Absolution

Of course I didn't say that I wouldn't work on some sort of command pod ever. It's just that I want to keep the content of my mods focused on the core intent of a given mod. Anvil is just a lifting platform and that's all it will ever be. A future mod may be a space station or a Munar base and in that case I would give it a different name.

As a matter of fact nobody has asked that question before. No, command pods are not planned for Anvil. It is just a heavy lift platform. Update on my new project: I tried building a texture using normals to make it pop but it went horribly south and looked absolutely terrible. It did work which is a victory in and of itself but my lack of artistic skill really, REALLY showed. So I dumped that I am simply going back to the tried and true. Unfortunately, that also set me back a week or two but live and learn. I will still be trying out an emissive texture later one but now that I've settled on a "look" for my project I should be able to clock out the remaining work without too many hiccups. Still no ETA and realistically we are probably talking about "weeks". Stay tuned.

I made this video a while ago and I have no idea why I took it down but here it is again. It shows how to install the fairings. Try this out and let me know if you are still having trouble.

HA! Good catch.

That was their original intent but the delta-v necessary to accomplish it and the fact that it was an uncontrolled burn made the situation worse. Instead of a piece of debris gently orbiting in a stable path you now had a large, spinning, missile orbiting erratically. It was a disaster waiting to happen. The retro rockets are now intended to aid in stage separation. A short, gentle, burn to get the spent stages away from your payloads. I never use them myself but I left them in the pack just in case someone found a use. The SMRT modules were developed to de-orbit spent stages by allowing you to retain control of said spent stage after separation. Assuming you left enough gas in the tank you can turn the spent stage around and bring her home. Hopefully not literally onto some poor Kerbal's home...

Anvil 1.6.2 is now released! As I always state: please delete all previous Anvil content before installing the new stuff. Of course, that shouldn't be too hard considering KSP 0.20 just rewrote the rules on mod folder structure. I also suggest replacing any .craft files you may have from the older releases with the ones contained in the download. ---HOW TO INSTALL--- Copy the entire folder titled "CORE_ANVIL_162" into the following directory: "KSP_win\GameData" Assuming you have not installed any other mods you should now see two folders. One is titled "CORE_ANVIL_162" and the other is titled "Squad". Change Log: ---1.6.2--- (27MAY13) -Now fully compatible with KSP 0.20. -Rearranged folder stucture to comply with KSP 0.20 and moved fairings into the "Aero" category. -Improved radial attachment scheme on CSB parts. Now more user friendly -Fixed RDM radial decoupler. Now detaches correctly. -Improved mesh colliders of all fairings. Now more user friendly and accurate. Less chance of clipping. Also, unofficially, I think I made my fairings compatible with "FAR" but I didn't test it. Here's hoping for the best. The new CORE logo is also still in work. It has nothing to do with this release so I didn't see a reason to delay this version for a silly picture. If you see any bugs or any other weird behavior you know where to find me. Good luck and have fun!

Thanks for the support! By brand I meant a logo for CORE. The big name mods in this community have very nice and easily recognized logos and I would like to do that for CORE as well. What do I have? A plain text title for my OP and a half baked logo for the openings of my videos. Bleh. Anvil is what it is and I have no intention to change it. It will inevitably evolve as KSP does but I built Anvil to be a quick, easy and reliable platform and that's the way it will stay.

Well... update .20 really flipped the mod folder structure on it's head. I understand what I need to do to get Anvil to work with the new system but it will take a couple of days to implement and test. Stay tuned! oh... and my early normal map tests aren't turning out so well, lol. There's much learning to be done on that front too. *edit* Also, I want to get everything caught up with the bugs/improvements people have identified since the last release so here is a list of what is coming in version 1.6.2: -FAR compatibility (making an effort but no promises) -Fix radial attachments for CSB to be more user friendly -Better colliders for fairings -Investigate RDM not firing properly (not sure what the problem is so I don't know if I can fix it) -Incorporate new folder structure for compliance with KSP 0.20 I hope to have something out by this weekend but, as always, I promise nothing. I can only do my best. *edit 2* I am also developing a new "brand" image. My current one is quite... bleh. Not that anyone really cares but I do.

As with most, if not all, rocket builds you should start with your payload and then assemble the rocket below it. There are two existing resources for helping to figure out how to put an Anvil rocket together. The first is the ANVIL ROCKETS GUIDE PDF included in the download package. At the end of the document are two exploded views for the Anvil IV and V. It shows which parts are used and where. All of the Anvil variations are assembled in the same basic format. The second resource is the .craft files also provided in the download package. Copy those files to your game's "Ships\VAB" folder and then open it inside of the VAB screen. These are pre-assembled examples of a typical rocket/payload configuration. Hope that helps! --- Update on the next project: Progress has slowed a little because I am learning how to do more advanced texturing techniques such as normal mapping and emisives. It's not like they are complicated but I am starting from zero experience and the learning curve is always steepest at the start. Hopefully I can get this stuff down and be able to offer more visually appealing work.

Are emissives tied to engine heat only? Can I tie it to something else or even nothing at all? I would like to create a persistent glowing effect independent of other variables. Perhaps something that "pulses" over time. Is that doable?

I didn't use Isp as an input value but I did consider the end results when running the equations. Every variable was sanity checked and weighed against a reasonable value. So to say that I had no intention to make it more or less realistic is not an accurate statement. I have had every intention to do so. The results, however, are what they are. I simply don't want to give the impression that I did not do my due diligence.

I used to have transitional parts when there was only one meter difference in diameters. I chose not to do it for this latest generation of parts because it looked weird... I can take another look at it, though.

I wouldn't say that either. I did the best I could.

What is FAR and why would the name have anything to do with stability? The Isp is a derived value on Anvil. I first determined what payload it should be capable of and then used a spreadsheet to determine the rocket's properties. I then adjusted values as necessary to get everything within a reasonable ballpark. What you see is the end result of several months worth of balancing and fine tuning. It's not perfect but it gets the job done.

No PhysX issues. I am just dealing with "writer's block" when it comes to the 3D design of these parts. Once I get these last parts finished and everything textured I'll release a beta copy for people to play with. It will be light on features but will have enough to get the idea. Anvil was all about getting stuff off of Kerbal and into space. The next project focuses on what to do when you get there.

I used to feature separate engines and fuel tanks but that lead to some very wobbly rockets. Sure, one could try to strut the heck out of the rocket to stiffen it up but I always aim for the simplest more reliable rockets. The way Anvil is packaged you can combine the CSBs in a variety of ways that will still deliver your payload properly. It is not my intent to separate the engines from the fuel tanks any time in the future unless KSP evolves in such a way as to compel me to. Hopefully you choose to keep playing around with the parts I have provided and hopefully you can find a configuration that works for you. Good luck! ------------ Update on my next project: I am still quite a ways away from showing anything publicly but things have been going quite well. Historically I've always had a problem with coding and balance when it comes to making new parts. The actual design part was very straight forward and easy. For this project it's the complete opposite. I've built several proof of concept parts and tested them in game with great success. Often times it only took me a single test flight to satisfy myself with its functionality. Alternatively I have had trouble with the designs and I've gone through numerous iterations. I have many concepts I would like to integrate but they are not meshing well when I put them together. I will make a part one day and scrap it the next because I no longer like the result. The good news is I have crossed one of my biggest design hurdles today and while I am far from content with it I think it's good enough to move forward with. That leaves me with two more parts to design before I move on to texturing. The bad news is I am probably several weeks away from being able to showcase anything to the public. I am leaning in the direction of doing an open beta release at some point to allow willing community members to play around with my work and hopefully help me nail down any quirks/bugs. It's hard to say exactly how this thing will evolve in the future but what I can say is that it will be an iterative process. I wont deliver everything at once but I will slowly add features as time goes on. Pretty much the same way that Anvil played out. Stay tuned.

Can you still turn the animation on and off when it's set to loop? I'd like to do some visual effects like a spinning radar dish but I'd like to "turn it on" and "turn it off".

That's... odd. Are you using any other mods/plugins? Can you offer more description?

KSP uses the collider mesh to determine where you can "click" on a given part (assuming I am fully informed). Since Unity does not allow for an "open" shape (such as a C) for colliders I can't help this situation. I could make the fairings into multiple individual panels and give each its own collider... I'll have to think about that. Do they start flopping around like that the instant you load up the rocket or does it take a while? Part of the issue is that Unity allows for only a single point of attachment between two parts and Squad has not been able (or had the time to) code a way of stiffening up that single attach point. Of course I reserve the right to be completely out of date in my knowledge of the current state of the game's programing. It's hard to keep up.

Anariaq, I hear you have a model of the Kerbals (which I can see in the pictures above). The link in an earlier post doesn't work. Would you be willing to share your Kerbal 3D model?

The behavior you are seeing is not by intent. There are some quirks to how KSP reads a given part and those settings are not set up properly. It's on my end. As you have discovered its a simple matter of rotating the part using the WASD keys in the VAB to get everything to line up. I will add this to a bug list and stomp it out at the next release. KSP 0.20 will likely mandate I update my parts if I understand the preview change log correct so it's my intent to catch everything up at once. In the short term you can fix this behavior yourself. In the part CFG file you will notice a section titled "node definitions" and in that section is the "node_attach". This is the node that tells KSP how and where the CSB is to attach in a radial setup. In this particular case we are interested in the last three digits of this 6 digit entry. You want to change the 5th digit to 0 and the 6th digit to 1. This tells KSP which axis is considered "up". That should move you in the right direction. Before: // --- node definitions --- node_stack_top = 0.0, 6, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 node_stack_bottom = 0.0, 0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 node_attach = 0.0, 3.0, 2.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 After // --- node definitions --- node_stack_top = 0.0, 6, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 node_stack_bottom = 0.0, 0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 node_attach = 0.0, 3.0, 2.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0

I am looking for a simple 3D model of a typical Kerbal I can use to help design interior spaces. Any ideas? I understand a typical Kerbal is 0.75m tall and from that I can model up my own "Kerbal-dummy" for kinematics purposes but that can only take me so far. How long are their arms and where do they articulate? How far above the feet are the knees? I can probably make a hallway easy enough but what about more particular spaces like a chair? I need more information on how a Kerbal is built.

Anvil 1.6.1 is RELEASED! What's new? -Recalculated properties of Anvil IV standard (no change to capabilities). -Added Anvil IV "Light" rocket parts (note gold bands on light CSBs). -Added DCM-4301-2 and DCM4501-2 decoupler to permit Anvil IV to accept 3m or 5m payload fairings. -Added 5m payload fairings. -Added "065" class SRBs to expand payload capabilites of Anvil IV series. -Added "SMRT" command pods. Intent is to allow control of upper stages after payload delivery. Now you can de-orbit spent stages. -Removed Alternator modules from all CSBs. They didn't work anyway. All CSBs still have small batteries installed to power payloads during launch. -Added surface attach node to Anvil IV and IV-L rockets in the event you want to attach multiple together radially. I had to make the 5m decoupling force quite high. During ground tests the fairings kept hitting the main rocket and exploding. Very fancy but a little more dangerous than I prefer. There might still be a tendency for them to self impact depending on what you are doing when triggered. Use with caution. The Anvil IV-L parts bridge the gap between the Anvil IV and V standard variants. Payload capacities now sweep the full range between 8 and 36 tonnes at 2 tonne intervals. You could, theoretically, combine light and standard variant parts to build a very precisely engineered rocket. All told there are probably thousands of ways to put this thing together. As always I suggest deleting all previous CORE parts before installing new ones. If you find bugs report them here and I will try to solve them ASAP. --- With this release I, again, consider Anvil to be "feature complete". I might revisit the design of Anvil IV because it still grates on me but I've sunk so much time into Anvil that I just want to move on. I have some really cool concepts in work and I would like to bring those out into the light of day before coming back to Anvil for any major changes. I will continue to support Anvil if any bugs are discovered or if KSP evolves in a way that mandates it. For now, however... Mission Accomplished. --- Thanks for your assistance Deltac! I appreciate you taking the time to post in my thread to help out the community!

Glad it's working out for you. Is that set up stable during launch? Update on Anvil: I know that I was going to release this mini-update "in a few days" which has now turned into a week but I decided to throw in some extra toys into the release. Along with the minor tweaks I've done I hope this will bring Anvil back to a "final" state. No mod is ever final but the list of things I want to do to Anvil is very short and I am planning on getting them all into the next release which will happen soon. The extra toys are somewhat related to my super secret project I have going on in the shadows. I needed Anvil to do more than what the last release allowed for so there you go. One new part I am particularly pleased with enables a player to manage the launch debris in orbit. I was doing a lot of testing for Anvil V and had some real trouble with the crud those tests left behind but with proper planning all that goes away. How exactly? You'll have to wait and see.

What ultimately solved your problem?