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[rhesusmacabre]

Heh, sorry. It was my first attempt too!

To be fair, I entirely expected it to collapse under its own weight or topple over straight away, or maybe just disintegrate as soon as it started moving. But what most surprised me was how it kept on going when it reached the water.

The more I play this game, the more it impresses me.

[Twi]

Indeed. I tried this a while back, with limited success: the designs I made like that tended to disintegrate, topple (if they were monowheels), or just spin in place.


I have, however, hit upon an effective design- a sort of coil-spring-like set of plates, it's proven much more durable than anything else I've tried.. And as you say, Kerbal Paddlewheels are indeed a thing. They're hilariously drifty, though, but they work surprisingly well. Note to self: must test Damned Robotics-powered paddlewheel sometime.

[Twi]

Would you like a double post?

Yes you would!
Test one, Rotatron Paddlewheels: Default Rotatrons are far too slow for this, really. Also, the testing supports my suspicion that KSP cannot model things as partially in water, physics-wise: either they're in water or they're not.


 Test Two, Rocket Paddlewheels: Sitting low in the water appears to be a vital component to Paddlewheel success. It also seems to help with the bouncing. And there is a lot of bouncing.


Next step: Bigger paddlewheels! Also, either modded Rotatron or modded engine, because reasons.
(I already did this, but I've thrown enough pictures around for a few hours, so. ))

[Lightningfalcon]

Finally got my rocket assisted takeoff plane to kindof work.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

 Actually did well.  the wheel in the back right blew out, which caused the rockets to start exploding.  By that point I had enough speed to glide, but the jet engine wasn't spun up yet, and the takeoff was too chaotic to glide, so I only made it a few hundred feet before it exploded

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Eventually, after replacing the wheels I was using, I was able to fly about 10 kilometers before I lost control

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I decided to try to make a few changes, when this happened-

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Trying to move around the wings didn't work that well. 

The biggest problems are the two seconds after release from the takeoff vehicle.  When separating, you can't immediately put your nose up, as then the back of the plane will smash into the rocket.  If you wait too long, then you will smash into the ground.  If you go to fast when you separate, then the hole plane spins out of control.  Go to slow, and you simply won't take off. 
Does anyone have any tips on how to have a plane that is stable in flight?  Mine will either flip out immidiatly, or be fine for a long time then start spinning for no reason. 

[ank]

Why don't you attach the plane at an angle, so it will be nose up on separation?

[Lightningfalcon]

Why don't you attach the plane at an angle, so it will be nose up on separation?

How would I do that? 

[ank]

Shift + S or W when attaching the rocket.

[Lightningfalcon]

Found an even better solution, along with one that solves some of my flight issues.  And is more awesome.
I expanded the wing structure, and instead of having the rocket sled attached to the fuselage, I attached it to the wings.  THis solved all my problems, and only created one. I only have to be slightly careful when seperating, it doesn't do any insane flips, and I double the amount of rockets.  Only downside is that you have to almost constantly hold down the S key to keep it from trying to flip due to the air intakes

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[Leonon]

Parachutes are great for dropping spent boosters in atmosphere. Just have them deploy at the same time as the boosters are decoupled and they'll yank them away from the rest of the craft.

It looks like there should be room under your jet for 2 more intakes to equalize the top/bottom drag.

[Lightningfalcon]

Parachutes are great for dropping spent boosters in atmosphere. Just have them deploy at the same time as the boosters are decoupled and they'll yank them away from the rest of the craft.

It looks like there should be room under your jet for 2 more intakes to equalize the top/bottom drag.

Already put those extra two intakes there.  Plane is a bit more unresponsive, but at least it's not trying to constantly flip over now.  Didn't think of attaching parachutes to the booster thou. 

[Twi]

Speaking of unresponsive planes:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Have a Kerbalized Focke-Wulf Triebflugeljager (try saying THAT three times fast, I dare you).

This design was the culmination of long and arduous minutes messing around with rotating things for the totally unrelated purpose of marine propulsion. Oh, and me making a modded wing in frustration. Rest assured, it's still terrible! As a matter of fact, this design failed due to the ramjets providing insufficient thrust at any reasonable (read: safe) rotation speed.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

A more conventional (?!?) jet design worked, but is basically unable to pitch or yaw for some strange reason. Rolls fine though. Sadly, this problem has not yet been fixed.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Canards didn't help much.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Did I mention that the ball bearing likes to break if you push the rotor too fast?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

And for some reason, even though it's stuck in vertical when flying up in heli-mode, when it goes down on nose-mounted parachutes it somehow begins to spin like crazy. What is this, I don't even.



In conclusion: WHY DOESN'T IT WANT TO MANEUVER. Aside from that, everything else is fixable.

[Mini]

Try actually angling the engines, instead of just having them sideways, so they provide some lift independent of the wings spinning.

[ank]

You mean angling them forwards for more thrust?
That's actually what the Germans tried to do... it failed for them, but maybe it will work for KSP.

Also, there seems to be a suspicious lack of struts.
I distrust anything that is not made of at least 20% strutmetal.

[DrPoo]

If you could somehow counteract the torque forces of the propeller, maybe by having another propeller spinning in the opposite direction, it might not spin out like that when you start going forwards?

[jocan2003]

For each force applied there is a counter-force, so if you have one giant propeller spinning on one side it will send a counter-spin force on your fuselage, the way to counteract would be to had a counter-spin giant propeler.