SSTO Laythe Interceptor

[Stargate525]

Just a little thing I threw together that I thought I'd show off, since I'm rather proud of it.

I needed a Laythe lander/launcher capable of ferrying my scientific equipment from the mothership down to the planet, taking the readings, and then flying back up. I haven't really dabbled in aircraft much beyond 'see what weirdness I can crash into the control tower,' so I figured that this would be a good time to make a new SSTO. The name is rather hopeful; as of this writing it hasn't seen Laythe. On Kerbin, however, it is able to reach a 100x100 orbit with fuel to spare, so I'm hoping that will be more than enough for a round trip down to Laythe and back. Hopefully two.

Here she is in space. Note the enclosed cargo bay filled with scientific equipment (This could, I'm certain, be swapped out for a satellite or small station payload), as well as the parachutes. I know Laythe's atmosphere is thinner than Kerbin's so I'm worried about potentially coming in too steeply in the landing glide. Those are emergency parachutes to avoid a catastrophic landing lithobraking scenario.

And coming in over the KSC. I began my insertion too early, and was coming in over the desert on the western continent. The Interceptor had enough fuel to fly to KSC and then some. Handling in atmosphere is strange. It's a very floaty aircraft, and despite having the proper CoL and CoM had a tendency to want to nose up on takeoff. When coming in for the landing I was able to stall the craft easily; I suspect that I might have too many control surfaces, but I'm not sure. Anyone with insight, please enlighten me!

Craft file, for those interested: Here (note, I changed the ladder placement in the final version)