Daedalus - A 100% stock munar capable caft

[ccik]

Hello,

I\'m fairly new to this game, but enjoy it very much. After playing around a little, i set myself the goal to reach the mun, land, and return safely to Kerbin with my own design and only stock parts.

After achieving my goal i started improving my design to improve it in a couple of aspects. Now i want to present my craft to the community to see what others think about my design.

So i present, the 'Daedalus' :

The Daedalus is a 5-Stage Munar Craft, easy to maneuver (for me at least), has a lot of fuel for orbit adjustments, can land on the mun on rough surfaces and even slide on the surface and is also capable of limited maneuvering during reentry and landing phase back on Kerbin.

I\'m now describing the stages a little in detail.

Stage 1: Get this rocket in the Air

Seconds after Liftoff

Stage 1 consists of 16 SRB\'s, radially mounted around the later stage 2. Also adding Propulsion to this stage are the 8 Liquid Engines from Stage 2, which are powered up simultaneously with the SRB\'s. The Deadalus seems a little unstable with slight pitching and rolling tendencies during liftoff, but these motions are easily overcome by the ASAS module of the 4th Stage with help from the movable winglets of the later stages. As soon as the airspeed increases, stability is also improved, the ASAS will handle the rest. 2 Boosters are coupled together, and leave the craft as one piece, descending on two parachutes to be reused.

Stage 2: Punch through the lower atmosphere:

Separation of Stage 1

The main components of Stage 2 are 8 LV-T30 liquid fuel engines. These 8 engines are mounted radially around the 3rd stage. Fuel is provided by 24 liquid fuel tanks, 3 for each engine. Although speed is decreasing after separation of the SRB\'s, the Stage is not underpowered, and speed will gradually increase.

Stage 3: Getting into Orbit:

The 3rd stage consist again of LV-T30 engines, 4 this time. Main task of this stage is to achieve a stable orbit around Kerbin. Each engine gets fuel from 4 Tanks, making a total of 16 Tanks in this Stage. For stability, 4 R8 Winglets are added to this stage, which help to keep the craft under control while in the atmoshpere. These winglets will be decoupled with the engines later, as they wont be needed anymore when in Space. This stage tends to get a little bit unstable around 35km height, where the winglets are not very effective anymore, while the craft is still to heavy to be maneuvered with RCS. One trick to let this help you is to wait with the pitch over until this altitude, then just deactivate ASAS, give the craft a small kick with the RCS thrusters, and it will smoothly start to pich over.

This stage has enought fuel to get you to a stable orbit, and has even a little bit of fuel for adjustments, depending how much fuel was used for the inital orbit.

Stage 4: Orbit adjustment and getting to Mun:

Leaving the parts of stage 3 in orbit, it\'s time to prepare for TMI

Stage 4 is the main stage for orbit adjustments, and for getting to the mun. It consist of one LV-T45 thrust vectoring engine, 4 fuel tanks, 2 RCS fuel tanks, 4 RCS thrusters and the ASAS module. The 4 tanks should hold enough fuel for making it to the mun, adjusting orbit to find a nice landing spot, and for breaking the initial descent. Maneuvering with this stage is fairly easy with the 4 RCS thrusters in this stage and the additional 16 thrusters of the later stages. Depending on how much you alter your orbit with this stage, it is possible that you have to jettison this stage right before landing on the mun with fuel still remaining. In any case this stage should not be jettisoned until empty or a couple hundred meters above the muns surface, so save some fuel for the way back.

Stage 5: Munal landing and return:

Landing on the dark side of mun in rough terrain

Parts of the final stage are on LV-T45 engine, 3 fuel tanks, one RCS tank, 16 RCS thrusters and 6 R8 Winglets. Landing with this stage should be fairly easy. Use the thrust vectoring for control on the way down, to safe some RCS fuel. 16 RCS thrusters seems like overdoing it, but you\'ll find out that any side movement can be easily controlled with RCS. Just control the attitude to point straight up, engage the SAS from the Command capsule, and them modulate descend grade with the engine, and sidemovement with the RCS. This can easily be done by steering the green velocity vector on your attitude indicator with RCS to the center. Touchdown shoud be smooth, with SAS and RCS helping to prevent the stage from tipping over. The 6 Winglets as lander legs should provide good stability even in rough terrain. Test showed that at a sliding speed of more than 1.3 m/s one of the winglets will break off, but the stage will still be stable on the ground. An immediate lift-off is possible with full power, should something go wrong.

After your landing, you should have plenty of fuel for orbiting the moon, and making the way back. Orbit can also be controlled with RCS.

The two tanks mounted to the side can be jettisoned when empty

For reentry on kerbin I tested to options: Forwards or backwards.

I always try to get as close to launch side for landing as possible. You should enter the atmosphere backwards to reduce G-Forces on the crew. Set your predicted impact point long of your landing target, prior to overflight throttle up to max thrust, and when almost overhead your target, detach the command capsule, deploy the chute and splash down in your intendet landing area.

It is also possible to turn around the craft while reentering. While flying forward, you have limited maneuverability with the 6 Winglets to adjust your landing area. However, control in this gliding stage prooved difficult, so my prefered method is to enter backwards.

After detaching the command module, deploy the chute, and the kerbonauts are back safely.

You can alter the craft in a couple of ways, like removing to of the tanks from the last stage, and add one RCS tank instead. In this configuration, you will arrive with more fuel at mun, but you have to be careful with your fuel on your way back, altering orbits with RCS and use the atmosphere to get back to Kerbin.

Feel free to use the Craft, alter it in any way, and response with your opinions.

[MC3craze]

This looks neat, I\'m terrible with stock parts myself.

_{It\'s because of all the mods I use}

[Panichio]

Deadalus might not be the most fitting name for a Munar craft but still, very nice design!

[Guest Flixxbeatz]

Deadalus might not be the most fitting name for a stock craft but still, very nice design!

Fixed.

[greatorder]

Deadalus might not be the most fitting name for a Munar craft but still, very nice design!

Deadalus

Deadalus

I see nothing wrong with the name now.