The 720 is my resupply ship, my station core booster can loft one of the orange ones full. Let me see how much I can get minus the rest of the station.
http://imgur.com/a/V7FZp I lied earlier, my supply ship is 1440. This guy though lofts 3600 fuel and 750 monopropellant up to 70k. I could probably get this thing out to 150k where my station lives with the 400 or so left in the first stage booster. I'm not going to try to go any bigger; this thing is hard enough to fly as it is.
This is what I got my orange tank into orbit with (or something close, several iterations later now.) I'm having a hard time scaling beyond this though.
Grats Kyle! My upper stage with the competition payload has a Poodle engine and it's sitting on a 3m decoupler. I've got six struts going from the base of the upper fuel tank down to the top of the decoupler clipping the interstage shroud. Also, my boost stage is asparagus-staged.
Interesting, I have never heard of such a concept. I was using more of the upper right strategy in your image, with overlapping stages (s3 and s2 fire, then after s3 burns out, s2 and s1 burn).
That's not quite right; here's the staging order: 5: All vertical SRBs, the core Mainsail, and the 6 radial Mainsails fire. Launch gantries release. 4: All vertical SRBs empty and separate. 3: Two of the 6 radial stages empty and separate. 4 Seperatron SRBs fire to get each stage away from the core. 2: Two more radial stages empty and separate (with Seperatrons). 1: The final two radial stages empty and separate (with Seperatrons). Core booster continues to push payload to orbit. 0: Payload separates from core booster. (Optional, Poodle fires for orbital corrections)
I saw that too, as well as the ruinous amount of monoprop he went through. @TheRedburn, there are several design philosophies for assembling large subassemblies. In my own case, I use single large docking ports though I think I'll try multiple small next time like the video shows for ease of alignment. However, all of my modules are capable of limited free flight and are equipped with a probe core of some sort, power, and RCS thrusters. It makes integration much easier because you can stablize and cooperatively maneuver all the pieces. I may try out the tug approach but I don't really like the amount of propellant they consume.
The multiple small ports is a nightmare for alignment. If you don't get it right the first time, you can't get the thing decoupled.
Experimented with these tonight. Got one successful alignment. Then spent 1.5 hrs of failed attempts at "stowing" my tug. I got so upset; I just rammed it into the ocean.
My dream of several orange tanks with a mainsail for interplanetary adventures is delayed another day...
I was just going to post similar results: I got the first half of the interplanetary exploror in space (2 orange tanks, 1 RCS tank). I used a similar lifting platform to get the junction in space. The lifter is a bunch of struts with some fuel tanks attached. (It also uses the asparagus strand method to great effect.)
1) Using the spaceplane hanger, create a vehicle that will travel at the Highest Speed Over Land (reported on the flight results page after ending the flight) before crashing.
2) The vehicle must be on the ground for at least 90% of the runway.
3) Maximum altitude: 100m (The runway is at ~65m).
4) There will be two categories for this challenge as each provides a slightly different type of challenge: a) Wheels b) Sled
Comments
Most mass in a single lift able to be put in 70km + orbit.
For fuel systems, calculate the mass = dry mass + (wet mass - dry mass) * remaining fuel %
Any stages with less than 10% fuel remaining shall not count toward mass in orbit.
I'm currently at 720.
Edit: I was just short of a full orange in orbit, but with no RCS tanks and no SAS... not very useful and incredibly difficult to fly.
I lied earlier, my supply ship is 1440. This guy though lofts 3600 fuel and 750 monopropellant up to 70k. I could probably get this thing out to 150k where my station lives with the 400 or so left in the first stage booster. I'm not going to try to go any bigger; this thing is hard enough to fly as it is.
This is what I got my orange tank into orbit with (or something close, several iterations later now.) I'm having a hard time scaling beyond this though.
5: All vertical SRBs, the core Mainsail, and the 6 radial Mainsails fire. Launch gantries release.
4: All vertical SRBs empty and separate.
3: Two of the 6 radial stages empty and separate. 4 Seperatron SRBs fire to get each stage away from the core.
2: Two more radial stages empty and separate (with Seperatrons).
1: The final two radial stages empty and separate (with Seperatrons). Core booster continues to push payload to orbit.
0: Payload separates from core booster. (Optional, Poodle fires for orbital corrections)
My dream of several orange tanks with a mainsail for interplanetary adventures is delayed another day...
http://imgur.com/a/y6HNE
Rules:
1) Using the spaceplane hanger, create a vehicle that will travel at the Highest Speed Over Land (reported on the flight results page after ending the flight) before crashing.
2) The vehicle must be on the ground for at least 90% of the runway.
3) Maximum altitude: 100m (The runway is at ~65m).
4) There will be two categories for this challenge as each provides a slightly different type of challenge:
a) Wheels
b) Sled
Can't do a Mun landing without this happening...