Definitely one of your coolest Mk.2 SSTOs… I love these build-it-with-me videos, always a blast! (pun intended) Mike Aben is a great content creator too, nice to see you giving him some love
My entire career game is built on SSTO rockets right now... As soon as I unlocked probecores and aerobrakes I started retrolanding my rockets and improving my designs and skills in doing so. For example... My method of landing on KSC right now is to make sure my SSTO parks in 100km orbital altitude (this is like my parking altitude in current games), the SSTO rocket then releases the ship or probe there. Then the SSTO rocket prepares to land. Again, I make sure the SSTO is at 100km altitude, then I burn a 400DV retrograde curve. I make sure it hits 3 times the distance away from KSC than the flystrip island for measure. This usually gives me a nice room to brake in space above KSC. I also make sure to have 700-1000DV when the rocket is returning to halt the landing speed, but also to brake above KSC. Then I aim for the airstrip with the rocket, quite easy. Although even if I miss the airstrip or land near KSC I get 98% of the value back or more of the entire rocket. I save so much I can overengineer a lot of ship and stil make more than I ever would with single use rockets. And it is quite fun to design. It does take more time to fly these missions. But I save so much money that I could even over-engineer my space station contract with a nice looking station using parts from Nerteas stockalike stationparts pack and stil make a buck! The same space station is orbiting kerbin right now making me years of research with just 3 landings on the moons of kerbin. Design decisions that are a practice for my SSTO rockets. 1. make sure to have 1.5-2 TWR 2. Make sure to have 3800DV or preferably 4000DV. 3. Use gravity turns to space. Before I land the SSTO rocket I move all my fuel to the bottom of the rocket for stability, I also have powerfull bipropellant RCS thrusters so I dont need to waste weight on monopro. But also because they are handy in atmos. And I put a bunch of aerobrakes on the top of my rocket. Half of them deply fully. While the other half/array only used as control surface during landing. All of this really helps preventing the rocket from flipping and gives a lot of control upon landing. Also, disable gimbal on rocket engines and put the control surface to reverse on the fins at the bottom. Otherwise it will work against you. And make sure the aerobrakes point the correct way. Place them thinking the engine of the rocket is the nose of the plane you would normally use them. I even made my own mini addon where I made a new aerobrake, basically I took the vanilla aerobrake and made an XL version for large rockets. It is 2x on rescale in code. Which makes it 4 times the surface area in the game (it fits 4 normal aerobrake surfaces on itself) so I calculate the values for that stuff to be 4 times as large. I also increased the price accordingly. Nerteas near future launch vehicles also adds a bunch of tank sizes and adapters and cones along other payload systems suitable for SSTO rockets, and probe control systems fitting for it. This allows me to make some of the largest rockets I have ever seen in career. I frequently send 100k worth of rockets. But I get back 99% of that value. Making them cheaper than small single use rockets. SSTO rockets are super op in career and makes it fun! I earn a heckton despite making a lot of personal missions. Even the cheapest contracts earns me a decent amount of money. I stil havent unlocked SSTO spaceplane capable parts yet but I am planning that too. Just never enjoyed planes too much in KSP but after learning more stuff about planes with MS flightsim I am gonna return to it. I made 2 pretty sucessfull SSTO spaceplanes in my last career game, one which litterally huge and used for landing payloads of refined uranium from the munbase I made to earn money without having to do contracts. I stil found SSTO rockets easier to build and quicker and easier to land.
Also I have reached a point where I am able to make two stage missions to the kerbin moons. SSTO rocket to get the command module to space. The command module has 4000DV. Enough to go to either moon, land there, then get back. With additional fuel to reach kerbin orbit and dock with my spacestation to deliver science to the spacestation. This gives me so much science I could ever ask for right now. Which I dearly need. I got community tech tree and far future technologies + near future technologies. So lots of stuff to unlock. I will stil be unlocking stuff after visiting other planets.
Very good information for sure. You can also build Rocket SSTO space planes that have .7 or less TWR and use less fuel to deliver the same amount of payload that a more powerful, heavier SSTO rocket can carry into orbit. 👍 They are also fun to build. 😎
@@vaos3712 stuff i plan require pretty massive payloads i dont see realistically carried in spaceplanes. I also just really love the look of the SSTO rockets i build. I intend to use spaceplanes for smaller payloads and cargo. But for massive spacestation parts and heavy cargo that is larger than what the MK3 spaceplane parts can fit I will likely just use the massive rocket parts Near future launch vehicles give. Also love those cryonic engines the modpack gives. My SSTO rockets are also generally quick in use compared to when I fly spaceplanes.
@@zefnoly9147 oh ya that sounds really fun regardless. any payloads bigger then mk3 cargobays youll need to build your own bay. Like the 290ton rocket ssto space plane video i put together. haven’t tried those mods you suggested. i’ll give them a look. 👍
Nerteas near future launch vehicles adds absolute beasts of tank sizes. The rockets you can make are huge and they have some really cool payload parts as well to conceil systems inside the rocket. Including payloads that can open up so you can have re-usable caps or concealments on the rockets too and make them truly "re-usable" I basically made my KSP1 what KSP2 promized by adding all of Nertea's near + far future mods, and cryonics + atomics for the H2 and Methane fuels. + restock ofc which makes them all fit together visually. The only other mod I have besides that is waterfall and simple construction to allow me to build offworld in a way that doesnt overcomplicate the game managment wise... I think you also used that mod at some point? Just happy I can use my own docking ports to design my own construction modules visually speaking. Then sprinkling the game with chatterer and final frontier.
I really need Vaos to do these upcoming videos on how to build the huge SSTO's as I been trying fr months to build a huge Cargo SSTO t o help my station supply and go pick up some bug rocket launched robotic space Tugs that are stuck in a orbit on the rocket which ran out of fuel on route to the station. So I need a big SSTO to help pick those tugs up and move them to the station! I did all the stuff he said about balance and fuel and weight and wings angling etc. but can't get the SSTO even off the runway. even with now 12 Raper engines.
Fantastic work as usual. Been making my way through your old videos which are all quality. Solar Nations -chef's kiss-. Can see the impressive effort and time put into those vids. And deft understand why you want to move onto content that's less demanding and more fun for you. 👏👏👏
I like this new series concept where you critique other people’s SSTO builds. I’m also interested in the stuff you said about how to fly it. I was flying it based on what I thought I saw. I always thought you were actively, slowly pitching up. Maybe a short video on how to construct a launch profile would be cool.
Sweet little design. Its a bit too fast for that cockpit. I noticed you had extra oxidizer, but with pitching up or just starting out with a 5 degree climb and lock it that flight path should better match your fuel load. Basically burn a bit less liquid fuel, less time in the thick atmosphere and in space quicker. Great video on a cool simple SSTO.
Nice remake of Mike’s ssto I notice, as of late, you like the challenge of night landings. I’d love to see what you can do with a 2.0/1 twr. Like to hell with efficiency we are going to the effn moon attitude
They are useful for all kinds of stuff. Personal favorite is using them to mark the edge of runway/ launch pad for wide crafts or ones I want to stick off the edge
8:39 I find it weird how he chose the SSTO engine (over 1000 research points) over getting any higher tier probes. I generally try to get a balanced progression but I guess "Different people different playstyles" apply
Hey VAOS you make it sound like you use kerbal engineer redux specifically for vacuum delta v. If that's the case I just want to say there is an stock option to see that using the default delta v tool.
It seem unnecessary but for a build like that I'd have capped those 0.625 tank stack with a couple of spark engines for orbital manoeuvres. The isp bump is worth it and the lower thrust helps with precision. The rapiers are horrible space engines.
I recently rewatched solar nations and i saerched for a sled guide to remake the sled you used... Can you make a video or short for sleds??? I cant seem to get mine to work
Try Reliants vs Swivels. They have a better TWR for the engine; more thrust for the weight. That said its really tricky. I have a built a working SSTO with 4 Panthers (wet mode), 2 Reliants, and 1 Terrier. It was underpowered for the weight, but that's what worked. However its a different assent profile. Basically climb to 3500 meters, level out and lock SAS at zero degrees, that will help you get up to speed to get the best effciency from the Panthers before it naturally starts climbing. Also don't ignite the Rapiers until 4500 meters. Ignite the Terrier at 9500 meters or more. Good Luck. The great thing about the Panthers is you can kick them to dry mode after reentry if you are too short to glide to the runway.
@@vaos3712One last question, is there a way to attach multiple(4 and up) engines(rapier/nuclear) to 2.5 or mk3 parts without an engine plate? (An engine plate seems very draggy during testing)
I saw the atmos? mod and wondered if you knew about the STOCK button in the bottom right IN SPH/VAB, right above Reset. The ###m/s readout is a button that shows twr and whatnot. It works in flight also. Good for knowing if your vtol is fixing to fall out of the sky lmao
Vaos, can you please make a new series where you showcase your subscribers' SSTOs and rate them by how much ∆v they have, how nice they look, etc.? I think that would be pretty cool.
You're such a talented builder, but every time I watch I always want to know what you'd do with mods, like nertea's near future or more specifically the mark iv spaceplane.. not hinting at all...
Speaking of mods, I would love to see you using Orbit Portal Technologies (OPT) mod's spaceplane parts, in particular size KH cargo bays, which can hold S3 (3.75m) diameter parts such as the Mammoth engine.
Thanks, man. I'll have to incorporate some of these ideas the next time the thing flies.
Hi mike
Now you have much more subs
Definitely one of your coolest Mk.2 SSTOs… I love these build-it-with-me videos, always a blast! (pun intended) Mike Aben is a great content creator too, nice to see you giving him some love
My entire career game is built on SSTO rockets right now... As soon as I unlocked probecores and aerobrakes I started retrolanding my rockets and improving my designs and skills in doing so.
For example... My method of landing on KSC right now is to make sure my SSTO parks in 100km orbital altitude (this is like my parking altitude in current games), the SSTO rocket then releases the ship or probe there. Then the SSTO rocket prepares to land.
Again, I make sure the SSTO is at 100km altitude, then I burn a 400DV retrograde curve. I make sure it hits 3 times the distance away from KSC than the flystrip island for measure. This usually gives me a nice room to brake in space above KSC. I also make sure to have 700-1000DV when the rocket is returning to halt the landing speed, but also to brake above KSC.
Then I aim for the airstrip with the rocket, quite easy. Although even if I miss the airstrip or land near KSC I get 98% of the value back or more of the entire rocket. I save so much I can overengineer a lot of ship and stil make more than I ever would with single use rockets. And it is quite fun to design. It does take more time to fly these missions. But I save so much money that I could even over-engineer my space station contract with a nice looking station using parts from Nerteas stockalike stationparts pack and stil make a buck! The same space station is orbiting kerbin right now making me years of research with just 3 landings on the moons of kerbin.
Design decisions that are a practice for my SSTO rockets.
1. make sure to have 1.5-2 TWR
2. Make sure to have 3800DV or preferably 4000DV.
3. Use gravity turns to space.
Before I land the SSTO rocket I move all my fuel to the bottom of the rocket for stability, I also have powerfull bipropellant RCS thrusters so I dont need to waste weight on monopro. But also because they are handy in atmos. And I put a bunch of aerobrakes on the top of my rocket. Half of them deply fully. While the other half/array only used as control surface during landing. All of this really helps preventing the rocket from flipping and gives a lot of control upon landing.
Also, disable gimbal on rocket engines and put the control surface to reverse on the fins at the bottom. Otherwise it will work against you. And make sure the aerobrakes point the correct way. Place them thinking the engine of the rocket is the nose of the plane you would normally use them.
I even made my own mini addon where I made a new aerobrake, basically I took the vanilla aerobrake and made an XL version for large rockets. It is 2x on rescale in code. Which makes it 4 times the surface area in the game (it fits 4 normal aerobrake surfaces on itself) so I calculate the values for that stuff to be 4 times as large. I also increased the price accordingly.
Nerteas near future launch vehicles also adds a bunch of tank sizes and adapters and cones along other payload systems suitable for SSTO rockets, and probe control systems fitting for it. This allows me to make some of the largest rockets I have ever seen in career. I frequently send 100k worth of rockets. But I get back 99% of that value. Making them cheaper than small single use rockets. SSTO rockets are super op in career and makes it fun! I earn a heckton despite making a lot of personal missions. Even the cheapest contracts earns me a decent amount of money.
I stil havent unlocked SSTO spaceplane capable parts yet but I am planning that too. Just never enjoyed planes too much in KSP but after learning more stuff about planes with MS flightsim I am gonna return to it. I made 2 pretty sucessfull SSTO spaceplanes in my last career game, one which litterally huge and used for landing payloads of refined uranium from the munbase I made to earn money without having to do contracts. I stil found SSTO rockets easier to build and quicker and easier to land.
Also I have reached a point where I am able to make two stage missions to the kerbin moons. SSTO rocket to get the command module to space. The command module has 4000DV. Enough to go to either moon, land there, then get back. With additional fuel to reach kerbin orbit and dock with my spacestation to deliver science to the spacestation. This gives me so much science I could ever ask for right now. Which I dearly need. I got community tech tree and far future technologies + near future technologies. So lots of stuff to unlock. I will stil be unlocking stuff after visiting other planets.
Very good information for sure. You can also build Rocket SSTO space planes that have .7 or less TWR and use less fuel to deliver the same amount of payload that a more powerful, heavier SSTO rocket can carry into orbit. 👍
They are also fun to build. 😎
@@vaos3712 stuff i plan require pretty massive payloads i dont see realistically carried in spaceplanes. I also just really love the look of the SSTO rockets i build. I intend to use spaceplanes for smaller payloads and cargo. But for massive spacestation parts and heavy cargo that is larger than what the MK3 spaceplane parts can fit I will likely just use the massive rocket parts Near future launch vehicles give. Also love those cryonic engines the modpack gives. My SSTO rockets are also generally quick in use compared to when I fly spaceplanes.
@@zefnoly9147 oh ya that sounds really fun regardless. any payloads bigger then mk3 cargobays youll need to build your own bay. Like the 290ton rocket ssto space plane video i put together. haven’t tried those mods you suggested. i’ll give them a look. 👍
Nerteas near future launch vehicles adds absolute beasts of tank sizes. The rockets you can make are huge and they have some really cool payload parts as well to conceil systems inside the rocket. Including payloads that can open up so you can have re-usable caps or concealments on the rockets too and make them truly "re-usable"
I basically made my KSP1 what KSP2 promized by adding all of Nertea's near + far future mods, and cryonics + atomics for the H2 and Methane fuels. + restock ofc which makes them all fit together visually. The only other mod I have besides that is waterfall and simple construction to allow me to build offworld in a way that doesnt overcomplicate the game managment wise... I think you also used that mod at some point? Just happy I can use my own docking ports to design my own construction modules visually speaking. Then sprinkling the game with chatterer and final frontier.
I really need Vaos to do these upcoming videos on how to build the huge SSTO's as I been trying fr months to build a huge Cargo SSTO t
o help my station supply and go pick up some bug rocket launched robotic space Tugs that are stuck in a orbit on the rocket which ran out of fuel on route to the station.
So I need a big SSTO to help pick those tugs up and move them to the station! I did all the stuff he said about balance and fuel and weight and wings angling etc. but can't get the SSTO even off the runway. even with now 12 Raper engines.
Fantastic work as usual. Been making my way through your old videos which are all quality.
Solar Nations -chef's kiss-. Can see the impressive effort and time put into those vids. And deft understand why you want to move onto content that's less demanding and more fun for you.
👏👏👏
I like this new series concept where you critique other people’s SSTO builds.
I’m also interested in the stuff you said about how to fly it. I was flying it based on what I thought I saw. I always thought you were actively, slowly pitching up.
Maybe a short video on how to construct a launch profile would be cool.
Sweet little design. Its a bit too fast for that cockpit. I noticed you had extra oxidizer, but with pitching up or just starting out with a 5 degree climb and lock it that flight path should better match your fuel load. Basically burn a bit less liquid fuel, less time in the thick atmosphere and in space quicker. Great video on a cool simple SSTO.
hola bro thesse vids are awesome bro keep up the good work
Nice remake of Mike’s ssto
I notice, as of late, you like the challenge of night landings.
I’d love to see what you can do with a 2.0/1 twr. Like to hell with efficiency we are going to the effn moon attitude
I like aben i discovered your channel and his channel at the same time and have been following you both👍🏻
OMG TYTYTY I NEED THIS 2 YRS AGO
Also am I the only one who realized that the lines on the bottom of SPH are representing a plane? A,... really fat one?
They are useful for all kinds of stuff. Personal favorite is using them to mark the edge of runway/ launch pad for wide crafts or ones I want to stick off the edge
JUst noticed that becayse of you, thanks for the fact :)
I love your videos man please keep up the good work
Nice.. 👍
8:39 I find it weird how he chose the SSTO engine (over 1000 research points) over getting any higher tier probes.
I generally try to get a balanced progression but I guess "Different people different playstyles" apply
75 % of the time I just build planes and paint them cool colors and that type of stuff
@@JimmyThree-BallsWhat mod are you using to paint the craft or are you playing KSP 2?
@@illiaishchuk T.E.R.D, and its pretty damned cool
@@JimmyThree-BallsThank you so much
@@illiaishchuk did you find it?
Hey VAOS you make it sound like you use kerbal engineer redux specifically for vacuum delta v. If that's the case I just want to say there is an stock option to see that using the default delta v tool.
You can also see it in the "more options" of a part
Also you can see your apoapsis and time in the purple button in the area below the staging
@@the_rbop Yeah, I know a lot of these tricks because I play on console. Makes it a lot easier
In game? No mods?
@@cmbaz1140 yes
❤
It seem unnecessary but for a build like that I'd have capped those 0.625 tank stack with a couple of spark engines for orbital manoeuvres. The isp bump is worth it and the lower thrust helps with precision. The rapiers are horrible space engines.
love your stuff mah dood
I recently rewatched solar nations and i saerched for a sled guide to remake the sled you used...
Can you make a video or short for sleds???
I cant seem to get mine to work
We struggle with Panthers and Swivels. Help us out here.
😎👍
Try Reliants vs Swivels. They have a better TWR for the engine; more thrust for the weight. That said its really tricky. I have a built a working SSTO with 4 Panthers (wet mode), 2 Reliants, and 1 Terrier. It was underpowered for the weight, but that's what worked. However its a different assent profile. Basically climb to 3500 meters, level out and lock SAS at zero degrees, that will help you get up to speed to get the best effciency from the Panthers before it naturally starts climbing. Also don't ignite the Rapiers until 4500 meters. Ignite the Terrier at 9500 meters or more. Good Luck. The great thing about the Panthers is you can kick them to dry mode after reentry if you are too short to glide to the runway.
Could you make the ranger class ship from Interstellar? Just watched the movie and thought of your channel
Did the solar panels survive the reentry burn? Lol.
They refold so … yes 👍
Hey VAOS, is nuclear engines worth using for interplanetary sstos?
yes. although they are not the only engines capable of interplanetary travel. terrier engines are great too.
@@vaos3712 Thanks that is very helpful😀
@@vaos3712One last question, is there a way to attach multiple(4 and up) engines(rapier/nuclear) to 2.5 or mk3 parts without an engine plate? (An engine plate seems very draggy during testing)
@@EnderRobber101 try a side mounted nose cone and place the engines on those.
Thanks that worked
I saw the atmos? mod and wondered if you knew about the STOCK button in the bottom right IN SPH/VAB, right above Reset. The ###m/s readout is a button that shows twr and whatnot. It works in flight also. Good for knowing if your vtol is fixing to fall out of the sky lmao
Hey vaos, have you ever tried a pvp ksp battle trading save states or using mods?
a looooooong time ago , yes. ua-cam.com/video/E7z898g_Wak/v-deo.html
@@vaos3712 far out! I'm surprised I've never seen this. I was thinking about trying this exact thing again, gotta get good at editing
Vaos, can you please make a new series where you showcase your subscribers' SSTOs and rate them by how much ∆v they have, how nice they look, etc.? I think that would be pretty cool.
You're such a talented builder, but every time I watch I always want to know what you'd do with mods, like nertea's near future or more specifically the mark iv spaceplane.. not hinting at all...
I’ve played RSS/RO … thats a lot of mods lol.
Speaking of mods, I would love to see you using Orbit Portal Technologies (OPT) mod's spaceplane parts, in particular size KH cargo bays, which can hold S3 (3.75m) diameter parts such as the Mammoth engine.
I subscribed because of this video.
:D
Hi ❤
Hai hai Jolly! 💜
I think the original design had rcs thrusters for docking.
I wonder if you could make one with landing legs on the back instead of wheels…
what mods u got?
2nd like!
Vaos how old are you
Vaos is ageless. 😊
It's not pronounced Rapior. It's pronounces Crappier.
I’ve made chemical interplanetary sstos. Don’t laugh.
Hey… you’re a cool guy. I kinda like ya. But…. An F1 Produces 1.5 Million pounds of thrust…
Same