KerbalX

Description

6:Juno 7:rotors

I meant to do something completely different this evening… This was fun.

My first chopper: Chippewa. Built in the KSP 1.7.3 SPH with 64 stock parts. Nothing at all imaginative in this one, but it performs very adequately and is fun, too. I plan to deploy one each at every Commnet groundstation to ferry personnel between the installation and a permanent base nearby.

Pin the top rotor and a blade open. Start the Junos (AG6) just to make some racket.

Engage the rotor drive with AG7. The throttle is on H/N.

Trim the yaw (~60%) with J/L. And, of course, I/K is the collective. I recommend 40% torque and about 30-50% collective.

SAS Hold helps the party stay on course. Switching the cockpit (lander can) control reference to Up and using SAS Radial Out greatly assists accurate hovering…

Add a little Juno throttle (X/Z) and then open it up only when you’ve got a stable forward motion established.

The rotor rpm is limited to 300 to avoid rotor head wobble, but for higher altitudes or faster climb, you can manually adjust that up to 460 rpm.

Toggle the rotor brake with AG8 once back on the ground.

90 m/s straight and level, range 170 km. Hover ceiling: 6+ km. (Follow my Kerbin Helicopter Circumnavigation mission!)
127 m/s in cruise with rotors feathered/stopped.

ECO 2020-12-03 added +2 RW for stability
ECO 2020-12-09 adjusted seats; removed MP; removed rungs; entry through the troop cabin…
ECO 2020-12-10 added skid tanks increasing LF capacity from 180 to 380 for longer range
ECO 2020-12-12 yaw-only rudder; [b] rotor brakes