Kerbal Space Program Ships and stuff

I've attached the revised ship I've made below.

The total mass for your original ship was 115.144. This is largely due to the extra X200-32 fuels tanks. They have a total mass of 18 a piece, which is a lot of mass to drag up once we empty them. Staging should alleviate some of the unused mass. 

Total mass for the revised (v1.4) ship is 104.8325. The reduction in mass is largely due to the decreased number of fuel tanks(3 instead of 4), as well as removing one BACC Solid Fuel Booster (SFB), which is the second most massive component in the build. I've replaced that one with 3 small RT-10 SFBs, which have a better thrust/mass ratio together than the single extra BACC SFB. I've got fuel ducts going from the small booster to the large to keep the large ones going for longer. I'm unsure if the ducts do boosters, but the mass increase per fuel line (.05x3) is so small it's a chance I'm willing to take.

So mass wise:

v1= 115.144
v4= 104.8325

For thrust, I've switched out the "Skipper" you had for a "Mainsail". The Skipper allows you to operate at maximum thrust, but has a top thrust of 650. The Mainsail has a maximum thrust of 1500, but is unstable beyond 75% thrust. Assuming that this 75% thrust effects all attached SFBs then it will drop the total thrust from them. However, even at 75% thrust (1500x.75) we get 1125 thrust alone, to the Skipper's 600 thrust. The mass difference is 2, so nearly a 50% increase for a 50% mass increase.

The thinking behind this is to clear atmosphere as soon as possible. Drag and high g is the most expensive part of the exit from atmosphere, so we should leave atmo as soon as possible. 

So thrust wise:

v1= 1595
v4= 2396.25

Where this really matters is our thrust/mass ratio, which shows a decent improvement. Also worth noting is that as the new craft loses fuel and empties tanks, it will discard them, keeping a lower mass for it's new lower thrust. 

Thrust/mass:

v1= 13.85
v4= 22.86

As a side note, both craft are decent. The v1 achieved orbit without issue, but was just dragging a lot of unnecessary extra weight. The switching of the skipper for a mainsail was also large, due to the high thrust of the mainsail. As well, that mass difference when compared with all the fuel we're taking up is minor. v4 cannot operate beyond 75% thrust due to the mainsail, but the mainsail/RT-10s more than accounts for the difference.

 

So, I was intrigued by the efficiency of the small RT-10 SFBs, so I built one using mainly RT-10s. It works quite well, and reaches an awesome altitude while still running initial booster sets (think I hit 40 km). Only restriction is heat. As before, mainsail so a limited thrust of 75%.


Honestly I'm really surprised at the power of the little guys. They work well.