What am I going to do with all these plane parts?

[Evanitis]

The bigest merit of spaceplanes I found is that using those is harder than rockets. Some might call it a flaw, but in my opinion, more challenge is more fun.

I'm having a balst with my vertical launch only career. Just did my first Mun-landing there. That allowed me to unlock turbojets. That makes the remaining tasks too easy.

[Edax]

The great thing about spaceplanes is how cheaply they can be used. I managed to strap a non-SSTO spaceplane to a larger SSTO, and use the combination to complete Mun and Minmus orbits, and a Minmus landing (in 1.0.2). And all it cost me was fuel, a single nose cone and decoupler, since I got both spaceplanes back to KSC for the 100% refund. (since 1.0.4, the non-SSTO needs to stop at a refueling station but the system is still costing my space program very little).

Edited July 27, 2015 by Edax

[fireblade274]

Yea SSTO's are cool. I would agree that a dedicated marker for KSC would be nice. I don't really have that much a problem finding it, and I've done the "plant a flag there" trick, but I would prefer a dedicated marker. Its almost impossible to spot KSC when attempting a night landing

[Vegvisir]

I need to learn how to SSTO spaceplane properly. But I really like them, just as planes. Early career I spend a lot of time on Kerbin. A lot. So spaceplane unlocks are typically before the bigger/wider fuel tanks and accompanying engines for me.

It irks me a little how much investment it takes to get the parts, when it can in essence delay space-exploration because you need to then re-earn that couple hundred science to get other rocket parts you might need.

[Tourist]

I use them for a number of purposes. Satellite Launch contracts around kerbin (could probably reach Mun or Minmus too with current tech level, I just haven't tried yet). Essentially I take a very small, very light probe into orbit in the plane with whatever it needs to fullfill the conditions, small amount of fuel and light engines, and a parachute. Once the contract is done I can bring every single thing except the fuel used back again. No wasted stages.

Part recovery missions. Again, a small probe with a claw and parachute, RCS fuel only. Send the plane up, intercept the part, attach the probe, de-orbit and parachute, return the plane. I think its the only way to make such missions economical.

Rescue missions around Kerbin. Benefit being, using the method above, not only do I save the Kerbal, but I can return the wreck for a few extra $$.

Crew changeover missions for the spacestation.... no in-game real benefit per see, but vital for the health and morale of the Kerbals in my head canon. Also I use this changing out the crew on before interplanetary missions. Usually a lower ranked kerbal will get the modules for my interplanetary ship into orbit and connect them up, but I swap them for Jeb, Val, Bill and Bob just before the transfer window. That is also how I get them back to Kerbin again with the science they have collected.

Finally, I do it because it allows me to pretend-time being a hotshot pilot. You feel badass re-entering the atmosphere, flames surrounding the ship, flaring, doing figure Ss, slowing it down, and eventually bringing it safely onto the runway.

[problemecium]

Hmm.

Most of this thread is irrelevant to me, but I do concur on the issue of a map marker for KSC. It's a little silly that one of the first things I do in a new Career is go plant a flag so I can see on the map where KSC is at night xP

[Goddess Bhavani]

I don't see any practical purpose of spaceplanes in my career game either but planes are all round fun to build and fly even if as previous mentioned, science bombing has no purpose whatsoever unless I have experiments that I somehow never conducted during the normal course of gameplay. I'm looking forward to building turboramjet craft though but in the meantime, making simple aircraft replicas is really a lot of fun.

As I use DMagic science parts, short takeoff and landing (STOL) capable planes can be very useful to obtain science, and unlike sub-orbital science payloads, I can 'sell' the plane after landing for the full build price.

So in short I don't use planes a lot, but when they do, they look like this:

Polish Air Force PZL-230F "Skorpion" with dropsonde payload on a mountain survey mission. Screenshot edited by Hellblazer's Wallpaper Factory

You also could try building maneuverable re-entry vehicles, you know, capsules that fly back to the runway after re-entry. Something like this rocket-launched micro-shuttle. Sometimes the top part of the stack generates so much lift, I need to add plane wings on the rocket to balance it out, something like the real-life X-20 Dyna Soar / Winged Titan Booster concept.

Edited July 28, 2015 by pandoras kitten

[moogoob]

I use planes to blow off steam. You know, do stunts, buzz the VAB, do laps to the island airport and back, circle the mountains, and basically just .... around when I don't feel like all the effort of a crewed return Mun landing or landing a probe on Vall.

Then again, I pretty much only play Sandbox.

[GoSlash27]

I'm fully on board the spaceplane hype- train.

They're a whole lot more economical, reliable, and safe than rockets. Great for orbiting kerbals and consumables. For everything else, I use rockets.

Best,

-Slashy

[juanml82]

I'm fully on board the spaceplane hype- train.

They're a whole lot more economical, reliable, and safe than rockets. Great for orbiting kerbals and consumables. For everything else, I use rockets.

Best,

-Slashy

After trying 20 times to land a spaceplane at Duna, no, I'm not sold of planes being safer than rockets.

(I succeded on the 21st try)

[Vaporo]

I find small SSTOs incredibly efficient for completing the "rescue from Kerbin orbit" contracts. Launches take a bit longer than rockets, but I get to space with plenty of fuel to spare and plenty of passenger space, whereas with rockets I always end up with less fuel than I'd like. Cargo planes have always proven too much of a hassle, though.

[Sharpy]

I have never considered my time to be worth anything and have always tried to maximize my payload. I seen now it may be better to build a craft capable 20 degrees all the way to orbit at 5x time warp. If I could get to orbit in 5 real minutes it would might be worth it.

The one big problem with a lengthy climb is that the more time you spend before reaching the orbit the more fuel you burn fighting atmospheric and gravity drag. And while the wings do help against the former, they don't remove it entirely.

If your engine burns twice the fuel of the "most efficient" but an reach the orbit in 1/4 the time, you'll waste half the fuel you'd waste on fighting the gravity and drag.

^^ that's an oversimplification, it doesn't quite work that way, but the concept stands: very long climbs are wasteful. You save on not taking heavier engines, you save on better fuel usage, but you still may come short on simply fighting the gravity. Now, will you come short? That depends largely on the drag and lift profile of your craft. I it's light, lean and with just enough wing surface, your savings will outweigh the losses. But if you're building a hulking monster, you really want to have it up there fast, because each second you spend between the ground and the orbit is a few kg of fuel burned with only the goal of keeping you from falling down or slowing down - without actually contributing anything to speeding up and climbing up.

For a good estimate of the spoilage - at any point of your SSTO climb, level your flight and throttle down to a level where your speed remains constant. Wherever the throttle is on the scale then, is the fraction *lost* every second. The part between the current throttle position and the top is what is actually utilized for gaining the orbit.

[KerikBalm]

But if you can do SSTOs, they also allow delivery of low-bulk cargo (Kerbals, fuel, satellites, lightweight probes) to LKO for virtually no cost. And once you can lift fuel easily, using an orbital depot to top up your SSTOs in LKO gives them the range to head off interplanetary.

Low bulk? not really restricted to that now that we have fairings.

This whole bulky thing was assembled (fully fueled too!) with just 2 launches of my SSTOs

100% recovery, and each time I ended up hauling much more tonnage to orbit than I needed (lots of left over fuel in the tanks), as the SSTOs were more limited by the payload size than its mass.

I think the fuel costs to get that into orbit were about 30k (or maybe that was per launch... good luck getting such a craft to orbit with rockets for anywhere close to that)

Still running 1.02 here, as I have been focused on other things since the update, but these all worked in 1.0 or 1.02....

This plane was bulky (it was the payload, electric atmospheric propulsion), but not very heavy.

For internally carried payloads rather than payloads with external strap-on SSTOs:

[Evanitis]

external strap-on SSTOs

The awesomness coefficient is pretty high with these. Also those were the pictures I had to see to advance my horizontal launch only career.

[GoSlash27]

After trying 20 times to land a spaceplane at Duna, no, I'm not sold of planes being safer than rockets.

(I succeded on the 21st try)

Agreed, but I don't use spaceplanes for that.

If I'm sending an expedition to Mars, it's going to be in a ship assembled in orbit with landers designed for use on Mars.

I put it in orbit in sections on vertical rockets, assemble it in place with tugs, and fuel/ staff it using spaceplanes.

I look at expeditions as a big jigsaw puzzle. Spaceplanes are a good fit for their piece of the puzzle, but not much good anywhere else.

Best,

-Slashy

[Jouni]

Planes are fun, but they're not particularly useful. Surely they're cheaper than disposable rockets, but who cares. By the time you can reliably build and fly spaceplanes, you're experienced enough that your profit margins should be at least 90% anyway. If you replace a √100,000 rocket with a spaceplane with √10,000 operating costs, the plane is only 10% more cost-effective, because it increases the profits from √900,000 to √990,000.

[O-Doc]

...

Please help me make my investment not a dead one.

Sorry, there's basically no meta reason to use spaceplane parts. But, I won't play the game without them. Flyers gonna fly.

[Sharpy]

BTW, plane parts make for pretty decent structural parts. Much lighter than iron slabs and a good choice of sizes.

Yesterday I built a pair of munar rovers using a pair of Structural Intakes (the narrow, long ones) for the core. 0.008t instead of 0.1875t of "beam pocket edition" which is about the same size; and they were easier to attach too.

[mikegt87]

You are right, rockets are easier and more reliable.

But building space planes is fun!

[Defenestrator47]

With regards to finding KSC - I first did the map memorization (the crescent of islands off the coast is a really good marker).

In my latest career mode I planted a flag at each end of the runway. This not only makes KSC easy to find, but it makes lining up for landing easier with spaceplanes. So, doubleplusgood.

Lastly, as others have said - you don't HAVE to do anything in KSC. It's about setting your own goals and challenging yourself.

[Nich]

I forgot rate of climb is directly related to power over steady state. However that only applies to <20 km and <1100 m/s above these values you are in orbital mechanics land and every ton of engine is a a ton less payload.

[FlyingPete]

I like spaceplanes as crew shuttles between ground and an orbiting space station- other spacecraft can handle things from there. There's little practical benefit to making a space plane that can go directly to e.g. Duna. They're also useful for lifting small payloads such as probes and satellites into LKO, where the probe's own engines can take it the rest of the way.

Outside of Kerbin, jet-propelled planes are a good way to explore Laythe, and planes with other means of propulsion have their uses on Eve and Duna.

[OgreMagi]

Since the atmosphere change ssto's are not useful unless you build them big. I miss my 12 ton and lighter ssto's.

[GoSlash27]

Since the atmosphere change ssto's are not useful unless you build them big. I miss my 12 ton and lighter ssto's.

Heresy! Shun the non-believer!

Light SSTOs are the best thing going for putting crews into orbit to meet up with their interplanetary vessels. I've found that it's actually *heavy* SSTOs that are impractical these days. Cool, but impractical...

Of course, I could be wrong...

Best,

-Slashy

[juanml82]

I like spaceplanes as crew shuttles between ground and an orbiting space station- other spacecraft can handle things from there. There's little practical benefit to making a space plane that can go directly to e.g. Duna. They're also useful for lifting small payloads such as probes and satellites into LKO, where the probe's own engines can take it the rest of the way

Yes, but the problem there, if you want to use contracts, is that contracts require new spacecraft for bases/spacestations.

So, a training mission for a bunch of rescued kerbals could start with an SSTO flying to LKO to dock with an orbital Tug. Tourists and kerbonauts are transfered to the Tug, the SSTO returns to the KSC empty or with just a pilot. The Tug rescues kerbals in LKO, if any, and heads for Mun and Minmus. In both moons, it docks with a lander already in orbit there, transfers kerbals again, all the kerbals go down to the surface, maybe the lander refuels with a mining rig there, takes off and redock with the Tug, and also refuels it. The Tug finally heads into interplanetary space and quickly returns to LKO where another SSTO retrieves the kerbonauts.

By doing it that way, however, you miss all the station and base contracts.