Stock Payload Fraction Challenge: 1.0.5 Edition

[selfish_meme]

YA improved with an MK3 design "SSTO V8 57.63"

Decoupler was attached to the payload. I have no idea how to get it to flip when working inside a cargo bay so need to subtract .025 from the payload

http://imgur.com/a/ePeQS

Flight path is as follows. Brake and full throttle engines until a whiplash gets 95 kn+. At the end of the runway don't pull up too hard or the back end will hit the grass. Not splashing in the water takes a large AOA 15 degrees at least DONT HIT THE WATER lol. Accelerate level till 400 and move LF forward to center the COM (you can tell by how much up force is on the tail fins). Tip up to 15 degrees until 10 km and then follow propagrade. Things will get hot and can explode don't be afraid to back off the throttle if it is over 1100m/s below 10 km. Air breathers die at about 22-23 km and 1350ish m/s Switch to LF OX the moment your not accelerating. This thing is a tank do lose to much upward momentum by waiting until it is too late. 57.605/129.86 44.36% and all i have to do is add airbrakes and possibly a parachute (i didn't for the purpose of the challenge)

My first successful try made it with 100 LF and 67 OX left but I screwed up the screen shots :/

How do you upload a craft file?

That is awesome.

If you want to flip the decoupler, use the a or d key then attach it to the end of a rapier, attach your cargo, detach and then you should be able to attach it to the front of the cargo bay.

My latest effort (which has not quite obtained orbit yet) has been adjusting down from 50% Payload Fraction, now sadly i am already under your fraction, but I am still hopeful of beating Slugy's yet for second place.

She is very light, 88t at start for 37.4t of cargo, i am balancing LF and O at the moment, plenty of performance, she rips through the power barrier without much more than a slight dip in AOA at about 7000m.

Edited June 29, 2015 by selfish_meme

[Nich]

Beautiful craft what is the assent profile? Your AOA in the pic is enourmous seems like a lot of drag and your cosine losses at 30 degrees would be 13.4%. If you don't mind sharing the craft file I think it would beat mine fairly easily.

Edited June 29, 2015 by Nich

[Laie]

That's 361.82t on the pad, 100.04 in orbit for a mass fraction of 27.65%. I can't post many pictures at the moment so I'm asking for a volunteer to verify my entry. It's a very easy and simple ascent: set SAS to prograde at launch time and leave it at that. When the navball switches to orbit (at ~35km altitude), toggle it back to surface mode. Aim for an apoapsis of at least 73km. Craft files. The first vessel carries slightly more fuel and should be good for a 80+km circular orbit. The second can't get any higher than 75km.

Edit: Nevermind this thing, I've broken the 28% barrier. Pics & Craft as soon as I can (should be in bed since, like, 3 hours).

Edited June 29, 2015 by Laie

[selfish_meme]

Beautiful craft what is the assent profile? Your AOA in the pic is enourmous seems like a lot of drag and your cosine losses at 30 degrees would be 13.4%. If you don't mind sharing the craft file I think it would beat mine fairly easily.

Thank you, like you and Slugy I let it run off the end of the runway, getting as much speed as I can down low, pitch about 10', it naturally pitches up very slowly over time so at about 4700m its at about 12 or 13', I shallowed the Pitch to about 7' this got it into the power band, I let it just naturally fly from about 5000m to 11k. By now it's pushing 1000m/s and I shallow it again to 7' as the thrust has reached max and I want to go as fast as possible. From there I let it go by itself, top speed around 1348m/s on air at about 22-23k, pitch has increased to about 20', taking your hint, switch to closed and wait for apoapsis, instead of pitching up further. This attempt was just shy of orbit by a couple of hundred m/s at 39.5% PF. I'm sure a better pilot could do better. I am adding toroidal tanks in the bay to top up the LF to try and achieve orbit at this fraction, which may be replaced by a 100 soon. Then I am going to up the fraction again.

Craft

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Edited July 15, 2015 by selfish_meme
Moved Craft File

[Nao]

Sry Laile but i like my spot, it has nice views

73x71km orbit with zero fuel left (was really close lol) 174.9t of rocket fuel on a 617.52t launcher = 28.32%

This time video only... @ Red Iron Crown you can check last 30s of it for both mass readouts.

EDIT: anybody having troubles loading the video, try using this link:

(Audio is half broken, but at least video should work), sorry for inconvenience.

Rocket is very similar to the previous design, although heavier and finally symmetrical, (doesn't anything symmetrical look and work 10x better haha)

Also a cookie to anybody who knows the connection between craft name and the song played during launch (~kappa)

Edited June 30, 2015 by Nao

[nicky4096]

nao, just saying, your video is blocked because of copyright

"...could contain music from SME..."

edit: nevermind, it's because im in germany

Edited June 30, 2015 by nicky4096

[Nao]

Gah dang it, i'll try the Youtube automatic song removal thingy... video should be available here shortly:

Can't really split the song from KSP sounds so if the above does not work, ill reupload it later with some "crappy" anime music again haha

I kind of wonder how does it work thou as the song itself was taken from some random small channel on youtube ... guess that one is blocked in Germany (and maybe more conutries) too.

edit: Actually the new video looks like it has the song still (although the audio is half botched lol). Welp, looks like what was "claimed" was the original song while i was using remix so it cut it ~ meh

Edited June 30, 2015 by Nao

[Red Iron Crown]

Awesome rocket and fraction, Nao, added to the leaderboard. No sound here, so I can't make the song/craft name link. (Video is working fine for me, though, might be a regional thing.)

Laie, looking forward to your entry.

[selfish_meme]

My latest entry the SMA - Prototype B.

36.13t payload, 94.5t at launch giving a payload fraction of 38.23%

Craft File

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Let it run to the end of the runway, keep the pitch just below 10' once off, you may have to get it as low as 5' till you reach 400m/s 900Kn then you can encourage it to pitch up to around 15'. At 10000m level out a bit and let the speed build towards 1200m/s then encourage it to pitch up again above 10'. Once you reach max speed around 1350m/s hit action group 1 to switch mode and follow the top of the prograde marker. There was literally no oxidiser left, but I overshot slightly. I think adding a touch more couldn't hurt. Now I am going to go forget about space planes and payload fractions for a while .

Edited July 15, 2015 by selfish_meme
Moved Craft File and renamed

[Red Iron Crown]

Great job, selfish_meme, added to the board. Aesthetically, your spaceplane reminds me of something from the Thunderbirds.

[selfish_meme]

Great job, selfish_meme, added to the board. Aesthetically, your spaceplane reminds me of something from the Thunderbirds.

It has brakes and a parachute and everything, International Rescue refueler!

[Laie]

Laie, looking forward to your entry.

N'ga hapn.

I thought I had a pretty stockish game, with KJR being the most problematic bit. Just to be on the safe side I loaded the vessel in a stock install and what do you know? It becomes heavier... and we're not talking about rounding errors. I don't know why or how. The individual part masses are identical between installs, but the vessel as a whole is not.

[Moesly_Armlis]

After lifting 125 t into orbit I think I caught the bug and want to try this challenge. It would not be until next week though.

Edit:

I could not wait. So I time warped until next week when I had some free time and completed the challenge.

Then I will have went back in time to post this.

260470 tonne of fuel

1119880 total

260470/1119880=0.2325

23.25%

Mamz6

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Edited July 3, 2015 by MoeslyArmlis
time

[selfish_meme]

My friend, not a forum member, has apparently managed an astonishing 45% PF Spaceplane using six rapiers, two whiplashes and 4 full ore tanks, I will try and snag the craft file and test it out.

Edit: nvm our ideas of orbit varied

Edited July 7, 2015 by selfish_meme

[selfish_meme]

So after about 30 attempts i have come to the conclusion you can not land a shuttle on the runway with wsad :/

Has anyone else managed to do this?

At night too!

[Red Iron Crown]

So sorry, MoeslyArmlis, I missed that you edited your entry into your post. Added to the leaderboard. Looks like you could squeak out a bit more fraction, the final orbit is way higher than required and decoupling the nose cone is not necessary.

[CaptainTurbomuffin]

Here is my entry. I hope it's not too late. Trying to be creative, instead of making something that focuses on efficieny, I tried to make a replica of the british Skylon spaceplane. I did everything to make it similar, while fitting the rules: using stock parts and minimal part clipping.

Here's the craft (with MechJeb):https://www.dropbox.com/s/k0vvpkafadyyns6/Skylon.craft?dl=0

And a full-stock version witouth MechJeb:https://www.dropbox.com/s/xlp9mex0rnkrcoj/Skylon%20Stock.craft?dl=0

Air-breathing; single stage; replica.

Takeoff mass: 22t

Cargo mass:5.5t

Efficiency:25%

I made a video of it:

[Red Iron Crown]

Great entry, CaptainTurbomuffin, I think that's the first replica in this challenge. Before adding you to the leaderboard, can I ask for a screenshot of the plane's mass on the runway before lighting the engine? I've been tracking the entries with two decimal places' worth of precision to reduce the chance of a tie and I'd like to be able to do the same for yours.

[CaptainTurbomuffin]

I have been watching the numbers in the editor. I tought those show the values with two decimal places. Now that I see that what's it like from map mode, I apologize for making that mistake, even in the video. As the screenshots show: With the cargo:22.05t; witouth:16.54 New efficiency:24.98866=24.99%=25%

Also, the way you describe scoring is incredibly confusing. It suggests that launch mass should be multipied with 100. Either change it to (cargo mass/launch mass)*100 or to 100*cargo mass/launch mass.

Anyway, great challange!

[Red Iron Crown]

Perfect, thank you CaptainTurbomuffin. Added you to the leaderboard.

The formula in the OP for calculating the fraction is correct, I can't help if people don't follow the order of operations properly.

[selfish_meme]

Great entry, CaptainTurbomuffin, I think that's the first replica in this challenge. Before adding you to the leaderboard, can I ask for a screenshot of the plane's mass on the runway before lighting the engine? I've been tracking the entries with two decimal places' worth of precision to reduce the chance of a tie and I'd like to be able to do the same for yours.

I think Runes was a sort of Skylon recreation.

[Moesly_Armlis]

So sorry, MoeslyArmlis, I missed that you edited your entry into your post. Added to the leaderboard. Looks like you could squeak out a bit more fraction, the final orbit is way higher than required and decoupling the nose cone is not necessary.

No problem missing the edit. I just returned from my step to the right.

You are right and there are some changes that I am planning and one less de-coupler. Thanks for the challenge Since 1.0 building within the VAB and during launches has become enjoyable and easier on my pewt . Yay for optimization!

[Norcalplanner]

Here's my entry for 1.04, the Fractionator 4. 45.27 tons of payload out of 200.17 tons of total craft mass works out to a 22.62 percent payload fraction. Description is in the photos.

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[g00bd0g]

Latest attempt:

I present "MK3 Cargo SSTO 1 Bay -record" which is a slightly optimized version of my standard MK3 Cargo SSTO 1 Bay cargo hauler.

Weighs 158.5t at launch, delivers 51t to LKO. 32.17% Payload Fraction

Had some oxidizer left over, could probably could do a better launch profile with less fuel loaded for a better ratio.

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Edited July 13, 2015 by g00bd0g

[Red Iron Crown]

Great entries, Norcalplanner and g00bd0g, added both of you to the boards. Each of you entries just barely squeaked past another entry, the competition in this challenge is pretty tight.