Reddit and its partners use cookies and similar technologies to provide you with a better experience. Any advices for building a vehicle for this task? Since gravity is effectively lower, they don't need as much wing area to maintain altitude-- which, in turn, means less drag, which makes for more efficient flight. It has two modes: The first, Dry mode, is similar to that of the J-33 "Wheesley" Basic Jet Engine, with a bit more thrust. Your link has been automatically embedded. Cheers again fellas. That would argue for going as high as possible, as slow as possible, but apart from drag you also have to fight gravity. Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible. Another problem is jet engines stealing fuel from the rockets' tanks - you may want to pump the fuel manually (requires an R&D centre upgrade) or add some pipes between them. Build a plane or rocket for Kerbal high altitudes, We've added a "Necessary cookies only" option to the cookie consent popup, Screenshot of the Week #85 [Submissions Closed - Vote Now!]. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. Kerbal Space Program 2 . Dedicated to the growth and advancement of amateur rocket scientists! A little while back I spent a long time trying to circumnavigate Kerbin on the least liquid fuel possible (i posted the record to the sub: 254 units of fuel. EDIT: Didn't notice you were using FAR. Minimising the environmental effects of my dyson brain, Theoretically Correct vs Practical Notation. Upload or insert images from URL. As said above, the Wheesley is specifically designed as a low altitude engine. at the very least, you'd need the panther, that'll get you over 16k easily, well to 25k. Pasted as rich text. Ok, the panther engine is still not good enough. Download (104.45 MiB) License: CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 Game Version: 1.8.1 Downloads: 371,115 Author: blackheart612 Mod Website: Forum Thread Support this mod: Donate Followers: 626 Outdated Mod This mod is not known to work with the latest version of Kerbal Space Program. The most obvious solution is try and optimize your craft for high altitude lift by giving it long wingspan like a U-2 spyplane. How can this new ban on drag possibly be considered constitutional? "Whiplash" Turbojet. its rather flat but its a solid surface. Why do many companies reject expired SSL certificates as bugs in bug bounties? Powered by Invision Community. Either of the two speeds are to be avoided. 3.) If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account. Strictly speaking this optimisation is unnecessary, but it can win you a bit of range. Another approach, which I was managing with some success before I figured out jets, is to build a rocket and catapult yourself towards the measurement point. You can post now and register later. Even up there the plane acts squirrely. 2022 Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. By climbing, you reduce drag, exponentially with altitude. Rationale: If that's all a case of Too Many Words, think of it this way: Suppose you just build a plane the "default" way and don't put any AoA at all on the wings. Each stage of the rocket has a delta-v that depends on the stage fuel mass and the engine specific impulse. Don't worry about Isp. Browse other questions tagged, Start here for a quick overview of the site, Detailed answers to any questions you might have, Discuss the workings and policies of this site. This thread is quite old. Clear editor. Pasted as rich text. Trying to do something without the right part is long and difficult path. If drag were the only concern, at any given altitude the slower you go, the less fuel you need: the work done by drag over a distance grows linearly with speed (the force grows quadratically with speed, but the time falls linearly). That annoys me but I can't seem to get a design to make it work. To subscribe to this RSS feed, copy and paste this URL into your RSS reader. FAR is supposed to take aspect into account, but I'm not very experienced with it and cannot advice you as to how it works. 2022 Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. edited 6 yr. ago. In this case lots of fuel is the wrong approach, I can get more than half way around Kerbin on 2 cans of Jet Fuel and a turbojet if I glide most of it. At 3500m, you have half the drag you'd have at the surface; at 7km, 1/4 the drag, at 10.5km, 1/8 the drag, etc. If too little air runs into the turbine your combustion chamber will not be able to burn up fuel effectively due to the lack of oxygen. I'd almost expect it to work better in stock since infini-gliders can be done. In KSP2, you are a rocket scientist who must build and test rockets, spaceships, and planes. If you enter the Mun's SOI, it immediately counts as "In Space High over Mun" until you get below 60km Mun altitude. Unfortunately I won't be able to test it today, but @SaintWacko's proposal sounds promising. as a rule of thumb they all lose thrust at higher altitudes and at high velocities. Is there a single-word adjective for "having exceptionally strong moral principles"? Not only does it conk out at high altitudes, but also it conks out at high speeds, and you need to be able to go fast to fly up high. Alternatively, you can assign the afterburner toggle (labelled "switch mode") to an action group if you wish to activate it with a hotkey. Once it's in the air, it's stable and easy to fly and manages to fly at altitudes between 11k 12k without problems. That's just a guess, though-- perhaps someone more familiar with FAR could weigh in.). In the main KSP settings menu you should set the default throttle to 1.0 (technically the above mechjeb setting winds up restoring the default throttle, so it needs to be 1.0) In the attitude adjustment menu make sure you are using the "better controller" Whack the 45 degree phase margin button Whack the restore all other defaults button Its an approximation missing someelements. So Pvt. I didn't succeed with his design, though; I always ended up having somehow unstable airplanes. That will probably allow you to fly comfortably above 20-25km (or higher, depending on the overall mass of your aircraft). What altitude and speed should I go? Also, jets eat fuel at pounds-per-minute -- if you cover twice as much ground in the same time, your plane will be more efficient. probably the easiest place to land in the system as terminal velocity is survivable for a craft less kerman. The flight time won't be as long, but you'll be able to fly a "plane" above 18km. Clear editor. Information Changelog Stats Kerbal Space Program Jool Landing Youtube. Redoing the align environment with a specific formatting, Trying to understand how to get this basic Fourier Series. Be aware that heat buildup can gradually become a problem when the afterburners are used in sustained flight. Privacy Policy. The most efficient way is, of course, to make a high altitude (or space) plane. When added to a plane it allows tuning of the controls vs speed/altitude/G load/other factors. I've since shaved that down more but that was by going even higher and even faster). There is a very close tolerance to the two speeds. The benefits should be obvious. Only the fuel tanks attached to rockets have any oxidiser in them. Kerbal Space Program ( KSP) is a space flight simulation video game developed by Mexican developer Squad for Linux, OS X, Windows, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One. Stack Exchange network consists of 181 Q&A communities including Stack Overflow, the largest, most trusted online community for developers to learn, share their knowledge, and build their careers. I tried building a plane but can't climb higher than about 11,000m (I don't have many plane parts yet, though). I followed a similar strategy. Either finish the low-altitudes and then spend all your fuel on the high-altitude boost, or do the boost first and save a little fuel or try to hit the rest through unpowered gliding. Delta-V is the velocity change necessary to perform orbital maneuvers. At altitude the nose goes up and down until it goes out of control. You will find that when you're flying around, will always be slightly below the crosshairs on the navball. The Rapier, for example, works great as a high-altitude engine, precisely because it can go so fast. Use the reaction wheel to hold your attitude slightly nose down as you float down and you can guide yourself like a paraglider. Powered by Invision Community, Thanks, I'll go try to stuff a few extra turbojets and intakes on my plane, I was generally under the impression that basic jets were mostly deadweight on high-performance aircraft: [] at hypersonic velocities. Paste as plain text instead, As high and fast as you can go without engine flameout: preferably ~2000 m/s at 25-30 km (and yes, that's almost orbital velocity). With some fins to keep you stable and careful aim, you can hit your desired location and altitude and will have 5-10 seconds to collect data before you hurtle past it and pull your chute. Hello there. Pretty often, the tail "wiggled" and/or the plane became totally unstable when I fired the rocket boosters. First off as of .15.1 intakes don't do anything. At this point the plane plummets, but as it goes deeper into the atmosphere, it regains pitch authority, and at 10km it's enough to regain control and turn it around for a safe landing. Sideslip handling. Air temperatures vary with latitude and time of day. KSP Career: Episode 13 - High Altitude Surveys Mike Aben 28.5K subscribers Subscribe 7.7K views 7 years ago Day 114: A busy day at the KSC with three missions, the highlights being the launch. I'm in career mode (have the turbofan engine) and trying to get some science readings for a mission at a high altitude. Grichman's answer got me in the right direction. That would oscillate slowly between 16000m and 17000m but was otherwise fully controllable. To get there, you're going to want to climb at the fastest rate you can manage to 18-20 km, at which point you should mostly level off and start accelerating horizontally. Is it even possible? All rights reserved. Why is there a voltage on my HDMI and coaxial cables? The drag differential is because your long-wing layout is using a bunch of struts, and the reason your delta-wing has a higher ceiling is because it has more wing area to provide lift. Paste as plain text instead, You could try combining the two. At about 400-500m/s (~15km), the two engines are even. But maybe your patience? : : . Thanks. Running the 60U engine at about 40U seems to give me a good balance between reduced drag and air intake. Check out the website and try the game out for yourself :Dhttps://kerbalspaceprogram.com/ I don't have the numbers handy, but you can expect something like 400m/s at 15km. (Actually, four ways: but balloons aren't in the stock game) Lifting surfaces are great but they lose effectiveness just as fast with altitude as drag falls. Ep. How to know if you've nailed it perfectly: when you're cruising in level flight, you want the marker to be precisely centered in your navball cross-hairs. You arent doing anything wrong. Fighting oscillations. Basically there are two things that limit your maximum speed: thrust and speed of sound and with that your maximum altitude. alternatively, combine a liquid fuel rocket into your plane. Immediately starting rocket engines at full throttle turned out to make most of my aircrafts totally unstable, turning them up gradually worked way better. Thank you, I was able to reach up to 24km altitude with this design. Will post my results. Yes, although they have only been flown with nearly full tanks. You may be correct and that 3 engine plane is a lemon. Please consider starting a new thread rather than reviving this one. Make sure you've angled your wings up slightly so that you provide enough lift for a 0 angle of attack at top speed. From my observations I can say that "Efficiency" is not a good indicator of how well your engine performs. The stratospheric region, where temperature rises as altitude increases, spans the region between the altitudes of 10 km and 22 km. Along with rockets, planes are one of KSP's most commonly referenced kinds of vessel, and are a vessel type . So I've created those two planes, both with weasley turbofan engine: This is your problem-- as folks have pointed out, it's not a high-altitude engine. There are no requirements as far as size or power are concerned, as the AI Pilot is capable of flying pretty much anything - from tiny scout planes to oversized freight craft. Though I'm still working on learning to be better at space planes. As long a you can fly faster, the lower density at altitude can be compensated for. It was meant for low altitude flight. A full suite of flaps on the trailing edges of the main wings give it exceptional low-speed lift, and small hydroplane steps mounted on each side of the fuselage bottom help lift it out of the water (lowering water drag) during takeoff runs. How to make a loop for linear actuator in Kerbal Space Program, Breaking Ground. below 5,000 m), since the engine's extreme maneuverability may allow the aircraft to perform turns sharply enough to break up in flight. The main body is a fuel tank with a Swivel engine at the end. Here's Mr. Manley using it in his tutorial: @Pvt.Grichmann: I think it's at specific locations on Kerbin, not just anywhere above 18km. At the equator, sea level temperatures vary between a nighttime low of 9 C and a daytime high of 15 C. Most SSTO space planes would be able to accomplish this easily. 2022 Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. Make sure we're on the same page with terminology. You can spin around the whole world on just fumes. This thread is quite old. Remembering the FW TA152 and the U2 I put long wings on it and while its turn rate makes an airliner look like a fighter plane it is stable enough at 19000m. Remember that you need to have intakes somewhere in line with the engine to function at that altitude. You can halve the drag by climbing a bit less than 3500m. The Boeing X-37, also known as the Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV), is a reusable robotic spacecraft. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. However, it seems as if your delta wing has has more area, might that be it? This thread is quite old. With only panthers unlocked I might add. You cannot paste images directly. Air Flow: Air Flow represents with how much force air passes the turbine (notice: different amounts of air at the same speed equals in different amounts of force!). If your using NEAR/FAR, once you get high and fast, kill the engine and glide to save fuel. Which lets you go faster, which lets you climb higher. The Panther engine can hold 19,000 steady and oscillates around 20,000. No, I think it's correct, unless I've got a brain fart going, here. (the engines will use very little at high altitude anyway). with a thrust vectoring range of only 3 degrees. I was even able to do this with three pairs of Junos instead of the large jet engine pair (I don't have the technology level for that). Slap that behind a plane you'll be able to go beyond 20km without any trouble. Using very light "engine rich" planes and "reverse swooping" (building velocity at 10km then gently curving up) you can temporarily get above 20km with Wheesely and Juno. It is somewhat slow but very steady in flight. i dont know what kind of range youre looking for but i would make a significantly smaller plane. Or you need to put a little bit of angle of incidence in your wings, which will reduce drag since you don't have to pitch the entire plane up, but will be stuck at a fixed angle meaning you'll have to pitch up or down anyway during certain phases of the flight that the plane isn't optimised for. KSP Quick Guides: High Altitude Design and Flying - Stock v.23 Stoober AK 3.32K subscribers Subscribe 21K views 8 years ago This tutorial will cover designing and flying a plane that can soar. Learn more about Stack Overflow the company, and our products. In my case, it brought me to 20km up at a 45-degree angle, but it is probably not optimal. I decided to look into that two intakes thing, and it turns out to make 11-12 m/s difference at 19,000m with my plane. The U-2 is probably the highest altitude aircraft still flying. Please consider starting a new thread rather than reviving this one. All trademarks are property of their respective owners in the US and other countries. 1 Pod outside the level 3 VAB. Sustained flight at over 20km requires at a minimum the Panther in Afterburning mode. http://kerbalspaceprogram.com, Press J to jump to the feed. You get tons of thrust if you put it into "wet" mode, but you lose fuel efficiency. It will be expensive and time consuming.