Kerbal Charter Challenge!

[Van Disaster]

Crew doesn't count, but is a small percentage of your score. I definitely didn't recruit 480 passengers...

 

[zolotiyeruki]

How many count as crew?  All four in the Mk3 cockpit, or just the pilot?

Last run left me with 12 tons of extra fuel.  Replaced extra fuel with two more cabins, and flew a bit more efficiently. (3600-245) = 3355 fuel used, (11*16)+4 = 180 kerbals, or 179 if you say that one of them has to be the pilot.  Final score: 0.8 * 3355/180 = 14.9

Too lazy to post all the pictures in spoiler tags.  Album here: http://imgur.com/a/CvzKv

Edited August 3, 2016 by zolotiyeruki

[ScriptKitt3h]

I made an attempt at the Emergency Rescue-class mission last night using a modified (and all-stock) F-4 Phantom II replica, which (compared to the "normal" aircraft) had been changed to resemble a proposed variant of the F-4 (F-4X) meant for high-altitude supersonic flight (much like the XB-70 Valkyrie and similar concepts). In KSP, this meant a pair of under-wing droptanks (3 0.625 meter LF tanks) and modified, reinforced landing gear.

After takeoff, the pilot (Jebediah) made a series of short hops to the upper edge of of the atmosphere and back down...

Spoiler

After roughly 3 of these "hops", the airport came into range.

Spoiler

By this point, roughly half the fuel in the onboard tanks was left (the droptanks had been jettisoned during the second "hop"), so things were needing to move quickly.

Shortly after touchdown, Hayne came down to the waiting jet and hopped in the open copilot seat behind Jeb, and the 2 quickly set off for home at KSC.

Spoiler

After a tense flight home (due to the very real risk involved with the aero heating at high speed), the aircraft came into sight of the KSC peninsula, off in the distance.

However, just prior to touchdown, the plane's onboard fuel reserves of 1180 LF ran out... leading to a very exciting unpowered landing on the runway, thanks to Jeb's piloting skills (and a ton of fighting with the brick of a plane that is the F-4 Phantom to behave while gliding).

This mission took 42 minutes, 51 seconds to complete (by the skin of my teeth though, as the last-minute engine flameout wasn't something I'd planned on).

[Van Disaster]

19 hours ago, zolotiyeruki said:

How many count as crew?  All four in the Mk3 cockpit, or just the pilot?

I believe it's all cockpit crew.

[swjr-swis]

On 8/3/2016 at 10:29 PM, Van Disaster said:

I believe it's all cockpit crew.

Even if the plane has a drone core? The thing is, the Mk2 factor has very little options to 'terminate' the front other than the cockpit, that would not simply cause more drag (and more fuel usage). But a drone core can fly the plane independently and essentially promotes any cockpit crew to passengers.

Not a point to drive home, just something to consider.

[Van Disaster]

*shrug* not my contest, I'd say all bar the crew needed to control the craft personally... but I'm flying nearly 600 pax if I need the FAR lead back, so crew doesn't really concern me

[zolotiyeruki]

This entry doesn't count, because:

1) I didn't take pictures through the takeoff, flight, descent, landing, takeoff, etc. (but you can see mission time in the pics)
2) I didn't use the provided save file (which I only noticed after I had taken off), although I *did* land reasonably close to where the polar base *would* be. (you can see the cargo's lat/lng)

So let's consider it a practice run.  That being said, if this entry *were* scored, here's how it would shake out:
Starting fuel: 7200
Ending fuel: 2242
Cargo deposited at the pole: 277 tons
Total score: 0.8 * (7200 - 2242) / 277 =14.319

http://imgur.com/a/VURYk

Edited August 9, 2016 by zolotiyeruki

[HazelPine]

@Van Disaster, @zolotiyeruki, and @ScriptKitt3h, I updated the leaderboards!

 

I think we have a new passenger flight master here guys, zolotiyeruki has come by and completely beat everyone so far on, even when I recalculated the scores to account for the pilot and crew (somehow!). Insane entries, mate! Definitely bumped up the competition!

 

To be clear, every plane needs to have a pod with crew, even if it has a drone core, since in a real flight there would be a flight crew to take care of the passengers and stuff, which are the kerbals in the cockpit. If the plane has a one kerbal pod, however, we'll just have to assume the passengers are flying with a cheap airline with no flight crew! That's how I'll handle all entries as I've been doing from the beginning, but if enough people want it changed we could change it.

 

Also, badges. I want to make a couple badges (P. Flights, C. Flights, R. Flights) for this challenge so everyone that did this challenge can proudly display they flew to an icy airport in style, but I think I may need your guy's help. I have some ideas on what the badge could look like, but I have no idea what kind of little text I could put on it for the different classes. All I came up wit so far is "Hayne Saviour" for the rescue one, but I feel it sounds dumb. If you have any ideas please tell me, and I will consider it deeply! 

 

Also,

I'm back for good, baby!

[Baybrawler]

@Pine I'll try my best to make some badges in photoshop if you'd like some help. If you'd like me to just give me some idea of what image(s) you'd like on it. 

[Van Disaster]

Someone mentioned a while back that one of my ridiculous craft "would never get off the ground in stock aero", so while I was messing around with this stupid thing I thought "hey, why not try it". So, uninstalled FAR, adjusted the main wing position & off we went. And... well, stock aero is certainly still made of goo, that's for sure - this thing can hardly lift off under FAR but takes about half the runway in stock. But... goes way faster & higher in FAR, as you'd expect from thinner atmo. As you'd also expect the fuel consumption in stock is considerably higher too...

Yes this is ridiculous:

 

Spoiler

 

Takes off nicely though

Cruise height is awful, I had to plot my way round mountains & with all the clouds around that was a little nerve-wracking.

So much fuel gone...

 

I have some cargo runs I haven't posted. Interesting setup for the engines, they consume a little fuel at idle ( as all engines should ), so turning a couple off to taxi with is a good idea.

 

Spoiler

 

Chug chug back into the air

I like the way the wings turned out on this one

No worries trying to slow down in stock aero...

Although I'm not used to m/s instead of knots

 

Despite touching down at the start of the runway the brakes did very little to slow the thing down, so it went off the other end at 30m/s or so... thankfully didn't cost much to taxi back.

Anyway:

Stock aero category:

Passengers: 42x16 = 672
Fuel: 6833 - 497 = 6336
Score: 6336 * 0.8 / 672 = 7.54

I'll do a run with essentially the same craft under FAR sometime, will be an interesting comparison. Stock + B9-pwings + SXT engines & the bit the front gear is attached to.
 

 

Edited August 13, 2016 by Van Disaster

[zolotiyeruki]

What's the Isp of those turboprops?

[Van Disaster]

About 22k iirc, there was an argument on the previous page where I thought they were too good. It seems they're realistic for static thrust - I spent some time working out numbers - but I'm pretty sure their efficiency doesn't drop off properly ( although I could be entirely wrong there, *shrug* ) because there's very little ram effect for turboprops. Worth messing around with though.

Edited August 14, 2016 by Van Disaster

[zolotiyeruki]

Ah, that would certainly explain the fuel efficiency, then!  That's nearly double the Isp of the biggest jets in KSP.

[Van Disaster]

Yeah, although the craft is slower so the fuel burn per distance isn't quite so good - the most efficient jet engine ever was the Olympus in Concorde despite it's burn per second being pretty horrible, the burn per distance was way in front of anything else.

[SpaceplaneAddict]

Heyo, whaddya mean by FAR edition? As in FAR the mod? 'Cause I wanna do that emergency flight one and need to know if I need FAR or not.

Edited August 17, 2016 by SpaceplaneAddict

[zolotiyeruki]

12 minutes ago, SpaceplaneAddict said:

Heyo, whaddya mean by FAR edition? As in FAR the mod? 'Cause I wanna do that emergency flight one and need to know if I need FAR or not.

You can complete the challenge with or without FAR, whichever you prefer.  It's just a separate leaderboard for each.

[SpaceplaneAddict]

Just now, zolotiyeruki said:

You can complete the challenge with or without FAR, whichever you prefer.  It's just a separate leaderboard for each.

I gotcha! @Pine, you should expect an Emergency Rescure mission soon^TM!

[SpaceplaneAddict]

My nosecone exploded during 2nd takeoff... will I be DQ'ed?

[Blasty McBlastblast]

@Pine I know you said no rocket planes, but how do you feel about rocket assisted lift off? 

I've been working on a monster able to deliver a stupendous 1,200 tonne payload but the runway is always slightly too short to be able to reach take off speed! 

 

Spoiler

top: SRB assistance to reach the critical lift off speed of ~100m/s (note: LHS of runway used so that wings clear buildings.. just )

bottom: in the air and flying under regular jet power.

 

Also: i'm running into a problem that is making it hard to maintain level flight, periodically the pitch control will become very unstable (roll and yaw are fine) with the plane see-sawing between about 30deg up and then nose diving. If anyone with proper big-plane building experience has any advice it would be appreciated, so far I've just been (ahem) winging it! 

Edited August 18, 2016 by Blasty McBlastblast
crazy imgur tags...

[Van Disaster]

Take off from the grass? I don't remember there being anything about having to take off from the runway pitch control issue sounds like you need to rebalance the CoL/CoM relationship and also just add more fixed tail to damp pitch oscillations. Also shove some fuel forwards.

Flaps do work in stock aero, btw.

Edited August 18, 2016 by Van Disaster

[Blasty McBlastblast]

Well, I did it! Here is my entry for the Cargo Flight (FAR edition), the score is not fantastic but I'm extremely happy with the sheer mass of the cargo 

cargo mass: 1,274 tonnes 

fuel: 16,000 - 6,297 = 9,703 units x 0.8 = 7,762 funds

score: 6.09

imgur album here

 

mods used:

• FAR (for voxel-model comfort)
• KJR (for stiffness)
• STX (for radial hulls)
• VSR (for 20% coolness)
• USI core (for the big kontainer, because 1200t of regular ore looks silly!)
• tweakscale (to make mk2 hulls 1.325m width so they fit nicely against radial hulls)
• B9 Procedural Wings (for literal acres of wings)

[Van Disaster]

Well done, that is a quite absurd load :). Don't shut down engines in flight though - they go from thrust producers to dead mass with a huge draggy closed intakes. What you really want to do is use all that wing & get as high as you can without increasing AoA much, then you'll have no drag ( because of altitude ) & no fuel burn because at high alts they don't use much.

I need to investigate alternate fuselage parts, Mk3 is very limiting. I guess I could just MM all the Mk3 bits to be 25% bigger ( tweakscale has a habit of causing a mess, I stopped using it quite some time ago ) but I'd rather use existing things. I don't suppose there's some 5m cargobays around?

Edited August 18, 2016 by Van Disaster

[HazelPine]

Updated the OP!

 

@SpaceplaneAddict, you don't get penalized by any mishaps during the mission, as long as you go to the airport, do the mission (rescue Hayne, in your case), and come back alive. Adventure is a part of the challenge after all, since you need to make a rugged enough plane to fly in cold polar skies and fly back home to the KSC in the equator!

@Blasty McBlastblast, awesome flight! I never expected anyone to complete the cargo mission with over a MILLION kilograms of cargo! Also, to answer your question about rocket assisted takeoffs:

Spoiler

 

Seems realistic enough for me, and I'm completely fine with it as long as they aren't used to boost around and avoid using aircraft engines. So rocket-assisted takeoffs and landings are fine, but no rocket flight stages, please.  

 

[SpaceplaneAddict]

1 minute ago, Pine said:

you don't get penalized by any mishaps during the mission, as long as you go to the airport, do the mission (rescue Hayne, in your case), and come back alive. Adventure is a part of the challenge after all, since you need to make a rugged enough plane to fly in cold polar skies and fly back home to the KSC in the equator!

ahaha, I'll show you the dfinition of "fun"... muahahahahaha (and I think I even managed to scare, the one and only, Jebediah Kerman.

Also, it seems once you are at altitude and at supercruise, the Whiplash engines BARELY consume fuel, AND keep speed up.

[Van Disaster]

13 hours ago, Pine said:

Updated the OP!

@Blasty McBlastblast, awesome flight! I never expected anyone to complete the cargo mission with over a MILLION kilograms of cargo! Also, to answer your question about rocket assisted takeoffs:

You missed my stock-aero absurdity flight anyway if we're allowed RATO, what does it cost?