[B9 Mod] ESP - Extensible Space Plane. A heavy SSTO with bay and rear ramp.

[evilC]

Features:

• An SSTO Spaceplane that can deliver a 75+ ton cargo to 72k+ orbit.
  
• Has extendable bay with opening top doors and rear cargo ramp.
  
• Easily adjust center of lift / gravity - wings and engines attached by 1 piece.
  
• Easily adjust fuel / engine loadout (Minimal balancing issues) as centered on wing.
  
• Sample payload included - a refuel/tug drone with 36 tons of rocket fuel, 2.5 tons of RCS fuel and docking ports each end.
  

Stats:

Parts: 237

Runway weight: 86.49t (Unladen) / 126.67t (Demo load)

Engines: 16x Turbojet, 2x LV-T45

Custom parts: B9 mod only

Installation

============

You need:

KSP 0.20.2 or greater

B9 Aerospace Pack R3 (http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/0-19-1-b9-aerospace-pack-release-2/)

Orbiting with Mechjeb

================

Throttle Control:

Manage Intakes

Prev Flameout

Prev Overheat

Smooth Throt

Hotkeys

======

1 Main engine

4 Lifter Pri Eng

5 Lifter Sec Eng

7 Bay Doors

0 RCS toggle forwards/back thrusters (Tug payload only)

Modification

=========

To change cargo:

Grab the FIRST (From front) cargo bay door section - the whole wings etc will come away and be easily replaceable

To adjust center of lift / gravity:

Grab the octagonal S2 body section at the base of each wing - slide whole wing up/down as required.

After moving, due to KSP bugs, you may have to:

1) Put engines in action groups again

2) pick up everything behind cockpit and replace (Else struts on symmetry wing do not attach)

To extend cargo bay length:

1) Remove wings (As above)

2) Grab LAST cargo bay door section (with tail attached) - put aside

3) Duplicate (Alt + Click) NEW LAST cargo bay door section and place at end. Repeat as needed

4) Replace tail section.

5) Replace Wings, adjust.

Download:

http://evilc.com/files/games/ksp/esp.zip

Changelog:

Mk2:

119 part reduction

B9 R3 intakes

Nosecones

Info dialog

Bays start closed

Edited June 5, 2013 by evilC

[Galacticruler]

Nice SSTO, but it always bothers me when people use so few control surfaces...

[evilC]

I did have them all along the wing, but they did not improve control and made the craft unstable, so I removed them.

The secret is the upturned wingtips - without them, yeah you need more control surfaces.

Bear in mind the craft is supremely well balanced - all the weight is in the middle, so you need v little force to rotate it.

[hellis]

Hey, thanks for the upload!

I'll give it a spin tonight or tomorrow.

If I manage to meet up with my station at 100km, I'll add the robotic arms for more fun!

[Simplicity]

I have a rather strange question :)

I really love the idea of what you are doing, but have a query, do you think it would be possible to make a WIDER/HIGHER cargo bay or somehow have the ability for the plane to take larger payloads (not heavier as such, just larger (like station parts)

[pinolallo]

I have a rather strange question :)

I really love the idea of what you are doing, but have a query, do you think it would be possible to make a WIDER/HIGHER cargo bay or somehow have the ability for the plane to take larger payloads (not heavier as such, just larger (like station parts)

I have these ships:

this one is in testing mode (almost ended)

http://imgur.com/a/jVR06

this one is just updated to 0.2.2 (tested but not yet published)

http://imgur.com/a/0w1st

[evilC]

I have a rather strange question :)

I really love the idea of what you are doing, but have a query, do you think it would be possible to make a WIDER/HIGHER cargo bay or somehow have the ability for the plane to take larger payloads (not heavier as such, just larger (like station parts)

I do not have a larger bay part at the moment.

What I currently do in this case is use the orbital construction mod to construct it in space. Be sure to get my DLL fix from post 80 on page 8.

Use ESP to loft the parts, then "build" it in space.

[evilC]

I have these ships:

this one is in testing mode (almost ended)

http://imgur.com/a/jVR06

this one is just updated to 0.2.2 (tested but not yet published)

http://imgur.com/a/0w1st

What bay is that?

[Simplicity]

I have these ships:

snip

Nice, give me a yell when released

I do not have a larger bay part at the moment.

What I currently do in this case is use the orbital construction mod to construct it in space. Be sure to get my DLL fix from post 80 on page 8.

Use ESP to loft the parts, then "build" it in space.

Thank you for that, will have to try that out and see how it goes...

[evilC]

Heh, the new B9 just launched with a bigger bay and a bunch of other tweaks too.

Stay tuned for a Mk2 of ESP

[evilC]

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/25241-0-20-2-B9-Aerospace-Pack-R3-New-pods-IVAs-engines-fuselages-structures?p=426254&viewfull=1#post426254

Kind of on hold until we have a solution to that. You could quite easily mod ESP yourself for the new wide body bay if you do not need the tail load ramp though.

Regarding the docking port at the front of the bay: This is NOT attached to the node (That is where the bay attaches), it is surface attached. If you have Edtools, enable vsnap - else place it anywhere on the face, save the craft and edit the file to make the x and y coords of the docking port the same as the cockpit.

[evilC]

Mk2 Released

Now lifts 75+ tons

119 part reduction

B9 R3 intakes

Nosecones

Info dialog

Bays start closed

[Simplicity]

You say in your instructions: IMPORTANT!! The B9 parts in the Parts folder are a patch to B9 R2-5: The CoMOffset line has been commented out to stop wings exploding when dropping out of warp.

Install B9, then patch your B9 install using these files.

Umm, in your zip file is only a craft file, there is no parts folder....

Just tried to get your plane up to orbit and failed completly 4 times..

I did exactly this:

45 degrees at takeoff

10 deg at 10K

7.5 deg at 20K

and thats as far as I got, I never got to the

5 deg at 27.5K

It got about as far as just over 21K and wouldn't go any higher.. the jets had throttled back automatically (presume that was mechjeb 2) and I just started losing alt.

Edited June 11, 2013 by Simplicity

[Tommy_walsh]

When it throttles down activate the rocket engienes with 5

[evilC]

You say in your instructions: IMPORTANT!! The B9 parts in the Parts folder are a patch to B9 R2-5: The CoMOffset line has been commented out to stop wings exploding when dropping out of warp.

Install B9, then patch your B9 install using these files.

Umm, in your zip file is only a craft file, there is no parts folder....

Apologies, I obviously forgot to remove that bit from the readme. This was to fix a bug with B9 R2.5. Since B9 R3, I have not needed to package fixed parts, so just ignore this.

[evilC]

When it throttles down activate the rocket engienes with 5

Yeah, also read the engines notes to tell you when to be activating engines. As Tommy says, with the release for B9 2.5, you had to fire the rockets part way during your climb.

The new version with the B9 R3 intakes though is much easier to orbit. Too easy in fact IMHO