I noticed that it looks much more narrow than it did before. Almost more like a cruise missile or something like that. Gives it a rather interesting feel and look now.
That nose view does make it look pointy. Do I see some smoothing errors near the stern? *gasp* Coolhand, I'm shocked. I thought you were perfect at all times! *tear*
In all seriousness, that is some excellent work as usual!
That nose view does make it look pointy. Do I see some smoothing errors near the stern? *gasp* Coolhand, I'm shocked. I thought you were perfect at all times! *tear*
yeah this wip full of all sorts of errors, essentially because its incomplete. this one has many panel lines which end abruptly causing the odd crease or funny shading, and i'm grafting a new engine section on at the rear which has overlaps and holes.
I have to agree, just looking at that mechanism and I can see how it works in my head. Awesome piece of work. That goes for the rest of the design too.
Hey Steve, looks great as always can't remember if I said this before (forgive me for not searching through the thread I should be at work right now!). It reminds me in design and aesthetics of the vessels in a cartoon called StarCom been a while since I saw it but maybe a more smoothed version of one of their craft. That's not a negative criticism just an observation, I loved that cartoon
Ah so this would be the Space Shuttle's angry, angry grandson!
It's very enlightening to see all the revisions, the evolution of the design throughout the WIP, and your willingness to say what you're thinking while you're modelling is very instructive.
Nothing really to add, apart from thanks for the insight into your creative process. Tutorials teach techniques, but you learn more about art from informal access to an artist.
^ Hot damn - now I like that. What are you using for inspiration concerning the loading mechanism? I ask this because it looks totaly fuctional.
I'm not sure there's any existing rotary launch system that actually works like this since they don't have to fight gravity usually. The first thing it has to do is to somehow propel the missile out the top, or at least lift it up into the airstream in a forwards pointing attitude. the arms seemed to be the best solution as if you let go of the missile at the right point you could possibly put some upward/forward momentum into it as you ignite it's engine.
Firelode, yeah i had some starcom toys as a kid, and yes iirc they were generally pointy, delta winged spaceplanes.
D.M.J. thanks, probably more a descendant of the dyna-soar which preceded the shuttle, but was never built - MikeyB is building a nice variant of that ship.
Instead of seperate arms for each missile, why not a carousel like system. I hold the missile by its ends and rotates around the arms. When the missile is over top of the arms, the arms can lift it out of the carousel and into launch position. With the same idea, reloads can be lifted into the system from the bottom.
that might be a slightly lighter system but perhaps not as effective, it would probably be slower to fire for example. Also, there's perhaps greater risk of a jam and since there's no redundancy if one set of arms fails to deploy then the whole thing is useless, if one fails with the current system you simply go on to the next.
From a construction POV it also involves building and animating some extra and fairly complex machinery that you'd probably never see. however the mechanism would work and would look pretty neat - though i'm not sure how good an idea it is to hold a big missile at both ends and jiggle it with no centre support
Nice design Coolhand. There is an article about the YF-22's missile ejection system that is similar in design (minus the rotary bay.) The trapeze design apparently did impart forward momentum as well as ejection into the airstream. But in the article it was mentioned that the forward momentum wasn't necessary for the F-22 and they went with a simpler, lighter vertical ejection system. (EDOAâs AVEL Missile Ejection System: Extending the RaptorAâs Claws) Just an interesting sidebar
I'm not sure there's any existing rotary launch system that actually works like this since they don't have to fight gravity usually. The first thing it has to do is to somehow propel the missile out the top, or at least lift it up into the airstream in a forwards pointing attitude. the arms seemed to be the best solution as if you let go of the missile at the right point you could possibly put some upward/forward momentum into it as you ignite it's engine.
Nice design Coolhand. There is an article about the YF-22's missile ejection system that is similar in design (minus the rotary bay.) The trapeze design apparently did impart forward momentum as well as ejection into the airstream. But in the article it was mentioned that the forward momentum wasn't necessary for the F-22 and they went with a simpler, lighter vertical ejection system. (EDOAâs AVEL Missile Ejection System: Extending the RaptorAâs Claws) Just an interesting sidebar
yep, well great minds, etc...;) I'm not sure how the 23's launcher worked, but i read somewhere that one of the many reasons why the 23 lost to the 22 was because the vertically stacked missiles could be prone to jamming so thats something i've taken into consideration here. The straight push out system thats apparently used there would work better with efritchs suggestion so you can clear the framework thats holding the missiles in place - something you can't actually do with arms swinging forwards.
here's another update showing the variable geometry wing, like the old XB70, the outer parts tuck in at high speed.
are you expecting an additional craft? It's a capable spacecraft in its own right, but the nearly unlimited highspeed loiter times in pretty much any atmosphere (whereas most other ships can merely orbit or fly slow) give it the edge in certain circumstances. but then the other ships don't have the aerohull and fusion scramjets. Not to mention it could make effective use of aerobraking to allow for passive manuvering or orbital plane changes, making it easy to sneak up on someone in orbit without using engines.
Futher proof we need people like coolhand to make designs for future craft. Terran based or Space based. Not the egg heads or people who get paid thousands of Tax payer dollars making designs a child would even say its ugly, too simple, doesn't need the bells and whistles and unimagitive.
I mean look at the designs of the stuff in 2001 movie, all the technology they based on what they had then (Except HAL and the cyo beds) They stinking had a awsome looking shuttle that was owned by PAN-AM lol, and a spacestation that had a hotel in it. Lack of imagination, and disintrest in space brought a end to that future, now were stuck trying to catch up. Whats the best NASA can pull off? Remaking a Capsule for the moon with super high tech parts and tech thats should be used for something more ambitious, like Mars, or Europa. We can get said capsule to where it needs to go with current technology, and a damn laptop hooked to said capsules systems lol. We need a actual ship, one like the shuttle but a actual spaceship, we don't need no capsules. Quickly lets make it our mission to get coolhand hired into NASA so maybe we can see some decent craft built in our life time. or better yet to that group making that commercial spacecraft. At least there making progress using the technology already avalible and not trying to rely on super advanced tech which is not yet proven.
If you want spacecraft innovation, i think the military or the private sector is where you should look in future or even today. Nasa currently just want to do things reliably and relatively cheaply which is why everything we fly into space (aside from the shuttle orbiter) looks like a collection of spheres and tubes.
There's plenty of wild 'blue sky' designs out there, for all sorts of things, from nasa commissions even, but due to engineering constraints and budget we mostly aren't going to see them any time soon. And yeah i'd love to have a go, but it would be down to actual engineers to make the design work and it's never as simple as saying that it should look like this or that. I think those guys are doing a great job and though it seems like we're stepping back i don't think we really are but we're maybe not really moving forward either in terms of manned spaceflight, aside from commercial concerns like Virgins planned fleet of spaceplanes or whatever the US military might be flying, depending on what you believe.
Roadwarrior, hmm, something to do with a fusion manifold...
Melak, i think it looks pretty different, no need for me to go and sue them or anything;)
Tovette, sorry man i tried to read your post but something to the left kept drawing my eyes away from the text.
Posts
In all seriousness, that is some excellent work as usual!
but nice work nevertheless.
is that nose reinforced for "ramming speed" ?
yeah this wip full of all sorts of errors, essentially because its incomplete. this one has many panel lines which end abruptly causing the odd crease or funny shading, and i'm grafting a new engine section on at the rear which has overlaps and holes.
So how're you going to texture this one?
It's very enlightening to see all the revisions, the evolution of the design throughout the WIP, and your willingness to say what you're thinking while you're modelling is very instructive.
Nothing really to add, apart from thanks for the insight into your creative process. Tutorials teach techniques, but you learn more about art from informal access to an artist.
I'm not sure there's any existing rotary launch system that actually works like this since they don't have to fight gravity usually. The first thing it has to do is to somehow propel the missile out the top, or at least lift it up into the airstream in a forwards pointing attitude. the arms seemed to be the best solution as if you let go of the missile at the right point you could possibly put some upward/forward momentum into it as you ignite it's engine.
Firelode, yeah i had some starcom toys as a kid, and yes iirc they were generally pointy, delta winged spaceplanes.
D.M.J. thanks, probably more a descendant of the dyna-soar which preceded the shuttle, but was never built - MikeyB is building a nice variant of that ship.
Instead of seperate arms for each missile, why not a carousel like system. I hold the missile by its ends and rotates around the arms. When the missile is over top of the arms, the arms can lift it out of the carousel and into launch position. With the same idea, reloads can be lifted into the system from the bottom.
I can whip up a quick render idea if need be.
From a construction POV it also involves building and animating some extra and fairly complex machinery that you'd probably never see. however the mechanism would work and would look pretty neat - though i'm not sure how good an idea it is to hold a big missile at both ends and jiggle it with no centre support
Eitherway though, you're ship is looking awesome.
yep, well great minds, etc...;) I'm not sure how the 23's launcher worked, but i read somewhere that one of the many reasons why the 23 lost to the 22 was because the vertically stacked missiles could be prone to jamming so thats something i've taken into consideration here. The straight push out system thats apparently used there would work better with efritchs suggestion so you can clear the framework thats holding the missiles in place - something you can't actually do with arms swinging forwards.
here's another update showing the variable geometry wing, like the old XB70, the outer parts tuck in at high speed.
Great work Coolhand
And when do we get to the space part of this vessel?
I thought you might find it interesting that theres a not too dissimilar shuttle in the most recent tom clancy game:
http://xs137.xs.to/xs137/09120/shuttle1605.jpg
http://xs137.xs.to/xs137/09120/shuttle2705.jpg
I mean look at the designs of the stuff in 2001 movie, all the technology they based on what they had then (Except HAL and the cyo beds) They stinking had a awsome looking shuttle that was owned by PAN-AM lol, and a spacestation that had a hotel in it. Lack of imagination, and disintrest in space brought a end to that future, now were stuck trying to catch up. Whats the best NASA can pull off? Remaking a Capsule for the moon with super high tech parts and tech thats should be used for something more ambitious, like Mars, or Europa. We can get said capsule to where it needs to go with current technology, and a damn laptop hooked to said capsules systems lol. We need a actual ship, one like the shuttle but a actual spaceship, we don't need no capsules. Quickly lets make it our mission to get coolhand hired into NASA so maybe we can see some decent craft built in our life time. or better yet to that group making that commercial spacecraft. At least there making progress using the technology already avalible and not trying to rely on super advanced tech which is not yet proven.
There's plenty of wild 'blue sky' designs out there, for all sorts of things, from nasa commissions even, but due to engineering constraints and budget we mostly aren't going to see them any time soon. And yeah i'd love to have a go, but it would be down to actual engineers to make the design work and it's never as simple as saying that it should look like this or that. I think those guys are doing a great job and though it seems like we're stepping back i don't think we really are but we're maybe not really moving forward either in terms of manned spaceflight, aside from commercial concerns like Virgins planned fleet of spaceplanes or whatever the US military might be flying, depending on what you believe.
Roadwarrior, hmm, something to do with a fusion manifold...
Melak, i think it looks pretty different, no need for me to go and sue them or anything;)
Tovette, sorry man i tried to read your post but something to the left kept drawing my eyes away from the text.