Engineering a HYPERSONIC 737 in Kerbal Space Program! 

For anyone playing at home, in Kerbal aircraft, if your centers of mass and lift overlap your vehicle will lift off fine, but as the mass changes from fuel burn the handling will change significantly. It can be easier to keep the center of lift somewhat behind the center of mass, and most normal plane-shaped designs will probably naturally turn out this way.

Matt's immense confidence when he starts these videos gives me life lol

a couple things. 1) I think RCE is still getting ever closer to understanding the rocket equation lmao. more rockets does not necessarily equal more speed. and 2) the devs have said in their latest videos about KSP2 that the new runways in the sequel will not have any collision objects at the end of runways.... namely those GOD DAMN LIGHTS lmao. those vibranium little runway lights have been the indestructible bane of every plane builder's existence in KSP for so long now lol

"I'm gonna look for a 737 on steam" *Downloads a 747* Also btw matt that plane wasn't to launch the shuttle but only to transport it haba

by default G retracts and extends gear. there is also a button at the top of the HUD between lights and parking brakes

Matt: I think we want the blue thing as far forward as possible. All KSP players: ThIs iS fInEE....

As an aerospace engineer, this hurt so much 😂

I’d be very impressed if you managed to hit 3430m/s in atmospheric flight, considering that’s above Kerbin’s escape velocity… Also G for Gear

The main idea of the shuttle on the plane is for either transporting it, or performing sub-orbital tests without needing a proper launch.

i love how with the flags, rce has essentially made dazzle camouflage, whereby the colours of a vehicle obscure its shape. it's a pretty cool concept

RCE + KSP is always awesome!

8:22 While that's what they did for testing the Enterprise landing, it was actually for transporting the Space Shuttle if it had to land elsewhere since it didn't have thrusters of it's own it was used to transport it back to Florida or to the final Museum locations.

As a MechE, now I know how you feel when you watch us build bridges.

343m/s is sea level speed of sound… you were way above that 😂

him breaking all ksp rules possible is just so entertaining, and then he goes "what did i do wrong??"

I feel that as somebody who knows something about aerospace, I need to make a channel just to show matt how to actually build aircraft because this is painful

As an Aerospace Engineering student this was… Interesting to watch Looking forward to see what other ridiculou… I mean, perfectly acceptable aircraft designs you come up with

The shuttle is on the back merely for transport. The shuttle has been retired but use to launch using the Space Launch System (SLS) which includes a large fuel tank (which was actually two fuel tanks) and two solid rocket boosters. It would land after reentry like a large glider and would be transported back to Florida piggybacking the 747.

Tips for RCE please read -G is for gear -You can copy if you hold alt -Solid fuel boosters aren't affected by the throttle

Video idea, can you make a modular bridge system in space? Then maybe add fuel or crew capsules to make it into a space station

You usually want to build simpler designs in KSP if you are trying to achieve something other than exploding on the runway. Also, there are certain engines and air intakes that are designed for flying at higher altitudes and speeds.

When Matt learns about spaghetti staging it'll blow his mind.

To switch control to the shuttle before it's detached, right click it's cockpit and select "control from here". To switch control after it's detached use the "[" and "]" keys. This cycles control to any craft within a 2km radius. To switch controls after a distance of 2km hit "M" for the map view, click on the icon that represents the shuttle (if you can) and select "control this craft". You can use the KSP tracking center to do the same thing but the game won't let you leave a craft for the tracking center while it's in atmospheric flight. When you look up speeds, pay attention to meters per second and meters or kilometers per hour. The number differences are huge. KSP, NASA, SpaceX, etc. display rocket speeds in meters per second. The number you are mistakenly trying to hit is kilometers per hour.

you can Press the button G to retract landing gear and button T and R to activate RCS and SAS (T for SAS and R for RCS)

The tailstrike at 23:07 was so cinematic.

Speed of sound is 343m/s

*sees title about hypersonics, excited about ramjet n stuff *Matt slaps the biggest subsonic wings ever "Oh lord"

imagine a ball with a firework taped to the top: ball will roll forward and the thrust will go downwards. This is what you are doing to yourself when you ignite a rocket that is above your CoM and try to take off. The high engine is pushing you into the ground

I think RCE was pretty close to going (the corrected) hypersonic before he started overloading with boosters. The issue with boosters is it adds weight/drag and also adds air resistance because you're hitting more air faster. It would probably be easier to just make sure the jet engines aren't at 100% from the get-go and to slowly stage up. A rule of thumb I remember from playing is you shouldn't see air effects during launch. If you are, you're just wasting fuel trying to go too fast too early.

This game is never going to get old. Party on RCE

The size of that big modded booster just reminds me of your original design with the fuel tank body. It seems totally feasible, then, (in a don’t try this at home kind of way), to just stick wings and a butt and nose one and whatnot straight on the giant booster. Nothing could possibly go wrong with that, right? Right? 💥

Thanks for following the Clarkson theory, speed and power is always good, even if it blows up, speeeeeed Edit: 20:10

For the record, never attached the landing gear directly to the wings, it causes the craft to swing to the left during takeoff. Edit: G toggles the landing gear, also there’s a button by the height display.

Matt trying to anger us while making us think he doesn't understand planes: *calls cargo ramp butt flaps and calling an 747 a 737*

NAsa opted to use some rocket stuff, not a Boing 747 to launch the shuttle into space. But they transported it on one and made some early landing tests with this system. Still pretty amazing thing. Definitely up there (lol) with the most amazing sights in aviation ever. btw in every flight simulator known to mankind "G" does the gear....

If you want to reach hypersonic: 1) Use afterburner engines 2) Add some more air intakes to allow engines running high up in atmosphere (above 6km) Or you can glitch abuse with controllers and make faster-than-light plane.

RCE: "I think they have faith in me this time." Narrator: "And that was the first mistake of many, which would lead the poor Kerbals down a path of pain and horror."

You can use G to retract the wheels and you can controle role by using Q and E.

1. The RCS button turns on RCS thrusters and allowes the SAS to use the RCS thrusters. If you dont have RCS thrusters, it wont do anything. 2. You can just press "g" to pull up landing gear. 3. You can reduce the max throttle on thrusters in the space plane hangar which decreases fuel consumption and increases flight duration. 4. If you have time like after the last launch, you can just EVA the kerbals and have the open their parachutes. I think its worth having them servive at least once. 5. There is a keybind to switch vehicles, but you can also right click the other crew module and press "control from here" while still close to each other. There is also a third way, where you go to the tracking station but that one is too slow and should only be used when the crafts are in orbit and far away from each other bcs you cant use the other methods BVR(Beyond Visual Range)

@RCE: In fact your first center of lift to center of weight position was quite perfect ... normal planes have it that way to wnsure a stable flight. Fighter jets have their center of lift in front of their center of mass to achieve an unstable flight condition to be more maneuverable but at the cost that the plane can not be controlled without a computer countering this unstable flight condition by moving the control surfaces of the plane dozens of times each second. Also note: If you have your engines underneath the wing they will produce an upward torgue for the plane by rotating the fuselage around the wing. So the nose gets pushed upwards if the engines are turned on. At least that's how it works in real life ... how far it is translated in KSP i have not tried yet ...

10:18 The plane is out of fuel, heading nose first into the ocean at over 500 meters a second... And Jebediah is still happy.

This is my favorite game out of all the others you've played. Please make more videos on kerabal!

IDEA: make the smallest plane you can make. Attach big solid fuel booster below for power. Attach big 737 plane below it. Fly the tiny plane with solid fuel with the big plane, detach it, then use the solid booster to max the speed of the tiny plane and then detach it

Actually, the model you loaded in is a recreation of what was used to TEST the landing behaviour of the Shuttle. There's an actual, modified 747 that was built to carry the shuttle up, then they would detach it, and they'd let the shuttle glide in for the final parts of the landing process. This was done during testing because they needed to make sure it would actually work. It's never been done in the way you described, where the plane carries it up and then the secondary craft continues to orbit; the shuttle doesn't actually have anywhere near enough on-board fuel for that, hence that massive orange tank in the shuttle launch system. The reusable solid boosters on the side, combined with the shuttle's engines using fuel from the external tank, handle the beginning of the launch, the SRBs decouple once expended, then it continues raising apogee and perigee using the fuel from that massive external; once that tank is jettisoned, it pretty much only has enough internal fuel to finish circularizing the orbit, and then deorbiting at the end of the mission.

I’m nowhere near the aerospace engineering profession, and even I feel the effects of this epic trolling.

When the hill is gaining altitude faster than your plane taking off, surely something must be wrong.

"There's still some danglyness underneath (...) ." My new favorite knob quote 🎛️

thank you matt i needed cheering up and your kerbal adventures did that but also hurt my brain a little LOL

As an obsessive flight nerd i can Say that seeing a 747 swapped for a 737 hurts

Glad to see the UK space agency back my dear

That chant at the end was perfect!

I will never forget Matt's words "In ya face game!" "Ahh look at this!"

Here we go again!!!

20:10 Ah yes, the infamous Clarkson theory... Very risky, very dangerous, just ask the Reliant Robin he almost sent into space...

RCE: "The shuttle detaches from the aircraft and keeps on going to space." Um.....who's gonna tell him? 🤣

I watched this video last night after a long day, and probably went asleep watching it, today I thought that I had a fever dream, but no, when I checked my yt history, it's an actual video, love you dude

I have about 300 hours in ksp now and I still feel like I’m learning how to play the game every time I turn it on

Rce: Is R for Retract? All ksp players: How does he not know its G for retract!

Love how you factor in lift and balance. Then immediately forget it. Then remember once again. Then completely neglect it the rest of the video. 😂

Kerbal is a game where you build and fly your own aircraft. When you build a plane, it's important to think about two special places on the plane called the center of mass and the center of lift. The center of mass is the point where all of the weight is balanced and the center of lift is the point where the air pushing on the wings makes the plane fly. If the centers of mass and lift overlap, your plane will be able to take off, but as the plane uses up fuel it will become heavier, so the way it handles in the air might change. To make sure that this doesn't happen, it's a good idea to put the center of lift slightly behind the center of mass. Normally, when you design a plane-shaped plane, it will be like this already.

Yes, Kerbal is finally back! That brings back so many memories 🥲🥹

longer wheelbase = easier to handle at high speed = more stable during takeoff

"why won't it take off?" *rockets pointed downwards and overpowering any lift he had*

Love the video, though, I will just say, the 747 with the shuttle is meant to just transport it around the planet, like, from where it's made and serviced, to the launch site. The shuttle was never launched from the 747, since it doesn't have the fuel to go to orbit like that.

There‘s a green button at the top to the right of the altitude to toggle all gears so you don‘t have to select every single one manually Edit: Alternatively you can press G

I’m amused that his first plane was missing roll control all tougher.

"In your face game!" Honestly mate, there is not a youtuber I enjoy watching more. Thanks Matt!

Matt.... You do know those shuttle carrying arecraft are for transportation purposes of the shuttle from one aerodrome to another right? You can't launch the shuttle from the aircraft lol.

The amount of confidence and ignorance is incredible. It makes these videos so funny to watch if you've ever played KSP.

19:02 "We need to add some struts" NOW you're getting it! KSP Yeah! Moar Boosters!

while more wing does mean more lift, it also means more drag and more weight, and so, you need sufficient thrust or the plane doesn't fly. Although, I'm sure you have enough thrust.

Hey Matt! It's "G" to toggle landing gear!

The speed of sound is 343 m/s, so you went well faster!

The 747 does not carry the shuttle to space. The shuttle gets massive rocket boosters attaches to it and it launches straight up like an old rocket. The 747 carries it from wherever it landed, back to Cape Canaveral, where NASA missions launch from.

it's Q and R to control roll. Use roll + pitch to turn, never use yaw to turn!!!! Also press G to retract all landing gear at once.

The editor deserves a Nobel Prize for this one!

Usually when he uploads it’s usually anarchy

You effectively jettisoned an entire plane. Nicely done.

17:49 when the most efficient/strongest shape lets RCE down

Concorde: delta-wing with four engines under the rear Tu-144: delta-wing with four engines under the rear L-2000 (cancelled): delta-wing with four engines under the rear 2707 (when cancelled): delta-wing with four engines under the rear RCE: let's stick some rockets on top of a wing designed for low speed

Your "737" has a cokpit from a CRJ, engines from a 777 and landing gear form a tu-154. Perfect, good job matt. You should be an aviation engeneer.

The best way to avoid flameouts is to add more intakes(jets), or check if the fuselages you are using are for jets or spaceplanes. Also try the ramjet engine, afterburners for liquid fuel planes or the rapier engine if you want to go with oxidizer. You can also just add the engine with the biggest specific impuls. More thrust per the rate of fuel consumption.

When the plane starts to look like an illegal firework 19:08

Instead of using the prefab engine modules, you can actually get a lot more speed by building your own. They've got ramjet parts in there that can get up to hypersonic speeds as well as air intakes that let you fly up at the very edge of the atmosphere (up to 25km, IIRC) instead of just up to the edge of the dense atmosphere where your turbofans were stuck at. Also, you need to make sure that you're doublechecking your fuel tanks for oxidizer, its just dead weight if you aren't using liquid fuel rockets and will just slow you down. (most fuel tanks are preloaded with oxidizer and fuel)

11:41 bob is always concerned when going at least 50 meters/second lol

I was rewatching this but something so cool happened, so basically I got a sick 2 min ad of kerbal space program 2! (It was sooooo cool!)

Civil Engineers are great with static structures. When you start adding dynamics, you're entering Mechanical Engineer territory. :)

I love how in the beginning, out of all the modded parts, he uses the vanilla turbo fan engine.

14:38 I just need something that sounds like a small booster,ooo the shrimp!”

Aerospace engineer here. Just to let you know, Takeoff distance is very sensitive to weight. If you double weight, you quadruple the takeoff distance. To decrease takeoff distance in this chaotic experiment of yours, you'd best massively increase the wing area i.e. get a massive wing.

History of Jebediah: Jebediah was a loved kerbal as he always dreamed of going to space like everyone else, he also… loved knobs. On his 20th birthday, he was employed at the UK Space Agency to test fly rockets and supersonic aircraft. His first aircraft he test flew was the Knob Rocket V1, a very strong and efficient designed rocket, that turned out to be a success and Jebediah was promptly promoted to lead test flyer. His second spacecraft he test flew was the Space bridge and that was also a major success but this time, Jebediah’s seniors took all the credit for it, after this Jebediah continued to test fly aircraft and spacecraft like the space worm and then after 20 years, he was selected to do the maiden flight of the Supersonic 737 V1. Unfortunately though, he was put with Bob and some unnamed Kerbal, and they weren’t the brightest of Kerbals and on takeoff, the 737 took off, flew for 1-2 minutes then Bob took the controls and deliberately crashed it into the ground, killing all 3 of the Kerbals. Jebediah died on the 4th of December 2022 aged 52, he was buried in Westminster Abbey to celebrate the life of Jebediah the Kerbal, he was buried next to his dog paddy and Bob’s Dad, Bob Kerbal Sr. was arrested for allegedly sabotaging the 737 but all charges were dropped as Bob was found guilty of Murder Suicide.

When going for hypersonic, you need to have as little air resistance as possible, think flat dorito or needle, and less classic style passenger jet. Any thrust must be from behind, and not attached to the wings, otherwise you’ll just slow down. You want a smooth, powerful device that has enough thrust, yet slides through the atmosphere like it’s lubed up.

FYI, the "G" key deploys and retracts landing gear, holding the "B" key holds your brakes, and winglets go on wingtips.

@RealCivilEngineer As a matter of fact, the plane was used for aerodynamics testing, not for launches. For launches, they used the iconic space shuttle rocket. The shuttle on the plane did not have functioning engines (in real life, I don't know how it is in the game).

They never launched a shuttle off a plane into space. The used the plane to take the shuttle up high in the air and drop it so they could do test landings.

8:10 that is a boeing 747 with a space shuttle on its back. This was used to transport the shuttles from their landing sites to the sites they would be assembled / launched in. The space shuttle would not launch from the rear of a plane, because the very large orange seen when it is fully assembled is actually the only fuel source for its main engines. I am too much of a nerd not to write this twitlonger thing in the comments (The concept he described would be the case if it were anything apart from the space shuttle like stratolaunch)

"Can we do boosters ontop of boosters...?" And here he is discovering the kerbal way to do things. And adding more struts afterwards proves that the UK space agency has learned how to kerbal a rocket

every ksp player, including me, are trying so hard not to scream. also, a tip, if you want hypersonic, bang a bunch of "vector" engines with a ton of fuel, and smaller wings, small wings = MOAR SPEED

More KSP. Finally!

The first plane only had control surfaces on the tail. The wings didn't have any control surfaces built it which is one of the main reasons it was so hard to control.