How am I supposed to do visual survey above 22,000 m? Jet Engine Cuts at 15,000

[leocrumb]

I tried for days to reach it from space but I was told the visual survey contracts are much easier in a plane. These Visual survey things are proving to be the most frustratingly difficult things to do. Can someone point me in the right direction?

Edited April 29, 2015 by leocrumb

[Jarin]

Get a jet with better than 1.0 TWR and get a good run-up on it from lower altitude. Your engines will flame out, but you can coast right over the point without trouble.

[Starwhip]

Well, they used to be easier to do in spaceplanes. All the nerfs and realism balances.

Try going at a low altitude, then suddenly climbing to push your apoapsis to around 30-45 km before jet flameout.

[panzer1b]

assuming ur using turbos or rapiers, getting to a AP of 60km is easy when you blast yourself above after gaining as much horizontal speed before u burn.

If you are stuck with teh default jets (the regulars), just get below ur desired spot and blast vertical or near vertical. This SHOULD get you just enough to pull off teh contract, although i dont use basic jets much myself so i can really tell how effective thisll be.

[Poofer]

not very effective, i tried this earlier yesterday with 5 engines. Ship went full nope.jpg and nosedived at around 15km

also tried adding SRBs or LFO engines for extra kick, but i haven't tried again since last explosion, i veered my attention towards orbits for now.

[cantab]

You could try a zoom climb. Build speed at an altitude you can fly level at, then pitch up and climb on your momentum. Or you could try a rocket plane. Or, if it's a visual survey, I believe you can do the "above" parts from orbit.

[SpenSpaceCorp]

Use rockets.

[WOODY01]

With the new aero and jet engine performance it is really tough to get a plane with the basic jet engines up to 14-15 k. Seems they loss enough thrust around 12.5-13k that my planes started losing speed even at full throttle. I am not sure how well the aero is modeled and not sure if the wings start losing lift as your plane ascends. They diffently are not as effient at higher speeds.

I acepted a contract requiring me to reach 16.5 k at the lowest and 18.5 k at the highest. I currently only have the first jet engines. My first attempt failed which was doing what I normal would in previous releases which was build up enough speed to reach those altitudes and coast up to them. I only tried twice and the highest I reached was around 15.5k.

I decided to try to design a realiable aircraft that can reach those altitudes every time powered the whole way. My first attempt is going to be adding more engines to make up for the loss of thrust. My first attempt seems promising but has a limited range since I was trying to save weight. I think with some tweaking I could get it up to around 15k, but the range is limited enough that completeing contracts with it would require some careful planing or just completing 1/2 the areas I am required to get temp readings and not have enough fuel to return to the KSC.

I may go with rocket assited plane. I'll use jets to get to 13k and rockets to go the rest of the way. I actually think this would be the easiest way, but I waant to see how far I can keep a plane flying under it's own power and stable with the early jets.