Improved Stock Crafts (Orbiter)

[Xeldrak]

Submissions are closed! Start voting

here!

Please post your vote here!

Since it seems like Bob's Guardian Angel abandoned his thread, I will pick up the challenge.

As some of you might have noticed, the stock crafts in KSP are horrible for the most part. So I challenge you to come up with a replacement craft.

There are a few things required for you submission:

1. You craft MUST NOT use any mods - 100% stock
   
2. You need to show us at least one Screenshot
   
3. You need to make you .craft file available
   

Otherwise your submission will not be accepted.

And there are a few things you should consider

-Your craft should be easy to use, simple and safe - stock craft are mostly for new players, they should not be overwhelmed by 10 action groups that must be used at the right time.

-Your craft should be an example new players can emulate. It should demonstrate design techniques. What ARE action groups? What's aspargus? Can linear RCS boosters be of some use? These are questions new players could be able to answer by testing your craft.

-If you use Action Groups of have any special commentary to make, use that neat, new description field in the VAB.

It's a fine line between encouraging a new player with something new and overwhelming him - try to walk it.

How is this going to work?

You will have exactly one week to build your craft and post it here, this way even the working people of us should have enough time.

Post your entry here with at least one screenshot and its .craft file. Also be so kind to drop us a few lines, about your craft? What were your thoughts on the design? Why is it a good stock craft?

Sumissions will be closed at

Saturday, 4 August

11:59:59 p.m. (GMT+0)

(in 7 days)

After submissions are closed I will set up a poll somewhere (since I can't edit a poll to this thread).

Should we have 8 or less entries, you can vote for one week for you final winner.

Should we have more than 8 entries, we will hold a three day pre-election. The top six of this election will then go into a four day final election.

The winner will have bragging rights and...maybe I'll come up with something, who knows.

What craft are we doing this Week?

This week we will take a look at the stock orbiter:

You will notice, that the engine assembly is...creative at best. They are hold in place by tailfins (!) which realy is nothing to emulate. Also, this orbiter hat six landing legs?! RCS is all over the place.

Try to come up with something better.

Contenders

ThePsuedoMonkey - Improved Stock Orbiter

Bean - Orbiter 2b

Xeldrak - ChemRock Orbiter 1b

Spartwo - k-3

John FX - Orbiter_2

Grim187 - Orbiter 1B

JamesClonk - Dragonfly Orbiter 2A

AmpsterMan - Dargon CTV

Poll

You can find the poll here. Please vote! Also be so kind, to post who you've voted for - so the threat gets bumped up once in a while.

The poll will close on Sunday, 11th August

11:59:59 p.m. (GMT+0)

Edited August 8, 2013 by Xeldrak

[ThePsuedoMonkey]

Well, I'm not really sure what other people look for in an orbiter but here is a fairly generic reworking of the stock one. It's been given lights, a docking port, a satellite dish, and a bit of electricity to power the reaction wheels. It's a bit under 13T for the mass, and 1.4km/s for the dV.

download

[Bean]

Here's my attempt to get things rolling: The Orbiter 2B

It is simple ( less parts than the original ), has a sane amount of landing legs and a ladder (Comes down with landing gear).

Flight is pretty simple, hit space to launch, throttle up before the end of the boosters and space when out of fuel.

Makes orbit with plenty of fuel to spare and has working abort function.

Big battery in case of forgetting to open the solar panels the moment you're in orbit (Action group 1).

Docking port at the front to dock with things, as an orbiter is a good shuttle vessel to future station, or just dock two together for practice. (Action group 2 to open/close)

Apparently I cannot post attachments, so I'll upload the .craft somewhere: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BwhymaaHM0RsUWhsX3VrSlhIZzA/edit?usp=sharing

It's also good to go, since we can't mix and match payloads with launch vehicles I figure any stock craft should be ready to launch. Gallery: http://imgur.com/a/Z1tYe#0

Edited July 29, 2013 by Bean

[Xeldrak]

Allright, I've come up with my own Orbiter, the Chemrock Orbiter 1b.

It comes with an action group to deploy it's solar panels and satellite dish.

It also has Chutes, a docking Port, light for docking in the darkness and quite a lot of RCS fuel, since I think with .21 RCS has become much better.

I tired to make it simple and good looking, also the sat-dish marks the ventral side of the Orbiter wich correlates with the RCS-controls. I hope this make docking a bit more intuitive.

~2500 m/s dV with a powerfull engine

It comes with it own two-stage launch vehicle, with a fully functional abort-button. It's the most simplistic design I could come up with, that is powerfull enough to get the orbiter reliable into space.

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ChemRock 1b orbiter

---

I realized that one week of building, one week of voting might be a bit long. I'm thinking about cutting it down to 4 Days building, 3 Days voting or something like that. Also I hope a craft that is more interesting than the orbiter might get more attention.

Edited July 30, 2013 by Xeldrak

[Spartwo]

K-3 standard krew rotation

http://www./download/sr3rweo13ku84k7/k-3.craft

The k-3 can reach anything within 1km/s and return without refueling

Action group toggles everything.

Edited July 30, 2013 by Spartwo

[John FX]

Just spotted this thread and made this quickly.

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Just as an aside, what exactly is an `orbiter`?

It seems from the stock example that it is some form of lander. I would agree except we are given stock landers and they are called as such (heavy and two stage). The stock craft does not seem capable of getting into orbit by itself and is not a good station design. I decided to go with a craft that can get into orbit and then land safely with huge margins and a lot of safety.

http://www./view/ooowe1nioonwxg0/Orbiter_2_(Stock).craft

It teaches overheating, staging, orbiting, deorbit and parachute landing. Also EVA if you like.

Edited July 30, 2013 by John FX

[Grim187]

Orbiter 1B

w/ Delivery

Description:

i started out with just trying to improve the current design and ended up flipping the whole thing on it head.

known bug; ladder transition requires you release "s" and tap "a" (left).

Action Groups:

Gear (g) - Landing Legs

Lights (u) - Landing Lights

Custom One (1) - Solar Panels

Custom Two (2) - Communication

todo:

actions groups.

science equipment.

communication

side note:

while testing the delivery stage i got lost and landed on the wrong moon;

still had enough fuel to make it back and then some.

Edited August 1, 2013 by Grim187

[Captain Sierra]

Glad this challenge is back. Time to get to work!

[JamesClonk]

Love the challenge!

I too think some of the stock crafts are a bit wierd and not exactly helpful for beginners.

So I made this orbiter here:

Dragonfly Orbiter 2A

Download .craft file, zipped | unzipped

~2450 m/s of delta V. Easy travel to and from the Mün/Minmus, landing included.

300 Units of monopropellant, allows for mistakes during docking. No need to worry about running out of monoprop.

980 Units of electric charge. No problem on the dark side of the Mün.

4 1x6 solar panels.

4 Landing legs for extra tough landings.

3 Additional fixed solar panels in case someone forgets to deploy the 4 main ones. (Happened to me many times before already. )

3 Parachutes for safe atmospheric landing.

1 Docking port for docking.

2 Lights for easier docking during the dark.

1 Remote guidance unit for remote control if the capsule is not crewed. (I do this for all my creations ever since these units were introduced.)

The RCS thrusters are placed very slightly above the CoM, in order to make docking as easy as possible.

Once you have expended a little bit of fuel they become perfectly aligned.

Custom action groups as described also in the craft file:

Custom 01: Toggle Solar Panels

Custom 02: Toggle Landing Legs

Custom 03: Toggle Docking Port Shield

Custom 04: Toggle Lights

Custom 05: Toggle Engine

The custom action groups are not really needed at all obviously.

They're just there out of habit..

Edited July 30, 2013 by JamesClonk

[Captain Sierra]

Mine is still in for some tinkering but it will be ready for a proper submission very soon. In an effort to make an orbiter vehicle that could maximize it's operational potential and teach valuable lessons about orbital maneuvering, rendezvous, docking, and refueling, here is a teaser of what I plan to submit:

[Xeldrak]

Ah, this thread is finally gathering way... I allready thought, that the orbiter might be too boring.

As I plan to continue this series - do you guys think, 1 week building, 1 week voting is too long?

[Captain Sierra]

no and no. 1 week building, too short, 10-14 days says I. 1 week voting, perfect.

[astropapi1]

-snip-

I really liked your orbiter.

[AmpsterMan]

Dargon CTV

Using the new, SPACEX Dragon vehicle as inspiration, the Dargon CTV (Crew Transport Vehicle) can ferry up to 3 Kerbals to anywhere from LKO to LMO. It carries a hitchhiker module for extra long stays and can be very easily converted to a non-manned version for simple resupply missions. It has a very powerful escape tower for those "unplanned rapid dis-assembly" days.

Keys:

1: Activates Solar Panels

Back: Activates escape system

DL link

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[Kenobi McCormick]

Working on one right now. My goal is to build something capable of a munshot/minmus shot, demonstrates how to use cubic octagonals to mount engines, demonstrates proper use of SRBs and winglets, and is low enough on part count that even the crappiest of laptops will get playable FPS with it.

[Xeldrak]

Submissions are closed! Start voting

here!

Well, one week is over, entries are closed. You may now beginn voting. Sadly Captain Sierra and Kenobi McCormick did not finish their crafts in time.

You can find the poll here. Please vote! Also be so kind, to post who you've voted for - so the threat gets bumped up once in a while.

The poll will close on Sunday, 11th August

11:59:59 p.m. (GMT+0)

I for one voted for JamesClonk's Dragonfly Orbiter - it's a nice, compact design with everything an orbiter needs. I like the docking lights and the remote controll unit

Edited August 5, 2013 by Xeldrak

[John FX]

For the next challenge it would be good to have some idea of design parameters. Does the craft need to land, does it need to be able to travel to another planet, dock etc

I must say I was designing blind for example.

[Bean]

That's part of the challenge, the design was an orbiter, so as long as it gets up and orbits it counts, I didn't vote for those that did too much. Some entrants were more fitting for a lander replacement. I voted for the Dragonfly Orbiter 2A, it does a lot, looks good and even though it can do landings it's really good for practicing getting to orbit, rendezvous and docking. And as a basic crew transport. Simple enough for newbies to learn from too I think.

[Xeldrak]

Well, right now I'm not realy satisfied with the format, too. Additionaly the stock Orbiter itself was kind of a mystery to me, it could basicaly land, hat tons of rcs but a really weak engine and no docking port. Basically all I could derive from that was, that it should be something that could orbit I'n my mind I though of it like a Apollo CM - but that's only my conception.

[Xeldrak]

Well, just to make sure you vote for the right craft I made a small overview

Edited August 8, 2013 by Xeldrak

[Francesco]

I voted for Grim187's Orbiter 1B - it's the farthest away in terms of design from the stock Orbier, and it only carries one Kerbal, but I found it to be very original.

[Xeldrak]

I think if everybody who voted would write a line, like Frencesco, this would be very helpfull

[AmpsterMan]

Bumping this thread I voted for myself

I didn't know this thread was still going on. I was waiting for it to show up on my registered threads area.

Congrats to Xendrak btw, that is a very nice craft you have there. I really like the look of the Orion type craft

Edited August 17, 2013 by AmpsterMan

[Xeldrak]

Well, actually the voting is closed - I simply can't disable the vote

[Giggleplex777]

Damnit, I didn't get a chance to try this challenge.