Rocketology

How awesome is Team Galileo and Team Kopernicus! Thank you for doing so much to KSP fresh!

@SQUAD Thank you guys so much for listening to the community! The updated Skipper and Mainsail look great! You are all

I forgot to add "barring any major bug finds" in that tweet. Which obviously happened. And I probably should have just stated "soon". The idea was to build hype for the release, as at that time, all parties thought a Monday release was going to happen. #monday gate.....lol Those tweets are also for my audience, of which @Galileo and @Sigma88 are there often, and are willing to answer questions to the best of their ability, because they are simply that awesome. Should have stopped by and you would have heard it directly from the source!

I know the art guys put a lot into these engine revamps, but I can't help but echo some of the other thoughts here that these are far too simplistic in there design. I look at the new Skipper and this Mainsail and my first thought is: "Made by Fisher Price, for ages 3 and up"

I do! Restock FTW!

That is pretty Christmas Epic!

Many answers here may fit in here, as long as they are JNSQ.

@Boris-Barboris I just wanted to take a moment and thank you for this great mod! I have been using this since I discovered it a long time back, and it's everything that I wish SAS was - and more! The "coordinated turn" mode for an aviation enthusiast is pure gold. This one item alone is something that has always bugged the Hell out of me with SAS - as it isn't possible to execute a coordinated turn with it. And for those that are not aware, nearly all aircraft IRL use this for turning, and is one of the very first things taught if you take flying lessons. So once again Boris, Thank you!

@Nertea This is an exemplary mod and one I can no longer play without! Tomorrow I will do a livestream highlight of it for you guys as it's too awesome not to share (and maybe get your team some much deserved donations)!

@Lisias The latest version of Tweakscale does indeed appear to be working fine with the 1.8.1 update! Maybe you get to keep your hair after all!

A balanced space shuttle type architecture in KSP is arguably one of the most difficult things to engineer in game. As others have stated above, ensuring that your Center of Thrust is aligned through the Center of Mass is only the beginning. As the CoM of the shuttle will move toward the orbiter and aft as you burn fuel (both solid and LFO). Thus, the Center of Thrust must also move to compensate; and this is where it gets difficult. If you are trying to build a NASA shuttle analog, you may need to thrust limit the Vectors if the shuttle is wanting to pitch forward, may also wish to use the rotate tool and rotate them in the pitch axis 5-15 degrees where they mount to better align through CoM. If your design is wanting to pitch backwards, the SRB's may be overpowering the Vectors, depending on your setup and that SRB's TWR climbs rapidly as they burn solid fuel, so what may be balanced at launch won't be shortly after lift-off. If this is the case, and you have the Breaking Ground DLC, you can set a KAL 1000 controller to thrust curve (decreasing thrust limit over time) the SRB's - this will require a lot of trial and error to figure out the ideal curve for your design and may vary by payload mass. If you do not have the Breaking Ground DLC, you can still thrust curve stock SRB's - you just have to thrust limit them in pairs, I did this for my shuttle long before the Breaking Ground DLC. This requires extensive trial and error to get right, and for my design, it took 14 Kickbacks per side to accomplish, thrust limiting in pairs from 90-50%. Longer still to tune them so the shuttle could fly both empty and max payload with the same SRB setup. I then used a small LFO tank to fuel Cub engines that I used for engine gimbal. The only reaction wheel on mine is from the Mk3 cockpit and the shuttle is very smooth in flight. Here's some screenshots of my original setup (NOT a NASA analog), all stock, pre-BG DLC (note the attachment setup using the docking ports no longer works with changes due to Breaking Ground DLC):

Reeentry with the 2.5m heatshield from LKO was possible, but not the 1.25m - even with just the Mk 1 crew capsule. I tried various reentry angles, too steep, it would just pop, everything else, you would simply run out of ablator and pop. When I first started I had stock reentry heat set to 120% + DRE, not even a 2.5m capsule would survive, so reduced to 100% + DRE, 1.25M was a NOGO and the 1.875M could squeak by a hair if reentry was perfectly executed every time. I'd say 2 in 5 were successful, so I just ended up removing DRE and setting stock reentry heat back to 120%. Even then, it's a challenge to get a 1.25m capsule back w/o popping, a 1.875m would use 90%+ of ablator, and the 2.5m could survive a Munar return using about 98% of ablator.

I guess I should have quoted the "will there be an update for 1.8" post that was posted within minutes of 1.8 being released.

Best way to tell if a mod works or not after an update is to simply test it yourself. Just like you, mod authors have real lives, real families, real jobs, and other obligations and may not be able to immediately test it themselves after an update as they don't have access to said update until the same time you do. And the best way to motivate a mod author; DONATE to their cause!

Team Galileo, you guys are awesome! This is truly amazing work!