Three1415

I went ahead and took my turn; the Fermi retaliated with what remained of its ammunition, destroying your fighter quite spectacularly [Hooray for Kessler Syndrome!], although it is now effectively out of action for the remainder of combat, as it is relying on backup power and has depleted its armament. Likewise, I retreated the Kirchhoff to a fairly inaccessible and certainly delta-v-intensive low inclined orbit in the hopes of protecting it against attacks, and the Bohr has moved into high retrograde orbit in preparation the interception of your carrier-group [i know that the Firehole 1 is not technically a carrier, but it certainly resembles one]; the Euclid and Rutherford have remained in position, awaiting further combat before committing to a particular course of action. Screenshots: Persistence File: https://www./?vh44eufkunuom7g

AvronMullican has seemingly disappeared, to my great disappointment. MUST...HAVE...TURN RESULTS!

Noted; I do not mind waiting.

Ship placement complete: And here is the persist: http://www./download/uhyw8p1v3wachbq/persistent(BattleAtVall).sfs I await your move.

While waiting for AvronMullican to choose the battle location, I decided to increase the maximum tonnage to 200, after realizing that the combined mass of my ships was exactly 175 tons; such perfect exploitation of allowable tonnage seemed somewhat unfair. Also, I shall present my ships: 1: The C3V [read "cee-three-vee"] Kirchoff, a Diffraction Class Battlecruiser: 94.26 tons. 2: The C3V Euclid, a Vertex Class Corvette: 34.11 tons. 3: The C3V Rutherford, a Hadron Class Bomber: 22.4 tons. and finally 4/5: Two Lepton Class Fighters, the C3V Fermi and the C3V Bohr: 12.3 tons each. Total Tonnage: 175.37 tons.

@AvronMullican: Excellent! Choose the location for the battle and select your ships.

Curse your overly-armored vessels. All of my ships seem to be super-light compared to everyone else's, probably because I use intakes and wings rather than girders and plates...Battling you would probably have resulted in my instant death, anyway, considering that you are undefeated against far more experienced opponents. Anyone else? Edit: Why am I stuck at four posts? The number does not increase! What is this?!

I have completed my proto-fleet; does anyone wish to battle? Standard rules, 5 five ships or 175 tons, belligerent chooses the theater. I do warn that my ships have rather high part counts, but if you are fine with some lag, then it is irrelevant...Considering that this will be my first battle, and I shall be using otherwise untested ships, I shall probably die horribly, but I must begin somehow. So, any takers?

I have returned, and I present to you my first capital ship. Although unarmed as of yet [i have yet to develop adequate missiles], it promises to be quite formidable...Without further ado, I give you the Diffraction Class Battlecruiser At over eight hundred parts and eighty tons, this is by far the largest vessel I have ever constructed; at least for now, it shall be the flagship of my developing fleet. All I must do now is design adequate smallcraft, and I shall be ready for battle. [And yes, it is four-way symmetrical.]

If I can intimidate zekes with my armoring scheme, I know I have done a good job. This is why I always look through the new parts--I saw that and thought, "Wait a minute..." It is rather odd that those intakes are as durable as I-Beams but are less than a fifteenth the mass, but whatever. The Vac-Co ones (the 0.5 IntakeAir intakes) have the same impact tolerance, but both are rather hard to place; they do not like to be attached to things. As to what I intend to do with this, I shall probably design a fighter or two and then challenge someone to a small (>50 tons) engagement, so as to test them out in the only real way one can: Battle. [cue dramatic music.]

I, long wanting to participate in these battles, believe I have something worthy of being the first member of my fleet. I present: The Vertex-Class Corvette [MK I] I decided to create something slightly less mundane than the infinite pylon-like ships others are building, so I made something resembling Project Orion crossed with a dodecahedron (though it is neither). Hooray for hexagonal symmetry! Anyway, it is armed with, at full capacity, 18 I-Beam missiles and one guided torpedo, allowing it to perform its duty as a fighter- and light-vessel-hunter, something its 4 km/s of delta-v, provided by two LV-Ns, assist it in doing. It is similarly high in survivability, despite massing in at just over 34 tons; it can bounce I-Beams easily, and absorb SRB missiles without excessive damage. Similarly, each sixth of the ship is redundant, allowing it to remain functional even if the majority of the craft is destroyed. Nonetheless, I seek further input; feedback would be appreciated.

Yours is not the smallest; stare in wonder (or horror) at...Whatever this thing is! Or, for a better sense of scale, Of course, it helps that the seat is arranged such that your unfortunate kerbal is clipped into the rocketpack; however, I think it makes them appear augmented with non-organic technology. Despite what it may look like, that thing is a VTOL--as proof: Sadly, it can only fly for thirty seconds or so; nonetheless, it has something like 2.5 km/s of delta-v (mainly due to its single Ion Engine and abuse of massless parts), complete with a parachute, lights, and RCS.

After expending a ridiculous amount of time reading all sixty-two pages of this thread, I must say that this is quite an interesting project; I would most certainly support it. I was sufficiently intrigued to do some minor number-crunching in terms of temperature management on the night side of the planet, and I wondered as to the feasibility of using a water-based heatsink. The requirements for such are minimal; assuming the CubeSat's is kept at a temperature of 25 degrees Celsius upon passing into the night side, has an aluminum exterior, and follows the roughly ninety-minute orbital cycle in LEO, only about 62 grams of water heated almost to boiling while in sunlight would be able to stave off heat loss entirely, while reducing cooling requirements. This is also the absolute worst-case scenario for the night side; I used the maximum values for aluminum emissivity and a probably unreasonably-low surface temperature for the cube. This method of temperature regulation could easily be more weight- and volume-efficient than battery-based systems.

Although this should probably go in the Spacecraft Exchange, I thought that I would consult the military experts for comments and critiques on my first foray into military technology. I thus present to you: The Electromagnetism Class Ion Frigate ________________________________________________________________________ Statistics: Control: 2 redundant LC-R01 probe cores. Maneuvering: 300 units of monopropellant with 6 RCS ports; 3 ASAS modules. Power: 16 RTGs with 12 Gigantor solar panels [these are retracted below the armor and hidden from view in the first picture]. Capacitance: 30000 units of electric charge. Fuel: 40000 units of xenon gas and 360 units of liquid fuel with corresponding oxidizer. Engines: 16 Ion Engines and 2 LV-909s. Mass: 55 tons. Total delta-v: ~3.8 km/s. Part Count: 348. Ammunition storage: 16 small docking ports and 6 standard. ______________________________________________________________________ My main concern for this ship is its high part count, mostly due to my inexperience with armoring craft; this resulted in both the former and the ship's high mass. Any advice as to how to improve this would be welcome, as would any pertaining to other aspects of the craft. [As a footnote, does anyone have Bannon's original classification system archived somewhere? It might be useful to have linked somewhere for standardization purposes.]

Upon seeing much recent discussion on the subject of minute SSTO-type craft, I thought I could best those already presented in the areas of small proportions and general functionality. Although extremely complex for such a small size (135 parts), and having a density approaching that of solid lead, this SSTO is capable of fulfilling all roles in unmanned space travel. I hereby present *trumpet fanfare*: The Singularity-Class SSTO _________________________________________________________________________________ Statistics: Control: 1 OKTO core. Maneuvering: 120 units of monopropellant with 3 RCS ports and 1 SAS module. Power: 4 RTGs and 6 Gigantor solar panels, as well as 1610 units of electric charge. Intakes: 3 Circular Intakes and 8 Ram Air Intakes, all foward-facing. Fuel: 107 units of liquid fuel and 12800 units of xenon gas. Engines: 1 Turbojet and 8 Ion Engines. Mass: 10.13 metric tons on launchpad. Part count: 135. Ion delta-v: ~5.9 km/s. Action Groups: 1: Toggle Turbojet. 2: Toggle Ion Engines. 3: Toggle solar panels. 4: Deploy parachute. _______________________________________________________________________ Despite its small size, this SSTO possesses enough delta-v to get to Jool, has a forward docking port and monopropellant, and has enough a sufficiently high TWR on ion power to allow surface landings on bodies with up to 16 percent of Kerbin surface gravity, allowing it to satisfy almost any mission requirements; one thus has a fully functional spacecraft contained within a small package. Ascent profile: To achieve orbit, TimeWarp until dawn (this is the best time for launch), activate the Turbojet, and proceed straight up to 10 kilometers in altitude, then begin a very slight gravity turn at about a 75-degree inclination from the horizontal; until this point, the craft will be moving very slowly (>100 m/s). Continue to gain speed while ascending, gradually decreasing the angle of attack to about 20 degrees above the horizon by the time you reach 20 kilometers. Continue to gain speed while maintaining vertical velocity (should be ~300 m/s); by 30 kilometers in altitude, your craft's speed should be ~1600 m/s. After this point, slowly throttle down while continuing to build speed, and gradually increase the angle of attack to push the apoapsis higher. Upon reaching 40 kilometers in altitude, your speed should be (in orbital velocity on the navball) ~2 km/s; deploy the solar panels and activate the Ion Engines while keeping the Turbojet on, the throttle at about 40 percent, and the angle of attack at about 60 degrees. After the Turbojet flames out at approximately 45-50 kilometers, deactivate it and throttle the Ion Engines up to full, maintaining angle of attack; when the apoapsis is above 70 kilometers, burn straight prograde until orbit is achieved. Minmus Excursion in Images: Words of Warning: Whatever you do, do not use 4x physics warp while in the atmosphere; it summons the Kraken and/or causes the toroidal fuel tanks to fall out of the craft for no apparent reason. Also, the single parachute is not enough to slow descent to survivable speeds; use the remaining fuel on the Turbojet for safe touchdown at about five meters per second. Also, as I learned (this is why there is no landing frame on the album ), avoid inclines: If the craft falls over, it tends to explode. Violently. Also, mess with fuel flow at your own peril. I spent multiple hours trying to fix problems posed by such, and had to disassemble the craft entirely and put it back together three times before I finally fixed the problem. [The third time I had problems, I gave up and clipped a strut randomly into the body of the craft, then put the Turbojet back on. For some reason, that fixed it completely...But still: Beware.] Above all (or rather below, looking at this post), enjoy! Craft file: http://www./view/xgm3cup4loc6a1a/Singularity_Class_Ion_SSTO.craft

I have been lurking on these forums for quite awhile now, waiting to debut with something I consider remarkable; and, at last, I present to you [*trumpet fanfare*]: A Jetpack I have found that I am terrible at naming things, but regardless, I have created, through much stacking of toroidal tanks, a jetpack in the style of a Manned Maneuvering Unit. In terms of general specifications, the craft's propulsion consists of a single Basic Jet. Between its the outer intake and SAS module lie seven toroidal tanks and two Oscar-Bs (with a duplicate set on the other side), providing a total of 163 units of liquid fuel, enough to run the Basic Jet for approximately twenty-seven minutes; with a top speed of, at ~1500 meters, 210 m/s, this craft can traverse essentially any reasonable distance from KSC in an extremely short time. As is evident, it seats (literally) one Kerbal; in addition, four circular intakes provide a plentiful supply of oxygen; power is provided by four RTGs clipped into the engine body; and two standard SAS modules ensure stability. As (at least with my piloting skills) the craft is essentially impossible to land, a MK16 parachute (regular size) is clipped into the upper frame; this, as well as about 1/3 throttle applied at ~100 meters, is sufficient for a safe landing at about 6 m/s. After deployment and landing, the seated Kerbal can repack the parachute, though it may be necessary to zoom into the body of the craft to access it; the craft is 62 parts in total. Pressing the 1 key toggles the engine; 2 deploys the parachute. Hovering is achieved at approximately 35 kilo-newtons of thrust, or about 40% throttle. Given the fuel capacity of the craft, I was prepared to challenge someone to rework the fuel lines, refill the tanks with oxidizer, and convert this jetpack into an SSTO, until I realized that I was not going to pass up that opportunity. Thus, I introduce to you The SSTOpack (I mean, really? What do you even call this sort of thing?) After about an hour and a half clipping yet more parts (without the Alt + F12 option, mind you), adding more engines, and reworking the fuel lines, I at last created a fully functional SSTO that far surpassed my expectations. Specifications: Propulsion: 1 Turbojet Engine (for atmospheric travel), and 1 LV-909 (for orbital adjustments) Propellant: 163 units liquid fuel, 179 units oxidizer (to compensate for jet fuel usage) Powerplant: 4 RTGs Control: Two SAS modules Intakes: 3 ram air intakes, 4 circular intakes Capacity: 1 Kerbal Part Count:74 Wet Mass: 5.2 tons. Landing Gear: 1 Regular MK 16 parachute. Action Groups: 1: Toggle Turbojet 2: Toggle LV-909 3: Deploy parachute This small apparatus can, from launch at KSC, achieve a 150 km x 150 km orbit with approximately 60 units of liquid fuel left to spare, giving it access to all of LKO, with its outer operational bounds at approximately Kerbin-synchronous orbit, if not beyond. The launch profile is as follows: Simply fly straight up to a height of ~12 km, then conduct a gravity turn, with direct of travel between 15 and 20 degrees above the horizon; continue gaining speed and slowly decrease throttle after about 25 km; with proper management, the turbojet can remain operational to 45 km, at which point one should cut it, toggle to the LV-909, and conduct a requisite burn at the apoapsis, which should be between 75 or 80 km; re-entry is just as simple, and enough liquid fuel should remain to traverse the majority of Kerbin after re-entry, as I had to do after missing the KSC (as I always do) after re-entry in the album below: Much like the standard jetpack, a safe landing is achieved at about 6 m/s; throttle up to about 1/3 at ~100 meters above the terrain to slow your velocity after deploying the parachute. The abundance of struts within the design wards of Xactar's wiggle horse, which I find otherwise attacks during flight. Also, the clipped parts have some strange effects during impacts; sometimes an unfortunate Jebediah Kerman is ejected at approximately a kilometer per second, and sometimes one simply bounces for no reason (Danny2462 would be intrigued ). As I am rather new to this (evidenced by all of my 1 post), how does one go about sharing craft files, assuming that anyone wants to fiddle around with this? Also, I do wonder if I have broken some kind of record for smallest SSTO by volume; certainly I hope that I have . My apologies in (how does one word this? "Retreat?") for the walls of text; any feedback or criticism is welcome.