Flight Officers Aldeny and Tedman work through learning how to taxi the large aircraft and turn it about on the runway while also doing performance tests and operating with a full 4t load of fuel
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
all engines are shut down and C7/Genesis engineers will look over the data while ground crews inspect the nose wheel, which experienced some lateral load thanks to the spin. If data looks good and plane is not damaged, it will do some taxi work later today after 3rd sunrise
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
Flight Officers Tedman & Aldeny are back aboard the Dhumla and have fired up ALL FOUR engines to prepare for taxi! Ground crews have cleared the nose wheel but caution will still be taken at first to confirm it is in good working order
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
heading out for the runway, both pilots agree that 6-8m/s feels like a good speed. They usually zip along in a Civvie or Deuce at ~12m/s but Ted is like "I can *feel* the massiveness of this thing. Slow and easy!". They will eventually have to speed up for some testing though
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
Ted & Aldy have both been practicing turning on the runway, using the wide center portion. Nose wheel can only steer 30° so they must use reverse thrust on the turning side to spin around tighter. It definitely has a technique to it that they are getting the hang of
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
Dhumla has just turned about at the end of the runway without running off the edge, in fact if done properly the turn can only take up a little over half the width of the runway. With more room ahead now, they'll do a power test to see how much the wheel brakes can hold
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
plane began to roll at ~33% throttle or 32.8kN. Good info as there's no sense applying brakes when they would be useless and just burn them out faster if too much thrust is being applied. Taxiing back to the HAB, the aircraft will now be loaded with more fuel
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
earlier taxi test was done with 1t of fuel, now the aircraft is carrying 2.5t, a little over half its full capacity. Pilots will be keeping a careful eye on how the gear handles the additional weight and how steering is affected while taxiing
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
after going through some more figure eights in the middle runway section Aldy reports it definitely takes a bit more effort to move it around and they do notice a slight wobble if turning too tight and too fast. Taxiing back in, they will get a full load of fuel for a final test
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
after hauling around 4t of fuel and performing the same exercises aircraft is taxiing back to the HAB. Crew report no obvious issues as long as the plane is handled properly. C7/Genesis will have a final ground test Mon before clearing the aircraft for flight trials
Kerbal Space Agency
@KSA_MissionCtrl
what a long and busy week! So much to talk about in our weekly ops report - stop by even if you've seen all our tweets as we do like to include additional information here: kerbalspace.agency/?p=8434
