Bill Kermann visiting Laythe island on board his Mirage

[gilflo]

Bill Kermann was sent to mission to make scientific experiences and reports.

The end of his first mission was here:http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/82985-Laythe-scientific-Mission

Now he is back to a second Laythe site after having draw a general map of Laythe island.

He divided it in 5 sectors: the first where he landed was a group of French islands: They seem to be the biggest on Laythe, around Equator between 50E and 175W

The 2nd group are dragonhead island, seen from above yoiu can imagine the neck followed by the dragon claws on the west end of the main island.

3rd group are the south banks, they are in the south of Laythe around 50W and the main one looks like a short bone.

4th group are lost islands in northern part of Laythe, small islands drawing a circle with a tiny one in the center 15N 065W

5th group are £3 volcano small islands, in the northern part, east of French islands. We are not sure we can land a plane on it

Bill Kermann was sent for a second scientific mission on Fantome island and we decided to send him a jet aircraft, a mirage, to reward him by visiting Laythe island for us.

The red cross indicates the landing site

Here he is maneuvering for landing, great view of Jool

Atmosphere entry

Retro burning on detachable tanks

Just leaving last tank before landing

Landing

Great place, Fantastic views of Jool

Doing science

MEANWHILE, we are launching the Mirage and a Jetpack of 14 150L tanks that will refuel the jet during his travel between island

We use the same launcher that brings Bill Kermann on Laythe. The jet is at the top above the Jetpack machine

We got plenty of DV and the launcher is very reliable

Coasting to Jool

Aerodynamic breaking in Jool atmosphere: first peri at 118km

Laythe interception, we were very lucky, it happens on the first try

Laythe Aerobraking, peri 25km

Edited July 1, 2014 by gilflo

[gilflo]

Chapter 1: The mirage is launched to fantome island

First, english being not my native language, sorry for the story telling, i'll do my best.

Bill Kermann is in command now. From his labship, on fantome, by mean of his remote control, he launched the mirage from the mothership orbiting at 73Kms

The mirage begins its de-orbital maneuver, using its 2 rockets engines.

He is now on approach to fantome island but Bill cannot see him yet. It's still on autopilot descending to 10000m where Bill will start up the jet engine.

At 22000m, Bill separates the rockets from the Mirage. Now he will fly and glide with its own jet engine.

The aircraft is approaching 4000m

Then Bill will run a lot of tests to see the consumption and the flying quality of the Mirage. Due to the tiny atmosphere 10000m seems to be maximum height for flying. He determines the best range at 10000m, 7500m and 5000m. At 70% of power it's 5.4km/unit of fuel at 10000M, and respectively 4 and 3.4. at 7500 and 5000m he can use only 50% of power and the range is 4.6 and 4, the speed being less of course.

So flying at 10000m double the range and the speed, but at this altitude the plane is tricky and it's better to remains on autopilot.

From 7500m the plane is easy to manually pilots. The main thing is to always balanced the fuel through the 3 tanks via TAC.

The jet is very simple, 1 pit, 3 tanks containing each 150L of fuel, 1 jet engine and to ram air.2 delta wings, 2 canards and 2 winglets. So we get 450L, which let us the possibility to fly more than 2000km with a spare of 50L

Here all the circuit the Mirage flew during tests

Now bill is going to perform the final approach by remote control.

The mirage is pointing towards Bill lander

The plane is approaching by the left to perform a long final between the small lake and the big one.

The slope seems to be minimum here. You can see waves in the sand but in fact it's not.

Final still a little higher over Bill but he is very careful with the rate of descent, not to be more than 5m/s for the touch. The plane weights 5.5T and had get still 2/3 of its fuel. He needs only 20% of power on final.

2m height, nearly landed...Speed 63m/s (126 its)

Making 180 turn to come back to the launcher

Bill can now admires his Mirage. Flying and landing were easy, but the landing site is quite good, no slope, flat. He lands it at the first try.

He can't wait trying it and is going to prepare his next flight. We'll see later for refueling.

[gilflo]

CHAPTER 2: Departure to Dragonrock

Dragonrock is a little island on route to Dragonhead islands in the south of Fantome island.

After a rest Bill climb in the pit to take control of the jet.

Then he realizes that it should be better to take off early in the morning because the Dragonhead island, final destination is in the south east of fantome and day is no very long there.

So it would be better to land during day light because it's his first flight to this island.

He throttles 100%

and climb 8500 in the early morning

Then he checks the heading is good

Approaching dragonrock

Descending to 1500m and looking for an approach path. This island is small and not very interesting.

There seems to be be a positive slope on the ground

He begins approach carefully

and lands at more than 500m high

Then he climbs the hill with the jet, admiring Jool rising just in front of him.

and plants a flag for his first landing here

We got nearly half tank and bill is ready to fly to Dragonhead.

Edited July 2, 2014 by gilflo

[gilflo]

CHAPTER3: Flight to dragonhead.

Here is Dragonhead on the map, it should be a heading of 75 to 85°

Bill select a Heading of 80° and an altitude of 9000m on his autopilot, in case he need it.

Then he aligns the jet in the slope and pull throttle to 100%. slope is not a problem as he gets a TWR of more than3 !

He is rapidly airborne climbing gently over the slope

Jool is climbing in the sky with the Mirage.

He discovered a small bay that was not easy to see on the map

It just looks beautiful in the early morning facing Jool, the bay behind...

A few minutes later he is approaching Dragonhead at 9000m, heading just between the claws. At 70% speed is 540 km/h and he can make 4.9 km per unit of fuel burnt.

Bill is now descending to search a landing place

He finds it and is flying right base leg. Final will be on the flat ground, right of the hill.

Turning final

Aligned 435m over field. there's a light positive slope.

Once on the ground he climbs at the top with the mirage.

and decides to take off for a visit, he has still enough fuel.

Taking off

In sight of the "neck of the dragon".

Heading East, just 2000mover ground at 50%of power

He is flying towards the "belly of the Dragon"

He finds a place land between the hills

Turning final, gear down

Once on ground he makes his way trough the hill, searching for a place to land the refueling pack. He has got about 50L left.

The total flight distance since the release from the launcher is around 2500kms (coming from persistent trails add-on )

Disembarking to do some science, but it's no use, he can't take it in the pit.

[gilflo]

CHAPTER 4: Calling for the refueling pack.

Refuelling pack is on the way, de orbiting....

Atmosphere entry

Detaching de orbiting engine and tank

Parachutes opened

Bill is looking at the landing. Everything seems to run normally.

Then he brings his Mirage to the refuel station.

The refuel station is made of 14 pack of 150L stuck together and 2 arms from Magic smoke industries. The clamp o tron can rotate around an axe and move horizontally.

Tests have been done to determine the height of the clamp o tron and it don't need to move vertically.

Once the parking break set, the refueling station align the clamp o tron for docking

Done. It's magic! the clamp o tron is just a the CG of the jet.

Refuelling can begin. it will be very quick

Tanks are full and Bill undocks and let the mirage go back slowly down the slope, before setting the parking brake.

TO BE FOLLOWED..........

Edited July 2, 2014 by gilflo