Life Size Space Shuttle

[zekes]

"Mainsail in the OMS"

[zekes]

Well I just found out the real shuttle weighs 75 tons empty. This is a huge "OH" moment because my shuttle is 137 empty- that's almost twice the weight. I looked into it and I realized it's due to the fact that the 600 done wing parts in it weigh .1 tons each, which adds up to over 60 tons alone. This explains a lot as to why my shuttle is not only underpowered but also under fueled.

Because of this, and due to the fact that 1.0 is going to kill what's left of the shuttles flight profile, I'm going to build a "lite" version of the shuttle. It will be single winged (unlike the heavy double wing now) and less wing parts overall. I will also try to rework the main tank and SRBs to be more efficient/ more realistic weights. The end product will probably not ge attractive or realistic looking, but it hopefully will work in RSS and regular KSP, just like the real shuttle, as well as be more part count friendly. But this version will still stand as the "replica" just because it is so pretty.

[zekes]

Ok, so the first page has been changed some. It now has a gallery of the best renders and screenshots of the shuttle, and the download link is now a rar file that includes the working STS-Mk 2A, the "pretty" shuttle (AKA no struts, fuel lines, or launch stabilizers), two blender files (one with and without landing gear since they dont seem to fold in), and the high-res images from the gallery.

Also, here is an absolutely amazing render from esinohio of the shuttle on the pad.

An early work up. How does it look? A wide shot of the shuttle being moved with a basic background. For the launch pic I'm going to shamelessly swipe the shot setup that Starwhip setup with the super close up that looks skyward. His eye for shot design is far better than mine.

Edited February 28, 2015 by zekes

[zekes]

Its been six months since this bird last flew, I'm kind of nostalgic.... with the new aero, it's highly broken, but I am almost motivated enough to put the work in to see her fly again. Anyone else?

[Majorjim!]

To be honest mate, the state of the game right now I don't want to go anywhere near anything with over 1300 parts. It will most likely just crash the game.

It's a sorry state of affairs.. I

Would like to see this beast fly again!

Edited July 23, 2015 by Majorjim

[RAINCRAFTER]

I am in support of this. Go zekes!

Also, this post got me to 2 posts per day in my About Me! Yay!

[Frozen_Heart]

Good luck with this!

[Jon144]

Bring on the lag

[RocketscientistV]

Oh dear gosh, I forgot how big that thing is.

[Sampa]

At it again, I see, Zekes! You do fine work!

[zekes]

Thanks everyone, I know it would be lovely to see fly again but I don't know.

First thing to do is to take out every non-essential part to lower lag and drag. That means updates on SRB, Orange tank, and most importantly the orbiter. The orbiter will probably have to lose it's double wing, or at least shave a lot of parts off to lower weight. We also have to deal with the lack of thrust now that the KR-2L is less powerful than before.

All right first part of the rework is done - I took the old Mk1 shuttle and ripped half the wing off, saving some 250 parts, and then I reworked the fuel, wing, and landing gear (I love the new ultra-sized but it's still a bit small).

Not kidding, the glide angle is 30 degrees, and if you go under 20 m/s you end up falling like a brick. Comfortable glide path was found at around 60 m/s with one exiting flare at the end - I dropped it from 200 feet for the test, just landed on grass, it survived rather well. Total weight is still a bit high for what I'd like, but it's way less than the old one, and less part count means the whole package might be sub-1000 parts. We'll see.

Second update: I got the STS together, it's 1100 parts, but it won't launch yet - keeps loading right but blows up the instant I decouple. Probably another hidden coupler somewhere.....

Edited July 24, 2015 by zekes

[zekes]

About to test the Mk IIIA - with any luck we'll get past SRBsep without problem!

[RAINCRAFTER]

Let's hope! #BringHerBack

[zekes]

I had a great test flight! SRB stepping is amazing now that I can turn off pairs of the 12 SRB engines as I go on keys 5-10. It makes ascent so easy I was hands off the SAS. After SRB stage it gets weird due to Thrust imbalance on the Tank and tank fueling issues *blah blah blah no one cares why* but I believe I can fix that pretty easily.

It's actually slightly heavier than the original, but same D/V numbers (on paper) and around 200 less parts. And she's way easier to launch (so far).

[RAINCRAFTER]

Yeah, we can do this! #BringHerBack

[VR_Dev]

As someone who sculpts a lot of craft with the wing parts, I feel like you could make more use of the triangle pieces. The D triangle especially. It allows you to change the shape of the fuselage without having gaps.

You just need to spend some time with the tweak tools and you could smooth the whole thing out.

This is humble constructive criticism. The shuttle has a lot of hard shapes, it isn't easy to replicate. And you know I'm super impressed with what you've got already.

[zekes]

I would like to personally thank squad for making the KR-2Ls LESS Powerful than they allready were - It's the #1 thing that's holding up the shuttle right now, I can't get the TWR over 1 with enough fuel in the orange tank. Grrrrrr.

Edit: Managed to clip another KR-2L into the SSMEs. This will be interesting.

Edited July 25, 2015 by zekes

[RAINCRAFTER]

Hopefully we can get through! #BringHerBack

Spread this hashtag all across the forums!

[Frozen_Heart]

I would like to personally thank squad for making the KR-2Ls LESS Powerful than they allready were - It's the #1 thing that's holding up the shuttle right now, I can't get the TWR over 1 with enough fuel in the orange tank. Grrrrrr.

Edit: Managed to clip another KR-2L into the SSMEs. This will be interesting.

The new part balance is physically painful. :/

[RAINCRAFTER]

#BringHerBack

Do it! Do it!

[zekes]

I've gotten it to the point where it might fly, I have no idea though, and with my schedule I don't have the time or patience to complete the hour-long tests to get up to the upper atmo. If you guys want to be my testing group I can release the download and you guys see if you can get it to orbit. It's much easier to fly now but everything after SRB drop is still untested.

[RAINCRAFTER]

Ok, let's do that. I'm going to be the first tester other than you. #BringHerBack

[zekes]

Allright, here it is: https://www./?addxtkojyd80ay9

"2" to toggle OMS engines

"3" to toggle 3 of the SSMEs

"4" to toggle 1 of the SSMEs (the top one of the second pair I think)

"5-0" to toggle 1 each SRB engine. This is used to control shifts in ascent - if the ship begins pitching down, turn more SRBs on and SSMEs off, if it goes up (twoards orbiter) turn off some SRBs to maintain.

It's a pretty easy system to use but I am having problems with after SRBsep - the SSMEs just don't seem to carry the weight. I added 3 more but IDK if their thrust is aligned or if they are powerful enough. I call upon you guys to figure out what's wrong and how to fix it/get it to orbit.

If you manage to get it to orbit, I'll make you a special badge, for it is a great honor to get a 2400 ton space shuttle into LKO! And you will have made it functional, something it has not been in 6 months.

Ascent is a peach now, just set SAS on up, rotate the orbiter to be side-down when the gravity turn comes, and watch the pitch guage to see which engines need to be on/off.

Thanks guys! Godspeed to your computers, they'll need it!

Zekes

[RAINCRAFTER]

Good. I will report back when I can.

[RAINCRAFTER]

Well... I have only made one flight, and the shuttle crashed. The only one giving strong results here is my laptop; it is reporting back at a "steady" 3-5 FPS!

- - - Updated - - -

Actually, the shuttle didn't crash on that flight, but it was inevitable. I've also made two other flights and they both exploded mid-air.

- - - Updated - - -

Okay... well this is how my most recent test went:

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That's four on the counter. That said, I really suck as a pilot. Got to keep trying! #BringHerBack