[Showcase] Non Asparagus Launch Vehicles

[magnemoe]

I don't like it because i think it is an un-necessary amount of work for a little extra delta v. you really don't need it unless you are launching really heavy payloads, as well as it being unrealistic. in real life, fuel flowing like that would have torqued a rocket apart with the shifting center of mass

The 6 booster or more who pump fuel from tank to tank trough all boosters in to the core is unrealistic. Falcon heavy will drain fuel directly from booster tank to main engines pump and switch to main tank before decoupling, to simplify things 3 or four engines drain from each side tank.

The reason why asparagus work so well in KSP is that our engines have poor TWR, mainsail has 25, real world engines are 75-150.

This make it important to fire up all engines at startup and get rid of unneeded engines fast.

The poor TWR is because of balancing, orbital speed on Kerbin is just 2.400 m/s making it more like Mars than Earth. Had they had engines with twr of 75 it would be little reason for anything else than SSTO.

It also make it pretty easy to get an small pod or probe in orbit. The challenge is to lift 100 ton.

[Fried]

in .16 whole mission here

http://imgur.com/a/8Tw5e

never made one like this since but it was capable of getting to any planet with fuel to spare

this is another back in the days when the dmv was necessary.

http://imgur.com/a/eToHr

Edited June 17, 2013 by Fried

[AmpsterMan]

The poor TWR is because of balancing, orbital speed on Kerbin is just 2.400 m/s making it more like Mars than Earth. Had they had engines with twr of 75 it would be little reason for anything else than SSTO.

I've heard people state this before but I really wonder how true that is. I have always thought that the increased weight of engines discourages serial staging because the potential TWR and Delta-v loss of having engines not firing on stage one are larger than usual. I remember a time when the engines had even worse performances than they do now; I would try to minimize my staging to not deal with less than stellar performance.

If I knew how to mod the stock parts I would love to try it out to see what happens.

[sgt_flyer]

While there may not be the real life equivalent of a KSP 'pancake' in use IRL, there actually are two real-life rockets that I know of that do fuel cross-feeding. NASA's SLS ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System ), and the currently in development Falcon Heavy ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy ). So it is theoretically possible with current technology. The reason we don't use them is that it just adds a lot of complexity, more things to go wrong. I also read something somewhere (don't remember where) about the aerodynamics of the separating stages at rocket velocities that could cause a lot of problems (It was a bit over my head...)

although the falcon 9 heavy will use asparagus, i did not see it for the SLS ? (almost everything on the SLS is derived from the shuttle's SRB's and external tank)

[Tw1]

I I have always thought that the increased weight of engines discourages serial staging because the potential TWR and Delta-v loss of having engines not firing on stage --

One of the main advantages I believe purely asparagus or cross-fed rockets have over serial stages is the fact that there aren't any heavy engines being dead weight at any time.

The contrast between the amount of rocket I needed to lift my standard Mun rescue vessel into orbit with a mostly serial staged lifter, compared to my more recent asparagus rockets.

Though perhaps I could've saved some weight with clustering smaller engines, or using the new skipper engine.

Droptank designs have this advantage too.

This shuttle was intended to save anything expensive, so it could be re-used. But the mainsail had a problem of falling of after the parachutes were deployed.

You could call replacing a whole engine "maintenance", so I guess I had one of the same problems the real shuttle program had.

[Flixxbeatz]

Simple 2-strap lifter design, for light to medium mass payloads (Crew Launch Vehicles also follow the same configuration). My

goes with the same config, but has 4 straps and vegetables.

And when in doubt, Falcon Heavy. Awesome, but impractical.

[Jod]

I use SPH SSTOs. One for payloads up to 20 tons:

And one for payloads up to 40:

Cheap. Reliable. Reusable. A bitch to construct. And a hell to work out the kinks.

Have not used VAB ever yet.

[AustralianFries]

.

Well, these certainly are...interesting...

[AmpsterMan]

Seeing all these Launch Vehicles has got me thinking; what are your opiniond on rocket engine clustering. I can't decide if it is an exploit or a feature XD

[wilt57]

Seeing all these Launch Vehicles has got me thinking; what are your opiniond on rocket engine clustering. I can't decide if it is an exploit or a feature XD

I've thought the same thing. I kinda feel like it's cheating to use clustering, but once you've done it, it's tough to go back to using Mainsails. They are so horribly inefficient, I find myself strapping so much more fuel on.

It doesn't matter now, but once cost is considered, 1 Mainsail costs the same as 1 LV-T30, so clustering is just that much more expensive. Depending upon the cost of fuel (I'm not on my game comp. and the wiki doesn't list fuel tank cost) it could be cheaper to use a Mainsail even with the additional fuel required to get it where you want it.

[foamyesque]

This vehicle contains no fuel lines:

[BubbaWilkins]

My general duty all purpose lifter. I have no idea what the current tonnage limit is, but intend to test it out a bit this evening.

I've modified the tail and wings a little since these were taken, but the rest remains unchanged.

[Eric S]

It doesn't matter now, but once cost is considered, 1 Mainsail costs the same as 1 LV-T30, so clustering is just that much more expensive. Depending upon the cost of fuel (I'm not on my game comp. and the wiki doesn't list fuel tank cost) it could be cheaper to use a Mainsail even with the additional fuel required to get it where you want it.

That could certainly affect the cost effectiveness of both engine clusters and asparagus launchers, but I really don't think those prices are final.

[technicalfool]

Does anyone have recommendations for photo hosting so I can show off my builds?

Photobucket gives away quite a bit of free photo space, and they allow direct hotlinking into other websites so you can do things like this:

On the downside, Photobucket links are looooooong, and giving someone the direct picture link will still send them to the Flash-filled, bloated viewing pages rather than just showing the picture.

[koshelenkovv]

I kinda feel like it's cheating to use clustering, but once you've done it, it's tough to go back to using Mainsails.

[katateochi]

^^ wow, seeing it like that really puts it in scale. wow.

These two are meant to be replicas (kinda) of the Aries I and V launch vehicles. The Aries V can take up 75 tons no problem which I know is not that great but for what I need it does the job.

The boosters are from the BobCat American pack (which has a complete Aries I, but I prefer to build/hack together my own things). I think the boosters are a bit over powered, but they are huge. On the Aries V I used to use two side mounted tanks in an asparagus config and two additional boosters but changed it to use these boosters to make it look more like the Aries. The previous version of the Aries I was truly horrific, I managed to stick 4 smaller boosters (from the KW pack) right inside a larger one (from NovaPunch) to make it look more authentic while also having more power, it amazingly worked without blowing up, but the large Bobcat booster is more to scale.

[DerekL1963]

The Soyuz booster is something of an anomaly... The trend over time has been to use fewer but larger engines to reduce complexity, cost, and parts count. SpaceX bucked that trend for the reason Soyuz is such a cluster... they were unable to develop a large engine on time. (Seriously, it's easy to "prove" something with a single snapshot - but that obscures (at best) the truth provided by context.)

[asae]

The Soyuz booster is something of an anomaly... The trend over time has been to use fewer but larger engines to reduce complexity, cost, and parts count. SpaceX bucked that trend for the reason Soyuz is such a cluster... they were unable to develop a large engine on time. (Seriously, it's easy to "prove" something with a single snapshot - but that obscures (at best) the truth provided by context.)

Saturn V: cluster of 5 engines in first stage and 2nd stage, Space shuttle: cluster of 3 main engines on the shuttle itself, soyuz as given, Saturn IB. There are more but I cannot find them easily. If you want to get technical in terms of engine bells seen then even the gemini program used a cluster of 2 engines.

[Superseaslug]

Does this count as non-asparagus? MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

I use this thing to send pretty much anything I want to Laythe.

[wilt57]

Well, I was referring to KSP as I know they cluster in RL. My reason for feeling it's cheating in KSP is that one cannot select an LV-T30, set symmetry to 4, and place them on the bottom of a Jumbo-64. One has to use those small girder thingymabobs first. It "seems" like a loophole to me that the designers didn't intend to include.

[sal_vager]

You can use those radial attachment things though, they work well for clustering engines

[Giggleplex777]

Well, I was referring to KSP as I know they cluster in RL. My reason for feeling it's cheating in KSP is that one cannot select an LV-T30, set symmetry to 4, and place them on the bottom of a Jumbo-64. One has to use those small girder thingymabobs first. It "seems" like a loophole to me that the designers didn't intend to include.

Have you ever heard of the "Radial Attachment Point"?

[Giggleplex777]

The Soyuz booster is something of an anomaly... The trend over time has been to use fewer but larger engines to reduce complexity, cost, and parts count. SpaceX bucked that trend for the reason Soyuz is such a cluster... they were unable to develop a large engine on time. (Seriously, it's easy to "prove" something with a single snapshot - but that obscures (at best) the truth provided by context.)

The Soyuz first stage engine is actually a single engine with 4 nozzles and two verniers.

Edited June 18, 2013 by Giggleplex777

[spaceBrezel]

nice photos, real life graphics are insane

this "thing" made it to mun.

TT-70 decoupler ftw!

[AmpsterMan]

I've thought the same thing. I kinda feel like it's cheating to use clustering, but once you've done it, it's tough to go back to using Mainsail.

That's just it right there. When the cubic struts first came out I started using them after Temstar's Thread. Then I stopped because it felt like cheating. With the radial attachment points I just don't know anymore. :/.

Still, more non-asparagus boosters coming right up!