European Agency of Space Stuff

Time for our first rocket-plane flight! I will be performing this flight in full virtual reality, using the amazing Kerbal VR mod. I've had to reduce the graphics somewhat (disabling scatterer , specifically) in order to maintain VR compatibility. Unfortunately I haven't yet unlocked one of the plane cockpits which supports all the fancy buttons either, so I'll be controlling it using the Oculus Touch controllers for now. The objective of this mission is to drop launch our Y-1 rocket plane from our mothership , maintain level(-ish) flight at a speed of at least 343m/s for at least 30 seconds, then touchdown on the Saharan desert. In the cockpit is heroic test pilot Matt Clarkson . You'll notice that after I turn off the engines I start performing banking turns. Generally, in flight, you control your speed with your throttle and control altitude with your pitch. However when your engines are off and when you are in a state of gliding, you have to control both by maneu...

Rocket science is fundamentally pretty simple. Big explosion go down, steel cylinder go up. A very simple implementation of Newton's third law : "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction ". Building aeroplanes is somewhat trickier. In ordinary (stock) Kerbal, building your first aeroplane is generally tougher than building, say, an orbital rocket, but the aerodynamic model is still pretty simple and forgiving. Something that is sort of like a plane will still fly. RP-1, specifically the mod FAR , is not nearly so forgiving. First, let's make it clear that we're not building a traditional plane. While RP-1 does let you build propeller planes of the era, I've decided to head straight to rocket-planes . Rocket planes are what they sound like, planes that are primarily (or solely) powered by rocket engines. Historically, the most famous rocket plane is the Bell X-1 , the spiritual analogue of the Y-1 we're about to build. In our fantasy timel...