LV-N has less than 25% of its full power at Kerbin sea level. Either put more engines or reduce the amount of rocket fuel. Thank you and happy landings. I believe the issue is there is not enough control surfaces to offset this issue, but it comes up very easy so it is not a very big deal. Everything looks perfectly symmetrical as far as I can tell. You can deploy your chutes just prior to touchdown for rapid deceleration. You main problem is your landing gear. Landing also often requires rapid deceleration to avoid running off the end of the runway or crashing into a slope when landing on open terrain. This page was last edited on 17 December 2021, at 13:14. Take the large delta wings and place them on the aircraft. Be warned that if you do not provide sufficient air intakes for the engines you've placed, you may find that some of your engines shut down before others. Lift maxes out at 30 and declines beyond that point, so avoid excessive fuselage tilt.[1]. Mechjeb Spaceplane Guidance. The Kerbal Space Program subreddit. Also, excessive use of the rudder usually causes the plane to spin out of control and crash. Edit: I made a simple easy plane in career mode that is both stable and cheap: A trick i've used before is to put modular girders on the sides of the fuselage and putting the gear on the bottom of the girders. Landing speed (minimum speed for level flight) can be reduced by adding components to increase maneuverability, by using larger wings, by increasing wing angle of attack on the fuselage (3-5 degrees is the recommended range for a spaceplane to achieve the best lift-to-drag ratio [source]), and by decreasing the weight of the aircraft. (For test purposes, all aircraft are not pitched up and SAS is turned off. Aim to get your speed below 50m/s, and have plenty of water ahead of you; keep the plane level, and pitch up to shed velocity. This aircraft can takeoff at just above 50 m/s and can glide for a few minutes without engine. For example, having your landing gears located near the ends of the wings is an easy way to ensure that you don't roll and shred your wings when landing or taking off. Consequently, atmospheric reentry is less dangerous with a Mk2 or Mk3 fuselage, compared to reentry with Mk1 fuselages. Increasing the number of intakes will not allow you to continue using your jet engines at higher altitudes. - Make sure you have enough control authority to lift the nose up. if its too far behind plane cannot lift. Even a small deviation can cause serious instability, making your aircraft bounce and jolt left and right even during takeoff. Because of how small Kerbin is and how high its gravity is, a perfectly flat surface just north of the equator will cause planes taking off to bias to the right of the runway, as if they were rolling downhill. While having the same stock parts as in the VAB, spaceplane design is obviously quite different from pure rocket design. Now for wings, the "Wing Connector Type B" is the largest you have so far; connect a set of those where the centre of mass is. Be aware that landing on water is an option if your spaceplane can fly level at less than ~40-50 m/s. . If your spaceplane is able to fly and land steadily at low speeds but just you're having difficulty slowing down as you approach the runway, try to reach your desired speed first and then approach the runway in almost level flight. I made this aircraft based on real life commercial jet design. Though, I use the FAR mod which will change things, so I can't guarantee the results will be useful, but it might be interesting. It's said that takeoffs are optional but landings are mandatory. I started investigating why this was happening. The plane is clearly unstable. All of them had one thing in common though. Consider placing your rear landing gears close to the spaceplane's center of mass, but be careful to avoid an engine collision with the runway. FAR says it would take an Angle of Attack of 24.3 degrees at 119 m/s to generate enough lift to get it to take off. It is also said that a good landing is one you can walk away from. To slow down faster, you can increase the braking strength of your rear wheels. When your spaceplane rolls shortly after touchdown, veers to one side and then explodes on the runway, you have a problem with landing stability. (However, it must be noted that it is bad practice to use ailerons as elevators since it makes it hard to control the aircraft), The rudder moves the tip of the plane left and right; it is rarely used, since it is hard to put it both up and down due to the possibility of hitting the ground. Also, lift is usually placed in the middle-to-back of the wing, depending on the shape. They sometimes coincide with elevators. Note that as you fly higher the air intakes will become less effective and you may come to a point when the engines will shut down due to the lack of air. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. An altitude set to 18,000 meters tops off at 19,000 meters and drops to 15,700 meters . Also, try this mod: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/99660-0-25-Adjustable-Landing-Gear-v1-0-4%28doors-fixed%29-Nov-14 (still works in 0.90 if you get updated firespitter.dll). Angled landing gear create rotational force for whatever reason. As with everything in KSP, experiment, experiment, experiment. All of them had one thing in common though. Bit late i know, but i had the same problem. However it's huge size can make it tricky to take off from the runway without destroying the engine. This allows you to avoid the extra weight and mass of additional fuselage parts, so you only have to deal with the extra weight of the fuel itself. A plane is any craft which flies horizontally in an atmosphere utilizing lift primarily generated by wings, winglets, or control surfaces. Try disabling friction control with on the front landing gears. If your rear wheels are too far back the aircraft will not be able to pivot on the wheels and lift its nose up. - SF. It provides a wider, more stable wheel base while keeping the wheels straight up and down (no camber). I have doubled the max stress value for aerodynamics failure in FAR for every category. if mounted on not struted part). If you use an Advanced SAS, and raise your front landing wheel so that it is higher than the rear wheels, by just turning the SAS on and going full throttle, due to the 10 degree angle of the plane, it should eventually take off by itself. Paste as plain text instead, EDIT: So, I set the front landing gear spring and damper to 0.5, and also set the tail gear spring and damper to 2, and the problem was fixed! here are some images and a gif. The problem could be about the angle of wheels, though there could be more problems with the COM and wheels placement. I have never successfully landed a single aircraft before as they all tend to roll over when landing at high speed. For some reason, when the plane is trying to take off and pulling up, the plane begins to bounce on it's front wheels (the back wheel kicks up), whichhinders the plane taking off. Subscribe! First of all, since the launch happens horizontally, you will have to include landing gears, and you will most likely want to include jet engines for the first stage for excellent fuel and cost efficiency. I checked my planes and I found the problem. This makes them a very effective choice for SSTOs since they do a good job of getting maximum velocity out of air-breathing mode, and then allow you to use oxidizer without needing the added weight and drag of a separate rocket engine. This tutorial was created primarily based on a Reddit post by the incredibly helpful u/AnArgonianSpellsword. I've had stability issues in planes where I'd have proper gear setup, balanced weight and lift. While I am not a great plane builder there is a part in the structural (I think it is a pylon?) Doesnt make sense so just do this: Nope that didn't solve anything, even when the plane is past the runway and gliding on the little bit of space before the ocean it will slowly lower to the ocean, what am I doing wrong? All trademarks are property of their respective owners in the US and other countries. Set up for a long glide path, and watch rate of climb indicator at top of screen, aim for -5 m/s. Brakes in the back keep you stable. Any ideas? If your spaceplane is difficult to land when full of fuel but easy to land when empty, then it may be helpful to burn off or transfer out most of the excess fuel before landing to make the aircraft lighter. I am definitely aware that there are multiple reasons as to why the plane flips. 200 m/s runway stability just doesn't seem to have a worthwhile purpose to me, and is inducing counter productive engineering challenges. As lift increases you remove some strain on the gear, however you've just increased the amount of sag. This plane will be able to take off, travel somewhere, perform a crew report, and then land. Rapiers generally provide less thrust than a Whiplash at speeds below mach 2, but provide more thrust at higher speeds. This is an important distinction; a plane with great lift rating but without any control surfaces will fly easily but will be almost uncontrollable. * Gear not mounted to parts that will flex (e.g. If you keep all of the fuel in the front, you may find that your center of mass drifts backwards as your fuel drains. wings, unless they're very well braced). Just after having taken off, the plane will immediately start rolling to the right, and completely uncontrollably. When flying straight the plane is pretty stable but pitching up causes a sharp roll and I cant figure out why. If you can give a craft file and a mod list I could take a look. Do you have new pics after you moved the rear wheels forward? The design I used is similar to what I normally used for planes but I had to swap out parts and make it smaller to compensate for Career mode changes. Please consider starting a new thread rather than reviving this one. Here is an example of landing gear place on a complex geometric surface: Unstable plane Rear landing gears only seems to work on cylindrical fuselage, if you place them on a fuselage intake or anything other than a cylinder, the wheels can behave strangely. I was wrong. I have found a solution to my problem. As you would expect, spaceplanes need wings: they have various shapes and dimensions, and they differ basically in lift rating: you will want to have enough lift to keep your fuselage approximately prograde during your ascent to orbit. Because of how small Kerbin is and how high its gravity is, a perfectly flat surface just north of the equator will cause planes taking off to bias to the right of the runway, as if they were rolling downhill. Ailerons to roll your aircraft should be placed as far off to the edges of your wings as possible. LV-N exceeds 75% of its full power at just 7700m altitude on Kerbin. After a successful touchdown, high-speed motion on the runway (let alone uneven ground) can be unstable, causing the aircraft to careen to one side or the other, potentially resulting in loss of a wing and sometimes the entire aircraft. Powered by Invision Community. KSC's runway is slightly north of Kerbin's equator and perfectly flat. When your jet engines stop working, it is time to ignite the old, reliable liquid fuel engine. These have extremely poor temperature tolerance and will almost inevitably break up during atmospheric reentry. Note: This is ONLY to be used to report spam, advertising, and problematic (harassment, fighting, or rude) posts. If you have trouble pitching up enough to land at a reasonable speed, you can increase your maneuverability by toggling your flaps, canards and ailerons to greater than 100% control authority. This is starting to get really frustrating. Managed to fix it with some different wings; idk what was going on with the other ones but I was just thr FAT aeroplane wings. By accepting all cookies, you agree to our use of cookies to deliver and maintain our services and site, improve the quality of Reddit, personalize Reddit content and advertising, and measure the effectiveness of advertising. - KSP Matt Lowne 527K subscribers 1.3M views 2 years ago I've wanted. However, they do take a conventional mix of fuel and oxidizer, and thus require much more fuel mass than jet engines or LV-N Nerv. Note that most air intakes tend to produce less drag than aerodynamic nose cones and pointy cockpits, especially shock cone intakes. as Shkeec said check gear check gear check gear. Notice how the landing gears are placed out on the wings. Does anybidy have any tips on how to build spaceplanes? It is due to the spinning up of the engines. If the front landing gear touches down first and has its brakes on, it's going to make the rest of your aircraft pivot around it as it's pressed into the ground. All rights reserved. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account. The reverse also happens. I dunno why but this picture makes the one side look like it is tipped in but I know they are straight, I believe it just the angle that the picture was taken that is causing it to look like this. * Unlock steering and disable brakes on front gear. But regardless of that, try very hard to let the plane fly itself off the ground without you applying any controls. This page was last edited on 14 April 2021, at 01:04. You can either go with four "LY-O1 Fixed" or a tricycle of two LY-01 near the back and one "LY-05 Steerable" at the front; either is fine for now. If that's not an option, you can still recover some value by landing at any suitable flat place on Kerbin. Although I usually only need 50 m/s for most planes to wobble out of control. Valve Corporation. This is also the same reason why planes start rolling toward the middle of the runway; because both ends of the runway are further from the center of Kerbin than the middle (because it's totally flat), the runway is a valley from a gravitational frame of reference. Not sure why you would want that stability for speeds in excess of 200 m/s though, as most planes will take off and land at far slower speeds. Also note that for maximum efficiency, you should make sure that your horizontal control surfaces are rotated to exactly the same pitch that you've rotated your wings. I managed to successfully takeoff and land this aircraft at least 20 times in a roll now and I haven't even lost a single pilot flying this. So yesterday I was playing some KSP2, and resumed the game from a save where I had landed in Duna. I'm trying to do some of the surveying and taxi-ing missions because now that's all the games giving me but flying with a regular rockets just not working for me. Geometric shape of the body you attach the landing gear to. Enable mirror symmetry to save yourself some alignment effort. Powered by Invision Community. If you pull up and cause the tailwheel etiher to hit the ground if it was already up or push it into the ground if it was still in contact, you will create bounciness. Similar principles apply when finding suitable landing sites away from the KSC. This is also the same reason why planes start rolling toward the middle of the runway; because both ends of the runway are further from . Your wings provide the lift, and they cant provide lift if your wheels are too far back because then your base is to stable and the craft wont pivot upwards. See the tutorial below. "Type E" is the smallest you should have, and you want a set of those connected at the back of the fuselage. My first test of the plane parts in KSP2.Like and Subscribe for more Kerbal stuffs!#kerbalspaceprogram #ksp2 #kerbalspaceprogram2 #shorts #spaceplane #nasa You can post now and register later. I moved the back landing gear to right underneath the COM. I found biggest cause of this as well as not being able to possibly correct is having sas on during takeoff, make sure that is off during take off and should find problem is less likely to occur, but I too struggle to make working space planes even when center of lift, mass, thrust are all as needed. 2022 Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. Or adding a RATO boosters. 1. make sure your main gear is not wobbling (ie. Privacy Policy. 2. Powered by Invision Community. But also check to make sure that your wheels are placed symmetrically and your engines are aligned properly. Thanks for the help guys. Display as a link instead, For your first flight, it may be easiest to ignore yaw altogether and just maneuver by rolling slightly and pitching. A relatively low-drag alternative is to use an inverted cargo bay and some hydraulic cylinders with structural panels as a cargo elevator. LV-N engines also have the advantage of using the same liquid for propellant that jet engines use for fuel. If your aircraft is burning up during this stage, you may need larger wings to slow you down faster, radiator panels to carry away the heat more effectively, parts with a higher temperature tolerance (like the Mk2 liquid fuel fuselage instead of the Mk1 liquid fuel fuselage), or parts to increase your maneuverability, like RCS thrusters, reaction wheels, or canards and elevons.