Korolev Cross

[Skylab]

Does anyone know how to stage a Korolev cross? I'm not sure how to place and angle the sepratrons in the right way.

Edited January 3, 2015 by Skylab

[Pecan]

Amusingly enough, when I looked up 'Korolev cross' on google, several of the pictures are from KSP.

It's a single-stage, dropping the four boosters at the same time. Just position the separatrons to push the top of them away.

[Greep]

If you're using s1-srbs, position a single pair of separatrons shooting outward on the highest dark grey mark (so about 1/4 of the way down). I had to do this because they tipped inward without separatrons, but tipping outward made them look cool without killing my rocket. If it kills your rocket because it tips too far, I think any point above the radial decoupler should work, so just go lower.

Edit: Or have your rocket held up by the srbs rather than the liquid fuel engine.

Edited January 2, 2015 by Greep

[WuphonsReach]

If your radial SRBs are tipping inward, try moving them downward on the radial decouplers. If they are tipping outwards, try moving them upwards on the radial decouplers.

Once you have them adjusted to the limits of the mounting points on the decouplers, add a pair of Separatrons above the decoupler to deal with inward tipping. You may also want to mount a pair of Separatrons below the decoupler to deal with too much outward tipping.

At the start, I'll mount the Seps at the very top of the SRB because inward tipping is more hazardous then outward tipping. The bottom Seps will be mounted about halfway between the radial decoupler and the bottom of the SRB.

[MarvinKitFox]

And always remember the option of slinging them outwards by rotating your ship while staging.

Centrifugal effect is stronger than most seperatron setups, and has a mass penalty of exactly zero.

[zekes]

Yeah, i have an almost-Korolev, it could be but it's more fuel efficient to drop the boosters about 10 seconds later. Still petty awesome. Put your seperator motors angling up and out, so it lifts them away from one another and out of the ship's exhaust.

[Signo]

Hi, I made one just yesterday and the sepratrons angle really depends more on what the sepratrons will fire on. I incinerated the central tank a couple of times before finding the good angle.

[Skylab]

Okay, now I understand how to do it. Thanks, guys

[Slam_Jones]

Make sure when you try it, to adjust the amount of solid fuel in the sepratrons. If you have too much, the boosters will roatate all the way down, rather than making the cross and staying that way.

Also, I've had issues with the seperatrons actually destroying the rest of my rocket by overheating them on the way down. Adjusting the solid fuel to a quick burst reduces this risk a huge amount.

[Skorpychan]

Semi-related, found this while googling for it: http://www.astronautix.com/articles/theghoax.htm

About the soviet attempts at a moon landing, that were covered up.

[PPR]

Something to remember about booster rockets is the center of mass is not always where you'd think. For liquid-fueled boosters, remember that the booster will be empty when you stage and the engine is the heaviest part, so the center of mass will be low, near the engine. So the sepratrons need to be low (just above the center of mass for the booster). You get into trouble when you place the sepratrons near the center of the booster, far above the center mass, so that the boosters rotate outwards too quickly, causing the booster engines to collide with the main engine and explode.

Solid boosters have a different distribution of mass. The center of mass is more near the center of the rocket.

The best way to figure this out is to construct the booster by itself and tweak all the fuel out of it. This way you can find the center of mass when it is empty, as it would be when you stage it.