Saturn-Shuttle (Kronos-Demeter)

[XB-70A]

After three months and five different design changes I finally place the craft online in KerbalX :

 

Named after the Greek titan Kronos (know by the Romans as Saturn) and his daughter Demeter the vehicle is made to reach an Ap of 500 with its "Vector" as S.S.M.E. and circulate with the "Thud" playing a role of O.M.E.

 

Fully made of 140 stock parts the craft is costing a bunch (about 260 000 funds) to just send seven crew members in orbit.

The Orbiter for its parts comes with a laboratory and a docking-node-wanna-be made of a lander can and a small fuel tank : 

 

The sole bad point to me is the really sensitive attitude of the orbiter during any re-enter. You have to ensure a perfectly stable angle before 60 km or the craft will be easily destroyed. Once around 20-15 km its controls start to beome effective again.

 

The landing for its part is more than easy and soft. Just try to be perfectly aligned with the RWY and everthing will be normal.

 

The file can be find here : https://kerbalx.com/XB-70A/Kronos-Demeter-Saturn-Shuttle

And the last flight album here : http://imgur.com/a/LRS2G

 

Edited November 28, 2016 by XB-70A

[DMSP]

Pretty nice Saturn shuttle man!

[SHiftER2O]

What a very unorthodox shuttle... I like it!

[XB-70A]

Thanks for the support everyone. I would like to share more but the season is starting again here and the heavy work by the same way.

And this is only the beginning...

[Majorjim!]

That does not look easy to balance, so kudos! It's a great looking little shuttle!

[XB-70A]

From one of the Stock Masters, it's an honor. Actually the sole important problems with the first prototypes were at first the choice to place four Swivel like the wood model :

Even angled with the CoM the Orbiter was flipping all the time with their limited gimbal. So the final choice was the pair of Vectors.

Secondly cames a terrifying attitude while re-entering, even worst between 15 and 10000 m. The wings were built using the mirror system but while using the aerodynamic cheat it became possible to see a huge instability. All the plan was made with the thin parts :

 

Also the Big-S tail needs its controls to be inverted for a reason I totally ignored, all the re-entries in the thicker levels of the atmosphere finished on the back... I feel the first flights like these poor guys discovering the commands reverse while approaching the sound barrier.

 

The next will probably to get some fun with the liquid rocket booster shuttle, like the wood model right of the Saturn-Shuttle model up.