Aerospace Match Challenge

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

The name of the game is simple, design match.

 

But we're talking more than shape-matching with Kerbin Lookalikes here.

We're talking realistic specification match.

Hard?  Yes.

Doable, I know it is.  I have built a working SR-71 that conformed to the physical shape, mass, and flight envelope as it appears on paper (including the catastrophic backflip condition).  I have also built mass, size, and endurance-accurate copies of a 737, MH-53, P3-Orion (Which flew amazingly gentle),

 

So here's how it works.

Build a match of your aircraft of choice.  The craft must not only look like its counterpart, it must conform to the following:

- Length

- Height

- Wingspan

- Weight

- Speed 

- Endurance

- Service Ceiling (with adjustment for Kerbin's atmosphere)

 

FAR is required for behavioral accuracy of all aircraft.

The use of mods is welcome and encouraged.  AJE is advised (provided it works with the KSP version you're using), B9 Procedural Wings (with internal fuel tanks) is HIGHLY suggested.  Alternate Resource Panel will also be useful so you can use it to study your fuel-consumption and get endurance times.

 

This appears easier than you might expect and it will test your understanding of how aircraft are built and behave.  Using the SR-71 example I mentioned above (And sadly have no screenshots of since I built it a year ago), the aircraft was fast, but fragile.  Top speeds of 400 to 600 knots equivalent based on altitude, unable to withstand Gs, and having a rather exacting ascent profile meant a very methodical approach to flying it.  Reproducing it in KSP required a lot of patience and flight testing, fitting the design to shape, size, and mass.  Placing the fuel tanks in the right places at the correct sizes was trial and error, and making it fit its flight envelope from a takeoff at nearly 200 knots to landing around the same with a drag chute deploying on wheels down.

 

This is your challenge.  The closer you get to an aircraft in both the design AND the performance, the better.  But there will be no 'winners'.  Simply, fist bumps and bragging rights.

 

I now leave you with a video link to my under-tonned, and overly enduring MH-53 clone.

http://original.livestream.com/admiraltigerclaw/video?clipId=pla_9c1d84bf-4a8a-49af-8d24-09c4d9677b18

[Van Disaster]

Bonus points for combat capability if it's a combat craft? not really sure if this is a challenge or something that should live in Spacecraft Exchange, but should be a few interesting things. Would you want them scaled around parts we have, or as many parts fullsize as possible? cockpits would be a problem for instance - plus most craft fuselage are not actually cylindrical.

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

On ‎4‎/‎27‎/‎2016 at 6:51 AM, Van Disaster said:

Bonus points for combat capability if it's a combat craft? not really sure if this is a challenge or something that should live in Spacecraft Exchange, but should be a few interesting things. Would you want them scaled around parts we have, or as many parts fullsize as possible? cockpits would be a problem for instance - plus most craft fuselage are not actually cylindrical.

As close as possible.

 

My SR-71 was size and mass scaled to almost perfection once I figured out how to size out the engine nacelles with procedural parts (which still took some doing).  Getting the takeoff speed and endurance then became a case of ensuring the correct size and distribution of fuel tanks.  And flight characteristics took a lot of adjustment to get the chines just right.