Shaun

All works fine to me, just wish it would work with tweakscale.

Hey, I'm wondering is there's a way to remove the 'afterburner' effects from the basic jet engine and turbofans?

I did clean installs so the settings are default. Setting the drag multiplier to around 2 got me to speeds and throttles that I was using in 1.7.3/1.8

Drag still needs fixing. From 1.8 to 1.8.1 the drag on all my aircraft is well over twice as much, also parts attached to nodes don’t seem to be occluded, sometimes having a higher drag than the front cone/cockpit!

Yeah, a few parts like the structural fuselage are way off and too draggy, so a middle-ground would be nice; all the corrections and fixes of 1.8.1, just lower drag. Alternatively, the drag is already multiplied by 8 in KSP, so I may reduce this.

I haven't played KSP in a few months because I mainly fly atmospheric avaition. After one of the recent updates I noticed drag was all over the place and my aircraft could no longer reach airliner speeds (Mach 0.72-0.84). I thought my save was corrupted or perhaps it was a mod, so I did a clean install and new sandbox save. Here are the results with the following constants: Stock Gull, modified without floats, Mach 0.65 @ 6,000 metres. An aircraft with such few parts shouldn't be draggy and should fly like a dream. Version 1.8 Most of the drag is concentrated on the most frontal and rear components in a 'line of nodes'; the advanced nose cone has a fair amount of drag (0.60); the tail connector has half of this (0.30) and the components in-between about half again (0.15), which makes sense because they're only causing skin friction with a tiny amount of form drag due to the angle of attack, negative in this case. Similar results with secondary 'line of nodes'; the engine nacelle: Intake has 0.21 drag, engine has 0.17 and tanks have 0.02. Version 1.8.1 Overall drag is far higher, and middle components must be creating some invisible form drag or something; the advanced nose cone has a slightly higher amount of drag (0.83); but the tail connector has far more (1.15) and the components in-between almost that of the nose cone! (0.74). Results with the engine nacelle: Intake has 0.21 drag, engine now has higher drag (0.23) and tanks have close to the same drag at 0.18!) Also note the far greater thrust required! Now, the 1.8.1 Bugfixes displays this: "Fix DragCube generation discrepancies in partdatabase - was affecting drag and thermals." I don't know if this is something to do with this, but something has to be done, and I wonder if there's a way to transfer the drag model from 1.8 to 1.8.1 as a mod to fix this issue.

Edit 2: Found source of issues. It's 1.8.1. I reverted to 1.8 and the drag was fine. Now I just have to prove it, make a complaint bug report and possible somehow make a mod to revert drag to 1.8

I might try and make a new save game and transfer a model... perhaps my save game was corrupted somehow... Edit: New install after everything including settings deleted. New profile, Still the same problem.

In one of the latest updates last year, the drag model/calculations must have been modified so that aircraft that used to be able to cruise at transonic speeds can barely reach mach 0.60.

Thanks to the new terrible drag models in KSP, there is no way this challenge could ever be brought back.

There's definitely something strange about atmospheric drag: before a Mk1 cabin within a fuselage had between 0.04 and 0.06 drag at 245m/s. It now has around 0.64 drag and I can't even get to 200m/s.

So cute yet so versatile, I love it!

Try setting your propeller authorities to around 120 (or -120 if reversed). That's what I use to get the most thrust when stationary... on Kerbin at-least...

Motors that consume liquid fuel like the R121 and R7000 should be able to generate electricity, depending on the torque output. Even the smallest torque settings like 1-2%, which can power a 2-4 blade type B prop should be able to generate enough electricity to power a cabin light or landing light at night. This became apparent because I don't use lights during the daytime making solar panels useless, and the RTG is often more expensive than the aircraft itself.

He cursed! REPORT! REPOOORT! Delete this now admins, k thx gbye! On a serious note, that’s a nice bugger buggy u got there.

I asked that a while ago.

Perhaps a new thread is needed for a more ‘hardcore’ type competition that’s is more balanced, calculated maintenance costs dependant on engine costs and number of parts, and more emphasis on speed, access and cost per 100km as well as KPPM, more accurate range calculations, takeoff and landing distance as well as speed, and so on.

I agree with you and I’m aware of the drag created by props, but is it just too much though? The Kitty can produce up to 65kN and the drag maxes out at maybe 5kN(?) While I would expect power to drop fairly quickly, I wouldn’t expect the drop to be so sudden. Most performance props maintain speed at altitude with only 55-75% throttle, and can maintain better speeds at higher altitude to a point. It may just be the aerosport isn’t turbocharged or has a good leaning simulation, but who knows. It would just be nice if I could go a tad faster so I could throttle down, maintain a decent speed and get a good fuel economy.

Bugger.

I began to review your Swirlygigs (although I’m not sure the first review was genuine or not, page 27) and I have to say I just can’t beat it’s efficiency with my own turboprops, even if they’re lighter. I think it’s because I prefer stock wings over the fuelled ones so I have to use a belly tank or fuselage tank, which is just more drag. Hopefully I will release my review by tomorrow. By the way, I made a great medium airliner candidate, but my question is am I allowed to clip a wing at the front of the fuselage to bring forward the centre of lift? Otherwise if I move the entire wings forward, the plane just looks off.

Yes but the Titan’s engines are only 375hp, which works out to approximately 4kN. The aero sport does way more. Stock KSP’s drag is already multiplied by 8 to compensate for the sheer power of the jets in game. A prop doing 15kN of drag while only producing 20kN of thrust is ridiculous. There is a thrust limiter for a reason. What I’m saying is the aerosport gives a lot of thrust when taking off but the drag quickly takes over. Could just be the aerosport is an overpowered engine with huge drag and ISP to offset. I don’t believe the other props work like this, and certainly not the turboprops. 40kN on a 7T aircraft is a lot. I understand props are limited because of the sound barrier, but this shouldn’t mean having two massive props should limit me to 90m/s, when the sound barrier is at 340m/s.

Lisias If I make a light aircraft with two Aerosports, about 7 tonnes in total, the aircraft can not reach over 100m/s, while the likes of a Cessna Titan can reach around 120m/s cruise. If you had a Juno (20kN static), you could propel your little plane quite fast. Now I understand the drop off is a lot larger for a prop, but the Aerosport drag is wayyy to high. Use the debug/cheat menu, aero, then show in menus. Click on the engine, the drag will be close to 15kN, which is probably more than the rest of your aircraft combined. This is more drag than even Mk3 parts, and more drag than any other prop or turboprop I’ve come across in KSP.

Quick question regarding the aerosport engine... should the drag really be 15kN+? Can't get above 90m/s at all!

Fair enough. Btw, how many passengers do the 1.5m (CRJ looking) cabin constitute?

Why not use an average? Take off with full fuel and get cruise stats, then do it at 20% fuel (not empty because reserves) and test cruise stats again, then average them out. This is because many aircraft would obtain higher altitudes with lower mass, therefore being more efficient.