VTOL: to the island airport and back in style!

[moogoob]

My favourite shakedown mission for new aircraft is one I'm sure I share with a lot of you - fly to the island airport, then fly back. If it can accomplish all that, it's a pretty good sigh that it might just be a usable vehicle!

As I've been playing around with vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) craft recently, I've had the opportunity to do the same with those craft, and it's not just A) fun but B) a bit of a challenge, too, and I thought I'd share.

So, the rules!

1. Make a craft.

2. Take off vertically from KSC - your choice to use the runway or launch pad.

3. Fly to the Island.

4. Land vertically at the airport. Take a picture!

5. Take off, fly back, and land at KSC. Take another picture!

Refueling, ISRU are prohibited. Wings and chutes are allowed so long as you don't use them to land.

Mods: sure! Go ahead! Knock yourselves out! Just let me know if it's modded.

As to scoring... no idea. This is more of a "mission idea" for now. If anyone has any ideas other than judging on looks alone (which, would disqualify mine, let's face it. ) I'm all ears.

 

Here's my own entry to kick stuff off: (from two successful attempts - thus the varying times of day)

 

So- Participant Awards! Here goes:

@Eidahlil gets the "I said BUZZ the tower, not land on it!" award.

@foamyesque gets the "Just like balancing a broom on your finger!" award.

@Speeding Mullet gets the "What if the Jumbo Jet needs to land on a helipad? What then!?!" award.

@Nicole gets the "Seaside dinner cruise for four." award.

@Element4ry gets the "Who in their right mind would land using jets?!?" award.

@MunGazer gets the "Osprey XL" award.

@RonnieThePotato gets 3/4ths of the "Drop Tank Extravaganza" award.

Edited November 13, 2016 by moogoob
Awards ceremony!

[Eidahlil]

I attempted to participate with my VTOL jet, but ran into a curious problem on the island. I'll make another attempt as soon as I stop laughing. But since everyone loves crash videos:

 

5 hours ago, moogoob said:

If anyone has any ideas <..>, I'm all ears.

I'd have a guest list of all participants and their crafts in the OP, with possible special awards (yes, idea shamelessly stolen from the K Prize thread), like:

Spoiler

VTOL precision award: Land on a building; Advanced VTOL precision: Do so in both airports.

Raw power award: Use no wings or control surfaces.

Speed award: Exceed Mach 2 (686m/s, no detours just to build up speed); Blazing speed: Get plasma effects (let's put the cut-off at 900m/s).

Broken altimeter award: Exceed 30km altitude with the vertical engines only.

Confidence award: Use no wheels for landing (landing legs OK).

Teambuilding award: Bring at least 10 kerbals. Take a photo with them all outside on the island.

Mountain goat award: Land on the fuel tower between the runway and the SPH.

Well, you get the idea.

 

[swjr-swis]

3 hours ago, Eidahlil said:

but ran into a curious problem on the island.

Ahh yes, the 'Bird Trap'. We had to install that last friday, after the umpteenth supersonic jet blasted the eardrums out of our entire  air controller staff by trying to land on the roof of the tower....

 

 

[moogoob]

On 10/31/2016 at 11:04 PM, Eidahlil said:

I attempted to participate with my VTOL jet, but ran into a curious problem on the island. I'll make another attempt as soon as I stop laughing. But since everyone loves crash videos:

 

I'd have a guest list of all participants and their crafts in the OP, with possible special awards (yes, idea shamelessly stolen from the K Prize thread), like:

  Reveal hidden contents

VTOL precision award: Land on a building; Advanced VTOL precision: Do so in both airports.

Raw power award: Use no wings or control surfaces.

Speed award: Exceed Mach 2 (686m/s, no detours just to build up speed); Blazing speed: Get plasma effects (let's put the cut-off at 900m/s).

Broken altimeter award: Exceed 30km altitude with the vertical engines only.

Confidence award: Use no wheels for landing (landing legs OK).

Teambuilding award: Bring at least 10 kerbals. Take a photo with them all outside on the island.

Mountain goat award: Land on the fuel tower between the runway and the SPH.

Well, you get the idea.

 

Your dedication to a tower landing was certainly commendable!

I like your participant roster idea - if this thread gets a few participants, I'll add it. What's your craft called?

[Rath]

Rocket award: Use only rocket engines.

[MunGazer]

I hosted a VTOL challenge similar to this one what seemed like a year ago.  This type of challenge can be really fun, I saw it happen.  People had built amazing crafts that would even transform themselves after taking off vertically to enter horizontal flight mode.  Eventually, the well of interested participants dried up (kinda glad because I wouldn't want to host a challenge for the rest of my life :P), but it was still an awesome experience seeing people pour in so much ingenuity and creativeness and have it be shared and appreciated by their peers.

In retrospect, my challenge was probably a little too technically demanding and probably scared off many who wanted to just have fun and make a freestyle submission.  It brought out some very impressive crafts and competition.  I learned that you can have entrants of vastly varying ability levels and so it's good to be inclusive.

In hindsight, the go / no-go format part by itself was a good thing it seemed.  That is, can you do X given constraints Y and Z, or not? Based on my experience with hosting that challenge of mine, I would say as long as entrants can somehow show they met the requirements,  that's good enough.

I really like Eidahlil's k-prize inspired special achievement idea.  I have a few ideas to offer:

Cargo Hauler - Take something heavy to the island while you're at it and drop it off, and take note of how much it weighed in tons.

Finesse - at the small island, fly through one hangar, then immediately swing around and pass through the other without hitting anything or touching the ground.

Rover transport - demonstrate the ability to deploy a rover from your VTOL to the small island, one which can drive around to some extent on the island, then pick it up for the return trip.

As for actual scoring, you could possibly delegate that to the entrants themselves because trust me, that can be a headache to manage as a host.  For instance, cargo hauler.  People will no doubt be running a myriad variety of mods.  That said, you can just post what their tonnage was for that leaderboard, and let them debate amongst themselves who has the most legit high score.

 

Oh, also figure out beforehand (wish I knew how to do it) how to hyperlink the entries so that entrants and spectators can look at the list and have a blast looking at all the entries without having to read every single reply.

Edited November 2, 2016 by MunGazer

[Eidahlil]

Due to a few flaws in the initial Erre 1 design (like spontaneous disassembly on 100G turns, parts not melting during flight and in general looking kind of like a plane), the engineering team came up with a new iteration (and another one, and another, and so on, until finally), the Erre 21.

It's ugly and fast but Diesel & Jeans had a blast. What with 110G turns and all. And I finally completed the flight (kind of, there was one quick load).

Used MechJeb to help a bit with the flying, no other mods.

 

22 hours ago, moogoob said:

What's your craft called?

The first one was "Erre 1", but it did not complete the flight. Or are you planning to go all the way, and also have gatecrasher entries, a la K Prize?

16 hours ago, MunGazer said:

(wish I knew) how to hyperlink the entries

On every post there's a "share this post" button at the top right. That's the link, so just right click it, click copy link location (or something similar, depending on your browser), and then make a link in the post (chain button, second one on the second row) by just pasting it into the URL. I wish so much every challenge did this.

EDIT:

Also finally vindicated my VTOL spree and conquered that tower which has vexed me so. This one was also assisted by TCA.

Edited November 3, 2016 by Eidahlil
Added mod mention

[MunGazer]

Awesome little VTOL.  Looks small enough that you could pack it in a 5 meter procedural fairing on a rocket.

[foamyesque]

A VTOL, y'say.

 

 

Landing gear and multiple engines are for losers, I say.

[moogoob]

10 hours ago, foamyesque said:

A VTOL, y'say.

 

 

Landing gear and multiple engines are for losers, I say.

VTOL is as VTOL does.  

[moogoob]

Added some quick awards to the end of the first post for those who've entered so far.

[Speeding Mullet]

I have a small craft to submit for this challenge!  No formal name but I guess the Mullet Dyne SHVTOL (Super Heavy VTOL) will do:

105 Parts, 79.5t, room for 32 passengers, 4 crew, and cargo.  It uses 8 J-33 Wheesley Turbofan engines for vertical thrust, and 2 J-90 Goliaths for normal flight.  When in normal flight the J-33's are stowed and most of the intakes shut down for efficiency, but it needs every single one of its 28 air intakes to not flame out while in VTOL mode.

As you can see it's very very controllable despite it's size, and due to excellent balancing in the design you can pretty much hover on the spot, allowing for pinpoint landings such as this one on the roof of the VAB:

 

Once in pure flight mode it's capable of maintaining hands free level flight even under 4x time-warp and incredibly user friendly action groups help with things like closing the cargo bay doors and closing the intakes etc:

 

Landing at the island airfield is simple, just taxi down the runway under VTOL thrust with the craft perfectly balanced, and feather the throttle as you come in to reduce your vertical and horizontal speeds for the required touchdown:

 

Once the passengers have had a look around the island it's a simple reverse of the flight so far, again a perfectly balanced VTOL takeoff, followed by a banking turn to gain altitude before flying back to towards the space center:

 

Another taxi under VTOL mode over to the aircraft bay by the SPH and we are ready for touchdown:

 

There we have it! I actually tried and failed (as I normally do) to build something small, and in the end just went overboard.  With a few quality of life tweaks the Mullet Dyne SHVTOL would basically be ready for the spacecraft exchange.  It's also capable of VTOL water landings without any difficulty.

SM

[Nicole]

Hello, I attempt your challenge! Aeroplanes seem like such outdated technology for travelling through the sky, so instead I based my VTOL more on a hot air balloon. I have not made a VTOL before so this was an interesting goal for me. Yes I have discovered that jet engines are annoying for a VTOL with their response times, oh well. 

I used Tweakscale it is the only mod, for some of the girders in the frame and one or two other things. Just better able to design my completely inefficient design with it. 

 

 

Edited November 7, 2016 by Nicole

[Element4ry]

Hello! I just finished the challenge and added a little quirk to it - the objective to pick up engineer from the helipad on the roof of the VAB building and delivering him to the control tower on the island. I guess he needed to fix that radar thing there. So, he called for KSC Air Taxi services, and here we go:

Driver (pilot?) is waiting on the runway for some reason, idling in his air V-plane taxi vehicle:

 

After receiving his order he burns the rocket engines straight up, and he switches on conventional jet engine. Until the plane gains enough speed to fly in conventional way, it's supported by the thrust from the rocket engines:

 

Pilot circles back around the Kerbal Space Center and switches rocket engines back on to lose speed and land vertically on the helipad:

 

Passenger onboard, liftoff!

 

And away from KSC, flying just like any other plane:

 

After a while, destination is in the sight range. Prepare for landing!

 

Landing zone is pretty small:

 

"Thank you! Keep the change."

 

Burning up again. Engineer already repairing the radar-thing.

 

On the jet engine again, flying back to base.

 

Near the Space Center, fuel reserve dangerously low.

 

Running on fumes:

 

It's done, trip completed:

 

============================

I used few mods to build and fly this little plane:
- Procedural Dynamics: Procedural Wings
- Throttle Controlled Avionics
- RCS Build Aid

With procedural wings I built the whole shell of the plane, and obviously wings. To fly it in VTOL mode, I used TCA. RCS Build Aid was used to balance downward thrust perfectly, so it behaves reasonably well even with TCA turned off.

Here in spoiler there are some screenshots with UI toggled on. Unfortunately I forgot about the part before I picked up the engineer.

Spoiler

 

 

[BILLYBOB(Kerman)]

Is this challenge still open? Because I'd love to have a go at this. 

Also, are mods fine?

Edited November 8, 2016 by BILLYBOB(Kerman)
Punctuation and other question.

[V7 Aerospace]

29 minutes ago, BILLYBOB(Kerman) said:

Q: Is this challenge still open? Because I'd love to have a go at this. 

Q: Also, are mods fine?

A: Yes it's still open.

A: The OP says that mods are fine, just make sure to tell which ones you used.

[BILLYBOB(Kerman)]

3 minutes ago, V7 Aerospace said:

A: Yes it's still open.

A: The OP says that mods are fine, just make sure to tell which ones you used.

Ok. Thanks for the fast response. 

[V7 Aerospace]

4 hours ago, BILLYBOB(Kerman) said:

Ok. Thanks for the fast response. 

More than happy to help, and welcome to the forums! 

[MunGazer]

 

Alright I made a fairly simple VTOL and, to avoid feature creeping on it for the next 3 weeks like weaponizing it or doing all the crazy things to it I've thought of, I figured I'd just share it here as it is in its most basic form, and I may come back through with another iteration here and there to show additional capabilities and features I'll be adding to it, like being able to fast rope a Kerbal down onto the island control tower while hovering, etc.

I call it the V-Eleventy.  Since all the other aircraft model numbers were taken, Jeb decided that Eleventy was an intelligent sounding make believe number.  It's a four engine tilt rotor design not much different from some real world concepts.

Mods used to build & operate:  B9 Procedural Wings, Firespitter, TweakScale, SXT, QuizTech, NavHud, Pilot Assistant. 

I have lots of other mods too and still need to learn how to get VTOL related stuff working - TCA was giving me grief when I tried to enable it in CKAN.  Firespitter's VTOL automatic hover module seems to have some kind of overheating issue, so I altered the config to avoid it, and still the auto hover didn't seem to do anything.  So in the end I just used the tilting and steering functions which all seemed to work great.

Initial features / design details:

1.  Fuel is in the wings and allows for about 1 hour and 15 minutes of flight at full throttle at sea level.  Most of the time full throttle isn't needed however and wing pylon mounted drop tanks could be added to extend range.

2.  I had to fine tune the thrust limiter for the front pair of engines to properly balance thrust when hovering, so the front engines are thrust limited to 73.5 while the rear ones are at 100.

3.  Action-key mapped the VTOL swivel controls for full forward, full vertical, and raise/lower for angles in between with the default increments which work great, not too much and not too little.

4.  I learned after a little frustration that QuizTech intake air diverting RCS thrusters won't produce much, if any thrust if you have precision [caps lock] mode engaged.  They work great though for stabilizing your craft without having to have monopropellant reserves.  I needed them because this craft has difficulty with the roll axis without them.

5.  Has a top speed at sea level of somewhere around 143 m/s at full throttle, but cruises at around 100 m/s at 2/3rd throttle.

6.  Engines are TweakScaled to 150% size

Planned possible future abilities:

1.  Ability to auto hover somehow

2.  Be able to fast rope kerbals out of the back while hovering

3.  Gunship upgrade variant.  Basically like an AC-130 VTOL.  Radial mounted 105mm cannon, gatling, 40mm bofors, targeting pod to aim them all, etc.

4.  Various compatible rovers.  Could be science rovers, mining rovers, cargo, military vehicles, etc.

 

Note that various parts of the video have been accelerated or clipped out to keep you from falling asleep and drooling.

 

Edited November 10, 2016 by MunGazer

[RonnieThePotato]

A nice and simple challenge, here's what i got so far...

The Orizon Heavy Loader!

I wanted to make a simple UFO style VTOL and ended up with this.
Im planning it to be able to lift heavy loads (up to 18t right now).
The current problem is fuel, I'm not sure if it can make it to the island and back.

 

[RonnieThePotato]

The Orizon Heavy Lifter is complete!

I did manage to get it to the island though, but there are no hopes of getting Jeb back without a refuel.
It has a docking port below it, so i kinda just attached some fuel there and dropped it when it was out.

Im planning to use it as a transporter for fuel, rovers, ore, and such. Anyways lets move on to the challenge.

Its a little hard to control and hard to land on small spaces.

How ya holding up there Jeb?

Sweet victory here I come! (well half victory since i never made it back)

Touch down! Sadly, not enough fuel to get Jeb back to the warmth and safety of the KSC. 

I hope you like this, I may put it for download soon. BUT I did use one mod... Tweak Scale. I used it to make the three "Spark" engines larger.

Do i get a gold star now? Or half a star? 3/4's for looking awesome?

[MunGazer]

1 hour ago, RonnieThePotato said:

Touch down! Sadly, not enough fuel to get Jeb back to the warmth and safety of the KSC.

 

1 hour ago, RonnieThePotato said:

Do i get a gold star now? Or half a star? 3/4's for looking awesome?

You get to be the president of KSC.  MAKE KERBIN GREAT AGAIN

 

j/k.  It is a unique design tho. Shouldn't be too hard to tack on some extra fuel somehow.  Did you burn it all on the way there?  What was your craft's fuel mass to overall weight ratio?

Edited November 11, 2016 by MunGazer