ihtoit

that is just epic!

yes, we did. Look for the Dragon 9 Hard Deck Challenge. Oh, wait, here it is.

OK I'll rejigger and do a weapons count. The X-Wing won't have any missiles.

I have a STOCK (+MJ+BDAI) X-Wing, is it too late to enter my baby with four Vulcan cannons? If not, I do have a twin-tailed variant of the EF2000, twin Vulcans and ten hardpoints for joint strike capability: Failing that, there's the Wasp, with fourteen hardpoints and outboard Vulcans, this thing is designed to plow through swarms of enemy fighters and unleash holy fire on them. It doesn't even *need* chaff/flares, it can outrun anything. Even the EF2000:

My extension pics:

that is a beast of an aeroshroud, what ya got under it?? [PSEUDOEDIT]: ooh, pretty!

Sure, it's easy - just slap a BDA Flight Computer on the side of each stage (anywhere - it's physicsless) and if you arm a payload with a rack of missiles (or guns, or lasers!) and the weapon manager as well, now you've got a deployable orbital weapon platform which you can set to Team B and with a few dozen of those puppies in 71km orbit, you can have fun dodging them with your hapless Kerbals in capsules sporting a BDAFM Team A badge.

how did you get that to not flip with the fins? I had to lose them because all the stage wanted to do with them on was nose down and piledrive the planet.

loving that! Pretty sure those antennas aren't stock, though? [EDIT] They might be in 1.0.5, I can't find them in my 1.0.4 build.

Jenga with a twist: Take two vehicles, each crewed by a Kerbal, and land one on top of the other (one of them necessarily has to be able to fly). Here's the catch: your flying craft must then lift BOTH vehicles and carry the total weight OFF THE GROUND for a minimum surface distance of 1km, at which point the other vehicle (necessarily wheeled) takes over and roves both vehicles - still mated together - back to the start point at the West end of the runway. Prohibited mods: anything with a cable attachment (winch, EVA/dynamic struts, etc.) such as KAS/KIS. Use the stock docking ports. Anything else is OK. Vehicles may NOT share fuel or power sources. [Challenger's photos to follow]

124.4 tons of what? Lander weight? Dry weight tanks? Snacks? You really have to be very specific. Might I suggest you read the challenge submission guide?

it's an option - in fact my early launches didn't use the SRBs, I only strapped them on to ensure I had enough fuel for a shallow-launch boostback after launching with a substantial payload. The Falcon Heavy uses strap-on boosters, that's what they'll be using for their crewed launches since we're talking 40 tons of capsule not 2 tons of comsats. Back to my early launches, this is what #1 looked like: Yep, those are fins. No chutes, and no RCS. The second stage consists of the stage control and a nose cone. Needless to say the fins were a mistake (the stage nosed into the deck at Mach 5) and soon came off. Launch #2 had no fins and a small satellite, and 4 chutes on the first stage. Short on fuel, it did a hypersonic swan dive and clipped straight through the VAB.

I stuck a pad landing! With a 32t crewed payload! (pix to follow soonish)

yep, I can go for that It is the Falcon 9 Challenge, but hey. [EDIT] I changed the name of the challenge, 'cos I do love the badge.

nice! Note to self: DEFINITELY don't trust MechJeb for landing. Also: welcome to the forums!

that's where BDArmory comes in handy, it allows you to switch at will, even if the engines are firing.

I admit, I MechJebbed it. Auto ascent and auto landing. I even let it do the orbit insertion. (why can't MechJeb nail circular orbits?) I reckon I could have put her down right on the pad if I had taken the time to do it manually, but I wanted to get some images up.

This post will be continually updated with screenshots of proven craft. Someday I'll post the .craft files as well. All structural parts are stock, only mods used here are MechJeb and BDArmory. First, the KD variant of the Eurofighter: twin-tailed mayhem in a supersonic joint strike capability. Oh, and it spins on a dime. Next, the Wasp SRF: with the RADAR signature of a sparrow, this thing can dodge clouds of AAM fire. It barely even NEEDS chaff/flares! Did I mention it's armed to the teeth with 14 (yes, FOURTEEN!) wing hardpoints and 4 (yes, FOUR!) Vulcan cannon? Next up: the Falcon 3 Light Reusable Launcher. Performance tested to 300km with proven Return-To-Site capability on the first stage (just like the SpaceX Falcon 9!)

All right, I've pretty much managed it! This is what I call the Falcon 3. Actually, it's about the ninth iteration and fourteenth launch - and the first 100% mission success. 261t on the pad. Note the ridiculous number of chutes and the airbrakes. You'll see why I went overkill later. SRB sep and chute deploy, they'll splash down in the sea. Clean separation: MECO and stage sep occurred at precisely 40km, which also happened to be the point at which the apoapse burn stopped. Handy. Also took the opportunity to jettison the shroud. Payload to orbit. Simple sensor package and a bit of solar overkill because I can. Back to the primary stage which since separation has been drifting in a ballistic arc. Time for that boostback burn. Target difference of 70m! I could correct that with the RCS, which is what I'm doing here. OK, this time I think I installed too many chutes. It threw the landing estimate off by 2km. At 5km there's nothing I can do now, since that's where I had set the chute to full deploy. It did stick the water landing, and in fact remained vertical as the landing legs were touching bottom! SUCCESS! You can see the top of the VAB on the horizon off to the right, and the pad water tower - that's how close I was! Shy of 2.1km! I had 4k LF after MECO for the boostback/landing and actually landed with the TINIEST bit of fuel to spare!

If you go for a shallow launch profile (direct burn to orbit, as you would a heavy launcher), you could try for the near coast of the continent to the East, or for a (probably) more realistic boostback, the Island centre. There is an old space centre to the North West(?) but you'd have to launch retrograde for that; hauling three quarters the way round the planet, or rather for one complete orbit as MET would demand, isn't on the table. The ideal would be at KSC. A possible extension to the challenge, if you do decide to land elsewhere, is to build a retrieval system to go fetch the stage. Quite how you'd load the stage onto the vehicle is going to be problematic without some sort of cabling system like KAS provides, tho... or you could go Manley and land it on a barge! Something to note though, is that for the first stage, you would need half the fuel you take up on that stage for the boostback/landing. I've tried the 3m tanks with 8k fuel for ascent and 3k for return, and ran out of fuel in the descent at about 15km altitude. Chutes didn't help. Although, I have consistently managed to put the first stage on or near (<2km) the KSC launch pad (and put the second stage into 100, 150, 200 and 300km orbits on my test flights). Albeit at hypersonic speed.

Okay, I know it says stock up there, but I will allow the flight contoller from BDArmory (to stop probe cores from physicsing out in atmosphere) and MechJeb. Everything else is strictly stock. PROFILE: Design and deploy a space launch system comprising of precisely TWO stages (SRBs permitted as a boost strap-on as long as they're fully retrievable) and a useful payload (robot probe, comsat, station part, whatever, as long as it has solar generation and battery storage and one antenna. Extra points for a multiple payload launch). The top stage forms part of the payload. Crewed payloads should also have some controllability, as in being able to choose the landing site anywhere within 20 degrees of the orbital plane. The first stage should have the capability (demonstrate, please) of making a turnaround landing at KSC (as in, refuel, attach the payload and light the bottom). The first stage is NOT allowed to enter orbit. [Challenger's note: Images to follow, I have not yet managed the landing part, seems the boost stage doesn't take too well to lithobraking on the pad at Mach 3 - fuel is the problem for me, and 8 stock parachutes don't seem to do a lot with a 17 ton deadweight). This is a Kudos challenge: great if you can demonstrate your design. Even better if you can perform a turnaround launch! Suggested timeline: Launch Kick MECO Stage sep (<40km) SEB to p.100km, SECO Switch to primary stage Boostback burn, deploy chutes Switch back to payload Orbital insertion Switch back to primary Landing Switch back to payload, deploy. Mission Badges: [EDIT] You're all going to hate me, but here's a mission extension I've not only been playing with, I've actually gone and done it. Using your current design stock launcher, put a crewed station module in orbit and then dock a spaceplane to it. Profile: Spaceplane should be STOCK. MJ and BDAI permitted addons. Station module should have an antenna, *space* available for the spaceplane crew, and at least one permanent crewmember. Demonstration should consist of a horizontal launch (on wheels, on the runway) of your spaceplane, and successful landing of your Dragon booster. (Pics to follow. I built and docked an X-Wing to a 35 ton science station. Tried getting a fuel tanker up there but didn't have the TWR on the top stage to make orbit).

somewhere around I have a test video of a shot with a KWRocketry 5m engine (that sounds like a Death Star laser when you fire it) with about three second's worth of fuel for 11MN thrust and a 0.5t capsule snuggled under a standard nosecone. Several THOUSAND G later, and somewhere going off in a straight line out of the Kerbolar system, Bob is wondering who dropped a fart bomb into his snack box.

The BAT flight aren't Challenge aircraft, they're Gauntlet aircraft. Read the rule again: "Points cap per challenge aircraft is 50 points."

so many BDAI challenges I'm getting lost...

I don't use FAR, too much messing around. Not that I've got much time for KSP right now. Dealing with my mum's estate is swallowing most of my waking hours.