STS-7/E Space Shuttle (Stock NASA Replica) Still Flies in KSP 1.4.3 - Re-enters Like the Real Thing!

[inigma]

So, with the 1.0.5 update, and the new SSME, what are your plans for the STS?

I want to rebuild, but keep my signature wings as I still hate the mk3 wings and how they clip into the bay no matter how one attempts to slice it. I LIKE CLEAN BAYS . I'll find out more when I get home and put the kids to bed tonight. I will not release a shuttle unless it can lift the STS Fuel Pod to orbit (42 tons) 120km preferred. I'm actually more focused on at the moment on developing these:

my first real modding venture: contracts! I was always bummed this game does not have a contract to regularly fly passengers to KSC Island and other destinations for grindable profit. So I see a need, and fill it. Still alpha, but it works. Currently this contract shows up perpetually, as desired, so I can make multiple runs for few credits and modest science, which I consider fair reward for flying the time and sweatin' the landings, especially when landing one of these: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/104212-90-Inigma-s-I-80-Mk-III-Jet-%2884-Kerbals%29-Now-also-a-Space-Shuttle-Carrier%21-A-KSP-FIRST%21-VIDEO

Edited November 10, 2015 by inigma

[Jon144]

My shuttle was broken by the update. I hope yours wasn't too.

[Jackvony]

I want to rebuild, but keep my signature wings as I still hate the mk3 wings and how they clip into the bay no matter how one attempts to slice it. I LIKE CLEAN BAYS . I'll find out more when I get home and put the kids to bed tonight.

Wait you have kids!?!?!?

Geez no wonder I'm the only 14 year old I know playing ksp! All you guys are old lol!

[ExplorerKlatt]

Wait you have kids!?!?!?

Geez no wonder I'm the only 14 year old I know playing ksp! All you guys are old lol!

Hey! Not old, just older.

Anyways, I will give it a test run in a few minutes and let you know if it'll still fly.

[Bubbadevlin]

Well I personally am a teenager too, so no your not the only kid playin ksp

Edited November 10, 2015 by Bubbadevlin

[clivman]

Wait you have kids!?!?!?

Geez no wonder I'm the only 14 year old I know playing ksp! All you guys are old lol!

We're not supposed to say our age on the forums....But I'll just say I'm not that much older than you, and there are more teenagers here than you would expect

[Sampa]

I will hold over using the shuttle in my youtube series until the rebuild.

[Jackvony]

We're not supposed to say our age on the forums....But I'll just say I'm not that much older than you, and there are more teenagers here than you would expect

Oh whoops. Well I'm glad to see my age group is well represented.

[Sampa]

It really does not matter what age you are! in this game, we are all kids at heart!

[inigma]

And WE HAVE LIFTOFF!! STS-7E flies just fine with the 1.0.5 update. Made it to 200km circ orbit with STS Fuel Pod 42 tons in the bay. Deployed.

I think my reentry though was a wee bit shallow. Lost the orbiter during reentry over the mountains, and rained down debris over KSC. Beautiful. I'll have to practice a better landing profile. Maybe one that is not so steep (I retro burned less than 1/4 away from KSC).

Edit: I have great respect now for upper atmosphere heating. New landing profile: reto burn 1/2 orbit away until periap marker 40km above KSC, when entering atmos go ahead and pitch up 33 degrees (hey, like the real thing man!) and watch your plasma trail all the way from the asia like landmass, all the way across the ocean to the africa landmass. Man that's a long fireball... again, just like the real thing. 30-35 degrees all the way. The upper atmos aero is really improved, and makes pitching this shuttle up a breeze like the real thing. AWESOME!! I survived, but mistimed my retro and landed at the alternate landing field in the south of the africa landmass.

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Oh, and I'm a few years behind Scott Manley. Maybe by a decade.

Edited November 10, 2015 by inigma

[inigma]

After a successful flight lifting the STS Fuel Pod (depot) to 240km orbit, and return to Kerbin firma without a scratch, STS-7E (and I assume 7 as well) is now certified for KSP 1.0.5. No rebuild was necessary. Man I love this thing. She re-enters the atmosphere now like the real thing: 33 degree pitch all the way in.

Good news is, no more heat bug on launch. I'm uploading a new KerbalX file now.

Edited November 10, 2015 by inigma

[clivman]

After a successful flight lifting the STS Fuel Pod (depot) to 240km orbit, and return to Kerbin firma without a scratch, STS-7E (and I assume 7 as well) is now certified for KSP 1.0.5. No rebuild was necessary. Man I love this thing. She re-enters the atmosphere now like the real thing: 33 degree pitch all the way in.

Good news is, no more heat bug on launch. I'm uploading a new KerbalX file now.

Awesome! Can't wait to try it out!

[mythic_fci]

I've replaced the Skippers with Vectors, and oh man do they work well. The payload capacity isn't substantially increased, but the maneuverability in the solid-fuel version is improved twofold.

[inigma]

I've replaced the Skippers with Vectors, and oh man do they work well. The payload capacity isn't substantially increased, but the maneuverability in the solid-fuel version is improved twofold.

I'm tellin' ya, I'm getting the itch to work on a rebuild... I haven't played with the new vectors yet. For now, the STS-7/E engines I can tell are really straining to lift the orbiter. I've not been able to reach the 400km height I did in 1.0.4 and only seem to reach a little over half of that height now. I really want to play with the vectors though to see how many expensive ET SAS modules I can remove. If I can, it just might make flying the shuttle profitable in career... and if not, I will find a way to make it so by writing my own Contract Pack for Contract Configurator. Maybe call it Inigmas-STS-Pack or something.

Since I love the solids so much, and they are something I am most proud of in developing, I think I will only release STS versions that only sports solids going forward.

Edited November 10, 2015 by inigma

[trooperMNG]

I'm tellin' ya, I'm getting the itch to work on a rebuild... I haven't played with the new vectors yet. For now, the STS-7/E engines I can tell are really straining to lift the orbiter. I've not been able to reach the 400km height I did in 1.0.4 and only seem to reach a little over half of that height now. I really want to play with the vectors though to see how many expensive ET SAS modules I can remove. If I can, it just might make flying the shuttle profitable in career... and if not, I will find a way to make it so by writing my own Contract Pack for Contract Configurator. Maybe call it Inigmas-STS-Pack or something.

Since I love the solids so much, and they are something I am most proud of in developing, I think I will only release STS versions that only sports solids going forward.

If you're going for a redesign, think about stock mk3 parts (wings, tail). They would drop down the part count and make the craft look awesome!

[inigma]

If you're going for a redesign, think about stock mk3 parts (wings, tail). They would drop down the part count and make the craft look awesome!

I would if they would still look good mounted to the mk3 cargo bay. Currently anyone using the mk3 wings for their shuttles has a bay with their clipped wings showing which for the mk3 wings looks weird. I like clean bays.

[mythic_fci]

I'm tellin' ya, I'm getting the itch to work on a rebuild... I haven't played with the new vectors yet. For now, the STS-7/E engines I can tell are really straining to lift the orbiter. I've not been able to reach the 400km height I did in 1.0.4 and only seem to reach a little over half of that height now. I really want to play with the vectors though to see how many expensive ET SAS modules I can remove. If I can, it just might make flying the shuttle profitable in career... and if not, I will find a way to make it so by writing my own Contract Pack for Contract Configurator. Maybe call it Inigmas-STS-Pack or something.

Since I love the solids so much, and they are something I am most proud of in developing, I think I will only release STS versions that only sports solids going forward.

Interesting... I've done some tests, and with my experimental STS-7E2 (only change is replacing the Skippers with Vectors), I can reach a max of 300km; theoretically, if some OMS fuel is used, it might be possible to get 320km. Reentry might be a little hairy though, considering that there would be very little RCS fuel left for attitude control. I'll see what I can do and report back.

Edited November 11, 2015 by FCISuperGuy

[inigma]

Interesting... I've done some tests, and with my experimental STS-7E2 (only change is replacing the Skippers with Vectors), I can reach a max of 300km; theoretically, if some OMS fuel is used, it might be possible to get 320km. Reentry might be a little hairy though, considering that there would be very little RCS fuel left for attitude control. I'll see what I can do and report back.

Thanks for testing. Last night I worked on releasing my first ever mod: a contact pack for airplanes. In the midst of my learning the ropes, I had this crazy idea to create a contract that would require a player to fly to the island and pick up astronauts spawned on the airfield, and fly them to KSC, load them in the STS Astrovan, require that they be driven to the Astronaut Complex, and on to the launchpad, and load up and fly a spawned and waiting STS Space Shuttle to deploy the fuel pod and come back safely. I tested spawning the STS on the island to hillarious results. More testing will be required until I can get the massively complex STS to spawn correctly. If so I might require a mission to ferry astronauts to KSC2 and launch from there. We'll see.

Go check out what I have so far:

SSI Aerospace Contract Pack

Edited November 11, 2015 by inigma

[Araym]

I'm tellin' ya, I'm getting the itch to work on a rebuild... I haven't played with the new vectors yet. For now, the STS-7/E engines I can tell are really straining to lift the orbiter. I've not been able to reach the 400km height I did in 1.0.4 and only seem to reach a little over half of that height now. I really want to play with the vectors though to see how many expensive ET SAS modules I can remove. If I can, it just might make flying the shuttle profitable in career... and if not, I will find a way to make it so by writing my own Contract Pack for Contract Configurator. Maybe call it Inigmas-STS-Pack or something.

Since I love the solids so much, and they are something I am most proud of in developing, I think I will only release STS versions that only sports solids going forward.

You know, Ingma, that I work "on par" with your shuttles, so... my 2 cents:

- My own shuttle it is working perfectly as it was in 1.0.4, using Skipper engines as Orbiter engine. I had to rework the external fuel lines on the central tank, caused by the new pilon model, but it was a marginal change not changing a thing (and removed their decoupler ability, to avoid problem with staging)

- I tested the new SSMEs (and the related engine mount): they are far more powerful than needed, with marginal differences in payload capability (this is related, now, to the cargobay dimension: we squeezed the max, with a single, long, cargobay, at 42t) or range. I found myself more successful once I lowered the SSME thrust at Skipper level (1 Skipper = (rougly) 65% SSME thrust) to be balanced with the SRBs stack (mine were built very likely as your solids assemble, at 80% limited thrust) to mantain the 3xengine Orbiter look.

I found the engine mount a bit difficoult to be balanced, now, if used with the 3 nodes available, just to keep simmetry working (and to not tweak any engine one by one) but I did a workaround about it: the upper one added on the upper node, and tweaked as single, then the lower 2 added as surface mounted on the engine mount, in "mirror mode", to change on both the inclination)

PROs: The look of the orbiter improves a lot: it seems a LOT MORE like the NASA shuttle. (SSME's flame is VERY LIKELY the real one *_* I like it)

CONs: if the SSME engine mount used AFTER the two mk3 monoprop tanks, the Shuttle's fuselage seems too long. I'm not sure if clipping it "inside" the rear monoprop tank, to leave it show just barelly from the rear.

I then having some issues on the SRBs separation moment: with the low gimbal Skipper, as soon SRBs are depleted (but also with my liquid booster version), the orbiter+ tank push more vertical, helping with its momentum to "launch away" the spent SRBs...

... BUT the SSME high gimbal rate keep the orbiter+tank a LOT more flat, orizzontal, trajectory: this always means SRBs to hit the wings (I copied your SRB's sepatrons configuration, up until now) even if adding to sepatrons more thrust. Probably are needed some more sepatrons, to the booster's base, pushing "away" from the orbiter.

--- further reports will be added as more tests will be done ---

Edited November 12, 2015 by Araym

[mythic_fci]

I HIGHLY recommend a redesign. My tests with a modified STS-7E with Vectors, a reworked ET, and slightly modified SRB skirts (only cosmetic) get the Fuel Pod to 350km, and my own prototype shuttle (100% made by myself; ET and SRBs based on yours) can reach 512km with a quick OMS boost after ET-sep.

[inigma]

I HIGHLY recommend a redesign. My tests with a modified STS-7E with Vectors, a reworked ET, and slightly modified SRB skirts (only cosmetic) get the Fuel Pod to 350km, and my own prototype shuttle (100% made by myself; ET and SRBs based on yours) can reach 512km with a quick OMS boost after ET-sep.

Good job! My ET fuel flow discovery (painstaking it was to figure out the game mechanics of how it works), SRBs and my shuttle's wings are my most proud achievements. Mostly everything else I learned from others, Naito and Westi were the most influential. I love it when people use them and expand on them!

I will aim to do a rebuild sometime around Thanksgiving vacation. Right now I'm furiously working on developing my contract pack to really be one of the first out there for early career airplanes, helicopters, ships, and submarines - even being the first to provide a contract that actually uses a space shuttle as its story.

Edited November 12, 2015 by inigma

[Naito]

Right now I'm furiously working on developing my contract pack to really be one of the first out there for early career airplanes, helicopters, ships, and submarines - even being the first to provide a contract that actually uses a space shuttle as its story.

WAY COOL! =) let me know if there's anything I can help with!

[mythic_fci]

Yes. A mission to recover all kerbals onboard the damaged shuttle, either fly it home safely or send up a rescue or repair mission.

Very nice! I fully support this project, and will definitely download it once it's done.

[NoSyMe]

Took me quite a few attempts and landing is still a struggle (I'm either overshooting or undershooting by a few kilometers), but I finally managed it.

It's a great feeling landing a Space Shuttle

[Third_OfFive]

Hi guys, I'm back! And I've got a new spinoff shuttle for you, complete with the new shuttle engines and other parts that were added in 1.0.5.

In terms of functionality, not much has changed, although I have removed the parachutes from the external fuel tank since my last post. (Come to think of it, however, recovering the external tank might actually be possible now, due to the new water mechanics in 1.0.5. Hmm... I'll think about it.)

Anyway, here's the demo flight.

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Here's the download link:

http://kerbalx.com/ThirdOfFive/Kerbal-Space-Shuttle-105-Enterprise

Enjoy

Edited November 15, 2015 by Third_OfFive