The Rhino

[GoSlash27]

 For me, the KR-2L Rhino is a useless engine with it's current stats. I understand that it is supposed to be a "failed design", but it is "failed" to the point that it serves no purpose that I can find.
 According to my numbers, it would be optimal as an upper stage for payloads in the 120-300t range, but lifting that much mass in one go is a serious hardship for the booster stage. You would need somewhere between 4 Twin Boars and 5 Mammoths to lift such a large stack.
 And besides... How often do we find a need to lift such a massive payload in one go, especially in career?

 I would like to propose a rebalance to make the Rhino more useful, *but* before I do that I'd like to hear from the rest of you first.
 Do you use the Rhino? What are you using it for? If you would keep it as- is, why? If you would change it, what would you like to use it for?

 

 Thanks,
-Slashy

[moogoob]

I use it all the time. Because it's the only size 3 engine that can fit in-line with the size 3 decoupler, it's a great choice for giant upper stages. A rhino, big tank, size-3 fairing, size-2 reaction wheel, batteries, mechjeb and mounting hardware is my Empress upper stage. Sometimes you can even launch them as a launch stage with a small enough payload.

I mostly use them for the biggest payloads - lifting 160 tons of fuel into LKO, for example is in the upper range of the Empress' capabilities.

[Slam_Jones]

Assuming I'm thinking of the right one (3.75m, single-nozzle, moderate atmo ISP, higher vac ISP?), and assuming the stats haven't been changed super-recently, I've used it with moderate success as a first-stage, or occasionally SSTO, launcher for small payloads.  Is it particularly efficient?  No, not really.  But, in some instances, it allows me to focus on ascent path, rather than stage timing, etc.

Also, I kinda like how it looks.  And the fact you can still stack below it, unlike the Mammoth.

Also, it lets me be lazy once in a while, and skip a stage or two.

But hey, that's just me.

Edited January 16, 2016 by Slam_Jones
Do spoilers not work anymore? :S

[Motokid600]

I'd use it more often if it didn't have that giant stupid tank-butt. Seriously Squad. Loose the butts. All of them. Especially this one.

[maccollo]

It's a pretty good and cost effective sustainer engine for something like 120-150 tons to LEO. It's just to bad you have to cluster the solids if you want to use those.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hb4TCJ0-T6g

As for how to make it more useful... I would increase the size of the the Kerbol system. That said, there are uses for it. For example, going to Eve or Tylo and back. Even just sending a single Kerbal require pretty significant payloads.

Edited January 16, 2016 by maccollo

[Slam_Jones]

2 minutes ago, Motokid600 said:

I'd use it more often if it didn't have that giant stupid tank-butt. Seriously Squad. Loose the butts. All of them. Especially this one.

 

... tank butts?  Have an picture of what you mean?

[Motokid600]

10 minutes ago, Slam_Jones said:

 

... tank butts?  Have an picture of what you mean?

The majority of the structure above the engine bell. It's a 3.75m size adapter. All of the stock engines have them. There supposed to represent the bottom of the fuel tank hence the name "tank butt". There ugly, and they rob the player of modularity. If you attempt to use this on anything smaller then a 3.75m tank it looks absolutely terrible. So on top of a stat rebalance all engines need to loose that tank butt when they get there make overs. ( hopefully for 1.2 )

Vs.

The tank butts should be modeled onto the fuel tanks. Not the engines.

Edited January 16, 2016 by Motokid600

[Slam_Jones]

Ahhh, gotcha.  I don't know enough about rockets to dispute functionality or aesthetics, but I kinda like em the way they are.  Then again, I always appreciate increases in creative freedom.  Then again, I (and others who can't afford Haswell/Skylake components) also appreciate low part counts.

Edit: Personally, not a fan of the "no tapered bottom" look, as shown in the above pictures.  I can't see why one couldn't clip the "tank butt" into the fuel tank...  But to each their own!

Edited January 16, 2016 by Slam_Jones

[regex]

29 minutes ago, GoSlash27 said:

And besides... How often do we find a need to lift such a massive payload in one go, especially in career?

Uh, all the time when I (used to) play vanilla.  If you want to play with rinky-dinky payloads go for it.  As far as I'm concerned, go big or go home.

11 minutes ago, Motokid600 said:

I'd use it more often if it didn't have that giant stupid tank-butt. Seriously Squad. Loose the butts. All of them. Especially this one.

This, pretty much, for ALL engines.

[Evanitis]

19 minutes ago, Motokid600 said:

The tank butts should be modeled onto the fuel tanks. Not the engines.

But how would you stack tanks on top of each other that way?

[I_Killed_Jeb]

I use it for huge interplanetary motherships since it has a very nice vac ISP, and I don't necessarily like using nukes all the time

[regex]

13 minutes ago, Evanitis said:

But how would you stack tanks on top of each other that way?

Leave the tank butts completely out; the fuel tanks are fine as they are.  A better way to make things work would be to include proper interstage fairings like Procedural Fairings does.  Then you can make housings to cover the engine components, like this:

Edited January 16, 2016 by regex

[Slam_Jones]

@Regex  Is it more realistic that way?  Because, to my untrained eye, it looks... not pretty.

Anyway I think we're getting a bit off-topic...

Edited January 16, 2016 by Slam_Jones

[Hotaru]

I use it in a few situations, but it's definitely something of a niche engine. With SRBs (or sometimes LRBs powered by Mainsails or Twin Boars) to get it through the first kilometer or two of thick air it can be a decent first-stage engine, as it's more efficient than the Mammoth. On very large vehicles it can be useful as an upper stage or transfer stage engine.

[Norcalplanner]

I like it, but it's really too powerful to use as an upper stage engine above a single Mammoth. Keep the Isp where it is, reduce or lose the tank butt, and reduce vacuum thrust to 900 - 1200 kN or so (with a commensurate decrease in mass) and you'd have a heck of an engine. A bonus would be if you then have landing legs big enough to have the option of using  the engine as a larger, more powerful Poodle.

[regex]

5 minutes ago, Slam_Jones said:

@Regex  Is it more realistic that way?  Because, to my untrained eye, it looks... not pretty.

It's much more realistic.  You cover up engine hardware to streamline the rocket in order to reduce drag and stress on the mechanisms.  Underneath that covering you'd have something like this:

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/images/rockets/angara/rd191/integration_1.jpg

[GoSlash27]

Good stuff, folks! Please keep it coming.

Re the "tank butt problem": The word on the street is that Squad is going to have a fix for that shortly.

[Warzouz]

I like the Rhino a lot. I use if form Eve, Duna, Dres and sometimes Jool. I alos use if for boosting the escape on Moho trips.

But again, I used to lift vey heavy loads at a bargain because of recoverable SSTO rockets.

 

EDIT  : ah, even my Jool and Eeloo space station interplanetary stage is Rhino powered. Only my Moho interplanetary is LVN powered but has a first stage with double Rhino. I'm not too fond of low TWR at LKO

Edited January 16, 2016 by Warzouz

[MagicFireCaster]

Hey, i use it a lot, it helps me to close kerbin orbit when i'm sending heavy things on orbit, like interplanetary ships, or asteroid movers, is like a bigger skiper to me, especially good for medium stages, i've never used the mamoth tho.

[Snark]

Personally, I like the tank butts.  I think of it as a feature, not a problem.  "It looks terrible if you put it on something smaller than 3.75m", as far as I'm concerned, is correct, because you're not supposed to.  For me, large-radius engines don't belong on small-radius tanks; it's a design constraint that I find interesting and worthwhile.  (I recognize that my opinion is probably in the extreme minority here.)

As for how useful it is:  I like it, it's a handy engine.  It's the ideal 2nd stage for lots of rockets that have Mammoth as a 1st stage.

Another case where I tend to use it:  if I'm sending a large, massive "mothership" on an interplanetary expedition.  I tend to give those super-low TWR in order to boost their dV, but this makes it awkard to do the initial burn to eject from LKO.  (Yes, I know about the multi-pass approach, and I use it sometimes, but there's a limit because you can only raise your Ap just so high before you just have to burn-baby-burn.)  So I'll often use a Rhino with the 41-ton 3.75m tank to give it a good hard shove out of LKO before I continue with the high-I_sp, low-TWR burn.

[GoSlash27]

28 minutes ago, Snark said:

As for how useful it is:  I like it, it's a handy engine.  It's the ideal 2nd stage for lots of rockets that have Mammoth as a 1st stage.

Actually, it's equally split with the Skipper. The Skipper covers from 31-47 tonnes and the Rhino covers from 48-64 tonnes. This is the entire range in which a single Mammoth is ideal.

But yeah... the Rhino has some serious hauling capacity as a 2nd stage.

I'd hate to have a rebalance take away this ability, especially if people are using it.

Best,

-Slashy

[Motokid600]

2 hours ago, Snark said:

Personally, I like the tank butts.  I think of it as a feature, not a problem.  "It looks terrible if you put it on something smaller than 3.75m", as far as I'm concerned, is correct, because you're not supposed to.  For me, large-radius engines don't belong on small-radius tanks; it's a design constraint that I find interesting and worthwhile.  (I recognize that my opinion is probably in the extreme minority here.)

 

That was a bad example. How about if I want to cluster two Rhinos ( is it Mammoth or Rhino? ) to the bottom of a 3.75m tank? Or five to the bottom of a 5m tank? ( No 5m tanks in stock, but the concept is the same. ) It looks absolutely terrible. 

There shouldnt be a "supposed to" and "not supposed to" in this game that defeats the whole purpose of KSP. And I guarantee you someone at sometime needed those large engines on the bottom of a 2.5m tank and had to put an ugly adapter piece to make it work. 

Make it so the butts have a toggle and it'd be great. I wouldn't call this too off topic. When it comes down to an engine's practicality it's layout plays a big part as well as its stats.

For instance they could make the Mammoth/Rhino the best performing engine in the game and I'd still find it useless because of that tank-butt.

3 hours ago, Evanitis said:

But how would you stack tanks on top of each other that way?

The hemispherical end wouldn't stick out. It would be inlaid to where the end is flush with the sidewalls.

 

Edited January 16, 2016 by Motokid600

[Gaarst]

8 minutes ago, Motokid600 said:

Make it so the butts have a toggle and it'd be great. I wouldn't call this too off topic. When it comes down to an engine's practicality it's layout plays a big part as well as its stats.

This.

SpaceY's engines have toggleable "tankbutts" and are surface attachable. This makes them so much easier to use, alone on smaller tanks or in lower stage clusters. Allowing KSP's engines to do this would a good thing for creativity IMO (this arguments is used here and there, so why shouldn't I ?). Having toggleable engine shrouds was one of the best things of 1.0.5, now I would like the next verions to continue in this direction.

Edited January 16, 2016 by Gaarst

[bewing]

Wow, you guys are nuts -- when it takes so much less than that to launch 4 40-ton payloads. Yeah, a Poodle is always much better than a Rhino if you aren't trying to blast a hole through the vacuum. It takes a little longer, but you get there with more fuel in the end.

 

 

[regex]

1 minute ago, bewing said:

Wow, you guys are nuts -- when it takes so much less than that to launch 4 40-ton payloads.

Why would I do in four launches what I can do in one?  Just to prove I can space-assemble or something?  Been there, done that, bored to tears of it.