Oh the Kerbality. The Ultimate Airship Challenge

[Fengist]

The Ultimate Airship Challenge

On May 6, 1937, Herbert Morrison, a radio reporter, was at the Naval Air Station in Lakehurst, New Jersey to give a first-hand account of what should have been a rather boring assignment. The Zepplin Hindenberg was due to arrive and dock at it's mooring mast. What actually happened to the Hindenberg is still a source of debate, but Morrison's coverage of the accident and his famous quote, "Oh, the humanity," became legendary. It would also signal the end of an era. The airship as a mode of transportation would soon vanish.

It's taken decades for we humans to put that disaster behind us and only now are we beginning to realize the true potential of the airship. This challenge is in honor of all those beautiful aerostats that used to lumber across the skies and all those yet to come.

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Ok, so what prompted this challenge anyway? Well, it was actually a submarine. True. I was trying to figure out a way to deliver a test submarine down to the ocean without having to strap wheels on it and couldn't come up with a solution. I know, there are a number of ways to do this but, I'm unique, so I needed a unique solution. For those of you who don't know me, I do walkers and VTOL's. You can find my VTOL challenge here and my Helo challenge here. I was trying to come up with a way to airlift my sub to the water and was thinking VTOL when I stumbled on what seems to be a fairly obscure mod, Procedural Airships. Yes, I think we all know about PWings.. but Airshps? Yep. I had to try it. And.... I'm floored. I'm so impressed that I've dusted off my blueprint for those other two horizontally challenged challenges, and made this one. Let's get started.

First, you'll need the PAirships mod. You can find it in this post: Procedural Airships release thread

Next. If you're new to PAirships, DO THE TUTORIAL! RadarManFromTheMoon did an EXCELLENT tutorial on how to build and fly his airships. Trust me, you'll want to do it otherwise, you'll recreate the Hindenberg... lots of times (can you tell I didn't read it at first?).

Note, Hooligan labs airships do not qualify for this challenge (and I'm not even sure if they're updated for .90). PAirships are MUCH more fragile and much more temperamental, thus making it a challenge. Plus, PAirships are MUCH more realistic in their flight characteristics.

Here's the Challenge

Your goal is to design and build an airship. Then, using only that one design, complete as many of the challenges listed below. Some of these challenges are completion challenges, others are timed challenges.

Here's the Rules

1. Mods are allowed (obviously). You may use any mod that has 'reasonable' capability. The spirit of this challenge is to mimic reality, not change the laws of physics. No OP'd mods with infinite fuel. You may use 'infinite' electricity, such as reactors and TEG's.

2. Your airship must fit within the hanger it's designed in, no hangar expansion mods.

3. You may use control surfaces and a LIMITED number of wing parts. Your lift should come from the airship, not wings. You should not have an infigliding balloon either.

4. You MUST have a pilot, no drones.

5. You may make MINOR adjustments to your design between challenges. You cannont make changes such as balloon size, fuel amounts, engines and engine locations or any other 'major' improvement. If you want to add solar panels or a battery, that's fine. Be conservative in this.

6. No changing of the default PAirship settings. (i.e. no turning off pressure damage, changing buoyancy or turning on 'always controllable'!)

7. Of course, no hyperediting.

8. If you think you might be disqualified, you probably will be as I may add silly rules later that I haven't thought of.

The spirit of this challenge is the overlying rule. Take Kerbal airships and push them to their, and you to your, limits. Test yourself and your design, not your abilities to find loopholes in my rules. That should sum it up.

The Challenge List

The Blanchard Challenge - In 1785, Jean-Pierre Blanchard fitted flapping wings to a balloon and flapped his way across the English Channel. Fly your airship from KSC to the Island Runway, disembark 2 Kerbals on the island and return to KSC, thus proving that lighter than air transportation is feasible. This is a timed event. Show screenshots on departure, at EVA and an F3 on landing back at KSC.

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The LZ1 Challenge Thinking ahead, Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin included a passenger compartment in his first airship. Prove that airship passenger service is practical by delivering 6 Kerbals to KSC2. (No need to return). This is a timed event. Show an F3 screenshot with all 6 Kerbals in view at landing at KSC2.

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The Eckener Challenge - Piloting the Graf Zepplin, Hugo Eckener traveled 6,384.5 km from Lakehurst, New Jersey to Friedrichshafen, Germany. To complete this challenge, you'll need to circumnavigate Kerbin, non-stop. Land back at KSC (you need not land on the runway). This is a time event, show an F3 of your landing.

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The LZ N07-100 Challenge - The highest speed officially measured for an airship, according to the Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI), is 112 km/h (69.6 mph), by Steve Fossett (USA) flying a Zeppelin Luftshifftechnik LZ N07-100 airship on 27 October 2004. Show a screenshot of your fastest speed attained.

• Fengist - 91.7m/s
  

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The Tandem Challenge - On October 22, 2011 JP Aerospace's Tandem airship broke the record for the world's highest airship flight with an altitude of 28,982 meters. It was unmanned but Kerbals don't need no stinking robotics. For this, you'll need a screenshot of the craft at it's maximum altitude and still in one piece. NOT the F3.

• Fengist - 4,596m
  

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The Macon Challenge - The Akron and Macon were two of the largest airships ever build. They even had their own aircraft. This challenge will be difficult but I believe it to be possible. Dock and undock a fixed wing aircraft (VTOL's are ok) from your airship. Screenshots required.

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The Pelican Challenge - There have been a number of attempts to build heavy cargo-lifting airships such as the Dragon Dream and Cargolifter. None have yet been completed. For this challenge, your airship will need to SAFELY deliver a cargo weighing at least 10 tons from KSC to the Island Runway AND return to KSC. Methods such as docking ports and KAS are acceptable. Challengers weights will be listed in order of heaviest first. I'll need a screenshot of your cargo with the info box open if you wish to achieve the top weight.

• 28.5 Tons - Fengist
  

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The Hindenberg Challenge - There's speculation that the Hindenberg disaster was caused by lightning, static electricity or even, St. Elmo's Fire. Since weather is not an issue on Kerbin, you should have no problem landing on the VAB roof with your airship.

Completed

• Fengist
  

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And one more or less just for fun...

Make a Spy Basket - During WW1, the Germans learned that visible airships made for easy targets. So, they'd take the airship above the clouds and then, lower a crew member in a 'basket' on a cable. The airship stayed safely out of view while the 'spy' was able to spot bombing targets from below the clouds. There was usually no problem finding volunteers as it was the one place they could smoke. You'll probably need KAS for this and it'll still be a challenge. KAS tends to turn things on the end of it's rope into a whip.

Edited April 12, 2015 by Fengist

[Van Disaster]

Heh, when I tried pAirShips last I couldn't stop them exploding inside 500m even with the venting turned on . Bonus points for having actual flapping wings for Blanchard's balloon, btw?

[Fengist]

Heh, when I tried pAirShips last I couldn't stop them exploding inside 500m even with the venting turned on . Bonus points for having actual flapping wings for Blanchard's balloon, btw?

I fully comprehend. And when all else fails (and it did), I RTFM. After that... hell, I was at 2600m and still climbing. And if you can make em flap on an airship and actually propel it forward... AND do the other challenges with that same flappy airship... yea, I'll knock off a few secs.

Oh, and I learned how to test my first flight in a new airship. I put 4 KAS winches on the underside with grappling hooks and assign the eject a hotkey. As soon as I launch. I nail that bastid to the tarmac and THEN get my airbag settings right. I also hotkey the release and retract.

Edited April 11, 2015 by Fengist

[Fengist]

Ok, here's my attempts to complete these challenges. I'll update this post as I get them done.

The KZI Kraken Bait

Hindenberg Challenge

Tandem Challenge - 4,596m. This was with 0 inflation in the forward and middle bags and 53% on the rear, which ended up being a bit much. I was trying to stand it on it's tail and let the engines push it upward. Instead, the angle of attack was so high that it rolled over to the port side. Surprisingly, it didn't pop.

The LZ N07-100 Challenge - I'm using 4 turboprops from the Karbonite Mod. I was trying to reach 100m/s but couldn't quite get there. My best recorded so far, 91.7m/s

Edited April 11, 2015 by Fengist

[Fengist]

Ok, this was challenging enough that I decided to give it it's own post

The Pelican Challenge

When I first started flying these blimps, I thought that with all those cubic meters of lighter than air gas, I should be able to lift the entire VAB... umm not so. This mod is realistic right down to the need for ballast.

Ok, so here is my dead weight that I'm going to deliver to the Island Runway. 28.5 tons.

I sent Bob out to get us ready to lift. He grabbed the KAS box on the side of the passenger gondola and installed 4 radial connector ports to the cargo. Kraken Bait has 8 KAS winches. Four are used to anchor it to the ground, and the other four, cargo. Bob got them all hooked up. You'll notice that I connected by docking to one of the ports. This left my buoyancy at -330. But, a neat effect, this negative buoyancy doesn't fully take effect until the entire vessel is off the ground. The airship can still get airborne.

Once I had the blimp in the air, I dumped over 21,000 units of water ballast, roughly 27 tons worth. This still left me with a negative buoyancy but, I was able to lighten the front airbag and make the rear one heavy so it nosed up. The engines provided the rest of the lift.

And here's 28+ tons off the runway. Since I hooked up to the cargo backwards, I needed to spin around. In this shot, I have the starboard engines running forward and the port engines in reverse.

Since this wasn't a speed challenge, I kinda took my time and got lined up for the runway. With the negative buoyancy, I was going to have to make a fast landing. I needed to come in at a low altitude and slam the engines into reverse and attempt to come to a dead stop before I started sinking like a rock.

The braking maneuver worked well but I didn't get completely stopped before I shot the grappling hooks into the ground. The blimp angled forward and one of the landing gear popped a radial port connector off the cargo. No real damage, only the port connector was lost and Bob was able to fix the landing gear.

Here, I've disconnected the plugs from the cargo. You'll notice my buoyancy is now at 250+ If I hadn't anchored before releasing the cargo, I would have shot straight up and popped.

In this shot, I'm preparing to vent off some gas. I've extended out my anchoring winches so that I know roughly the altitude I'll be at when I've vented enough gas to come back into balance. I've also turned on the pressure corrector. As I'm venting gas, it'll help make sure I don't vent too quickly and pop an airbag.

With the gas vented, I was able to release and retract my grappling hooks and stay perfectly level. Time to turn for home.

And here's landed back at KSC.

While this method of moving cargo with an airship does work, it's a one shot deal. I'm pretty sure you could refill the water ballast via KAS, but since the gas isn't considered a consumable, once you vent it, it's gone.

Edited April 12, 2015 by Fengist