(Stock Electric Propeller Vehicle Showcase): Bringing power to the people!

[klond]

@Jon144 Welcome back!

[Thor Wotansen]

A four 'engine' plane I've been toying with.  All the engines spin in the same direction for now, they have 5 small reaction wheels apiece and use RCS ball/thermometer bearings with two RCS balls on each end for stability.  She won't do 80m/s in level flight, but she cruises above 70m/s happily.  The stall characteristics are downright horrible.  Thankfully the engines have quite a lot of power at speeds between 35 and 65m/s so once you wallow through the inevitable wingover, you'll be able to pull right out, provided you don't encounter the ground first.

[Jon144]

Here are the motors I've been using. Feel free to take a look and use them yourself if you'd like. 

If you follow the directions and make sure to reattach all the internal struts, they should end up rotating very smoothly, smoother than most designs I have seen here. 

Edited December 3, 2018 by Jon144

[Zosma Procyon]

On 8/9/2016 at 4:18 PM, Azimech said:

Electrified the Chakora v3 ... I'm not impressed with electric flying, that's for sure. Top speed 140.

Do you have a craft file link i could have? That drive system could be the answer to my quest to build an electrical fan propelled boat for Eve. Of course I haven't been able to make anyone else's stock electric parts work, but maybe yours will.

[Zosma Procyon]

Have any of you KSP gods ever used powered rover wheels to drive your props rather than reaction wheels? It seems to me that if the wheels were all oriented the right way so that pressing the forward key rotated the drive shaft forward, MechJeb might be fooled into making rover guidance work. Also you wouldn't have to switch to an undocked draft partially inside your main vehicle to adjust the speed.

And regarding your systems where the prop has to be detached from the main vehicle and treated like a separate craft I have three questions: (1) Do any of the cheats have to be on to make them work? (2) Should parts in either subcraft be rigidly connected or autostructed? (3) How do you get a reaction wheel to keep spinning on a Mac with a Mac keyboard. I've tried using alt plus either the E or Q keys and it didn't work.

On 6/7/2018 at 12:01 AM, Tyr Anasazi said:

Hello all,

I have recently been spending way too much time learning to build stock supersonic propeller planes in KSP 1.4.3.

My goal is 400m/s. The best achieved so far is 377 m/s (mach 1.068) in sustained level flight at 335 m altitude. This is with stock aero settings. MUCH higher speeds are possible by playing with the stock aero settings in the debug menu, particularly the lift/drag ratio. Therefore I have posted screenshots including the debug menu settings.

Developing these things requires a significant effort in testing. Even fine adjustments to pitch, position of blades and many other variables, can radically change performance or affect stability.

Specs of "Spinner 377":

• 23 tons
• Part count 186
• Total 60 large reaction wheels in 2 contra-rotating engines
• Total 60 RTGs
• Bearings: Stayputnik and M-1x1 structural panels
• 4 x elevon 3, 8 x elevon 4

Spinner 377 is still experimental. When the project is complete I will upload the craft to Kerbal X. Meanwhile, please enjoy these images of the craft in flight and in the VAB:

 

Spinner 377

 

 

 

 

 

So the drive system is just flopping around the inside of the fairing? How do you keep it from "magically" popping through?

On 7/18/2018 at 12:31 AM, OHara said:

Yes the horizontal stabilizer helps lift the mass of the engines, which is placed all near the props.

One could move some of the engine components forward where the empty tapered fuel tanks are, where it looks like the engine should be, but then the moments of inertia are more like a wobble prone cigar and might need stronger bearings. The flying-saucer-like distribution of the rotating mass here is easy on the bearings.

This is a slow and forgiving aircraft. Top speed 100m/s at 10km altitude.  Maybe 120m/s on Duna. (If you want fast, of course, look two posts above.)

Is that the "klaw method" of building electric props? How does it work? Craft File?

[Zosma Procyon]

On 4/12/2017 at 12:48 AM, Skyshrim said:

I tried my hand at making a near replica of my favorite aircraft, the Consolidated B-24 Liberator!

Wasn't the B-24 one of the more Kevorkianesque American WW2 bombers?

On 1/4/2017 at 9:01 PM, _Rade said:

About the blade pitch, usually I set it to 30 degrees to the airflow. But I only use this on takeoff, for flying I usually set the authority limiter to -70  to reduce the blade angle. If the engine is powerful enough you can set the authority limiter up to -90 to get some extra speed. I try to optimize the engine so that it can reach the max speed with the authority limiter set to -70. That way I can use the higher blade angle for takeoff, and then just toggle the cruise mode via the hotkey. No need to fiddle with the authority limiter slider in flight.

Today I finally managed to build a working seaplane, it can carry 6 Kerbals at max speed about 150 m/s. It took me quite a few tries to find a hull configuration that can land on the water without doing a front flip or destroying the rotor blades.

Also I'm not sure if this is some sort of a bug or something else. After the first water landing the plane could takeoff with only about 50% trim on each engine. After the second water landing I had to give it full trim on the engines in order to takeoff and the plane couldn't reach its max speed. I'll have to do some more testing to find the cause to this.

https://kerbalx.com/Rade/Galeb

How do you keep the separated prop craft from just popping out through the fairing?

On 12/21/2016 at 11:27 AM, PointySideUp said:

Thank you @_Rade for the nicely designed propeller engine.  I had been looking for a powerful, compact electric engine to make an Eve ocean exploration vehicle.  I stripped off all of the plane parts, and ended up with an amphibious craft that can do a sustained 20m/s across Eve's ocean.

  Hide contents

 

I would love, more than you can imagine, to put two of those engines on a floating boat base with two science labs, drills, and an ISRU converter, and send it to Eve., but I have never succeeded in making an electric prop engine work. They always either just push through the fairing or whatever components is supposed to hold them, or shake themselves to pieces. I'm really hoping the devs just give us an electric or nuclear propelled prop engine that works on Eve. I'm great at building huge space stations and mobile bases, but useless at making things like your masterpiece work. In fact I'd be willing to bet a small amount of purely hypothetical money that if I loaded your craft file, It would just fly apart the moment I try to make it go. I wouldn't make it as a Pakled. 

[SuperHappySquid]

On 11/29/2018 at 5:12 PM, Phantomic said:

Wow, guess I shoulda been coming here all this time i was looking for a new bearing on my props. I'v tried the Standard thermometer/RCS props, Girder/stayputniks and RCS bearings but i never would have thought about an Antenna but eventually they all fail at some point (actually i havent tested the girder prop much).

I'm a replica builder on KerbalX and i try to focus on low part count craft and i think that antenna bearing would fit pretty well with my needs, could one of you show me the spacing and such for building one of these things?

 

by the way if you're interested, myself, holidaytheleek and HB stratos are going to have a stock prop air race, no set date yet but let me know if you're interested

Perhaps. I’ve mostly withdrawn from KSP. Maybe this would be an entertaining final thing - one last hurrah. :-) I’d need to know the strict rules. 

[sturmhauke]

56 minutes ago, SuperHappySquid said:

I’ve mostly withdrawn from KSP.

U wot? 

[Phantomic]

8 hours ago, SuperHappySquid said:

Perhaps. I’ve mostly withdrawn from KSP. Maybe this would be an entertaining final thing - one last hurrah. :-) I’d need to know the strict rules. 

Ah so ok, there aren't many rules right now, for classes there's 20 wheels and under, unlimited single and unlimited double (referring to the engines)

There will be two events, a pylon race and a speed run, you can submit 2 variants of the same plane but not two radically different designs.

Say if you have one airframe, you can use that for both events but can't jump from the 20 wheels and under to unlimited.

For the pylon you need a reliable engine, for the speed run you need a fast engine, mechanical failure will disqualify you from the round, 2 of pylon, 2 of speed.

Finally, keep it in 400 parts and Submit it to me, there is no set date for it because I want to record it so there's no questions about the results.

 

If your engine needs specific instructions to work it, let me know and I'll practice with it.

[SuperHappySquid]

9 hours ago, sturmhauke said:

U wot? 

Done most of the things I wanted in this game. My youtube channel was a source of constant frustration due to the gulf between the quality I wished I could produce and the content I actually posted. Best to just delete it and bow out of the scene. 

[sturmhauke]

But like... I finally learned how to make a stock prop by stealing your designs.

[Jon144]

4 hours ago, Phantomic said:

Ah so ok, there aren't many rules right now, for classes there's 20 wheels and under, unlimited single and unlimited double (referring to the engines)

There will be two events, a pylon race and a speed run, you can submit 2 variants of the same plane but not two radically different designs.

Say if you have one airframe, you can use that for both events but can't jump from the 20 wheels and under to unlimited.

For the pylon you need a reliable engine, for the speed run you need a fast engine, mechanical failure will disqualify you from the round, 2 of pylon, 2 of speed.

Finally, keep it in 400 parts and Submit it to me, there is no set date for it because I want to record it so there's no questions about the results.

 

If your engine needs specific instructions to work it, let me know and I'll practice with it.

Sounds like a fun challenge.

[Phantomic]

Dang those Cowls really put a hamper on the performance. i had some sort of symmetry glitch where one side of all things radially placed on the engines would disappear, that wasnt much of an issue on the cowls but the RCS bearings all had a bite taken out of them.

 

This obviously isnt the finished version but it flies well enough. anyone else really like the B-26 more than the B-25?

[Phantomic]

On 12/5/2018 at 11:33 AM, sturmhauke said:

 

i'd wager we've all stolen a prop every now and then

Edited December 19, 2018 by Phantomic

[Phantomic]

Here's the final product, it's up on Kerbal X if you'd like your own B-26, it was a pain in the you-know-what to finalize because the cowls had just a few areas that were rubbing, compound that with a symmetry glitch and that really starts to suck pretty quick

[klond]

3 hours ago, Phantomic said:

symmetry glitch and that really starts to suck pretty quick

I fight with this too.  I do symmetry, grab the parent and make it mirrored.  If I touch it again, bam, symmetry broke and items crowded to one side or missing.  Back to hand placement..

 I like your glass cockpit and rounded wings btw.

 

 

 Some have seen this already cuz I hock my wares all over the internet.  Tiny electric, wings unfold.  With one RTG I could do 2 small reaction wheels at 100, and a 3rd if I kept it around 87ish percent.  The 3rd one really was worth its extra weight.

 

 

[Phantomic]

45 minutes ago, klond said:

I fight with this too.  I do symmetry, grab the parent and make it mirrored.  If I touch it again, bam, symmetry broke and items crowded to one side or missing.  Back to hand placement..

 I like your glass cockpit and rounded wings btw.

 

 

 Some have seen this already cuz I hock my wares all over the internet.  Tiny electric, wings unfold.  With one RTG I could do 2 small reaction wheels at 100, and a 3rd if I kept it around 87ish percent.  The 3rd one really was worth its extra weight.

 

 

dang and i thought some of my props were efficient at 10m/s per wheel and here you get 55 with 3, on top of that the whole thing is really awesome

[Phantomic]

Hey guys, trying to build a new RCS prop that's more powerful than my standard 11 wheeler, what comes with more power is of course, more bearing failure.

What do you recommend for a 16 wheel 0.625M Prop?

Here's the download incase you'd like to look at it closer  https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/398148589660143618/528018229428355082/Blizzard.craft

Edited December 28, 2018 by Phantomic

[_Rade]

@Phantomic try using some other parts that have higher thickness than thermometers, the 5-way rcs and gravioli might work. Also it might help to include short I-beam as the root part of the rotor and then attach and autostrut all parts of the rotor to the I-beam, this should make the rotor more rigid and less likely to break.

[Phantomic]

13 minutes ago, _Rade said:

@Phantomic try using some other parts that have higher thickness than thermometers, the 5-way rcs and gravioli might work. Also it might help to include short I-beam as the root part of the rotor and then attach and autostrut all parts of the rotor to the I-beam, this should make the rotor more rigid and less likely to break.

good stuff, i'll try some of that

[Phantomic]

@_Rade took your suggestion for thicker bearings, i'v managed 87 with unoptomized props on the ground. thanks a bunch i think i have my new standard bearing

EDIT

i put it in my Hughes H-1, fastest i'v had it with the old engine in level flight is 93

Edited December 29, 2018 by Phantomic

[_Rade]

Nice to see it works, I'm glad I could help.

Also if you're using 1.25m parts you might as well go for the fairing/stayputnik combo for the bearing. It's probably the one of the best bearings for the propellers, mainly because it's really strong and fairing occludes the engine parts from the drag, which makes the planes that use these propellers much faster.

[HalcyonSon]

On 12/18/2018 at 1:29 PM, Phantomic said:

I had some sort of symmetry glitch where one side of all things radially placed on the engines would disappear, that wasnt much of an issue on the cowls but the RCS bearings all had a bite taken out of them.

I've had that happen a lot recently and it's driving me crazy.  Mirror is the default for anything I build in the SPH, but when I mix some Radial in, everything gets fouled up.  I built a Jedi Starfighter inspired interplanetary drive ring for a Spaceplane and a UFO for a Duna rescue mission.  Both used parts placed in Mirror to form a subassembly, and then the subassembly was placed in Radial.  Same for a barge I used to move some equipment to the Island.  Simply trying to adjust placement with the Offset tool broke symmetry.

[Phantomic]

5 1/2 hours and 462 parts later, i have built the ultrafortress

[Phantomic]

i think i may have the fastest thermo ever flown