Bring our boys far [winged SSTO "advanced" challenge]

[Thor Wotansen]

Well, I tried again.  http://imgur.com/a/5QoUR

DeltaV in orbit of 152km x 151km 1936m/s, with a TWR of 3.01.  The crew consists of the pilot only, no docking.  I may have found a cool place to land as well.

Spoiler

 

Edited December 23, 2016 by Thor Wotansen

[Signo]

@Thor Wotansen: "And then Mjolnir itself came upon us and divided our people: from now on shall the TWRs lower than 1 be divided from the ones above. Because bananas matter." 

Wonderful effort, next time do not be so shy about the power of the Mjolnir. Your score is a resounding 2688.69 as was predicted by the ancient runes, but in a brand new table. I will list both your entries due to the different specs, as long as you do not let me know otherwise. Impressive, at the moment you fill the first and second place. Usain Bolt would be proud.

 

@Firemetal will be happy too - he is now in first place in his own private "banana" table.

 

I would like to take this chance to ask for an extra effort from all the "banana" users out there. We need you now. The sample/example of this challenge is a banana like you. 

 

And you? Are you for "Team Apple" or "Team Banana"?

Edited December 23, 2016 by Signo

[Thor Wotansen]

Do you get points if you land twice?

 

EDIT:  I move to change the "apple" category to be the "raspberry" category as I don't wish to be anywhere near a group called "apple".  Also

Spoiler

 

Edited December 23, 2016 by Thor Wotansen

[Signo]

I second your request - from now on all apples shall be named raspberries.

Unfortunately, no more points for the second landing.

Edited December 23, 2016 by Signo

[Firemetal]

I am very honored. Thanks, @Signo! 

Fire

[AeroGav]

My entry - C7 Cormorant 

https://kerbalx.com/AeroGav/C7-Cormorant

Well, like the OP I went for an all-LF ship, 2 nukes and 1 rapier.    The total mass is limited by how much the single rapier can propel through the sound barrier.     This weighs a bit over 35 tons on takeoff, and needed 12 minutes to climb up to 11km then get supersonic.  I canvassed the crew for opinions on this approach, and received mixed responses

With two nukes, loads of wing and loads of fuel, the rest of it was easy, or would have been except for the fact SAS refused to work until i restarted the game.   I had to fly all the way to orbit by hand with keyboard control (pitch trim) only.   With 2 Rapiers and one nuke, you could double the launch weight.   However, you'd need oxidizer for most of the flight to orbit, so a much of that extra fuel would be gone by 150km.

150km x 150km orbit - 1976 fuel remaining.  Mass 26.62 tons.   My spreadsheet said 3644dV, then i installed KER and got 3639 - which i'm more inclined to trust than my maths.

KER gives two TWR figures - 0.72 current and 0.46 surface - i take it that's because Kerbin's gravity is less up here?

It has 3 seats and an inline clamp-o-tron.

Ok, just got to land the thing now..   will edit the post when i get that done

edit - aaargh !  SAS again non-functional.   I had to hand fly all the way home, so forgive me for not aiming at KSC this time.  Fortunately it's a pretty stable ship

Maximum cockpit temperature here - 725K at the end of a long hypersonic glide in from 150km.  Can you say heat soak?   Fortunately Val wears Impulse so as to not appear sweaty.  She's very specific about it , in fact.

Orange suits should not have to fly this back to KSC.  Get a couple of line pilots to do the donkey work.

Edited December 23, 2016 by AeroGav

[Signo]

@AeroGav:  Thank you for your entry. Excellent try, you are now on top of the "banana" table.

Your true TWR in orbit should be 0.4507 (120 kN - 26.62t) and that will give us a score of 1353.87.  

If I may, it seems to me that due to the extra drag provided by wings you spend too much time "low and subsonic". 

[AeroGav]

3 minutes ago, Signo said:

@AeroGav:

If I may, it seems to me that due to the extra drag provided by wings you spend too much time "low and subsonic". 

It still has more drag from the fuselage though.   Due to the large wing area, we can climb to thinner without having to use large angle of attack,  so it actually makes it easier to get supersonic on a very poor air breathing TWR.  You just have to be patient.    Drag declines more slowly than thrust up to 22km on the rapier.    

[Signo]

@Thor Wotansen: May I ask you for the craft file of your last attempt? I think that the readings from your KER might be incorrect: your craft weights 28t while in orbit - 3 rapiers can provide 540 kN - so your TWR should be 1.92 and absolutely not 3.01.

I hope you will clarify the misunderstanding as soon as possible.

Thank you.

[Thor Wotansen]

Just uploaded it to KerbalX

Edited December 24, 2016 by Thor Wotansen

[Signo]

@Thor Wotansen: First of all I would like to thank you for your swift reply - now on with the bad news -

There is something wrong with your KER readings, I tested your craft and I've got results that were a lot similar of what I eyeballed from the pictures.

Btw, very cool craft - really effective. 

I will amend the table as follows (if you agree of course): I will manually recalculate the TWRs in both your attempts, weight is displayed so it will be pretty easy.

 

[Thor Wotansen]

Certainly, I apologize if I unintentionally misled you.

[Signo]

No, no, my bad. Allowing for different "tools" to obtain the relevant data was a tough call, I knew it could lead to some inconsistencies.

Nvm, you are still in first place and your craft can improve the score.

[qzgy]

My turn!

Swedish Fish - SSTO capable of bringing 7 kerbals and a satellite to orbit (or docking, if fancied), but not much else.

Imgur Album

It is possible for me to trade payload and kerbal for more delta V, but I wanted to bring 7 kerbals to orbit as a challenge.

Question - my entry can have two theoretical scores, depending on if some or all of the engines are switched on. Which score would be used? (I used only the one rapier for orbital maneuvering, but all three can be used)

Edited December 25, 2016 by qzgy

[AeroGav]

3 hours ago, qzgy said:

My turn!

Swedish Fish - SSTO capable of bringing 7 kerbals and a satellite to orbit (or docking, if fancied), but not much else.

Imgur Album

It is possible for me to trade payload and kerbal for more delta V, but I wanted to bring 7 kerbals to orbit as a challenge.

Question - my entry can have two theoretical scores, depending on if some or all of the engines are switched on. Which score would be used? (I used only the one rapier for orbital maneuvering, but all three can be used)

I see that Big S strakes are catching on !

However, you don't have any NERV engines, can you make use of all your LF capacity?  

I suppose you could use Configurable containers to make oxidizer only fuselage tanks, if you don't want to add NERVs.

[qzgy]

14 hours ago, AeroGav said:

I see that Big S strakes are catching on !

However, you don't have any NERV engines, can you make use of all your LF capacity?  

I suppose you could use Configurable containers to make oxidizer only fuselage tanks, if you don't want to add NERVs.

I could try to add NERVs as I did not make full use of the LF carried into orbit, but then ascent becomes a bit harder (i could ditch the payload though...)

[Signo]

@qzgy: cheers, happy boxing day and thank you for your entry. It would be better for your final score to account for all the 3 engines. 

With 540kN we should have a TWR of 1.8065. So you are a raspberry.

Your final score is 515.98 (with just one rapier you would be a 313something banana). Largest crew to date, the usual "honorable mention".

You are the first to bring a payload too - second "honorable mention" for your craft.

You bring a light in the "TWR issue" we had with @Thor Wotansen entries - KER readings are indeed correct but the data we use in this challenge is the one that KER displays under the name "Surface TWR".

Come on berries, bananas and passionfruits: there is still plenty of "upside" to exploit.

Edited December 26, 2016 by Signo

[tseitsei89]

@Signo: Is there any particular reason why this entry by @Eidahlil is not on the top of the leaderboard?

It obeys all rules as far as I can tell.

1. 3 or less engines. Check

2. Horizontal takeoff. Check

3. SSTO. Check

4. Capable of landing safely. Check

That is pretty much all the rules I can find from the OP. (Besides the obvious no mods + no cheating).

 

I think it should either be accepted or we need more precise rules on which engines are allowed and which are not... I'm planning on an entry myself and would like to know what is allowed and what is not

Edited December 26, 2016 by tseitsei89

[Signo]

That is on top of the Passionfruit table. There is anything else you do want to imply?

[tseitsei89]

22 minutes ago, Signo said:

That is on top of the Passionfruit table. There is anything else you do want to imply?

I dont want to imply anything. I just want to know which engines are allowed for which category.

No offense meant or anything. I just want to know so I can plan my craft accordingly...

Peace

[Signo]

Basically we could say that anything that has got a mammoth or a vector goes in the Passionfruit table.

Anything with a TWR lower than 1 goes in the banana table, anything with a TWR higher than 1 goes in the raspberry table.

I will amend the OP to better clarify this point.

 

EDIT - @tseitsei89: in the OP it is now available a list of the engines that are "Passionfruit" specific. If any other available engine combo will be at a clear advantage in its category may be moved to Passionfruit. Cheers.

Edited December 26, 2016 by Signo

[Thor Wotansen]

May I suggest that you word that "any engine bigger than 1.25m and the Vector go in the passionfruit table"?

[Signo]

4 minutes ago, Thor Wotansen said:

May I suggest that you word that "any engine bigger than 1.25m and the Vector go in the passionfruit table"?

I wanted to "save the Skipper". Its TWR is just a little bit above 3 times a rapier. 

 

EDIT - And poodles could make a good banana.

Edited December 26, 2016 by Signo

[Thor Wotansen]

[Signo]

That is exactly my role model.