The Gorgonops Spaceplane (LLL+B9+KAX, FAR w/o aero failures)

[Pds314]

At 52 meters wide, 46 meters long, and a fueled weight of over 640 tonnes (it could be filled with more, as with a proper flight, it only burns <20% of its jet fuel, and it currently only has the oxidizer tanks 75% full)

Javascript is disabled. View full album

As the title says, it was made using LLL (most of the body and the engines and intakes) and B9 (Wings and struts) and KAX (landing gears).

A bit of a warning, the runway is far too short for it to take off properly, it must go off the end and pull up, but not so hard as to break the rudder (which won't stop you from going into space today) or the entire tail-plane (which definitely will).

Also, because of it's very high wing-loading (almost 2 tonnes/m^2), level flight basically requires 40000-60000 Pascals of dynamic pressure until orbital lift takes over for you. Trying to climb too quickly and not getting enough horizontal velocity will send you straight back to the lower atmosphere.

Top speed on pure jet power: Clocked at 2230 m/s surface speed.

Delta-V after reaching orbit: Up to 7110 m/s with standard fuel configuration (assuming you use exactly 25% of the jet fuel during launch and take 60 m/s to circularize orbit).

Ground thrust: 5.28 MN

Maximum jet thrust: 9.6 MN

Space thrust: 720 kN

Space thrust with safety disabled (lower Isp): 1520 kN

Powerplant: 48*Radial Turbojet Engine + 4*NE-800 NERVA.

Ground TWR at standard fuel load: 0.84

Maximum TWR at standard fuel load: 1.55

Space acceleration, assuming 600 tonnes reach orbit: 1.2 m/s^2

Space acceleration, safety disabled (lower Isp): 2.53 m/s^2 (in case you want to "land" it on the Mun or something).

Space acceleration, empty: 3.05 m/s^2

Space acceleration, empty, safety disabled: 6.43 m/s^2

Cargo bay: 29 meters long, comfortably fits 3.75 meter parts.

Mass upon reaching orbit: Ideal=589 tonnes. Any more means carrying around extra jet fuel (I will note that this is heavier than the international space station).

Crew: 3, though more could surely fit in the cargo bay, especially if it was just stuffed full of them, then thousands could be brought up and hopelessly ditched in orbit, or maybe on an escape trajectory from Kerbol with a V-infinity of >600 m/s.

Maximum payload to orbit: unknown.

Anyway, enjoy. Here's a download link.

[Voculus]

Great googly moogly!

[Pds314]

Great googly moogly!

Also, it's sometimes tough to get a sense of scale looking at this thing. Just keep in mind that that cockpit and fuselage are 5 METERS TALL. Those wings? 21 meters long, each.