XB-70 Valkyrie... SSTO?!

[Kagame]

This is probably the most surprising SSTO I've made. It started out as a project to re-create the XB-70 Valkyrie within KSP. The project worked, with generally agreeable flight manners and far too much Oxidizer due to me being lazy and not draining it from the bicouplers. So then I thinks: What would happen if I put some RAPIERs on this thing? Well, I did, and this happened.

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Ascent pattern:

Step 1: Lift off. Surprisingly enough, she doesn't take the entire runway, like most other six-engine behemoths do.

Step 2: Climb @ 30 degrees until you hit 10,000 meters. Full throttle.

Step 3: Once you're at 10,000 meters, level off (ish) to gain speed. Don't pull up until you've topped 1,000 m/s. Don't worry, nothing will kersplode. If the little temperature gauges show up, feel free to climb a bit faster if it makes you feel better. It'll make the plane feel better too.

Step 4: When you've topped 1000 m/s, resume your 30 degree climb. I occasionally pitch up to about 40-50 degrees when the RAPIERS switch to closed cycle..

Step 5: When you've attained a 75km apoapsis, shut down the engines and create a maneuvering node (or just burn prograde) to circularize. Don't execute until you're above 70km, otherwise it might get hinky. Might be useful to turn on RCS at this point.

Step 6: Once you've de-orbited (burn retrograde) and have re-entered the atmosphere (on a properly shallow trajectory, nothing will blow up), you will probably be in a spin about all three axis. This, admittedly, is a design issue. Here's a quick guide on how to recover, shamelessly borrowed from a website dealing with real piloting: PARE. Power: Off. (Adding more power just exacerbates the spin.) Aileron: Neutral. Rudder: Full opposite to the direction of the spin. (Guess, it's what I did.) Elevator: Down. (Your wings are stalled, you'll need to get more airflow across them.) After a bit, you'll find that you're suddenly pointing down. Recover as per usual.

Download the Craft File

Please note: While the Valkyrie does in fact have a large amount of cargo bay space, I wouldn't advise putting anything heavier than a can of snakes in there.

That's all for this post!

[SHiftER2O]

I'm buying it!