, this is inspired by the SABRE engine ) - note : i did not need to use the debug menu to do the clipping. the idea behind this engine pod was to have a self contained engine + air intakes (so we don't have to spam air intakes all over our designs, this one has it's air intakes placed where the compression would take place) the SSTO with it's two KRABE engines (the LV-N is a plus, once the SSTO has a good apoapsis, the LV-N is all it need to maintain it until it has escaped atmosphere and circularize. the SSTO make a smooth climbing on it's own after take off, and is a good reentry / glider plane. the engine : basically, the engine has 3 engines clipped in one spot : 1 basic jet engine, 1 turbojet engine and a Aerospike, mounted behind a structural fuselage. the radial engine body is here to hide the 8 circular air intakes. the advantage of this self contained system, is to be able to easily use it with subassembly loader. it gives this SSTO a good steady thrust (as height goes up, the turbojet thrust increases, while the basic jet thrust decrease). .craft file : KRABE Demonstrator Launch profile : Keys : 1 - Turn on the jets and turbojets 2 - Turn off the jets 3 - Turn off the turbojets, close all air intakes, and activate the aerospikes and LV-N. 4 - Turn off the aerospikes 5 - Turn off the LV-N, open all air intakes, activate the jets. Ascent profile : hit '1', go full throttle. you can take off on your own or let the plane do it (don't use ASAS for automatic takeoff ) the plane will start climbing alone as it passes the end of the runway. keep a 30° angle of attack over the horizon until you climb to 15000 meters (usually, you will have around 1.5 air in the intakes remaining at 15000m) at 15000m, shut down the basic jet engines with '2' and keep a 15° angle of attack over the horizon until you get to 30000m. at 30000m (or if you have 0.12 air remaining in the intakes, but that's the remaining air i got at 30000m) , hit '3' to shut down the turbojets and activate the 3 rockets engines, and go for a 30° angle of attack. push your apoapsis to 100km, and hit '4' to disable the aerospikes. make some low throttle burns with the lv-n to keep your apoapsis to 100km until you cleared the atmosphere. for the circularization burn, you will usually need a bit less than 1mn of burn with the LV-N, so start you circularization 30s before reaching apoapsis. Reentry : after deorbiting, simply keep the nose towards the prograde marker. the plane is able to stabilize itself alone during reentry (no need for ASAS during reentry) it's a capable glider with the few remaining fuel left, but you should still have more than enough liquid fuel left to make a powered landing (hit '5' to disable the LV-N and reopen the air intakes). Have fun

looks almost like the real thing with this skipper clipped into the service module i've been trying to make an escape tower which looks more like apollo's one (even if the I-beams looks a bit short compared to the real one srb's solid fuel tank ) basically, there's 12 separatrons at the base of this one, clipped (without the debug menu) to look like there's only 4 exhausts. for the two separatrons at the top, they have a slightly different angle from each side, so the one which is near the small nosecone's black paint offer slightly more lateral thrust, giving the abort system a nice arc like escape path which goes in the direction opposite to the black paint, to help it veer off course from the rocket. there is a cubic strut and a TR-2V decoupler hidden inside the clamp-o-tron (the cubic strut is radially attached to the 3 man capsule) the aerodynamic nose cone being the first part of the launch tower attached to this decoupler. - for standard 'inflight' jetissoning of the launch tower, i simply activate the 2 topmost separatrons, and 4 separatrons at the base, from the 12, and decouple the TR-2V.

on which one ? the monster or the lite ? the 'monster' one has basically 2.5meters tanks at the base almost entirely surrounded by FLT-800's (only towards the exterior, there are no flt's at the core stage's contact point) the flt800 extend past the 2.5m tank bottom, to cover the engines, and a few other 2.5 meters tanks which are shifted a bit from the lower one, all that covered by structural panels the onega 'lite' is simpler, with 1 shifted 2.5m tank, and 4 flt800 mounted on cubic struts to angle them as needed

Kliper has now made it's glided landing on all planets with an atmosphere (reached eve with the help of the onega's lite upper stage ) the kliper is a fantastic glider here in eve's thick atmosphere (landed near sea level, with no need to input any commands in final approach simply disable ASAS, level the horizon above a smooth landing site, and kliper will do the rest without needing to touch the controls it's angled control surfaces made it flight with a prograde marker staying 10° below horizon, and it landed nicely around 25 m/s

for the soyouz, yes, making spheres are damn hard with stock parts - and Darth Lazarus, using those small lander legs as soyouz's antennas is a great idea , that really look likes the real ones antennas else, my onega 'lite' was made for the kliper, which weight around 20 tons (although the onega lite might be able to lift up to 30 tons - even more for the heavylift version - but this one a bit more unstable ) about my kliper, onega 'lite' is way overengineered managed to get Kliper with barely enough fuel to laythe with the onega lite modified soyouz block I (jetisonned during transfer ) (if it can go to laythe, it can reach the other atmospheric planets too (done duna aboard the original 'monster' onega ), i still got to go to eve, but i know the kliper's able to do it's glided landing on both duna and laythe already

yeh, first rendez-vous and docking are always a great moment

very nice rocket pack as always, plus the additional subassembly .craft files already prepared is a really nice touch

i have released .craft files of each rocket version which are able to be used without subassembly too, if you read my post - even the rocket kit .craft can be reused without subassembly, simply pick the parts you want, assemble it under each other, declip this part and delete the rest nevertheless, rocket kits with standardized parts you can associate to lift different payloads are useful (plus, if one day in carrer mode the game take into account mass production of standardized assemblies, it will save some money on those ) anyway, subassembly loader is much less a necessity since 0.20, just a commodity now

herm your rocket kit looks good, but it's not the first rocket in kit (but i understand you missed it, the forum moves a lot ) i posted the Angara rocket family 2 days ago (and maybe there was some rocket kits before, which were lost to the forum kraken, although they needed payloader for this) my angara's a rocket in kit too (with the core node in their dummy payload ) so it was possible to create your own payload without requiring to use subassembly loader for the rocket, if you wanted, just by declipsing the rocket below the payload, letting it in the VAB, and trashing the payload and remaking your own

here's an answer (clic on the thumb for standard version) the boosters here are made off by two 'zenit' first stages sticked on a single manifold (so the two zenit act as a single booster) the direction of the struts is important (think transferring forces from one object to one other, as the rocket want to go up, simply strut accordingly to that, and you reduce tremendously the number of struts needed between the boosters and the rocket) note : i'm not talking of the struts needed for making the booster hold itself together - only the struts between the booster and the core. an example : this version of my energia rocket flew really well (without a side payload which moves way too far it's center of mass) basically, in this case, the X-shaped strutting is much more efficient for transmitting forces than two horizontal struts. can work horizontally too, if you want to keep boosters correctly spaced between them, like soyouz's use in real life (look at the base of the soyouz's boosters): http://i.usatoday.net/tech/gallery/2012/t120515soyuzlaunch/06-pg-horizontal.jpg that works extremely well, we use it on alot of the rocket in the soyouz's R7's thread, my onegas use them too (and the onega 'lite' version has only 2 struts each to the core (at the top) and two more struts between each other booster (at the bottom, plus the TT-38K radial holding the bottom of the booster to the bottom of the core) and they still have fuel tanks equivalent to a Jumbo 64, a x-200 32 and a x-200 16). basically, on the soyouz, think of the rocket being 'carried' by it's boosters

i mean struts between the boosters and the rocket on my energia rocket, i have manifolds holding my 'boosters' by pair, and they almost do not move upon separation, even with separatrons to help them. (and i have maybe 6 struts between the boosters and the main body)

for the separatrons, it depends, if you need a lot of strutting to keep your boosters, you will need the separatrons, as they will cancel the decoupler force.

news for the Onega Lite version managed to use the fuel left in the onega's upper stage for a Jool transfer - followed by a direct laythe encounter and aerobrake, then glided landing (note, i had not a single unit of fuel left in the orbital module after deorbiting over laythe - and i only had to do a 245m/s correction during Jool's transfer, followed by a approx 250m/s to get the direct laythe encounter and subsequent correction for aerobrake, so not much room for error (i made several saves, as that was the first time i went to laythe )) in this case, the upper stage was dropped during mid jool transfer burn, and i finished with the orbital module. 100km orbit above laythe glided approach Landed on laythe

Here's Kliper mounted Atop Angara A3 (which was one of the possible launchers for kliper) - Briz M replaced by Kliper on this version, and winglets added to first stage. i have included an access arm on the launch pad (it will separate and fall away from the rocket on liftoff) for adding up to 4 Kerbals into the Hitchiker's. (press 3 to deploy the access arm ladders) abort sequence : press the abort button or backspace (don't forget to disable ASAS just after hitting abort) and, once the escape tower finished it's burn, jetisson it with 1, and glide your way back to the surface. (you can reuse ASAS after the abort sequence) the craft is turned so it's wings face north at liftoff, it's to prevent from having the wing lift messing with the rest during g-turn (the rocket will slightly rotate during G-turn, but it won't make the rocket uncontrollable.) you should set your throttle at a bit more than 2/3rd (like on the image) and you shouldn't need to move it until orbit (if you go full throttle, you will hit your target Apoapsis too soon). start your G-Turn at 10000m, make a smooth turn to reach around 45° at 20000m, then continue your smooth turn to reach the horizon at 50000m. (the first stage will run out of fuel around 30000m, the escape tower will be jetisonned at the same time than the first stage). once at 50000 m, continue to burn towards the horizon until you have your apoapsis at the desired height for LKO (i usually go for a 100kmx100km orbit) , then circularize (and correct your orbital angle as needed, if you want to go equatorial). you can then separate from the second stage, switch to it, turn it retrograde, fire it's engines, and switch rapidly back to the kliper (the burn the second stage will make during the 2.5km until it goes on rails is enough to deorbit it) and voila, your kliper in orbit with 1200 m/s of Delta V in it's orbital module for your orbital manoeuvers needs . As always with the kliper, it's a great reentry glider, which can do precision landings (no parachutes ) for reentry : deorbit with it's orbital module engines, turn your kliper's prograde, and jetisson the orbital module. (i usually do my deorbit burn from a 100x100 orbit over the big mountain range in the desert, and let my orbit path fall a bit before the middle of the ocean east of KSC, this should bring you near KSC, and once the kliper speed is under 200 m/s, you should be able to easily manoeuver it to line up with KSC's runway, and landing at around 50m/s. (my usual suborbital trajectory after Deorbit burn with the kliper, though the end point can be even a little nearer KSC than what's in the pic) : here's the Angara Kliper : http://www./?06c048owuodieas New version of Angara + Kliper : at 345 parts, the A5 with modified soyouz block I - it can make a Free return trajectory from mün with the upper stage (kliper's will only need to use it's fuel to circularize around Mün, and coming from a FRT, you'll have plenty of fuel left to service whatever station you have up there http://www./?4yq1c9fmgkwujbk - does not come with the access scaffolding this time. ascent profile is as follow : liftoff with the throttle 4 small notches below the max. at 10000m, start a smooth G-turn, in order to reach : 45° at 15000m, 30° at 25000m, 20° at 35000m, and 0° at 45000m - burn until your apoapsis is at 80000m then wait until apoapsis to circularize. you can then make your Free return trajectory, to the Mün as usual with the Angara's upper stage as a transfer stage. (when i tested it, i had enough fuel left in the upper stage to send it on a crash course to mün after decoupling) once at mün, circularize with the kliper, and service whatever stations you have in orbit up there, before coming back to kerbin here's the Kliper around mün : - as you see, plenty of fuel left (around 1000 / 1100 remaining delta-V )

here's a new entry in the Angara's family (i've let aside energia / buran for the moment ) the Angara A3 was one of the proposed launch vehicles for Kliper, so i tried (just needed to add some winglets to prevent kliper from making the rocket tumbling) : the end result is down to 298 parts - but this time it can only bring Kliper to LKO, it can not act as a transfer stage like the onega's basically, the launch vehicle is an A3 with Briz-M replaced by Kliper. i'll add it to my Angara's post at the end, this version is much more usable for LKO ferrying of kerbals (much less parts to handle ) Kliper's represent around 8% of the total rocket weight (254tons on the pad) at liftoff. plus, the kliper and it's orbital module (which will be all that remains in orbit) is only 107 parts, so it can approach complex space stations (on a plus side, i almost halved the weight and removed 1/3rd of the part count between each iteration of kliper's launcher - original onega 'monster' was 977 parts and 900 tons on the pad, Onega 'lite' was 617 parts and 533 tons on the pad)

nah, the OK-GLI with the 4 jet engines was just for aerodynamics testings of the Buran. sole space flight was made without mounted jet engines and glided reentry (altough the buran still retain the capabilities of mounting 2 engines) - plus, KSP engines would be waaaay too big ^^ my aerodynamics test was made with 2 basic jet engines, which were only used to boost me to take off speed on the runway, then jetisonned just before takeoff (else, the engines would make me tumble ) the two LV-909 were enough to limit the loss of speed until 1000m to start the gliding tests ( and if used inflight, i think those would be enough to keep my version of buran aflight, due to the enormous winglift this thing has

nah - buran has no lift engines - only orbital manoeuver engines - all the carrying is done by the launcher itself. and adding that much RCS fuel would mess Energia (if not taking it apart right away )

booh guess Buran will prove wayyy to complicated to send to orbit (asymetric rocket + wing lift, ouch ) - guess it will stay in it's hangar, waiting for the hangar to collapse on it

i'm trying to get a specific payload on Energia (note, it has been tested as a glider (i added jetissonable jet engines for the test, connected to the rear RCS fins, dropping those engines just before takeoff (after initial acceleration) and taking some height with the rocket engines alone (which push it really nicely in atmosphere) and the thing, once engines are shut down, glides nicely (landing speed around 40m/s) - the junior docking ports are there because i intend to try to transform the bay doors into RCS controllable parts - the JR docking ports are placed so the bay doors will look like the real ones once opened (they are supposed to be open all the time once in orbit, they are used as radiators to cool down the systems)

on random ship rotation : i've found out that it's when we use partially rotated things as engine supports that we create random rotation - basically, when the engine start to thrust, it will 'bend' the part around it's contact point, and as it's partially rotated, it will shift it in a direction - and as all the engines will have the same bending, the rocket will start to rotate. (1 test you can do : between a Structural fuselage turned 90° to half clip in a larger tank as a engine support, and a Tail connector as engine support (tail connector which is naturally half clipped) - that's how i solved the problem for my Energia launcher

i have a question on the service module, why not clip the engine a bit into it ? appolo's services modules just show the bell nozzle at the end of the service module

i tried it, it's really well built, i didn't noticed wobble, but the third stage has only lvt 30's and is thus unsteerable during G-turn (had to abort, couldn't make it to orbit because i started tumbling at 35000 meters ^^) so yes, perfect replica ^^

the Energia launcher - buran's launcher (contrary to US shuttle, which's has integrated engines which pumps fuel from the exterior tank, Buran does not fire it's engines until after separation, to circularize in orbit - it's Energia who does all the work until near orbit) it basically flew only two times : 1st mission to deliver Polyus, a soviet anti satellite weapon, (energia worked fine, it's polyus after separation who messed up, because it has to flip 180° after separation, and made a 360° loop instead, so it burned retrograde instead of prograde ) the second time was the only buran flight - which worked as intended basically, it's a monster core, with 4 zenit 1st stages attached to the sides as boosters (the zenit rockets were develloped from energia boosters in fact )

yes, i noticed an improvement in performance too. (damn, after finishing Energia, i'll make a polyus first (yes, the upside/down thing, which need to to a 180° flip before firing it's engines to burn prograde - and yes, you will be able to replicate polyus's fate simply make a 360° loop before firing your engines . maybe i'll try later to make Vulkan (Energia based, but way more monstruous )

my own current project (okay, not using soyouz parts anymore, but it's still russian ) 442 parts for the moment - should be able to carry 63 tons of dead weight to LKO - for something bigger, you might be able to put near 100 tons on this, but the rocket will have only around 4200 m/s of delta V, with a liftoff TWR of 1.45, so the payload will have to circularize on it's own (note, this lil' baby flies correctly, with very limited wobble ) the decoupler is the first node for this craft, so i could add the launcher to my subassembly (you build the payload, add a small cubic strut and a decoupler to it, and snap the rocket to this decoupler, then strut the payload ) i'll add a side cargo bay for the moment