Mooncrasher Team Frontier 2.0

[Pink]

First up, Voyager quest.
I was thinking of attempting to challenge Altaïr, who attempted the voyager quest himself HERE.
He did it with 220.2t of launch mass. I managed 223.8t. Ah well, 1.6% more mass is close enough. Perhaps one day I'll get it with less.


Without further ado, here's the launcher. It makes heavy use of cross-fueling at every step which is likely not ideal in some cases and is a bit annoying to fly.


Launch, you can see that we lift-off on the first and second stage with immediate cross-fueling and adopt a (bit hot) agressive trajectory.
If you notice, lift-off TWR is over 2 because of the active second stage.


First stage depletion, we immediately start drawing from a drop tank.


First drop tank finished, starting on second one. I don't have pics of second drop tank separation, was in map view.


Fairing separation.


Reached orbit.


To be continued.

 

[EmberSkyMedia]

I find it interesting you still have a stage left, personally that extra engine isn’t any more efficient than the frontier so it’s a weight trade-off I’m not sure is beneficial (versus more fuel or save the weight).

 

[Idkgeek]

I find it interesting you still have a stage left, personally that extra engine isn’t any more efficient than the frontier so it’s a weight trade-off I’m not sure is beneficial (versus more fuel or save the weight).

I think you could've removed that and beat Altair

 

[Pink]

Frontier is a very bulky engine, at 6t versus 2t for the valiant.
If I only remove the valiant (thus lightening the craft by 2t immediately) and turned its fuel tank into a second drop tank, I would still have less dV



Thus you can see how the Frontier is such a weighty drag for small craft.
The situation would change slightly via more drop tanks, but not much.

 

[Pink]

Oh... that previous post inspired me. Now I have a slimmer rocket

My ugly beauty... only 218.1t


Launch, with immediate crossfeed.


First stage empty, detaching. Second stage still full.


First drop tank used.


Ugh, bad fairing deployment. At least it didn't break anything. Also, second drop tank used.


Third drop tank used.


Fourth drop tank used, and orbit!


Eyeballing the required angle to exit Earth's SOI nicely prograde.


Starting interstellar burn.


Going around for more Oberth effect.

To be continued...

 

[Pink]

Burn stage 2 to depletion


Big drop tank used and thrown away


Small drop tank used and thrown away


All fuel exhausted.


Resulting trajectory.


All done.


As usual, I'll let Altaïr or 4KidsOneCamera judge it.

 

[Altaïr]

Wait, we forgot to judge that?!

That's a pass of course, by a very tight margin, and that's a new mass record, congratulations

 

[Pink]

Yippee!
I'll give the badge to myself then.