Rune's Slightly Used Vehicles

[Rune]

Took quite a lot longer than I expected, but the result is cute as boop, if I may say so myself. Mayhaps there will be a new Spatha.

 

Rune. Finally, a 4xRapier design I like.

[septemberWaves]

That is a very nice spaceplane. Perhaps I should start taking notes.

[Frozen_Heart]

1 hour ago, eloquentJane said:

That is a very nice spaceplane. Perhaps I should start taking notes.

You better have a very large notepad as I've been taking notes on his designs for 4 years now. He never runs out of ideas!

[Rune]

22 hours ago, Frozen_Heart said:

You better have a very large notepad as I've been taking notes on his designs for 4 years now. He never runs out of ideas!

Well, . One does one's best! I do have the advantage of having spent those four years watching other people's awesome creations. We all inspire each other!

Also, I just have to share a couple pics with you guys. Because... reasons.

 

Rune. Sometimes the proportions just 'click', and then you don't want to touch anything other than F1.

[SingABrightSong]

Ooh, now that is nice. A space shuttle as an SSTO rather than a reentry vehicle. Clever, very clever. What's its ascent profile? The Claymore has high payload capacity, and the Orca is insanely easy to use, but this one looks like just the right candidate for a proper crew shuttle. Affix a Mk3 crew cabin or two in place of the cargo bay, and you could carry 32 crew to LKO for manning space stations or colony missions.

 

 

[Rune]

6 hours ago, SingABrightSong said:

Ooh, now that is nice. A space shuttle as an SSTO rather than a reentry vehicle. Clever, very clever. What's its ascent profile? The Claymore has high payload capacity, and the Orca is insanely easy to use, but this one looks like just the right candidate for a proper crew shuttle. Affix a Mk3 crew cabin or two in place of the cargo bay, and you could carry 32 crew to LKO for manning space stations or colony missions.

TWR is around 0.6 depending on payload, so the ascent is pretty much the same as my other SSTOs: go as horizontal as you can to break the Mach barrier, and then just let AoA rise on its own as you get speed and Kerbin curves below you. Drawing a straight line to orbit, pretty much.

And you totally guessed the reason for its existence: there was a big payload gap between the Orca's >30mT (or the Claymore's ~45mT!) and the new Dart's ~1mT payload. This new Spatha will round out the fleet, with ~18mT of maximum cargo (25% of MTOW!), and relatively lots of seats for passengers and such.

 

Rune. It is actually meant to fill the role the Shuttle filled in RL, short of a multirole medium lifter.

Edited July 18, 2016 by Rune

[SingABrightSong]

4 minutes ago, Rune said:

TWR is around 0.6 depending on payload, so the ascent is pretty much the same as my other SSTOs: go as horizontal as you can to break the Mach barrier, and then just let AoA rise on its own as you get speed and Kerbin curves below you. Drawing a straight line to orbit, pretty much.

And you totally guessed the reason for its existence: there was a big payload gap between the Orca's >30mT (or the Claymore's ~45mT!) and the new Dart's ~1mT payload. This new Spatha will round out the fleet, with ~18mT of maximum cargo (25% of MTOW!), and relatively lots of seats for passengers and such.

 

Rune. It is actually meant to fill the role the Shuttle filled in RL, short of a multirole medium lifter.

It'll have to be added to the "to-upload" list. I'm eager to see what you've done with the engines, for one, but none of the screenshots have a good angle on them.

Any word on the Espada, by the way? Last I heard you were doing stress testing of reentry; how did that turn out?

[Rune]

29 minutes ago, SingABrightSong said:

It'll have to be added to the "to-upload" list. I'm eager to see what you've done with the engines, for one, but none of the screenshots have a good angle on them.

Any word on the Espada, by the way? Last I heard you were doing stress testing of reentry; how did that turn out?

Well, nothing fancy, other than using the four nodes on the back of the Mk3 structural adapter to good effect, and sinking precoolers to do the intake job without extra drag. It looks like this:

I'll give it a couple days to see if I think of anything or any issues crop up, but it's looking very finished right now. As to the Espada, the other day the test crews finally made it to Minmus, planted their flags, and went on their way to the edge of kebin's SOI, in the inaugural sample mission (train two crews to level three in less than a month). My main save moves the clock slowly, which is why all the LKO stuff is tested quickly but the rest takes ages.

 

Rune. 'Aren't we burning the wrong way to get home?' 'Don't worry, we are just getting a running start'.

Edited July 18, 2016 by Rune

[Rune]

I put the Spatha up on KerbalX, because I've already made a few missions on it, it's that fun to fly, and I''m pretty confident nothing else will change with it. With that, and pending the reentry of the Espada, I think my SPH catalogue is all up to date. Can you believe that? All that would be left would be updating the OP!

 

Rune. I've been procrastinating so long on that, it's not even funny anymore.

[SingABrightSong]

Ooh!

 

Let's see then, remaining craft needing upload are as follows

          SPH:

• Espada

          VAB:

• Phoebus
• Updated Lackluster(the one without the winglets)
• Intrepid
• Whatever space station might have arisen from your monstrous Mk3 ring

 

          Subassemblies

• Cupola Tug
• Asteroid Refinery
• HL-20
• SimpleSat
• Ore Tank
• CRADLE

 

 

[SingABrightSong]

So I got a chance to take the Spatha "out for a spin", as it were, and my goodness that was the best reentry I've ever done. The reaction wheels ran out of electricity a third of the way through, but the Spatha was still able to handle a 30-degree angle-of-attack with only the elevons. Went subsonic over the ocean west of KSC, but was able to use the air-breathing mode on the RAPIERs to reach the runway. I didn't even have to quickload!

[Raptor9]

Nice.  Whether it's landing a capsule on KSC or splashing down near the beach east of the pad, or landing a spaceplane back at the KSC runway, it's so satisfying to nail a good landing back home; so you can hop out, stroll to the KSC parking lot, and drive your Kar down to get a post-mission brewsky at the local pub. 

[Rune]

20 hours ago, SingABrightSong said:

So I got a chance to take the Spatha "out for a spin", as it were, and my goodness that was the best reentry I've ever done. The reaction wheels ran out of electricity a third of the way through, but the Spatha was still able to handle a 30-degree angle-of-attack with only the elevons. Went subsonic over the ocean west of KSC, but was able to use the air-breathing mode on the RAPIERs to reach the runway. I didn't even have to quickload!

Glad you enjoyed yourself with it! It's meant to be very stable, with that huge tail (it ain't called 'vertical stabilizer' for nothing!). If you ran out of electricity, that's because you either run out of oxidizer, or you forgot to hit '5' to turn on the fuel cell. In any case, as you saw, she can be flown to a dead stick landing, and she actually glides quite decently. Did you notice the trick I did with the 'airbrakes'? I hope you landed with the brake group toggled.

4 hours ago, Raptor9 said:

Nice.  Whether it's landing a capsule on KSC or splashing down near the beach east of the pad, or landing a spaceplane back at the KSC runway, it's so satisfying to nail a good landing back home; so you can hop out, stroll to the KSC parking lot, and drive your Kar down to get a post-mission brewsky at the local pub. 

Gotta build me one of those Kars one of these days! In the meantime, I'll go tell the guys at Jeb's Junkyard that I found their missing cockpit.

 

Rune. Gotta love part recovery missions of opportunity!

Edited July 20, 2016 by Rune

[Zamolxes77]

I tried the Spatha, but engines are flaming out on the runway, am I missing something ? Myprecoolers don't act as intakes, I thought they never did. Is it something that Interstellar alters and on stock they're actually intakes also ?

NVM, found the problem, Interstellar indeed modifies the pre-coolers, stock they double as air intakes as well. Damn.

Edited July 23, 2016 by Zamolxes77

[Rune]

13 hours ago, Zamolxes77 said:

I tried the Spatha, but engines are flaming out on the runway, am I missing something ? Myprecoolers don't act as intakes, I thought they never did. Is it something that Interstellar alters and on stock they're actually intakes also ?

NVM, found the problem, Interstellar indeed modifies the pre-coolers, stock they double as air intakes as well. Damn.

Well, you could always cheat. The rear nodes of the RAPIERs are free, so if you just stick some shock cones and turn them 180º (and sink them a bit for looks), you will get more than enough air, and if anything less drag.

In other news, the huge ring I showed in the stations thread is getting an awful lot of likes, to be buried like it is. Can I surmise that you guys would be interested in a download, even if the launch is a tad... unconventional? (and expensive, and very scary!).

 

Rune. At least I managed to make it stable enough to be piloted to orbit... when you don't get a staging explosion. WiP!

[SingABrightSong]

Ooh, that thing's got cargo bays. Nice. The thing is too massive to send off anywhere, but it would make a great LKO station. Having six universal docking ports on the outside means you could use it for all of your LKO fuel and crew transfers, though it could use some smaller docking ports on the inside of the ring for attaching pods to service the station itself. Might finally be a station where using the HL-20 is worthwhile.

 

A download would be appreciated, of course, and it could then be crossed off of The List.

[Rune]

On 24/7/2016 at 6:44 PM, SingABrightSong said:

Ooh, that thing's got cargo bays. Nice. The thing is too massive to send off anywhere, but it would make a great LKO station. Having six universal docking ports on the outside means you could use it for all of your LKO fuel and crew transfers, though it could use some smaller docking ports on the inside of the ring for attaching pods to service the station itself. Might finally be a station where using the HL-20 is worthwhile.

 

A download would be appreciated, of course, and it could then be crossed off of The List.

Well, the four small bays are currently occupied by USI greenhouses, but when I provide the DL (I'll see if I can clean the staging a bit to avoid RUDs), they'll be gone, so they should be the perfect place to put docking ports and extra stuff. I'll just leave a corridor 'so the crew can move around'. The two big bays (which were a pain in the ass to balance) house the ISRU equipment in one side, and a lab and 'airlock' (the command pod, actually) on the other. The idea is that you could dock ore tanks to it and refuel from there, since the station has no tankage of its own. Of course, you could add tankage to the bays, too.

 

Rune. It's main (and pretty much only) purpose is to look cool.

[SingABrightSong]

Say, Rune, what sort of payloads do you carry in the Lackluster? I recall seeing a prototype for a Tylo mining rover, but other than that I suppose the answer is "Whatever you like"(I've been meticulously balancing a Science! module, myself). Payloads bigger than the cargo bay would unfortunately not be included, of course, though you could potentially dock them on top, but the most likely payloads seem like science and exploration, or a bunch of SimpleSats. Perhaps even one of @Cupcake...'s dropships?

 

I seem to be a frequent poster in this thread. What can I say, I'm a fan.

[Rune]

15 hours ago, SingABrightSong said:

Say, Rune, what sort of payloads do you carry in the Lackluster? I recall seeing a prototype for a Tylo mining rover, but other than that I suppose the answer is "Whatever you like"(I've been meticulously balancing a Science! module, myself). Payloads bigger than the cargo bay would unfortunately not be included, of course, though you could potentially dock them on top, but the most likely payloads seem like science and exploration, or a bunch of SimpleSats. Perhaps even one of @Cupcake...'s dropships?

 

I seem to be a frequent poster in this thread. What can I say, I'm a fan.

You could say I'm a fan of my fans, so you're welcome here anytime.

As to what payloads I use, yeah, the tiny ISRU rover I'm very proud of (tough it's inspired by Elon's mars architecture, not initially meant for Tylo). I have a stock version, but the modded one is much awesomer since you can winch it out of the bay. The stock one takes a @Cupcake...-class pilot to VTOL it inside, or a crapton of F9's...

But other than that, I put all shorts of crap in there, as you say. Imagination is the limit! Just to spark some more, I have, for example, a RCS escape capsule that turns it into a manned ship with an extra layer of safety:

Perfect as the backup return system in an expedition. It is too heavy to SSTO kerbin like that, but that's what the booster pack is for, or you could always pick the capsule on orbit. I also have KAS containers that can work as 1.25-2.5m adapters (always useful to tow other stuff, the capsule can also do this service), a fixed refinery that turns it into an infini-range ship (the big drill is long enough to reach the ground from the bay)... all sorts of crap, really. The thing I hadn't yet made for myself was a science package, actually. And of course a Mindy or something similar would fit with room to spare.

 

Rune. You are welcome to experiment and share your stuff with us, course!

Edited July 31, 2016 by Rune

[SingABrightSong]

Well, if you say so... Presenting the Science Pod:

 

Built around my discovery that the Command Seat and Mystery Goo are both the same mass and are both physics-enabled, the Science Pod has been meticulously balanced to have precisely zero torque in any direction of translation. Figures aren't as balanced for attitude adjustment, but it is recommended that you use the reaction wheels for that. The reaction wheels, as well as the RCS tanks and an OCTO2 probe core, are clipped inside of the Materials Bay, which I'll count as allowable due to the materials bay being hollow. It looks cool, too, which is always a plus. It contains every experiment in the base game, aside from the Crew Report, and all experiments can be accessed by an onboard Kerbal without leaving the cargo bay of the Lackluster. The command and control parts inside of the bay can all be accessed to enable or disable, as can the RCS tanks, which carry enough monoprop for roughly 1km/s of deltaV.

The Command Seat should probably allow Crew Reports to be taken. To the suggestions forum!

 

[fourfa]

On 7/26/2016 at 6:31 AM, Rune said:

The idea is that you could dock ore tanks to it and refuel from there, since the station has no tankage of its own.

Ore tanks? You could dock an ASTEROID in there!

[Rune]

A little Public Service Announcement for all those people out there that use my Base-In-A-Box series: without a shadow of a doubt, 1.1.3 is very broken regarding landing gear. And I'm not (only) talking about the confirmed occlusion bug, no. Tough that's also a thing.

Sadly, there seems to be hard limit either on part count or mass (most likely mass form what I'm seeing), when handling landed structures. Long story short? If you make the bases big enough, they will get 'the jitters' next load around and promptly blow themselves up and warp whatever connections remain:

That's Pinnacle Base, and it seems to have a very big issue with me trying to fill that Orca. It didn't complain the slightest bit when I docked it empty, and note that just in case I saved and reloaded to see if bad stuff happened. The only thing changing was the mass, due to the ISRU being at work in the background. And that is how it ended up after violently undocking said Orca (yes, that is a static picture at 0m/s without any roll). Apparently all those warped connections are perfectly fine .

Now for the fun part, stuff to work our way around the issue:

-The first piece of advice is simple: touch nothing until 1.2 comes, and see if that fixes things. Could work, I hope it is leg-related and it gets fixed, but it could also not happen. Basically, have faith in the gods. Not my style.

-If you absolutely have to touch it, and it keeps on exploding (say, like me, you really, really want to disconnect that Orca to use it elsewhere without the base you spent so much effort to build blowing up). Then timewarp is your friend. Try somehow to trigger it before physics kicks in enough to make you not be landed anymore, and you might get lucky and do it before the whole things starts jumping up and down (basically mash the key for timewarp as you load and pray). Once that is semi-stable, right-click on some docking port and try to undo timewarp and disconnect the port at basically the same time. It is tricky, but once you sever a sizeable portion of the base, the 'jitter' seems to stop. And of course, keep a sizeable amount of save backups around.

-If you are going to build a new one, keep it simple and light. And sadly, disconnect the mining modules to perform any refueling of Orcas or other ships. Which would leave the base unpowered or the mining rig without the big solar panels, but hey, it's a temporary fix. Definitely my recommended protocol from now on, to keep the base with as few connections and as light as possible.

 

Rune. And that is one of the reasons I'm not playing much lately. Everything is very explody this version around.

Edited August 23, 2016 by Rune

[Majorjim!]

Just now, Rune said:

'the jitters'

Yeah it's annoying huh.. That is all part of the very broken legs/wheels.. I truly hope 1.2 fixes that and the multitude of other leg/wheel issues..

Sorry to hear you lost a base.. I hope all Kerbals are safe!

[Rune]

10 minutes ago, Majorjim! said:

Yeah it's annoying huh.. That is all part of the very broken legs/wheels.. I truly hope 1.2 fixes that and the multitude of other leg/wheel issues..

Sorry to hear you lost a base.. I hope all Kerbals are safe!

Oh, we are not accepting that reality, and have decided to substitute our own.

I'll wait off-camera for the tanks to fill up form an earlier save, then try the "timewarp quickly" trick until I can get a clean separation. I swear!

 

Rune. Maybe when it's more massive it will jump slower?

[PointySideUp]

I have several of these bases deployed, and especially with something Orca-sized docked, they like to jitter or "rear up" and slam the base on load or approach.  I don't usually get the effect with my Mk2 based crew shuttles docked, but have a few times.  Another workaround is to enable Joints/Damage cheats from the cheat menu as you load the base or come within ~2km of it.  It stops things from exploding, then you just turn it back off.. no hassle.

None of mine have ever made a twisted mess of themselves like that though