Shuttle Challenge v6 - The STS thread [Stock and Mod Friendly] - ANNOUNCEMENT: v7 IS LIVE!

[sturmhauke]

If you already did Minmus STS-1, but you want to retcon the location for later missions, I'm ok with that. You don't need to do another report. Clearly Jeb tripped over a cable and caused a spacetime anomaly.

[KingDominoIII]

https://imgur.com/gallery/fdZr6Xq

These missions required a lot of tinkering. Got them to work, with a new series of shuttles capable of using fairings for payload. 

[sturmhauke]

That's a nice, compact base you got there, congratulations! I'm curious how you plan on docking the fuel pods though, clearances look pretty tight.

[Dcseal]

Okay! I'm giving these a shot because shuttles are fun, and very challenging to make, and land, as exemplified by this first attempt:

Here's my mission report for STS 1-A:

Spoiler

Mission STS-1-A:

• Ship: Pacifica
• Crew: 4
• No Payload
• Stock

Pacifica completed 2 orbits around Kerbin before making a de-orbit burn and subsequent re-entry over KSC, performing a textbook landing a couple hundred yards outside KSC grounds.

Photo Album

Debrief:

I've gotta admit that the allure of building a kerbalized shuttle with four massive lifter tanks in an easy-to-setup quad formation is already getting to me, as the balancing of thrust and control on the realistic style of shuttle is a little difficult and you can definitely squeeze more delta-v out of a less realistic design. Anyway, i've got the thrust vectoring, balance and orbital insertion pretty much down - my main issue is the control on landing.

For starters, the mass & lift dots in the SPH seem to glitch out and don't give me correct readings, but nonetheless i've taken the orbiter out on test landings with OMS tanks both empty and dry, and it's easily controllable and landable. However for the real deal the orbiter loses control out of rentry and enters into a tail-first vertical dive while pulling uncontrollable rolls. It gets even more confusing when I regain perfect control about 1km above the surface, but of course no where near close enough to attempt a landing on the KSC strip. What gives? My best guess is the orbiter can only stay stable in the thick air and just falls like a brick while still fairly high up?

 

 

 

 

[Dcseal]

Took a shot at STS-2a too. Same problems on re-entry with an uncontrollable dive, but we finished with a soft water landing instead of rough terrain landing. I interpreted the instructions of this mission as "get your shuttle to above 200km in orbit, and deploy two geosats" so I assume the satellites having their own thrusters to burn to the GEO orbit is okay.

 

Spoiler

Mission STS-2-A:

• Ship: Half Moon Bay
• Crew: 4
• Payload: 2x GEO Relay Satellites, equipped with orbital thrusters & power generation
• Stock

Photo Album

Debrief:

Half Moon Bay lifted off to orbit without almost no hitch, however whatever payload is shoved into the configuration results in the RS-25's requiring minor adjustment to balance the thrust, which meant minor fumbling. HMB parked in 400km equatorial orbit and released GEOsats. Both satellites burned for geostationary orbit and reached an orbital period of 5 hours, 59 minutes and 9 seconds.  HMB performed its de-orbit burn, and lost control late into reentry. HMB fired its OMS thrusters at roughly 3000km in a last-ditch effort to raise its nose from a near-vertical dive, succesfully regaining glide and coming into a smooth water landing at 60m/s. HMB was recovered intact with all crew.

I think I have to stop naming the shuttles after coastal CA towns if i'm going to keep overshooting into the ocean, I might be destining them for failure. 

 

[sturmhauke]

On 10/23/2022 at 9:02 PM, Dcseal said:

Mission STS-1-A

...

For starters, the mass & lift dots in the SPH seem to glitch out and don't give me correct readings, but nonetheless i've taken the orbiter out on test landings with OMS tanks both empty and dry, and it's easily controllable and landable. However for the real deal the orbiter loses control out of rentry and enters into a tail-first vertical dive while pulling uncontrollable rolls. It gets even more confusing when I regain perfect control about 1km above the surface, but of course no where near close enough to attempt a landing on the KSC strip. What gives? My best guess is the orbiter can only stay stable in the thick air and just falls like a brick while still fairly high up?

Welcome to the challenge! I'm not entirely sure what's happening with your editor mode, but I can say that canards can sometimes cause instability. You can try increasing the area on your main wings, adding a little fixed wing area to the canards, limiting the canard authority, and/or removing them entirely and adding more pitch control to the rear.

Unfortunately I cannot award you the STS-1a badge at this time due to your landing. The orbiter must survive largely intact. 

However, your STS-2a mission looks good. Getting the sats to their final positions under their own power is fine, expected even. Congrats!

[Dcseal]

11 hours ago, sturmhauke said:

Unfortunately I cannot award you the STS-1a badge at this time due to your landing. The orbiter must survive largely intact. 

 

Alright, after about fifty more tries I finally got a configuration that re-enters and can glide stable. Took about three hours of tries but here it is.

[sturmhauke]

Now that is a picture perfect landing! Nice work, Commander!

[OJT]

On 9/2/2022 at 12:20 PM, sturmhauke said:

As for the other badge, I haven't had a chance to work on it yet. I'll let you know when it's ready

How's that special badge coming along? 

[Dcseal]

STS-3 Commander!

Let me tell you I facepalmed when I re-checked my orbiter's COM/COL balance and realized I don't have to drain the main tank before re-entry, and infact instead I could use the fuel for that little kick to KSC since I keep overshooting. It was a little difficult to aim from such an inclined orbit.

Spoiler

Mission STS-3 

• Ship: "Erlin's Eye"
• Payload: 2 MMU's, Orbital Telescope
• Stock (Restock Textures)
• Crew: 4 (2 Pilot, 2 Engineers)

We succesfully launched into a 550km, 25* inclined orbit, deployed the sattelite, affixed panels and de-orbited. Reentry was a little off, but we managed to make it to the runaway by the skin of our teeth on the glide.

Photo Album

 

 

[Dcseal]

STS-4r Commander.

The KSC gets a call that a recent publicity stunt has gone horrifically long with six disgruntled product influencers now stuck in a highly inclined orbit in a defunct shuttle. 

The shuttle in question:

Spoiler

They report that their Experimental-All-New-Fuel-Mix^TM didn't work out as planned.

Mission Photo Album

[sturmhauke]

On 10/26/2022 at 3:13 PM, OJT said:

How's that special badge coming along? 

Sorry, I, uh, forgot.  I'll put something together when I can. 

[Yakez]

Wow. That have been a while! Back at KSP xD.

This challange have been a real mood saver back in the day. Actually was flying first missions while having  COVID! If I only knew back then... Got it two more times since then anyway.

It is really nice to see that some of my Minmus proposals that are now an actual part of this challange! And the extra part with LKO fuel hub and tanker is a neat addition on top! Actually I was thinking about something-something fancy like LKO Asteroid restaurant serving Minmus fueled ice-cream deserts. XD But hauling 140+ tons sounds like a good challenge.

 Busy fine-tuning my Minmus payloads. Will fly them soon tm. Keep up the good work! Keeping this challenge alive and kicking is a challenge in itself! xD

[Dcseal]

STS-5 - STS-8 Commander! (The following submissions are all stock parts, they've been recolored/retextured with TURD and Restock, the same goes for STS-4/4r)

I still suck at reentry landing, although I think i've identified the instability issue as lying with a heavy COM at the back of the shuttle, however that seems to be inherent in the design of a "realistic" styled shuttle so when I start the next set of missions i'll be sure to make something wacky that just works better. Anyway, sticking with the coastal towns theme, here's the photo albums detailing the four-shuttle launch construction of Humboldt Station.

STS-5: Core Module

STS-6: Science Module One

STS-7: Science Module Two

STS-8: Final Hab Module

 

Where should I head next? I'm split between Minmus or the Mun.. but it's definitely time to break out some modded parts because stock is getting a little stale..

[Fulgora]

On 10/24/2022 at 6:02 AM, Dcseal said:

I've gotta admit that the allure of building a kerbalized shuttle with four massive lifter tanks in an easy-to-setup quad formation is already getting to me [...]

Resist the evil! Your design looks promising - I would recommend sliding the external tank a bit higher but it looks like you have it figured out already pretty well!!

On 10/24/2022 at 6:02 AM, Dcseal said:

For starters, the mass & lift dots in the SPH seem to glitch out and don't give me correct readings

"RCS build aid" is a mod that *might* be able to fix that but in some cases the reading are simply bugged. Option B (if not tried already) can be to take only the shuttle and save it to the SPH as a standlone craft - this *could* also fix the readings and once the orbiter is working as expected save it as subassembly and re-attach it to your booster.

My orbiter is also asymetrically attached and I am pretty confident that I can do all missions without deltaV issues (but I am using nervs ).

[sturmhauke]

7 hours ago, Dcseal said:

I still suck at reentry landing, although I think i've identified the instability issue as lying with a heavy COM at the back of the shuttle, however that seems to be inherent in the design of a "realistic" styled shuttle so when I start the next set of missions i'll be sure to make something wacky that just works better.

My most reliable orbiter has been the Bustard-class, seen here. It's roughly similar to the Buran, but 4 times larger (well, in Kerbal scale anyway).

[Fulgora]

The large canards in front might be an issue as they have a lot of lift and for a stable reentry / landing you want the CoL to be "as far back as possible" - swapping them for smaller ones helps and with the tank in the back you have a lot of dry mass there.

Putting the fuel tank between cockpit and cargo bay could help to solve the  issue. Here is my design (extremely stable - managed to land a 15t asteroid with it on the runway (no mining):

 

Spoiler

The red bubble is the dry center of mass (thats what RCS build aid gives you). My wet CoM is exactly at the same spot so the only thing moving the actual CoM during flight is payload or manually shifting fuel around.

With the fuel tank in front manually shifting the CoM depending on mission requirements becomes possible and I used it at least in STS-9 (asteroid landing). Might use it again for STS Duna-2... WIP

 

Unfortunately I am locked out of my Youtube account and unable to recover - I will let it sit for a few month and hope that Google has mercy with me. Otherwise I will have to make a new channel to post new submissions.

Edited October 31, 2022 by Fulgora
typo

[Dcseal]

8 hours ago, Fulgora said:

The large canards in front might be an issue as they have a lot of lift and for a stable reentry / landing you want the CoL to be "as far back as possible" - swapping them for smaller ones helps and with the tank in the back you have a lot of dry mass there.

My biggest issue with shuttles is going into a complete/flatspin or just straight up turning into a leaf on the wind as I move into the lower atmo. I can wrestle the controls back at about 4000m or less above ground, but unless i've just perfectly nailed reentry over the KSC (I don't) that doesn't happen. I'm experimenting with a new design that can leave LKO and get somewhere meaningful and I'm running into the same issue. Reconfiguring COL/COM it just seems like regardless I'm like a leaf on the wind.

I empty all my tanks on the orbiter & then configure the stability for the orbiter completely dry, and I drain any extra fuel at the end of a mission as I come into reentry.. maybe the dry mass means instability?

[Yakez]

10 minutes ago, Dcseal said:

My biggest issue with shuttles is going into a complete/flatspin or just straight up turning into a leaf on the wind as I move into the lower atmo. I can wrestle the controls back at about 4000m or less above ground, but unless i've just perfectly nailed reentry over the KSC (I don't) that doesn't happen. I'm experimenting with a new design that can leave LKO and get somewhere meaningful and I'm running into the same issue. Reconfiguring COL/COM it just seems like regardless I'm like a leaf on the wind.

I empty all my tanks on the orbiter & then configure the stability for the orbiter completely dry, and I drain any extra fuel at the end of a mission as I come into reentry.. maybe the dry mass means instability?

You can just make Skylon layout with the same amount of fuel up front and in the back. This way you just forget about all of those issues altogether. Like after flying bunch of shuttles in "normal" shape I just ended going for those cigar-shaped-skylon like crafts for the sake of stability. Cant beat the physics.

[Fulgora]

The flatspin is typically caused by CoL being ahead (or too close) of the CoM. If this is the case once "drag > reaction wheel / canard forces" your shuttle will start to flatspin. Adding mass in the front and /or moving mass from the back to the front solves this issue.

[sturmhauke]

@Dcseal:

STS-3: Everything looks good, nice work!

STS-4: You're technically supposed to show both launches. I'm willing to overlook that, but your screenshots don't show the orbital parameters. If you have a save file handy, you can just reload and take a screenshot with KER or whatever.

STS-5-8: Gene Kerman isn't thrilled with the corporate-sponsored station assembly, but Wernher doesn't care as long as he gets his science. Station looks good, and landings are all solid. Congrats, Commander!

[Dcseal]

On 11/2/2022 at 4:37 PM, sturmhauke said:

STS-4: You're technically supposed to show both launches. I'm willing to overlook that, but your screenshots don't show the orbital parameters. If you have a save file handy, you can just reload and take a screenshot with KER or whatever.

Whoops. I totally wipe my screenshot drive religiously. I'll just run that one again soon.

Anyway, after (many untold hours) of playing roulette with COL/COM markers I have come up with the powerful, odd & very blue Dolphin: 

It's designed for use in Minmus missions, but it might have more range than that! More importantly though, it's stable as hell on takeoff & reentry. Success feels good.

Spoiler

 

[Dcseal]

On 11/2/2022 at 4:37 PM, sturmhauke said:

STS-4: You're technically supposed to show both launches. I'm willing to overlook that, but your screenshots don't show the orbital parameters. If you have a save file handy, you can just reload and take a screenshot with KER or whatever.

STS-4/4r REDO

The mining operation has begun!

Minmus STS-1

[sturmhauke]

3 hours ago, Dcseal said:

 

STS-4/4r REDO

The mining operation has begun!

Minmus STS-1

The STS-4/4R mission looks good, thanks for the update!

For Minmus STS-1, if you're going for Commander you're supposed to have 2 satellites: one for resource scanning, and a second for additional comms coverage. I only see the one. I can issue you the Pilot badge for now. Let me know if that other satellite turns up later.

[Yakez]

Hey hey. Simple task ballooned into a video, first time doing KSP stuff, can do better in visual department next time. Left quite a bit on a cutting floor. If you need some extra screens of subassemblies just say.

So here are my submissions for STS-6T and all Minmus STS challenges. Mods used are visual only. Mech Jeb used to create nodes and to land tanker 5 times during Minmus STS-6. Outside that everything is stock and should apply to commander level. Craft totally functional without Kerbal Joint Reinforcement https://kerbalx.com/Yakez/ASS-strutted hoewer used it to record video and have better FPS.

 

Edited November 12, 2022 by Yakez