VTOL craft thread

[patmatt2]

this is mine

post yours here

[Sapphire]

This is my cute little baby one which I named Serenity , because of the way it looks. The design is someone else's, though. I just made a B9 version of it.

[Elmetian]

Click the image below to see more pictures. Most of them were taken back in January with 0.18, but the craft has had only minor tweaks since then.

And here's a demo vid I put together:

Because I know it's a long video, the best bits are at 2:40, 8:40 and 11:10

I flew this entirely without RCS, though the Springbok is equipped with enough monopropellant for less subtle manoeuvres. Thanks to its turbojets it has a respectable service ceiling of 25km, a top speed of about 1350m/s and a range of 3300km. For the final landing, I moved some of the fuel from the central rear tank to the front one to rebalance the craft.

And just to be clear, that last landing took 4 attempts I was flying with an Xbox controller, but you can get similar results with just a keyboard.

To download this craft and others please see my thread here.

Edited July 24, 2013 by Narcosis

[Giggleplex777]

Stock swivel jet.

[patmatt2]

Keep em coming

[patmatt2]

And just to be clear, that last landing took 4 attempts

[here.

I'm yet to land the mk4 harrier myself its very twitchy

[Elmetian]

I'm yet to land the mk4 harrier myself its very twitchy

Designing something that faithfully recreates a RL plane probably won't mean you get something that handles the same. KSP's physics is a little off whack. With a VTOL, you want to have the direction of thrust passing straight through the centre of mass. You should also design it so that fuel flow doesn't irreparably unbalance the craft. It also helps having the lift engines quite widely separated I think.

I'm quite proud of my Springbok, and I'm relatively certain that it was the first to use that style of engine pod, something that I've seen a lot since on other people's aircraft. Sadly my original post from January was lost in the forum catastrophe, but I'm sure someone can vouch for me

Edited August 25, 2013 by Narcosis

[patmatt2]

the harrier flys very nicely but still

[zombiphylax]

Made this awhile ago:

Flies like a helicopter rather than a fixed-wing craft.

[RocketPilot573]

Has anyone landed a VTOL on the VAB's helipad yet?

UPDATE: I've done it!

And without breaking anything too!

Edited July 25, 2013 by RocketPilot573