FAR from impossible - making things fly, when they shouldn't [Finished! Now with pics]

[RobotsAndSpaceships]

Edit:

http://imgur.com/a/sBiN0

I noticed that having more than one stage can be something not that bad, so I will fix that rule.

This one only stays in control thanks to OP reaction wheels.

[tetryds]

This one only stays in control thanks to OP reaction wheels.

Not really, the craft is too heavy, it just added drag and prevented me from adding more surfaces.

They help a lot at stalls, but are useless at high speeds.

The original craft already had it though.

Good news, I will have access to a pc tomorrow and will be able to take the pictures (maybe even record!).

[sal_vager]

You know, I thought "Stupid is..." would be the hardest to make fly, at least without sticking something on those exposed nodes.

[Roflcopterkklol]

Do these, i can make a plane fly great in the stock aero, i cant really make one fly at all with FAR though.

If you do manage to fix em id love to see how for future reference in 1.0 when i am building planes

Would be good to have a set of these that are FAR compatible to put up for download in the meantime considering these three have been downloaded over 1000 times between them, i am sure people who do not use the stock aero would like to download them also.

http://www./download/kzxsdkb3tkasa16/Sr-71+white+bird.craft

http://www./download/krai8x2hcbmfwbr/SR-72+White+bird.craft

http://www./download/50eg7zxadhp7xxj/B-2+Spirit+bomber+mk2.craft

Edited February 15, 2015 by Roflcopterkklol

[tetryds]

Pics added! Finally!

@sal_vager: I also thought it would be harder than what it really was, and it ended up flying quite well.

Just keep your AoA low unless you plan to backflip, which you can easily recover from anyway.

@Roflcopterkklol: I don't think I can do that for you right now, will see if I can.

It wouldn't be too hard though, it's very likely that all of them already takeoff and you just need to tweak stability.

FAR doesn't like hulls made out of wings, but who cares? Boatatron clearly doesn't.

[Roflcopterkklol]

Pics added! Finally!

@sal_vager: I also thought it would be harder than what it really was, and it ended up flying quite well.

Just keep your AoA low unless you plan to backflip, which you can easily recover from anyway.

@Roflcopterkklol: I don't think I can do that for you right now, will see if I can.

It wouldn't be too hard though, it's very likely that all of them already takeoff and you just need to tweak stability.

FAR doesn't like hulls made out of wings, but who cares? Boatatron clearly doesn't.

It is more they all hardly fly with FAR, all of them are uncontrollable, stall incredibly easy and do not get the desired performance (the SR72 can do 8600kmh in stock aero for an example as well as being very maneuverable at low altitude, doesnt leave the runway with FAR on.)

Be nice if they could fly without SAS in FAR aero while still being able to perform at least near what they can do in the stock aero. (they do all have clipped parts to make them fly in stock aero btw)

[regex]

@sal_vager: I also thought it would be harder than what it really was, and it ended up flying quite well.

Just keep your AoA low unless you plan to backflip, which you can easily recover from anyway.

I suspect this is partly due to the TWR of the craft. Anyway, surprising to me, too, but your changes still serve to illustrate, to me at least, just how bad stock aero really is.

[sal_vager]

Hmm it looks to me that stock planes don't need much changed to at least fly badly in FAR, and yours still takes off so they can't be that dissimilar

[tetryds]

Ok, so before people start throwing knives at each other here let me just make some things very clear.

First of all, the changes on the crafts were not minor, on any of them, I just gave my best on making sure they are visually minor.

So, from the looks it will seem that they are pretty much the same, or at least obvious derivates from the original crafts, with a few different bits, but the pre and post FAR versions are substantially different.

Another thing to point out is, as I said on my post asking for pics, that these crafts are no piece of cake to pilot, especially both RICs' and regex', you need to really know what you are doing to tame them.

After tamed, like any other unstable craft, they can pull some pretty wild loops and tricks, but you still need to know how to regain control after that.

So, my point here, as stated on the OP, is to show that very wild designs can fly on FAR, the most realistic aerodynamics model we have to date on KSP.

Having them to fly on stock was a mere point to base the crafts off, serving as a very forgiving model where very wild crafts can still work, sort of "the worst it can get".

Most of the rules were meant to avoid abuses, but the entries were surprisingly reasonable, the next version of this challenge will not have nearly as many rules or limitations.

*how I got regex' craft to work will be on the notes I am adding soon.*

I recommend for anyone wanting to compare the two models to try both versions of every craft with and without FAR.

So, this done, I have proven my point, sorry for not achieving the other awesome ways I could have done for the release of the crafts.

But this was just too fun to stop here, can't wait to fly some dragons, and a flying asteroid.

My plans so far are to keep a continuously running version of this challenge, accepting both good and insane crafts.

Roflcopterkklol made a very good point there, people need to have a reference on what they will have to change to get their designs working on 1.0 or even on FAR.

@Roflcopterkklol: I am working on your SR-71 Whitebird, I can get it to fly well, but I make changes, not magic, can't promisse anything about its subsonic flight characteristics.

Also, you should start by not clipping control surfaces that much, haha.

[Red Iron Crown]

tetryds, do you think it's possible to make my entry fly with its full fuel load? It's impressive that you got it to fly at all in FAR, but I'm wondering how you would approach adding enough lift to get a heavier version to fly when there's so little lateral area to attach wings. Not asking you to do it necessarily as you have other craft to tackle, just wondering what your strategy would be.

Also, if you open this to another round of entries, can people who entered the first round enter again?

[tetryds]

tetryds, do you think it's possible to make my entry fly with its full fuel load? It's impressive that you got it to fly at all in FAR, but I'm wondering how you would approach adding enough lift to get a heavier version to fly when there's so little lateral area to attach wings. Not asking you to do it necessarily as you have other craft to tackle, just wondering what your strategy would be.

Also, if you open this to another round of entries, can people who entered the first round enter again?

Well, it will get really, really ugly, but since you asked so politely, sure.

I just need to add more wings (no biplanes, ugh).

But will also need to add some other stuff, lets see.

About entering on the next round, if I make it a constantly open challenge you will be able to submit as many crafts as you want, given a certain ammount of time between them, and given I finished your previous one, that is what I have in mind.

If someone wants to also try it out you are welcome.

@Roflcopterkklol: as I am fixing your craft its slowly turning into a SR-71 replica (next step would be adding chines), so better stop now as it already flies well.

Download: https://www.dropbox.com/s/02nr8vjnd4rgk8u/Sr-71%20white%20bird%20FAR.craft?dl=0

Have fun.

[Roflcopterkklol]

Well, it will get really, really ugly, but since you asked so politely, sure.

I just need to add more wings (no biplanes, ugh).

But will also need to add some other stuff, lets see.

About entering on the next round, if I make it a constantly open challenge you will be able to submit as many crafts as you want, given a certain ammount of time between them, and given I finished your previous one, that is what I have in mind.

If someone wants to also try it out you are welcome.

@Roflcopterkklol: as I am fixing your craft its slowly turning into a SR-71 replica (next step would be adding chines), so better stop now as it already flies well.

http://i.imgur.com/uEWimNf.png

Download: https://www.dropbox.com/s/02nr8vjnd4rgk8u/Sr-71%20white%20bird%20FAR.craft?dl=0

Have fun.

Neato i will try it out this afternoon

[Nemrav]

okay, Il edit this post when I get my next lunatic concept off the ground in stock

But only when the new rules are stated... Maybe specific types of aircraft such as rotor / vtol / dragon / triplane / biplane / physicsless part plane....

[tetryds]

...physicsless part plane....

No, please don't D:

This challenge is currently over, I will make a new topic for the next part once I have my own pc back, but you can continue posting your crafts here and I may make them work on FAR

[cantab]

I just need to add more wings (no biplanes, ugh).

For what it's worth, I've done a biplane in FAR. Flies very well too, though it's a strictly subsonic thing not a Mach 3 spyplane!

[Aerolfos]

Aww the vertical takeoff killed one of my EVIL ideas!

But do not despair, I had another one! This will be FUN! (For me building it... making it work in FAR... <Insert Evil Laughter>)

[Aerolfos]

I did it. It "flies", AKA stays off the ground for several minutes, does not horribly explode and does not crash. Now landing, who said anything about landing? I did land it, but decoupled some parts so dunno if valid. This is too awesome to pass up...

I present to you the Pod Racer. Have Fun. Lots of it.

Javascript is disabled. View full album

Flew this with keyboard for takeoff, then switched to my gamepad in the air. Sorry for really, really messing up the controls on this but I don't feel like messing with this. It "flies", that's what matters. To me anyway.

So if you can't do anything but make this "fly" in FAR, perfectly OK with me. No level flight needed.

I can make a video too if you really want.

Craft file:

http://wikifoundryattachments.com/3cO1RekRspbK3L-HHrnpMw109978

Edited February 18, 2015 by Aerolfos

[tetryds]

No need for a video, I trust you.

That thing is awesome, no worries it will fly.

Heck I may even put more time on it and (try to) land.

Edited February 18, 2015 by tetryds

[Red Iron Crown]

There are also super secret rewards, which I will only talk about once the submissions are closed.

The suspense is killing me here.

[tetryds]

The suspense is killing me here.

Sorry, I need a hype backup, this will have to wait.

[Aerolfos]

No need for a video, I trust you.

That thing is awesome, no worries it will fly.

Heck I may even put more time on it and (try to) land.

Well... it flies quite differently to what one might think.

Woo.

Its easy if you just glide by decoupling the parts, basically lands itself.

If you dont, a little harder!

[jake9039]

I think I will do this when I get home. my idea: a bunch of orange tanks. so many,in fact, it is an orange cube.tank. all flow into center. nosecones,m.k.3 parts, a bunch of jet engines, 4 delta wings

[Aerolfos]

I think I will do this when I get home. my idea: a bunch of orange tanks. so many,in fact, it is an orange cube.tank. all flow into center. nosecones,m.k.3 parts, a bunch of jet engines, 4 delta wings

This gave me an idea. TOo bad we dont have B9 eh... the flying Borg Cube would be glorious indeed.

[Superfluous J]

I've had a bit of an Astro-Glider setback. It turns out it's harder to make a flyable jet plane out of an asteroid than I thought. And in spite of my first success with the glider I actually thought it'd be pretty hard.

However I have an idea for a different setup, so here's hoping!

[tetryds]

I've had a bit of an Astro-Glider setback. It turns out it's harder to make a flyable jet plane out of an asteroid than I thought. And in spite of my first success with the glider I actually thought it'd be pretty hard.

However I have an idea for a different setup, so here's hoping!

But you don't need to make it fly, I do, lol.

Aerolfos, the challenge is for planes which do NOT fly on FAR

I am tweaking it anyway, its cool (I tend to fully overhaul planes which already fly).

Ah, I also finished Red5's plane, as requested now with the full fuel tank:

Download: https://www.dropbox.com/s/3n440qbg4dmdso3/FarFromLikely%20PLUS%20-%20RedIronCrown%20FAR.craft?dl=0

Edited February 20, 2015 by tetryds