keptin

Thanks folks! I've received a lot of requests to do a flight tutorial, but for all the time it would take to put something like that together, players could learn better through practice and trial & error. Understandably, it can be difficult to learn on certain designs of aircraft, which I why I supplied the EZ Trainer to learn the basics on. Beyond that, any real life flight manual will cover concepts applicable to KSP. An additional note: I think a joystick/controller is pretty essential for aircraft since the keyboard doesn't allow for small adjustments.

Hahahaha, you actually built it!! ~THE MAJESTIC EAGLE TAKES FLIGHT!~ I can't believe that actually flies... You have to take some daytime pics of it!

This. This is incredible. Years of pain and suffering and now we have a solution for easy gear alignment.

Varsass from Kerbalspaceprogram.fr has made a very nice French translation of the guide. I've included a link in the original post; you may also find it here, http://kerbalspaceprogram.fr/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=2758

How the hell do I use props without proptools? It's changed since 0.20 and I've been trying to find documentation on the new workflow to no avail. *edit* Oops, nevermind. I found this thing called a readme in the parttools folder. ... yeah.

I'm trying to create a large landing gear and am running into the death wobble where a heavy craft or even normal landing force will bend and wobble the gears. Is this a physics scaling issue? Is there anyway to increase the angular resisting force on the attach joints?

Could be image scaling. Try another browser or download the image directly, http://i.imgur.com/GqLQktX.jpg

http://www.pond5.com/sound-effect/8696976/airplane-turbo-prop.html I've found just buying them is the best bet. It's a few bucks and a better recording. Freesound.org also has a great collection of free use SFX.

Hey Firespitter users, I want to introduce the PC100 Turboprop, a versatile lightweight air breathing engine for your aircrafting needs. Snjo and I started development several months back on a vanilla-inspired aircraft parts expansion affectionately named Kerbal Aircraft Expansion (KAX). Shortly thereafter I took a break for real life reasons, but I finally spent some time to polish up the turboprop. Big thanks to Snjo for his help and fantastic plugin. KAX development is slowly ramping up again and a development thread will be posted soon-ish once there's a bit more to show. In the mean time, enjoy! Video: Forum thread: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/76668-0-23-5-Kerbal-Aircraft-Expansion-%28KAX%29-v1-4 *edit, replaced download link with forum thread link.

Aww, look at all these cute little planes. Muaahahaahah! I'm going for the biggest, heaviest aircraft entry. I present the Reactor VI E, an update to my previous submission. It's controlled using yaw induced roll. Basically the way the wings are shaped, as yaw is applied the outside wing's angle of attack increases and it produces more lift than the inside wing causing the aircraft to roll in the direction of the yaw. I have no roll authority on the stick, only pitch and yaw--and yaw acts as roll. And of course, no control surfaces or additional torque pods added. Kinda lazy with the points, but here goes... Success: Take off and fly at least 1 km. +100 Points Islander: Fly to the Insular Runway.**** +70 Points Whackjob: Use over 100 parts.** +200 Points =370 points

Sure did! Thanks!

You should clarify the rules so there's no confusion. "Magellan: Why turn west to land when you can just go east?* +100 Points" In a control challenge, I interpreted that as simply taking off and turning 180 such that you're flying east. There's no mention of flying east around the world and landing back at the KSC.

This is one of my favorite types of challenges! I'm going for the biggest-craft award; I pulled this one out of the stable, the Reactor-VI B. The wings are curved in a particular way to use dihedral effect to control banking through yaw input. It's actually pretty easy to fly. Success: Take off and fly at least 1 km. +100 Points Lander: Land your plane on the KSC runway. +50 Points Islander: Fly to the Insular Runway. +70 Points Magellan: Why turn west to land when you can just go east?* +100 Points = 320 points. Album: http://imgur.com/a/HyFhm#0 Craft file: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/66999462/Reactor-VIB.craft Took off, landed on the old alt runway island, took off again, and landed back at the KSC runway. Testing the Reactor-VI C's high altitude capabilities for that high flier achievement. Also shooting for the Wackjob achievement.

Awesome, it's great to hear the guide helped you out. Landings can be a little...tricky

Basic Aircraft Design v28.1 has been posted. Thanks /r/kerbalspaceprogram for helping me find some errors! These have since been fixed. In this update: -section on Angle of Incidence -updated illustrations -rotating engines to offset asymmetric thrust -landing gear positioning for proper tilt-back -rewording and other minor changes

Yes, to a point, the critical angle beyond which the airfoil produces less lift as it begins to stall. As I understand it, the angle of incidence has more to do with the desired angle of the aircraft relative to the ground when in normal flight, so as to not have to produce more lift by pitching up. Since lift is determined by speed, airfoil area, and air density, the appropriate angle of incidence depends on cruising altitude, speed, wing shape/size, and aircraft weight. In extreme cases, such as a B-52, so much lift is produced relative to its unladen weight, it will fly level nose-down...even takeoff nose-down.

Certainly! The angle at which the wing is "installed" onto the plane is called the angle of incidence. Designing wings with a higher angle of incidence for use on Duna won't benefit you anymore than doing so on Kerbin. Because the air is thinner on Duna, one solution could be to generate more lift by adding more wings or going faster. You can also increase the thrust--this always works, guaranteed.

Absolutely, go right ahead! And thanks for asking for permission. I'm happy to see my guide help students. Good luck! If you're not too shy, post some pics of your project when it's finished!

@numerobis, wow, I never realized that! Huh, yeah, then you're right about canards not stalling before the wing. Bummer. I wonder how FAR compares; I should do a comparison with the same aircraft at some point. I'm a bit torn between changing the guide or not to reflect this new info since it would be teaching the contrary, but maybe I can mention it in a future update. After all, I don't want to teach the wrong thing and the guide's higher purpose is to teach people about aircraft, not necessarily aircraft in KSP. Thanks numerobis for pointing that out!

I like that "college" is in all caps. That's some serious s*%t. All kidding aside, the original goal of the guide was to be more digestible and accessible than a textbook. I could have just included textbook images, which I'm sure your professors have access to, but then it'd be all lame sauce and uncool.

Go for it man!

Huh, it used to be stickied. Squad giveth and Squad taketh away. Now that we have tweakables in 0.23 I'm tempted to update it soon and add a section on empennage/control-suface layout. Mmm...empennage. And... -Mounting engines tilted to account for asymmetric thrust. -Laminar flow -Canard configuration -Editing dated graphics

@Voidryder, Ha, thanks, I'm glad I could help. No plans to do a piloting tut as of yet, but maybe in the future. @Prometheus, A few others asked about tail assembly as well. I might add something in the future, but I think leaving a certain amount for the players to discover through trial and error is better for learning.

The parts your gear are attached to are likely the weak point. Try using the fuselage. As always, a gentle, slow landing is ideal.

Try attaching small cubic struts directly to the wing-fuselage root (the fuselage part where the wings attach) and placing the gear below them. Alternatively, you can attach the gear directly to the fuselage. Don't forget to reinforce the fuselage so it doesn't twist. This sucker weighs around 480 tons and that did the job.