Hands-free flying challenge.

[Klapaucius]

I just re-released a favourite airplane of mine that needed tweaking due to KSP updates.  More through luck at first than skill, I managed to create a plane that pretty much takes off on its own.

So here is the challenge:

Build an aircraft and fly it as long and as far as possible with no input.  Throttle up, hit the spacebar and do nothing else. (Walk away from the computer and get a cup of tea).

 

RULES:

Must take off horizontally.

Must fly with air-breathing engines.(Rapiers can only be used as jets). Leaving the atmosphere is okay if it happens.

All you are allowed to do is throttle up and hit the space bar. You may not use the WASD keys or do anything that would manually affect any control surfaces.

You may retract landing gear.

You may set the throttle to any level you like or set a thrust limit, but you may not change it once you hit the spacebar and start rolling.

No time acceleration (this can affect aircraft trim).

No fly-by-wire.

UPDATED RULE: There will be two leaderboards. One for with SAS and one for without.

No additional reaction wheels of any kind.

Landing is of no concern.  See how far you can go and record your the distance from the KSC to your crash site.  I recommend the Waypoint Manager mod, but do whatever works for you.

2 leaderboards: one for distance, one for time aloft.  (I discovered with my own aircraft that I wound up flying in circles.)

If you are able, post video. Otherwise, this operates on the honour system.

Mods are fine so long as they do not upset the spirit of the challenge. 

Bonus Kudos if your pilot survives (I only stuck that in because I got lucky and Jeb is having a nice swim.)

PS. Open to including DLC prop planes (electric), but may need separate category to make for fair competition.

 

 

 

LEADERBOARD:

 

DISTANCE FROM KSC SAS ON:

@Scarecrow 7,624 kilometers

@Vanamonde  821 kilometers

 

TIME SAS ON:

@Scarecrow 4h 26m 41s

@Vanamonde 2 hours, 43 minutes

 

DISTANCE FROM KSC SAS OFF:

@esmenard 735 km

 

TIME SAS OFF:

@esmenard 18 minutes

 

 

 

NOTE: F3 is unreliable for calculating distance. I suggest installing the Waypoint Manager mod:

 

Edited October 23, 2019 by Klapaucius

[Signo]

May I "stage" at any point of the flight? (this does not mean I will activate any other engine apart from the engines that will start at take off)

Edited September 21, 2019 by Signo

[Klapaucius]

5 hours ago, Signo said:

May I "stage" at any point of the flight? (this does not mean I will activate any other engine apart from the engines that will start at take off)

I don't think so, that kind of defeats the intention of the challenge.  What were you thinking of specifically?

Edited September 21, 2019 by Klapaucius

[Signo]

I can actually build airbreathers that just need a small "kick" to get orbital. A decoupler could do.

I knew it was probably "gatecrashing", but you know...

[Klapaucius]

34 minutes ago, Signo said:

I can actually build airbreathers that just need a small "kick" to get orbital. A decoupler could do.

I knew it was probably "gatecrashing", but you know...

Going orbital is very much against the idea of the challenge.   The idea is building a stable plane for atmospheric flight.  Since the plane may be on a continuous ascent, I did say it was okay for it to venture into the upper atmosphere with the assumption the engines will cut out anyway and the plane will come back down.  But yeah, cool idea 

Edited September 21, 2019 by Klapaucius

[Vanamonde]

Does "no SAS" mean that it can't have the modules or the mode can't be turned on? Because I'm finding that things bounce around on the runway and can't leave the ground intact without at least the SAS assist of a probe core. 

[Klapaucius]

1 hour ago, Vanamonde said:

Does "no SAS" mean that it can't have the modules or the mode can't be turned on? Because I'm finding that things bounce around on the runway and can't leave the ground intact without at least the SAS assist of a probe core. 

SAS turned off.  BTW: This is something I don't quite understand.  Are you still getting some stability with a module even with SAS off?  At any rate, my plane is just the pilot, cockpit and SAS turned off.  So anything equivalent to that is fine.

Edited September 22, 2019 by Klapaucius

[Vanamonde]

I was saying that the craft is so small that it bounces around on the runway and needs SAS just to get off the ground without scraping a wing off. 

[Klapaucius]

4 hours ago, Vanamonde said:

I was saying that the craft is so small that it bounces around on the runway and needs SAS just to get off the ground without scraping a wing off. 

I'm keen to see this, so enter it anyway. I'll alter the rules so that there is are 2 categories for SAS on or SAS off.  The only issue with SAS on, is flight times may get really long.

 

 

Edited September 23, 2019 by Klapaucius

[Teilnehmer]

On 9/22/2019 at 3:43 AM, Signo said:

I can actually build airbreathers that just need a small "kick" to get orbital. A decoupler could do.

That’s interesting! Can I see this?

Does you craft accumulate kinetic energy in rotating parts like this one or does it use a different technique?

[Klapaucius]

8 hours ago, Vanamonde said:

I was saying that the craft is so small that it bounces around on the runway and needs SAS just to get off the ground without scraping a wing off. 

Sorry, I realized my second question probably came off the wrong way. I was actually curious as to whether in general there is some built-in stability within the modules even with SAS off and I figured you would be able to answer that.  But it was poorly phrased.

[Signo]

2 hours ago, Teilnehmer said:

That’s interesting! Can I see this?

Does you craft accumulate kinetic energy in rotating parts like this one or does it use a different technique?

I do not have just one of that, but it is not really such a piece of tech. You just need an airbreather fast enough to reach orbital speed with an almost 0° pitch flight plan. Then I build a "tail" made by decouplers I sequentially fire to give it the proper kick to circularize. Classical Kerbal engineering to strand a Jeb in orbit.

I could not play during last week-end but I will give it a try as soon as possible.

[tseitsei89]

11 hours ago, Signo said:

I do not have just one of that, but it is not really such a piece of tech. You just need an airbreather fast enough to reach orbital speed with an almost 0° pitch flight plan. Then I build a "tail" made by decouplers I sequentially fire to give it the proper kick to circularize. Classical Kerbal engineering to strand a Jeb in orbit.

I could not play during last week-end but I will give it a try as soon as possible.

Isn't the upper limit for airbreathing engines (rapier/whiplash) something like ~1700m/s? That is still quite a lot short of orbital speed... Or are you using modded parts

[Signo]

2 minutes ago, tseitsei89 said:

Isn't the upper limit for airbreathing engines (rapier/whiplash) something like ~1700m/s? That is still quite a lot short of orbital speed... Or are you using modded parts

No mods, however it does not work for this challenge. I need to "pilot" for it to be effective over 1600m/s. It goes everywhere but straight.

This was the first "candidate"

 

[tseitsei89]

4 minutes ago, Signo said:

No mods, however it does not work for this challenge. I need to "pilot" for it to be effective over 1600m/s. It goes everywhere but straight.

This was the first "candidate"

 

Oh you intend to fly so low that you get higher speeds on airbreathers? How are you dealing with the overheating? if you try to get orbital speeds at 2km you will surely explode, no?

[Signo]

Just now, tseitsei89 said:

Oh you intend to fly so low that you get higher speeds on airbreathers? How are you dealing with the overheating? if you try to get orbital speeds at 2km you will surely explode, no?

You can not see it but there is a heat shield (somewhere, any chef got his secrets)

[tseitsei89]

2 minutes ago, Signo said:

You can not see it but there is a heat shield (somewhere, any chef got his secrets)

Ahh, part clipping. Of course. Thanks for the clarifications

[Signo]

No clipping, just the tools. Nothing was changed in the alt+f12 settings. 

EDIT: I used an old old old building trick involving the powerful cubic octagonal strut.

Edited September 23, 2019 by Signo
Cubic magic

[EveMaster]

Without SAS on, symmetrical craft tend to steer to the right as can be seen in the video posted by @Klapaucius.

This is because the runway is not exactly on the equator and does not follow the curvature of Kerbin but is completely flat. So the force of gravity is not directed exaclty downwards.

As a tip for you and the contestants: You could build the landing gear slightly tilted or asymmetrical to compensate for this. I would suggest to just apply this to the landing gear because once in the air, you want your craft fly straight.

[Robonoise]

When I tried my plane with SAS it just went on forever. Never crashed. This was because the nose never really went up or down, so it kind of just skimmed the ocean for a while. So I decided to try the no SAS category. I’m still working on it, but I’m getting some ideas after watching the video provided.

[tseitsei89]

11 hours ago, Signo said:

No clipping, just the tools. Nothing was changed in the alt+f12 settings. 

EDIT: I used an old old old building trick involving the powerful cubic octagonal strut.

You can use quite a lot of clipping without ever touching the alt+f12 with just the offset tool. Especially if you use these cubic strut tricks or similar

[Signo]

@tseitsei89: are you sure we need a debate on what is clipping? I think you can find several threads on that.

Now I am going to hyperedit myself to the pub and I will clip myself to the bar.

[Vanamonde]

I find that craft bounce around so much on the runway that I can't get them into the air intact without turning SAS on, so I just went ahead and flew with the SAS of the probe core active. Here's my craft. 
 

It flew in a large spiral, porpoising up and down, but was airborne for 2 hours and 43 minutes covering 821kms over the surface. 
 

[Klapaucius]

17 minutes ago, Vanamonde said:

I find that craft bounce around so much on the runway that I can't get them into the air intact without turning SAS on, so I just went ahead and flew with the SAS of the probe core active. Here's my craft. 
 

It flew in a large spiral, porpoising up and down, but was airborne for 2 hours and 43 minutes covering 821kms over the surface. 
 

Thanks for entering!  Cool.  Can you upload it somewhere?  I'd be keen to have a play around with it.

[Vanamonde]

It's nothing fancy.

https://kerbalx.com/Vanamonde/Hands-off-Craft-2