Falcon - SSTO VTOL crew shuttle.

[Rune]

So, I built this as kind of a joke before 0.25 came by. I have since updated it, and it's actually a fun little craft, not to mention it brings a lot of style points when you can walk your kerbals around inside your ship. So here it is, the Falcon crew shuttle! I called it Falcon because I find a resemblance with the famous ship made by Correllian shipyards. Perhaps this was built somewhere close?

It has a passenger cabin directly behind the pilot cockpit with seats for four passengers, and a hatch that opens to reveal the ladder for crew ingress/egress. Other than that, it's a brute-force SSTO that can lift off on the single turbofan... then it goes up ridiculously quick on TWO turbojets. It is a bit intake-limited, and even though I did the intake trick so both engines flame out "at the same time", the small residual lag between them when they empty the common pool can still send you spinning at full throttle, so it is a bit sporty on ascent. The good part is, the huge TWR combined with the total absence of lift-generating surfaces means you can do weird things and still make it:

That is actually the proper way to court the flameout. Any slight thrust asymmetry makes you pitch "up", so you know, throttle down a bit (I think I ended at 50% throttle before cutting the turbojets at almost-orbital speeds) and make it go where you want. If case of any trouble, cutting thrust will solve anything, since it is perfectly aerodynamically stable in any orientation... the same way a perfectly round ball would be. Perfect for thrust-powered aerobatics.

It also comes with a rocket VTOL system, mainly because the single jet is like TWR 1.05 at maximum thrust. Otherwise landing this would be either suicide or incredibly boring, so you also get that cupcake-style extra response with that optional system. Or you could also use it for Duna SSTO: this thing is perfectly capable of filling all tanks with LFO mix and comply with TWR and deltaV for that planet.

With that said, have fun, and remember: do NOT try this with FAR. xD

IMGUR ALBUM:

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DOWNLOAD:

http://www./download/rhhwu9z6v9vc9uf/SSTO+Mk+XXXIX+-+Falcon.craft

Rune. Who cares about aerodynamics? We have thrust.

Edited November 4, 2014 by Rune

[Vagani]

Looking good, I always love your craft rune, so good

[Giggleplex777]

I've used the roll 90° technique with my vtols before. You know how pointing the wings perpendicular to the windstream nullifies lift, right? Just roll and pitch (yaw, actually) up and land it with the main engine like a tailsitter. That's one less engine to worry about!

[Redshift OTF]

It reminds me more of the Defiant.

[Rune]

Looking good, I always love your craft rune, so good

Thanks! Nice replies are always great to hear.

I've used the roll 90° technique with my vtols before. You know how pointing the wings perpendicular to the windstream nullifies lift, right? Just roll and pitch (yaw, actually) up and land it with the main engine like a tailsitter. That's one less engine to worry about!

Oh, I know, but then your vertical stabilizers would try to torque you straight, and you would have to fight the plane to keep a high AoA. And, also, you would have stuff flinging you every which way when you start yawing hundreds of º/sec because you were websurfing while it flamed out....

Regarding tailsitting, yeah, that would be MUCH more efficient. Landing "like Kod and Robert Heinlein intended ships to" and all that. And getting rid of the aesthetic plating, too. In fact, this is probably an ode as to how things shouldn't be done. But that's its thing! Looking good, and being silly. You'll forgive me this time

It reminds me more of the Defiant.

But I am a fan of the other franchise!

Rune. See? It achieved its purpose! It's a fun interlude between serious ships

[inigma]

its so cool looking it's SSI worthy! fly it on our server and/or upload it there. DMP is noninvasive.

[Guest]

I like it but the kerbal is stuck in the hatch

[Rune]

I like it but the kerbal is stuck in the hatch

Really? I thought I had tested that... I'll have to check it out again it seems... Look at the album, the little guy was able to go out and about at some point.

Edit: No... my savegames... the ones that were surviving form 0.22... yesterday's electrical storm... NOOO YOU SONOFAAA#@%$!!!!

Edit of the edit: I also had a look at the hatch thing. It seems something fundamental changed in the way KSP detects that between 0.24 and 0.25, because I have gutted the craft and it seems the blocking part is the I-beam that has always been the spine of the ship. So that may turn out to need a full rebuild. With everything else on top, this may take a lot of time to do.

Rune. You can guess I might be out of KSP a while.

Edited November 5, 2014 by Rune

[Majorjim!]

Really? I thought I had tested that... I'll have to check it out again it seems... Look at the album, the little guy was able to go out and about at some point.

Edit: No... my savegames... the ones that were surviving form 0.22... yesterday's electrical storm... NOOO YOU SONOFAAA#@%$!!!!

Rune. You can guess I might be out of KSP a while.

What happened matey?

[Rune]

What happened matey?

I'm still finding that out. So far, any of my saves in the save folder make the save menu tiself not show up (I've seen that before, and it doesn't bode well for the savefiles), and something is very rotten in the install anyhow, because I can't go from the SPH to a flight scene, only form the space center view. I'll keep you updated.

Rune. Hopefully I'll be able to salvage things from the gazillion quicksaves and backups I make. Hopefully.

[Majorjim!]

I'm still finding that out. So far, any of my saves in the save folder make the save menu tiself not show up (I've seen that before, and it doesn't bode well for the savefiles), and something is very rotten in the install anyhow, because I can't go from the SPH to a flight scene, only form the space center view. I'll keep you updated.

Rune. Hopefully I'll be able to salvage things from the gazillion quicksaves and backups I make. Hopefully.

Damn, sounds scary.

Yeah I save my ships across three hard drives now. My PC died the other day, probably the SSD but fingers crossed its not too bad.

I hope you can salvage something.

MJ

[Commander Jebidiah]

Hey rune this craft could be considered a dropship or you could make a bigger version as a luxury cruise to mün or Minmus

Just an idea