Challenge So You Think You Can Land?

[BruceJohnJennerLawso]

OK - I give up! When your Quicksave is:

Mars Runway Landing 0001 0002 0001 0002 0004 0001

I think I have given this a decent shot. I can get to the runway in the XR-2, a hair under 500 m/s, and below -10m/s vertical, with the spaceship as sloppy as hell, but I cannot stop on such a short strip. With keyboard controls, getting it stable under 400 m/s I think is close to impossible, but without that slow a speed and touching down right on the threshold, I doubt you can stop.

Here's a picture of my last attempt, where the commander was picked up in a Martian golf cart:

Maybe you could create an improvised airbrake by extending your radiator, gear, & payload bay doors?

 

[johan]

Right, so I managed to land, finally, only to find I needed about twice the length of the runway to stop.

It turns out that a 500m/s isn't the target to aim for, in fact it allows an impossibly generous margin.

I'm guessing that the target is around 320 to 350 m/s. It seems to become unflyable at around 280... the XR2 that is.

Possibly this is the hardest one of the three, because it is the heaviest. Harder to stop in the atmosphere, and harder to stop once in contact with the ground. And a higher stall speed, giving you less margin for err.r

Good challenge this, it's keeping me busy!


---------- Post added at 21:49 ---------- Previous post was at 21:16 ----------



So guess what... the XR2 stops much more quickly when doing a wheels-up landing than those puny disc brakes can manage....

I touched down not far from the numbers, wheels up, at somewhere around 360 m/s... and stopped, JUST inside the margin

Mission accomplished!

 

[BruceJohnJennerLawso]

Right, so I managed to land, finally, only to find I needed about twice the length of the runway to stop.

It turns out that a 500m/s isn't the target to aim for, in fact it allows an impossibly generous margin.

I'm guessing that the target is around 320 to 350 m/s. It seems to become unflyable at around 280... the XR2 that is.

Possibly this is the hardest one of the three, because it is the heaviest. Harder to stop in the atmosphere, and harder to stop once in contact with the ground. And a higher stall speed, giving you less margin for err.r

Good challenge this, it's keeping me busy!


---------- Post added at 21:49 ---------- Previous post was at 21:16 ----------



So guess what... the XR2 stops much more quickly when doing a wheels-up landing than those puny disc brakes can manage....

I touched down not far from the numbers, wheels up, at somewhere around 360 m/s... and stopped, JUST inside the margin

Mission accomplished!

Well mission accomplished to you maybe, but not so great for the ground crew who have to clean it up!

I too find the XR2 a frequent staller at low speed, but she does handle nicely when landing compared to the deltaglider and its offshoots.

 

[jangofett287]

"Congratulations, you have completed the challenge, here is the bill for a new heat shield." :jawdrops::leaving:

 

[hedzup456]

Just wondering if someone could give me a hand-orbiter tells me I am missing a certain "lua51.dll". What would I have to install to get this?
Thanks in advance, peoples,
~Hedz

 

[jangofett287]

Should be in the orbiter.zip, if it isn't you need to re-download it.

 

[hedzup456]

Thanks Jango..

Strange. I have it, but it doesn't exist for Orbiter?
~Hedz

 

[dgatsoulis]

When you have a problem with an addon, always post your orbiter.log file between code tags. Otherwise, it's almost impossible to help you.

 

[johan]

"Congratulations, you have completed the challenge, here is the bill for a new heat shield." :jawdrops::leaving:

:lol:

Yes!

So, I thought I'd try it with the standard delta glider. Of course, as soon as I had the scenario loaded, I realized "oh crap, now I don't have that fancy Altea attitude hold autopilot".

So.

I flew it by hand. :blink:

The re-entry is actually pretty easy, your only job is to keep the altitude near 25km above ground, and you're all set. And 80% of that can be accomplished using only the elevator trim control.

The problem was that I tried a bit too... erm, vigorously... to get lined up with the runway about 1000km out. Some heavy S turns combined with a altitude that almost never strayed above 30km led me to land 100km short. :facepalm: (and this was with using quite a bit of my RCS alotment, to accelerate... linear thrust forward does... not much, but every bit counts!)

However, I DID discover that the standard DG certainly does DRIVE very well. Wheel stop was about 20km from the runway :rofl:

Yes you heard right... no heatshield damage this time!

Next time I'm going to try to keep my entry altitude at 30km, not 25. The DG banks VERY well compared to the XR2, probably because it weighs about a quarter as much (that's guesswork). So I'm not scared of arriving fast, some S turns will sort that out in a hurry.

 

[asbjos]

Just wondering if someone could give me a hand-orbiter tells me I am missing a certain "lua51.dll". What would I have to install to get this?
Thanks in advance, peoples,
~Hedz

You probably haven't installed this challenge correctly. The file "lua5.1.dll" is included in the Orbiter package, but this add-on uses a "lua51.dll", which is included in the zip file. Be sure to install it correctly and try again. If the error reoccurs, please post the Orbiter.log file.

 

[dgatsoulis]

Congratulations to flytandem and johan for the successful landings. Now that we have the challenge completed with 2 of the 3 ships (and also a playback of an amazing landing with the DG), I think it's appropriate to post here a video of my landing with the DG. This is not from a save, but the complete mission from start to finish, total time 36 minutes.

I will post the XR2 landing this Sunday 27th of January.

The DGIV is the hardest ship for me. I've only done one semi-successful landing, where I lost the gear, but the ship stopped inside the runway.

 

[johan]

...post here a video of my landing with the DG.

:tiphat:

That's some precision flying, mister. I'm impressed! Much neater than my wild-west impression

How do you get the angle of attack so precise for such long times?

I will post the XR2 landing this Sunday 27th of January.

Looking forward to it!

 

[dgatsoulis]

How do you get the angle of attack so precise for such long times?

Elevator trim and pitch as needed. As you saw in the vid, I used aerobrakeMFD to check how far the ship would go, the orientation and more importantly the landing speed. The DeltaGlider is the most forgiving of the 3 ships since it can touchdown with ~400 m/s and still manage to stop before the end of the runway.

 

[Loru]

...That's some precision flying, mister. I'm impressed! Much neater than my wild-west impression ...

Well... after seeing that I won't be suprised by any atmospheric manuevre done by dgatsoulis

(warning - sound is pretty loud)

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tmG7YItRso"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tmG7YItRso[/ame]

 

[johan]

Well... after seeing that I won't be suprised by any atmospheric manuevre done by dgatsoulis

:10sign::11sign:

Pilot 1: "Did you know the XR-5 can do short field operations?"

Pilot 2: "You mean the XR-1 right?"

Pilot 1: "No, I mean the XR-5."

Pilot 2: Raises eyebrow - "No it can't, it weighs 300 tons! It needs at least 3 km's of runway to stop safely. You should know this!"

Pilot 1: "Here, hold my beer, I'll show you"

:jawdrops:

 

[dgatsoulis]

Well... after seeing that I won't be suprised by any atmospheric manuevre done by dgatsoulis

(warning - sound is pretty loud)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tmG7YItRso

Meh, runway landings are so mainstream. I prefer landing my Vanguard this way. (watch your speakers, sound is still pretty loud).

But I consider this XR2 landing as the best ever.

 

[blixel]

But I consider this XR2 landing as the best ever.

My favorite part of that video is actually the part from about 2:00 to 2:15. I love how the XR2 comes up at a nice arc, does a perfectly smooth 180 roll while reaching the peak of the arc, and then pierces its way back down through the sky like a dart. That particular segment just has a graceful elegance about it that really appeals to me.

 

[hedzup456]

I have found my problem; Norton thinks lua51 is a virus and bludgeons it to death. Now to work out how to infor Norton that it is not a 'High level trojan'..
~Hedz

 

[Cosmic Penguin]

I have found my problem; Norton thinks lua51 is a virus and bludgeons it to death. Now to work out how to infor Norton that it is not a 'High level trojan'..
~Hedz

That's because Norton itself is nothing short of a 'High level trojan'......... :rofl:

 

[dgatsoulis]

Here is the vid with the complete mission for the XR2 Ravenstar.

Normally, videos or playbacks of the completion of a challenge would be considered as spoilers.
But that isn't the case here. Even if you know exactly what to do, it still takes time to learn how to perform the landing.