VTOL SSTO "Xcover"

[Reimad]

I've been playing the game from before they even added the mun but never really had a design worth sharing.. Till now!

I always wanted to make a design like this but before 0.25 stock never had the parts I wanted. I'm still working on it, changing minor details (those lander legs..) etc but I'm pretty happy with it now. You launch it from the pad, go with a 80 degree angle till 5000 or so, then go to 45 degrees. at 10.000 put it on 20 degrees and then slowly end up with 15 degrees at 20.000.

After that when air runs out I switch the 2 horizontal engines to rocket mode and change pitch (slowly)to 30 degrees. once the intake air runs out I also switch the other 2 engines to rocket mode and slowly go to 45 degrees.

I can make it to 120KM with 1700 m/s remaining (using mechjeb it's only 1500) so I suppose that technically I could make a one way trip to the mün.

Landing I just slowly coast back into the atmosphere towards KSC and use the jet engines to reduce speed. It's still a little bit tricky to get rid of horizontal speed but with the parachutes it's really safe to land this as long as you pay attention.

And the wing design makes it really, really stable during flight and when changing course. The heavy behind is a bit problematic, but much less so than you would think.

Items for improvement? I'm also making a cargo version once I improve this version a bit more.

[NetHawk]

Awesome craft design!

Looking forward to see the cargo version.

PS: Can you share the craft file?

[Reimad]

I would, but I'm not really sure how..

The idea came from this old comic book my father had. It was this aircraft carrier pilot and his friends fighting commies who had a secret fighter prototype that looked really awesome in my eyes

[soulreaver1981]

You can use mediafire to share your file.

its free and verry easy to use.

you can find you craft file in you save files.

Edited October 20, 2014 by soulreaver1981