Kerbal Express Airlines - Regional Jet Challenge (Reboot Continued)

[toxictalon74]

Talon Aerospace is proud to present its next new Factory model, the new Valkyrie 2/991 - 1. A jumbo liner with the luxury of a cruise ship and the capacity of a true Jumbo class liner at 216 passengers who all get to experience thanks to the placement of the engines quite far on the wings, a smooth comforting flight at an optimal altitude of 7000 metres, where this Airliner will have a range of 4100km at a cruising speed of 180m/s. It comes with the price tag of 355,408,000 Kredits and a few other luxuries for passengers such as hefty stores of tea and coffee and the option for emotional baggage to be stored within the nose storage of the aircraft, something which may allow some of the upper class to even take a vehicle with this aircraft rather than via a specialised cargo variant.

And in regards for passenger advantages compared to some other vessels that one may see, it has great views and for the pilots this plane will take off comfortably at about 80m/s and glide decently well, the reverse thrust of its two Goliath engines also provide a great way to slow the plane down prior to landing where the breaks and engines can be used in conjunction with one another to allow for decently short landings for a plane of its weight. Further more all characteristics given here are under near full load and it is most certain that at lower fuel loads after long flights, where it may lose up to 18% of its mass, this airliner will certainly be both more responsive and capable of potentially even greater cruising speeds near the end of its flights.

https://kerbalx.com/Toxictalon74/Valkyrie-2991-1  

It can be found here


(Pictured here during its ascent to cruising altitude)

Edited June 20, 2018 by toxictalon74
Fixed Price error

[CrazyJebGuy]

Just now, panzerknoef said:

In the mean time I've finished construction on a medium regional jet with a price per seat of 186, pretty much a unicum for this class I think. Admittedly it flies like a winged turd and takes something like 7 minutes to get up to cruising speed, but it's as cheap as it gets and checks all the requirement boxes. 

I like to build the cheapest practical thing, and remember performance can be a significant factor in a review, still though those ultra-cheap-can-be-outstripped-by-a-bicycle planes have a niche, although definitely not on routes that contain hills. I reviewed @neistridlar's Stingy 24 and 32 planes, it was horrible flying them, they were so underpowered and the cruising altitude (even though it was 3km or something low) took a long while to reach, and I think in the review I said the 24 was okay for some stuff, but I rejected the 32 as simply too under-powered to use. I try to make sure all my planes have at least 0.4 TWR, mostly I get about 0.6.

 

Just now, panzerknoef said:

I'm really curious to see a tower shaped aircraft though! 

I plan to make one, I'm not sure it can be done well though, I'm worried on landing it will just keel over and fall on it's face if you put on brakes.

Just now, toxictalon74 said:

-snip-

For a first time poster, I'm impressed you got one so cheap. Hell, $35m is impressive for a veteran here. Would you mind putting a download link though? We cannot review your plane if we cannot download it.

[neistridlar]

3 hours ago, TheFlyingKerman said:

You are aware of this excel sheet by @neistridlar that compares the economy of a plane?

Hey, don't you dare give me all the credit! HoioH did like half the work! Also @panzerknoef you can request edit access to the sheet, since you are a judge.

1 hour ago, CrazyJebGuy said:

Think the pinnacle of design in that category will look something like a narrow tower of wing parts and cabins, shaped roughly like a skyscraper, those will have high capacity and use little land for parking.

Lol, are we going to see the first vertically oriented fuselage? Would be draggy as heck, and probably a bit of a bear to land without tipping over, but you know, someone might make it work.

17 minutes ago, panzerknoef said:

price per seat of 186, pretty much a unicum for this class I think

It is the far better than anything in the sheet indeed. I will have to extend my stingy series to encompass all categories (I have already started, many planes just need a bit of polishing before release, but it seems my medium regional is 191 per seat).

@toxictalon74 The aircraft looks sweet, but it looks like you missed a zero for your price. You are supposed to multiply the price by 1000, not 100, so it would be 355,408,000. 

[panzerknoef]

19 minutes ago, CrazyJebGuy said:

I like to build the cheapest practical thing, and remember performance can be a significant factor in a review, still though those ultra-cheap-can-be-outstripped-by-a-bicycle planes have a niche, although definitely not on routes that contain hills. I reviewed @neistridlar's Stingy 24 and 32 planes, it was horrible flying them, they were so underpowered and the cruising altitude (even though it was 3km or something low) took a long while to reach, and I think in the review I said the 24 was okay for some stuff, but I rejected the 32 as simply too under-powered to use. I try to make sure all my planes have at least 0.4 TWR, mostly I get about 0.6.

 

I plan to make one, I'm not sure it can be done well though, I'm worried on landing it will just keel over and fall on it's face if you put on brakes.

For a first time poster, I'm impressed you got one so cheap. Hell, $35m is impressive for a veteran here. Would you mind putting a download link though? We cannot review your plane if we cannot download it.

The plane still has a TWR of 0.74 according to KER so apparently it really isn't that bad at all. It's really only the accelerating to the cruising speed which takes up quite a bit of time, but it will get up to its desired altitude fairly easily. I too keep performance into account though, especially after the more or less failure that was the Bx-1/2, thanks to its abominable flight performance. I'll probably submit it soon enough, though I want to keep some time between my submissions so I don't take up too much of the already enormous queue. Can hit you up with a screenshot though.

Spoiler

 I did check on that submitted jumbo and its price is actually 350mil, so he just forgot a 0.

 

13 minutes ago, neistridlar said:

Hey, don't you dare give me all the credit! HoioH did like half the work! Also @panzerknoef you can request edit access to the sheet, since you are a judge.

I would definitely not mind access to that sheet, it seems to be a pretty important tool for objective judging.

[toxictalon74]

12 minutes ago, neistridlar said:

You are supposed to multiply the price by 1000, not 100, so it would be 355,408,000. 

I did multiply the price by 1000, but made a mistake when entering the number with an accidental decimal, consider it fixed.

[CrazyJebGuy]

Just now, panzerknoef said:

I would definitely not mind access to that sheet, it seems to be a pretty important tool for objective judging.

I don't like it much, given the innacuracy in data gathering I would not trust it to more than a digit or two, and doesn't account for aircraft oddities, or performance quirks that might cause a crash. I also kind of like how the planes are not judged mainly on numbers, having them play a large role I am fine with, but I simply don't think they should be applied this much.

[panzerknoef]

17 minutes ago, CrazyJebGuy said:

I don't like it much, given the innacuracy in data gathering I would not trust it to more than a digit or two, and doesn't account for aircraft oddities, or performance quirks that might cause a crash. I also kind of like how the planes are not judged mainly on numbers, having them play a large role I am fine with, but I simply don't think they should be applied this much.

I still wouldn't let it play a primary role in my judging, but it's nice to actually see how they stack up to the other airplanes and such. I think part of why this thread is so popular is the way in which reviews are being done so I wouldn't change that, but some extra stats to work with never hurt now do they. 

[hoioh]

3 hours ago, CrazyJebGuy said:

I don't like it much, given the innacuracy in data gathering I would not trust it to more than a digit or two, and doesn't account for aircraft oddities, or performance quirks that might cause a crash. I also kind of like how the planes are not judged mainly on numbers, having them play a large role I am fine with, but I simply don't think they should be applied this much.

It was never meant as a tool that would be the end all of judging. We simply wanted a neat, reliable way to compare plane economy. All other aspects are fairly hard to specify too clearly. So we're working on something that should make judging more uniform without taking out the human factor. We've placed it on the third page of the review queue for review of its own and would really like your input! and your's too @CrazyJebGuy

[Box of Stardust]

17 minutes ago, hoioh said:

It was never meant as a tool that would be the end all of judging. We simply wanted a neat, reliable way to compare plane economy. All other aspects are fairly hard to specify too clearly. So we're working on something that should make judging more uniform without taking out the human factor. We've placed it on the third page of the review queue for review of its own and would really like your input! and your's too @CrazyJebGuy

To build on this, basically, the numbers on the judging sheet don't affect how we judge. We roughly quantify what we identify as judges into numbers we can put down on the sheet.

All the judges post their reviews in a different style. Some judges are fairly quick and to the point. I do a little bit lengthier 'formal' report of the testing process. @hoioh does a drawn out narrative with lots of extraneous bits for entertainment.

The judging sheet is a way to simplify and unify the presentation of an aircraft's determined attributes, free of the stylistic things a judge writes down in their review post. 

[hoioh]

9 minutes ago, Box of Stardust said:

--snip--

What he said! 

[panzerknoef]

Test Pilot Review: @Brikoleur's  Brikoleur Aerospace Combine - Long Umpire P

Figures as Tested:

• Price: 126.757.000
• Fuel: 5.925 kallons
• Cruising speed: 260m/s
• Cruising altitude: 8000m
• Fuel burn rate: 0.48kal/s
• Range:  3200km

Review Notes:

When you think of the word "Behemoth" an image of this plane pretty much comes to mind automatically. It's big, It's loud and it has a flashy design. The Long Umpire is a seaplane, or to be more exact, it's a flying boat. We do genuinely think that it actually is a boat that had wings bolted to its side. These wings are pretty damn large, but well designed, there's no weird edges sticking out anywhere. Though noteworthy is the very large amount of control surfaces on the wings, rather expensive and a bit overkill. Another weird feature of this airplane is the massive cargo hold. Now I know passengers are gonna bring cargo, but I seriously doubt if that cargo is gonna be the invasion branch of the United States military, because they would fit in there!

Onward to performance, obviously with six engines this plane has a very high TWR and as such accelerates very quickly straight away. The takeoff speed might be a bit on the high side at around 70m/s, but it's reached very quickly. Sensitivity on all control axes is a bit lackluster, but that is pretty normal for a plane of such incredible size. The cruising speed and altitude mentioned in the manual were somehow not possible to achieve together. Either you go 280m/s at a lower altitude, or you go up to 8000m and fly at 260m/s. It doesn't really matter how you fly though, this plane has so much fuel that your range is massive regardless. The huge wing does make up for the fairly heavy body of the airplane, it glides very well, which makes it incredibly easy to absolutely butter the landing. Landing on water in this plane is about the softest and easiest I've ever experienced. The six engine configuration does have its negative side as well though. Mainly being the fuel consumption, at 0.48kal/s it's all but fuel efficient, and keeping this one aloft will require a significant amount of money.

Finally there's the comfort, and this is were the Long Umpire P really shines. First of all the cabins are placed in front of the high mounted wings, which means there's always a great view of the landscape below. Secondly the Mk3 Cabins are very spacious and comfortable for the 48 passengers on board. The engines are pretty far away from the cabins so vibrations and noise are already limited by that. However, the placement of the wing makes for even more noise dampening, all in all making for a very quiet flight.

As is so often with this kind of plane though, the price is huge. I already mentioned the fuel cost before, but that's not the only expensive thing about it. The plane itself comes in at a whopping 126.757.000. It also has 105 parts, 6 of which are engines which mean that maintenance cost will be high, very high. However, thanks to the fairly easy flying of this aircraft, retraining of the pilots should not be an above average expense.

The Verdict:

A flying boat as luxurious as a cruise liner, sadly it's also as expensive as cruise ship. We see a niche for this plane though, a plane which can be rented our for throwing fancy parties at 8000m up in the sky. Surely the millionaires of Kerbin will be interested in that. To make sure we absolutely don't saturate the market, and to keep it as unique as possible, we will acquire a single Long Umpire P.

[hoioh]

6 hours ago, panzerknoef said:

I would say a passenger capacity of at least 56 or something, that should add some variety as well, don't make it too hard because then the skill cap might get too high. I'm really curious to see a tower shaped aircraft though! 

On the note of your turboprop, I was wondering a bit, and my last uploaded plane was actually a small regional jet, not a turbo. Sounds like you're going to give us a pretty competitive aircraft though, i'm looking forward to it already. In the mean time I've finished construction on a medium regional jet with a price per seat of 186, pretty much a unicum for this class I think. Admittedly it flies like a winged turd and takes something like 7 minutes to get up to cruising speed, but it's as cheap as it gets and checks all the requirement boxes.

Something like this? A bit higher capacity though as I would consider these to be high-volume flights because you're basically just moving all the folks out of the city to a larger airfield where they will spread between multiple large planes I went for just under 200 passengers with this design, but I was considering a 3x3x2 model with a capactiy of 432 without taking up considerably more space in a hangar. It requires the length of the landing strip right up to the first two square white blocks for takeoff and landing, it's 11.6m high, 23.6m wide and 25.6m long. I would consider that the "footprint per passenger ratio" is a serious consideration for this class combined with takeoff and landing distance, climb rate would also be a good consideration to quickly remove the big noisy thing out of earshot

 

[panzerknoef]

51 minutes ago, hoioh said:

Something like this? A bit higher capacity though as I would consider these to be high-volume flights because you're basically just moving all the folks out of the city to a larger airfield where they will spread between multiple large planes I went for just under 200 passengers with this design, but I was considering a 3x3x2 model with a capactiy of 432 without taking up considerably more space in a hangar. It requires the length of the landing strip right up to the first two square white blocks for takeoff and landing, it's 11.6m high, 23.6m wide and 25.6m long. I would consider that the "footprint per passenger ratio" is a serious consideration for this class combined with takeoff and landing distance, climb rate would also be a good consideration to quickly remove the big noisy thing out of earshot

 

Stuff like that is exactly what I expected, but boy does that plane look ugly! Takes off on a dime though! A higher capacity does indeed sound good for the purpose of the planes, though I also like the idea of smaller planes with pocket sized take off distances 

[hoioh]

1 hour ago, panzerknoef said:

Stuff like that is exactly what I expected, but boy does that plane look ugly! Takes off on a dime though! A higher capacity does indeed sound good for the purpose of the planes, though I also like the idea of smaller planes with pocket sized take off distances 

Thanks! I was going for ugly, but very functional. I extended it to 288 passengers and it can go supersonic at 11km+ alt, at which point it can actualy compete with a slinky 152 for efficiency!
But it's costing that short takeoff run a bit and it's prone to runway strike, so it's a different purpose aircraft like that.

Small VSTOL planes are generally bush-planes, my favourite fo those being this Rutan design: the ATTT

[panzerknoef]

1 hour ago, hoioh said:

Thanks! I was going for ugly, but very functional. I extended it to 288 passengers and it can go supersonic at 11km+ alt, at which point it can actualy compete with a slinky 152 for efficiency!
But it's costing that short takeoff run a bit and it's prone to runway strike, so it's a different purpose aircraft like that.

Small VSTOL planes are generally bush-planes, my favourite fo those being this Rutan design: the ATTT

This picture is intriguing me so much that I might work something out with that design 

[CrazyJebGuy]

With the hoppers, why would you even want a mono-plane? With a biplane you get double the wing area for the same aircraft width. More lift, for less space.

[Box of Stardust]

1 hour ago, CrazyJebGuy said:

With the hoppers, why would you even want a mono-plane? With a biplane you get double the wing area for the same aircraft width. More lift, for less space.

In real world scenarios? Less drag. And I think, generally, insufficient lift isn't really a problem for aircraft anymore. 

As for tandem wings, probably production reasons and maintenance, and, again, the little perceived need for it. 

[CrazyJebGuy]

2 hours ago, Box of Stardust said:

In real world scenarios? Less drag. And I think, generally, insufficient lift isn't really a problem for aircraft anymore. 

As for tandem wings, probably production reasons and maintenance, and, again, the little perceived need for it. 

I know those reasons, but a biplane design is more compact. The whole point of a hopper is to be compact ( except in vertical, a hopper can be very tall and still not need much parking space.

[Box of Stardust]

Test Pilot Review: @NightshineRecorralis's Jupiter SST

Confidently sitting outside of the hangar...

Figures as Tested (Jupiter SST, 176 passengers max):

• Price: 95,960,000 (empty)
• Fuel: 3,780 kallons
• Cruising speed: ~1,200m/s
• Cruising altitude: ~21,000m
• Fuel burn rate: measured at 0.6kal/s
• Range:  6,000km (approximate calculation)

Review Notes:

Twin Crown Aerospace Industries has managed to recover from its hangar fire incident to near-operational status, and so was willing to take on one more aircraft test outsourced by KEA.

Habu Industries has designed a very sharp, confident-looking supersonic aircraft in the form of the Jupiter SST. Though, while walking around the exterior, TCA engineers could not help but note how it also looks like an enlarged version of a certain Belkan fighter prototype, in... almost all ways. The forward swept wing design was felt unnecessary by TCA engineers, as a commercial airliner shouldn't really need the flight characteristics of forward swept wings, but that's what Habu Industries designed the Jupiter with. (Meta note: forward sweep doesn't matter in stock KSP aero anyways...) Passenger capacity is very large thanks to the large amount of economy cabins, but some good thought was also put into adding in luxury cabins. The aircraft as a whole is put together very sensibly and fairly conventionally, from exterior examination. Very little extraneous parts seem to be on the aircraft; it seems to have only what is necessary, and everything has been integrated into the design of the Jupiter very cleanly. The only thing that really stuck out at first glance was the ventral aerodynamic control surface, which seemed to be a lift flap. Still, even this ventral flap was, overall, integrated cleanly into the design.

Our test pilot got into the aircraft and rolled it out from the tarmac to the runway. The controls as wired were sufficient, though, the ventral flap controls were... a bit awkward to use- there were separate buttons for deploying and retracting. But, that's a minor complaint, one not really much of a complaint at all.

Engines were started, and the Jupiter accelerated down the runway at a comfortable pace. The takeoff run was fairly short, and wheels-up was achieved at 57m/s, more than corroborating the 60m/s stated takeoff speed. There are no safeguards against a tail strike, but the possibility is highly unlikely anyways, and is therefore considered a non-issue.

Initial impressions on the stability of the aircraft were good. Stability with SAS off flying in a straight line is not the most steady, but in no way a significant issue. The flight up to cruise altitude was uneventful, reaching cruise altitude within a reasonable timeframe. Once at cruise altitude, we found it difficult to maintain a constant cruise condition, but this is probably something inherent to hypersonic, high-altitude designs. An approximate cruise was attempted to be made, and these values were used for range calculation. Values used were: 1210m/s cruise speed and 0.6 burn rate at about 21,000m altitude, in roughly level flight with minimal vertical velocity. Range was calculated to be possibly around 6,000km, which is 1,000km more than the advertised range. During approximated cruise, the aircraft was able to fly with a level pitch. Overall, we found the Jupiter to be a very good aircraft in cruise.

Engine failure testing came next. As per procedure, the outboard starboard engine was simulated to have an engine failure.

This had minimal effect on stability, aircraft able to compensate. In fact, due to the nature of the engines, engine placement, and the cruise conditions- the thin atmosphere- the one engine failure didn't appear to hamper the aircraft's ability to maintain cruise significantly at all... The failure still did affect it, but was, as far as testing showed, still able to maintain approximate cruise conditions, if with minor sideslip angle and less fuel efficiency.

Progressive failures, shutting down engines in succession from the outboard starboard engine, still did not result in any severe loss of stability or control at altitude.

We decided to drop back lower into the atmosphere to investigate the effect of having a single remaining operational engine, the outboard port side engine. The Jupiter responded very well, remaining very controllable even without SAS, and never experiencing a severe loss of control.

Next, we tested full power loss. The Jupiter maintains its favorable flight characteristics. Pitch control is very good, maintaining authority even down to 40m/s. We headed back to the airfield for flight dynamics testing.

In mid-speed flight, ~90m/s - ~150m/s, the Jupiter displayed excellent flight characteristics in both stability and control authority in all axes.

For low-speed flight, under 90m/s, we had to fully cut throttle, deploy the wing airbrakes, and deploy the ventral flap to slow down sufficiently (it was discovered somewhat accidentally that the ventral flap could also serve as an airbrake). Critical speed was determined to be ~50m/s with ventral flap active. Low-speed flight characteristics remained excellent up until the stall speed.

The entirety of the flight dynamics test was done with SAS inactive.

Landing was recommended at 50m/s, but found to be possible at lower speeds; ~40m/s. No complaints about ground handling.

For the water landing test, touchdown was possible at 30m/s, though care must be taken to approach with minimal vertical velocity to minimize damage to airframe. One of the water landing tests touched down a little too hard and caused damage to the vertical stabilizers. However, generally, the Jupiter responded very well to a water landing emergency.

Our findings show that the Jupiter passed the flight tests spectacularly, so we moved on to passenger testing.

This is, unfortunately, a spot that the Jupiter has an issue in. Somewhat minor, but still be noted.

The economy cabins have satisfactory views for the outboard seats. There is little outside disturbance transferred to the economy cabins for the most part. The rearmost cabins are deprived of views, due to being inboard of engine intakes and machinery, which does cause some sound and vibration.

The luxury cabins, however, are where the test crews really wrote down notes. The forward luxury cabins were noted to be very good; first class, as to be expected. The rear luxury cabins, however, had slight issues. Though they are sectioned off from most of the aircraft, which does make them luxurious in that sense, the rear cabins are surrounded by sources of noise that affect the luxuriousness. Ducting passing from the intakes going to the engines in the back compromises some of the luxury, and the engines themselves are mounted fairly close, with only some fuel tank providing initial buffer from vibrations. The luxuriousness of the rear cabins are not completely compromised, but they are not as luxurious as they could be. Which is a shame, because their placement relative to the rest of the aircraft and passengers has potential.

Lastly, a note on the construction of the aircraft. The entire aircraft shakes and wobbles through flight, which may be disconcerting. Production methods suggested to be inspected and improved. (Toggle rigid on everything except the wings...) The part count is on the fairly high end, over 90. A significant portion of this is in passenger cabins, however, as well as structural parts. 4 Whiplashes is within reasonable maintenance load for a supersonic airliner. Aerodynamic surfaces also do not present a significant maintenance load over average. Overall, maintenance is expected to be within reason.

The Verdict:

Habu Industries has designed an excellent high-capacity supersonic that doubles as a jumbo. The Jupiter's flight characteristics are near-flawless, which is a big step in designing an aircraft that will convince clients to purchase it. It's stable and maneuverable in all appropriate flight envelopes while being very cooperative to fly, and it has excellent range. It's also just a very clean, aesthetically pleasing design.

Minor flaws do exist in the design, but most of these do not seem to threaten the operability of the aircraft significantly. If anything, we'd recommend Habu Industries figure out a possible fix to the situation of the rear luxury cabins, as it seems to be the biggest flaw present. As for construction... well, the welds between the components could use more rigidity, but that's a production line issue.

To conclude, the Jupiter SST's economy and transport capabilities are excellent, and has no critical compromises in its design from an operational point of view. It's very economic, demanding only that an airline pay its dues through the somewhat above average maintenance of the aircraft, which TCA is of the opinion that such price to pay is very worth it.

Edited June 25, 2018 by Box of Stardust

[JPmAn]

Cyclone Aeronautics presents: The CY100 Series!

 

These airplanes are for the Turboprop category, with the CY100-1 carrying 24 passengers, and the -2 carrying 32. Recommended cruising speed is 140m/s, and cruising altitude of 7000m. New to this series is reduced turnaround times due to a two-sided entryway, doubling the boarding speed! Now for the specs!

The CY100-1 "Catcher" has a *theoretical* range of 1680km, and has a rotation speed of 45m/s. This aircraft will get your passengers anywhere with ease.

The CY100-2 "Designated Hitter" has a *theoretical* range of 1200km, and will rotate at an easy 50m/s. 

How to fly: 

T/O: Stage, hit throttles, keep flaps retracted, wait until 45m/s, rotate, and gear up at 10m/s vertical speed.

Cruise: Climb to 700m, and limit speed to 140 for best economy.

Descent: Extend flaps to slow down if needed, and descend as normal.

Landing: Land at same speed as rotation.

 

Features: Seating is the best we've ever pulled off, with the best leather seats you could find, outfitted with a 12" Video screen, 120V Outlet, Earphone jack, built in Greentooth^TM, and a set of lifejacket and parachute under the seat. With all of these features, your passengers will be sure to come back for many more flights, giving you more revenue. The large door in the front allows for skydiving with the complimentary parachutes, but as Bartford Kerman learned, it's almost impossible to get back in after said skydive. 

Also, the cockpit is a two-seater, so it's good as a trainer, or adding a single first class seat up there.

Price:

-1: 18,170,000

-2: 18,720,000

Links: 

-1: https://kerbalx.com/JPmAn24/CY100-1-Catcher

-2: https://kerbalx.com/JPmAn24/CY100-2-Designated-Hitter

Edited June 21, 2018 by JPmAn

[MaverickSawyer]

1 hour ago, JPmAn said:

Cyclone Aeronautics presents: The CY100 Series!

 

These airplanes are for the Turboprop category, with the CY100-1 carrying 24 passengers, and the -2 carrying 32. Recommended cruising speed is 140m/s, and cruising altitude of 7000m. New to this series is reduced turnaround times due to a two-sided entryway, doubling the boarding speed! Now for the specs!

The CY100-1 "Catcher" has a *theoretical* range of 1680km, and has a rotation speed of 45m/s. This aircraft will get your passengers anywhere with ease.

The CY100-2 "Designated Hitter" has a *theoretical* range of 1200km, and will rotate at an easy 50m/s. 

How to fly: 

T/O: Stage, hit throttles, keep flaps retracted, wait until 45m/s, rotate, and gear up at 10m/s vertical speed.

Cruise: Climb to 700m, and limit speed to 140 for best economy.

Descent: Extend flaps to slow down if needed, and descend as normal.

Landing: Land at same speed as rotation.

 

Features: Seating is the best we've ever pulled off, with the best leather seats you could find, outfitted with a 12" Video screen, 120V Outlet, Earphone jack, built in Greentooth^TM, and a set of lifejacket and parachute under the seat. With all of these features, your passengers will be sure to come back for many more flights, giving you more revenue. The large door in the front allows for skydiving with the complimentary parachutes, but as Bartford Kerman learned, it's almost impossible to get back in after said skydive. 

Also, the cockpit is a two-seater, so it's good as a trainer, or adding a single first class seat up there.

Price:

-1: 18,170,000

-2: 18,720,000

Links: 

-1: https://kerbalx.com/JPmAn24/CY100-1-Catcher

-2: https://kerbalx.com/JPmAn24/CY100-2-Designated-Hitter

Going for the Mooney Style tailfeathers, I see.  

[panzerknoef]

Having been working on my own hopper to get it ready before the actual category is released, I've come up with a rather interesting design.

takes 200 passengers on a length of 11.7m and a width of 17.6m. It takes off in about the same time as Hoioh's plane, though for now it does have some issues landing, I've already had to upgrade the landing gear because the runway would literally explode on landing otherwise. Oh and yes, it's powered by 8 wheesleys, and it's a triplane. Certainly gotta say that this category allows for some interesting design work

[TheFlyingKerman]

For a small regional jet, simple is good. So Kerbus enter this market with a simple entry, the Kerbus K-300

 

 

https://kerbalx.com/TheFlyingKerman/Kerbus-K-300

Eco. cruising speed: 225m/s @ 7000m Range: 1200km
Max. Cruising speed: 320m/s
Takeoff speed: 55m/s Landing speed: 45-55m/s

Costing 13160000 Kerbucks, with 23 part and one single engine, this is pretty much as cheap as it gets for a (usable) 40-passenger jetliner. However, the economy doesn't stop here. While cruising at the recommended 225m/s at 7000m, it burns 0.03 units of fuel a second, giving a KPPM of 0.0054. The K-300 is optimized to operate at small airfields, with short takeoff runs and thrust reverser (toggled by AG1) to help landing at tight spots. For such a cheap plane we don't compromise safety either, the intake at the back is reinforced, and the plane can safely glide down, even over land, by deploying the canards (AG3).

On 6/20/2018 at 5:42 PM, CrazyJebGuy said:

By the way, I had the idea: Bulk transport planes for big cities, where land is extremely expensive, (like inner New Kork or something) which tack off and land in a very small space, while tacking up as little surface area of hangars as possible, range would need not be longer than 300km or so to get to a airfield where bigger planes are more practical. Any-one got any suggestions for this class name? Comfort also, not too important due to short journey.

I am not sure how do you write the rules for these planes? How tight a spot must it be capable of landing/taking off? What if someone builds an 'ordinary' jet with the same STOL capability?

Edited June 22, 2018 by TheFlyingKerman

[Bottle Rocketeer 500]

PRESENTING:

Kerbobulus Aerospace Greyhound Liner

STATS:

Cruising: 180 m/s @ 4km

Fuel: 2,840 Kallons

Fuel Burn Rate: 0.29 kal/s

Price: 73,861,000.00

Range:  1762.76 km

Includes:

1. Super duper advanced aerodynamics systems
2. Newest Generation Fuel Efficient J-56 "Lotus" Engines, manufactured by Kerbal Standard
3. Seating for 96 passengers in a 2-class configuration (26 Premium Economy, 70 Economy) with TVs at every seat and complimentary snacks
4. Low cost per passenger, at just 769385.42
5. Cost of just 73,861,000
6. Only 59 parts
7. Komposite wings
8. Takes only 7364 flights if charging 100/ passenger to earn back the money spent on buying the plane
9. Solar panels and an antenna, to allow free wifi

NOTES:

NEVER fill the tanks in the tail

Action groups can be found on KerbalX

Take some time to experiment with flaps

AUTOPILOT MOD RECOMMENDED!

https://kerbalx.com/BottleRocketeer500/Greyhound-Liner

EDIT: DON'T FORGET TO HOLD THE "W" KEY WHEN STARTING THE TAKE-OFF. OTHERWISE, EXPECT A TAILSTRIKE!

Edited July 4, 2018 by Bottle Rocketeer 500

[panzerknoef]

Test Pilot Review: @Box of Stardust's Twin Crown Aerospace - A202 Safari

Figures as Tested:

• Price: 31.063.000
• Fuel: 855 kallons
• Cruising speed: 230m/s
• Cruising altitude: 1500m
• Fuel burn rate: 0.15kal/s
• Range:  1300km

Review Notes:

The A202 Safari really is a plane that stands out. Its design is pretty much unlike anything we've ever seen before, looks futuristic even. Our engineers had to walk around it a few times to actually get a good impression of this plane, and to see what exactly is attached where. The obvious things are the huge wings that are mounted way up high, we presume this was done to prevent them from striking the water. Another thing that stands out is the placement of the engines. Up high on the tail section of the plane. Not only is there 4 of them, they're also Tigers, an engine type which we rarely see in use.

Performance of this plane is absolutely lovely all over the board. It takes off around 35m/s which is very fast, you can already get up to that speed pretty quickly with the engines running in dry mode, but if you turn on the afterburners you're there in no time at all. A very small disadvantage of the engine placement however, is that it pushes the nose of the aircraft down, while not so important on land, it does have an impact on water, though this problem can be quite simply overcome by pitching up. Once you're airborne, it gets even better. The Safari flies like a stunt plane, super fast on the controls while remaining controllable at almost all speeds. It turns on a dime in all directions, and despite this super fast response on the controls, the plane doesn't over-steer at all. Thanks to the massive wings the A202 also glides amazingly well, making landing on both land and water an absolute piece of cake. Taking back off from water really does require the use of the afterburners though, it escapes from the surface at about 50m/s. The range is more than double than what is required at 1300km, and so is the passenger count, at 32.

The good news keeps coming when we reach the topic of comfort. Whilst the engine placement might be weird, it proves to provide very good comfort all over the line. The engines are far away from the cabins, and separated by air, so hardly any noise manages to make it into the cabin (though the little noise that does is a slight bit annoying thanks to the screamy sound the Tiger engines produce). Not only that, but thanks to the extraordinary construction of the aircraft, all engine related vibrations are completely prevented from having any impact on the cabin whatsoever. On top of that the views are unobstructed from every window on the plane. We are genuinely impressed by the amount of comfort Twin Crown Aerospace has managed to get into this plane.

The only real drawback of this plane is the price, though not exceptionally high for a seaplane by any means, it's still considerable. A part count of 51 is on the higher end of the average spectrum. The 4 engines, all afterburning engines, will however require a lot of maintenance. This does push the running cost of the plane up a bit. On its turn this is countered by a higher passenger capacity though.

The Verdict:

If you ever wanted a plane where you could hear a pin drop in mid flight, this is the one you want. We were very impressed by its behavior in all fields. We would like to order 12 for use on a large variety of sea bound routes, with an option of 8 more.