SSTO Without Rockets

[Geometrian]

Hi all,

I present a SSTO that uses a single turbojet and two ion engines to reach orbit:

It has a small docking port and RCS controls. I have found it quite easy to fly, and quite easy to reach a pretty high orbit (~120,000).

It uses part clipping in a "fair" way: there's an RCS tank inside the empty space in the nosecone, and the front landing gear retracts into some empty space. The jet fuel tank is collocated with the fuselage for space concerns, but not all of it is necessary to reach orbit by a longshot, as the screenshot shows; just imagine only the side/bottom parts of the tank are filled

.craft

-G

[Darthzeus]

Niiiiice. What's the part count? That may be the first successful manned ion SSTOs I've ever seen.

Ps. Go part clipping!

[TheBarnetts]

Dude this is awesome! I made my own and your idea works really well. Here are some pics of the flight and +rep.

Javascript is disabled. View full album

[speedboiae86]

I've done an SSTO like that!! Extremely low part count in itself and no part clipping to speak of!!

I called it the "Sundog".

I based it on a high altitude flyer design that could very nearly reach orbit on just it's turbojet.

1 turbojet jet, a can of jet fuel, 2 ion engines, 2 Gigantor XL Solar Arrays, 2 Ram Air Intakes, and one Engine Nacelle Intake.

[carazvan]

Ion SSTOs are a lot easier to make now since the 4x thrust boost they received; if interested check out the Flea SSTO (Ion) from my signature for multiple evolutions from 0.20-0.24

[gGATORr]

Hi all,

I present a SSTO that uses a single turbojet and two ion engines to reach orbit:

http://i739.photobucket.com/albums/xx36/geometrian/ionjet_zps497cfcd6.png

It has a small docking port and RCS controls. I have found it quite easy to fly, and quite easy to reach a pretty high orbit (~120,000).

It uses part clipping in a "fair" way: there's an RCS tank inside the empty space in the nosecone, and the front landing gear retracts into some empty space. The jet fuel tank is collocated with the fuselage for space concerns, but not all of it is necessary to reach orbit by a longshot, as the screenshot shows; just imagine only the side/bottom parts of the tank are filled

.craft

-G

Good job dude, that's awesome! It's a nice change from all the other SSTOs.

[Rune]

Hum. Have you guys seen the once-upon-a-time-stickied Ion showcase thread? Plenty of Ion-powered spaceplanes there. Just in case, one of mine!

Rune. Of course, that tank carries only liquid fuel. I needed the lenght.

[Geometrian]

Hi,

The part count on my OP is 56, I think. I added an octostrut and antenna on the front though (so now it's 58). I think actually it has a KW Rocketry nosecone, so it's not quite stock.

I've been playing around with this a bit, and I now present the Sunfish, named for its shape:

imgur.com/a/eUAtH

Bleh; how do I embed an Imgur album?

It is horrifically impractical. I had to use RCS just to get enough altitude, once the jet cut out--and don't even think about trying to liftoff when it's not morning. Even with 14 ion engines, it's underpowered (the thrust to weight ratio is bad, and adding more ion engines will actually make it worse). However, prettiness will not be denied . . .

.craft

Edited August 7, 2014 by Geometrian

[carazvan]

The general rule is that adding more Ion engines hurts because it makes getting to orbit harder and adds more weight needed for bateries and solar panels. However once in orbit the extra engines help you to have a higher thrust (Note the max limit is the 0.8TWR that the engines themselves have without any added fuel/electricity parts)

[Rune]

Hi,

The part count on my OP is 56, I think. I added an octostrut and antenna on the front though (so now it's 58). I think actually it has a KW Rocketry nosecone, so it's not quite stock.

I've been playing around with this a bit, and I now present the Sunfish, named for its shape:

imgur.com/a/eUAtH

Bleh; how do I embed an Imgur album?

It is horrifically impractical. I had to use RCS just to get enough altitude, once the jet cut out--and don't even think about trying to liftoff when it's not morning. Even with 14 ion engines, it's underpowered (the thrust to weight ratio is bad, and adding more ion engines will actually make it worse). However, prettiness will not be denied . . .

.craft

First, the imgur thingy. That would work out to this:

Javascript is disabled. View full album

...and what you want to write is that "eUAtH" (which is the album's ID) between imgur tags, like [imgur]eUAtH[ /imgur], but without that space that is messing up the code. Quote my post if you want to see what I'm doing, or when you see someone doing something you want to copy, the code will be there in the quoted text for you to figure out.

As to the SSTO, to make orbit on puny ion engines you first have to airhog your way into stupendous speeds that pretty much deny the gravity drag, at stupendous heights that practically negate aerodynamic drag (as a rule of thumb, >1,800m/s surface speed at >30kms). Then you don't care about your T/W and can slowly push your way into orbit.

Rune. It DOES look awesome, though. Clip intakes inside it to fix it!

Edited August 8, 2014 by Rune

[O-Doc]

It was probably about time to put this orbit album together. The Cicada's got a respectable 7.5km/s dV@LKO with full RCS tanks. I haven't really looked at an extended range variant, there's definitely the hardpoints to mount a couple of fuel drop pods to get range out to about 20km/s dV@LKO.

It's a very stripped back design for experienced pilots only. Very high wing loading for those who can efficiently and precisely cross-range back to base with an accurate swoop and landing flare. Its extremely limited RCS translation range means you need to be comfortable docking without RCS . It's best to take off from Kerbin in the afternoon or evening but, the RCS thrusters will put you into orbit without the aid of sunlight, which is more efficient for long distance travel anyway. You can effect landings on the smallest of bodies within the Kerbol system but, it's not designed with planetary landing in mind.

Javascript is disabled. View full album

Download: Cicada v1.0

Edited August 8, 2014 by O-Doc

[Geometrian]

Quote my post if you want to see what I'm doing, or when you see someone doing something you want to copy, the code will be there in the quoted text for you to figure out.

I had tried that strategy on a post above. The quote returns e.g.:

<url>http://imgur.com/a/eUAtH</url>

except with square brackets for the "url" tags, and "view source" returns e.g.:

<iframe class="imgur-album" src="http://imgur.com/a/eUAtH/embed" frameborder="0" height="550" width="100%"></iframe>

As to the SSTO, to make orbit on puny ion engines you first have to airhog your way into stupendous speeds that pretty much deny the gravity drag, at stupendous heights that practically negate aerodynamic drag (as a rule of thumb, >1,800m/s surface speed at >30kms). Then you don't care about your T/W and can slowly push your way into orbit.

Yup. By airhogging, I assume you mean just using the jets to do most of the acceleration?

Anyway, to get the Sunfish to orbit, you launch in the early morning, climb at about 45 degrees up (sharper is too slow). Start leveling off in middle atmo, and accelerate to about 1400m/s. Then, very slowly climb towards the upper atmosphere, and should should be able to accelerate to 1600 or 1700. The sun should be just about overhead. Angle 45 degrees upward with the dregs of the jet, and turn on the ion engines full blast. Also engage forward and upward RCS. Using all of this, you should just have enough to get the apogee to over 70,000m (I went for 71,000, I think). Be sure you save enough RCS/electricity to rotate back so the batteries can recharge. Once you reach apoapsis, burn forward. I ran out of power before the end, but the periapsis was 68,000m, which was easily corrected on the second orbit.

Maneuvering in orbits is pretty easy though. I docked it with an X-3 (another SSTO) in 100,000m orbit (the X-3 had to do the RCS, though) intending to rendezvous a tug with both of them and pull them to a refueling station. It was too buggy for that, so I deorbited the tug, separated the X-3 and Sunfish, and brought both of them to the station under their own power (the tug idea was really just for fun).

-G

[Rune]

I had tried that strategy on a post above. The quote returns e.g.:

<url>http://imgur.com/a/eUAtH</url>

except with square brackets for the "url" tags, and "view source" returns e.g.:

<iframe class="imgur-album" src="http://imgur.com/a/eUAtH/embed" frameborder="0" height="550" width="100%"></iframe>

Yup. By airhogging, I assume you mean just using the jets to do most of the acceleration?

Anyway, to get the Sunfish to orbit, you launch in the early morning, climb at about 45 degrees up (sharper is too slow). Start leveling off in middle atmo, and accelerate to about 1400m/s. Then, very slowly climb towards the upper atmosphere, and should should be able to accelerate to 1600 or 1700. The sun should be just about overhead. Angle 45 degrees upward with the dregs of the jet, and turn on the ion engines full blast. Also engage forward and upward RCS. Using all of this, you should just have enough to get the apogee to over 70,000m (I went for 71,000, I think). Be sure you save enough RCS/electricity to rotate back so the batteries can recharge. Once you reach apoapsis, burn forward. I ran out of power before the end, but the periapsis was 68,000m, which was easily corrected on the second orbit.

Maneuvering in orbits is pretty easy though. I docked it with an X-3 (another SSTO) in 100,000m orbit (the X-3 had to do the RCS, though) intending to rendezvous a tug with both of them and pull them to a refueling station. It was too buggy for that, so I deorbited the tug, separated the X-3 and Sunfish, and brought both of them to the station under their own power (the tug idea was really just for fun).

-G

Hum, didn't knew that. Now how the hell did I learn it? Good thing I also described the whole thing. Anyhow, the little guy I showed on the last page can push an apo of >140km just on the jets (doing about 2,400m/s at ~50kms) so yeah, judging by your ascent description, you are suffering form either a fat ass, a lack of intakes, or both. And it probably isn't the fat ass, because I burn less than 100 liquid fuel units out of the 360 that carries, meaning I lug quite the excess mass into orbit. The quantity of xenon burnt is kinda irrelevant, so multiple trip capability. I'm putting together some pics for a "Forgotten SSTO pack" I'm getting together, so here goes one that shows a lot of juicy information from just before the jet gave out (4:1 ram intake/jet ratio, my standard)... and another, because I like it

Rune. Pics or it didn't happen!

[Geometrian]

Your space station is very impressive, Rune!

I tried to make a SSTO using only RCS, but it wasn't close to working. However, I noticed that the chassis I built had really interesting aerodynamic properties. It can glide essentially indefinitely, kinda hover in the air, turn very quickly, and is very stable. It's not very unique-looking, but it flies the best out of anything I've ever made. So, I swapped out the RCS tanks for a jet tank and immediately produced the following SSTO:

Ascent is fairly standard, except because it is so light the jet can do almost all the work. I coaxed it to a top speed of 2211.1 m/s using the jet alone! This is enough to have its own periapsis. The orbital insertion was made through the RCS thrusters only.

This is the .craft file, I think: .craft

[ProGamerGov]

It was probably about time to put this orbit album together. The Cicada's got a respectable 7.5km/s dV@LKO with full RCS tanks. I haven't really looked at an extended range variant, there's definitely the hardpoints to mount a couple of fuel drop pods to get range out to about 20km/s dV@LKO.

It's a very stripped back design for experienced pilots only. Very high wing loading for those who can efficiently and precisely cross-range back to base with an accurate swoop and landing flare. Its extremely limited RCS translation range means you need to be comfortable docking without RCS . It's best to take off from Kerbin in the afternoon or evening but, the RCS thrusters will put you into orbit without the aid of sunlight, which is more efficient for long distance travel anyway. You can effect landings on the smallest of bodies within the Kerbol system but, it's not designed with planetary landing in mind.

http://imgur.com/a/IGiaS

Download: Cicada v1.0

Totally reverse engineering this!

[Mesklin]

Ion SSTO "Mun Flea" with Mun landing possibilities, 5.2 t start mass, ion dV ~4500 m/s

Javascript is disabled. View full album

And another one completely ion SSTO, only ion 1 engine, without turbojets

Javascript is disabled. View full album

[david50517]