To the poles

[lolmama]

The challenge is to get to one of Kerbans poles in the quickest time

There will be 2 competitions

Quickest to the north pole

and quickest to the south

I went to the north pole and my time was 00:47:21 (not too bad)

Rules

Only allowed to use stock parts

Not allowed out of the atmosphere

You can only use the jet engines (normal jet and turbo jet)

Not allowed to use green fuel tanks only the silver jet ones.

No mods (you can use mechjeb like i did, but i never actually used it because it doesn\'t even help)

No solid rockets

Take a screen shot when you land to show your time

You have to be near the pole, not at the shore of the Arctic circle

You are allowed staging for instance you can drop of engines or extra fuel tanks.

If i missed anything out or you have any questions don\'t be afraid to ask.

North pole record so far: SpaceMonkey9288 00:28:32 (saw your Youtube vid)

South pole record so far : SpaceMonkey9288 00:28:23

CHALLENGE ENDING ON SUNDAY 12 AUGUST 2012

Winners

North pole: SpaceMonkey9288

South pole: SpaceMonkey9288

Edited August 13, 2012 by lolmama

[A Fat Pokemon]

I landed with a time of about 45 minutes, but never got a screenshot of it until about 50, as I hadpressed f2 for some screenshots. Il make sure to upload one when I get on a computer.

[Markus Reese]

In light of this challenge, the kerbal crew decided they needed to visit the south pole. An amazing trip full of troubles and more. Mostly fuel systems. The first trip, a crossfeed capable piece turned out not to be. As result, 6 tanks of fuel were not used, and an emergency water landing had to occur in the midst of the cold southern ocean.

Upon finally returning home, the fuel system was rectified, or so they thought. 15 minutes into the trip at almost 500m/s 14km altitude, the rear line-fed tanks began to be fully drained first. Fuel flow had to be disabled when the plane began to lose control. The Bad weight imbalance quickly caused the plane to lose altitude, at one point dropping to 7km. But the situation was saved just in time as the fuel balance slowly came back. Altitude and velocity soon came back and the ice shelf was passing below.

All seemed well, until it became time to re-activate the crossflow of fuel. As the last of the forward tanks burned down, despite the crossflow being re-enabled, the fuel was locked as the line froze up! Even though the tanks had 298L of fuel reading in the tanks, the engines cut out and an emergency powerglide down began. The cabins grew quiet as Jeb pitched the plane forward in a steep dive. Without this dive, a stall would occur, and the plane would not be able to pitch back and cut the vertical speed. With precise timing, Jeb pulled out of the dive at only a couple hundred metres above the ground, and just before collision, the vertical velocity was eliminated, and landing was achieved.

Landing was confirmed at 39m 44s. Tracking station confirmed it was not exactly at the south pole, but with the time loss of having to glide down at a low speed, plus the loss of speed earlier in the flight, another attempt was not conducted. The kerbal command center came to a consensus that had the fuel problems not aroze, an exact polar landing would have been at a similar time or probably earlier.

After the meetings with the tracking center, a return to the spacecraft revealed the fuel line had unfrozen, further research will need to be conducted to prevent this situation from happening again in the future. The brave kerbonauts then pose one last time as the plane is dropped to the skids and the new research outpost can begin operation.

With the success of the design. It has now been put up for all to access. The design is an SSTO configuration and uses only KSP approved components.

[Railsmith]

Good lord. Markus, can I just say that\'s the coolest aircraft I\'ve ever seen?! There\'s no way I can top that!

[Markus Reese]

Thanks for the complement. The nice thing about KSP is that since it doesn\'t follow any form of aerodynamic physics, you can make all sorts of fun planes provided lift is centre of gravity. This one was quite stable, I went for style over function. I did have a different one capable of planetary round trip, but it was modeled after a cargo plane.

[Blazebeard]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]30695[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]30696[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]30697[/ATTACH] Here is my first completed challenge. Been making lots of planes and this one got to the north poll in 38 mins and 20 secs. I ended the flight the second the craft stopped.

[SpaceMonkey9288]

can I use the Airbrake mod? won't help with getting there just slowing down

[lolmama]

Sorry no MODS

[SpaceMonkey9288]

ok so no airbrakes. I'll record it latter and return to you with a vid on youtube

[Markus Reese]

The best airbrake with stock parts is the parachute. You can see it still deployed in my plane as it came to a stop. not reusable (yet? They do have a winch model...) but they work.

[SpaceMonkey9288]

what is a "Green Fuel Tank"? All the stock tanks look like soup cans without the lable

[SpaceMonkey9288]

ye that's the unfortunet bit but hey nice ship and mine's isn't going to look good unfortunetly just be able to get there before it explodes

[Limit]

Here's my entry:

Managed to reach the north pole in exactly 32 minutes (as soon as I came to a complete stop)

[Limit]

Here's the stripped down and turbo charged version that made it to the south pole in 30 minutes and 25 seconds (was really pushing the descent hard to get it in under 30minutes but I would of lost control of the plane!)

[SpaceMonkey9288]

Nice good job I needed to rethink my plane design then but I have made it but I'll make a vid tomorow

[SpaceMonkey9288]

Hey it's a little late at night for me but hey I recorded it and took screen shots for both north and south pole with times of 28:27 (North pole) and 28:17 (South pole) was roughto the south pole but I got there and I'll have a vid on www.youtube.com/SpaceMonkey9288 tomorow at some point