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LILITH-2

by Brikoleur

uploaded 2021-11-06

31 downloads /

points

Details

Action Groups

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VAB

stock+DLC aircraft

#eve #crewed #return #career

Description

This unassuming little plane packs a superpower: it will make a round trip to the surface of Eve with a single passenger. Once. On the way up, the passenger stays in a comfy airlock while the craft is remote-controlled into orbit.

To fly down, start from about 100 km and burn all your fuel so the the Pe is down to about 40 km (the small fuel tank will be sufficient), then set attitude to about 45 degrees, extend landing gear, set propeller blades to 0, open all the hatches, and hold a nose-up attitude as far as possible. Once through, start the motors (action group 2), set blade pitch to a positive number (U/D axis), and fly. To take the drudgery out of holding altitude, use elevator trim (U/D axis).

Don’t forget to jettison the heat shield as soon as you’re through.

To land on Eve, slow down to about 30 m/s with propeller pitch, descend slowly, then reduce propeller pitch so speed drops to 10 m/s, then set throttle to zero and brake to a stop.

To fly back to orbit, use the propellers to fly up to 20 km, maintaining a climb of about 25 degrees and 140 m/s. (Don’t forget to transfer crew to the airlock on the nose.) When you hit 20 km, set elevator trim to maximum up and pull the stick all the way up. When the plane no longer wants to pitch up, stage the rocket at maximum throttle with SAS set to Radial-Out. Start your gravity turn at around 25 km and fly to orbit. Be careful not to lose signal at a critical moment as the return module is probe core only!

Note: If you want the Return to Kerbin from the surface of Eve achievement, be sure to bring back the entire upper stage of the return rocket, the airlock alone won’t cut it (although it will bring back the science).

The craft file is packaged for launch to LKO, and is packed with a variety of gadgets and experiments.

A stock spaceplane called LILITH-2. Built with 121 of the finest parts, its root part is fuelTankSmallFlat.

Built in the VAB in KSP version 1.12.2.