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No shielding for spaceplanes?


Yukon0009

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They did.

Please read my post you quoted entirely and not just parts of it.

I said that it would be bad IF heatshields were OP not that they WILL surely be OP.

But yeah the problem with specifical heatshield PARTS is that we woukd need very very many different sizes and shapes of them to be able to shield different sized and shaped spaceplanes efficiently and aerodynamically. Just fixing the heat tolerances of all normal parts to a sufficient level compared to reentry heat is much better IMO. (And that slider thing even more so)

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An interim solution could be a tweakable, but seriously... If we are allowed to tweak heat resistance, structural integrity, and everything else about a part, then why have separate parts at all?

It depends. If increasing the heat resistance of a part also increases the mass and cost of the part, then that would be a fair tradeoff, and not something you'd want to do to every part "just because." It would be a design decision, especially if it can be done to varying degrees. Yes, arbitrarily letting the player pick values would be bad without constraining them by difficulty, but we don't know that squad is doing that. In fact, we don't know anything at all beyond reentry heat being an adjustable thing and no discrete heat shields.

Squad has been talking and thinking about reentry heat without dedicated heat shield parts for over two years. I'm not going to assume that I'll think that whatever conclusion they've come to in that time is a good one, but I'm not going to assume it's a bad one either. I'm sure in two years they've at least come up with more options (and pros/cons to those options) than you talk about here.

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Please read my post you quoted entirely and not just parts of it.

I said that it would be bad IF heatshields were OP not that they WILL surely be OP.

But yeah the problem with specifical heatshield PARTS is that we woukd need very very many different sizes and shapes of them to be able to shield different sized and shaped spaceplanes efficiently and aerodynamically. Just fixing the heat tolerances of all normal parts to a sufficient level compared to reentry heat is much better IMO. (And that slider thing even more so)

My apologies.

I honestly don't think we need that many shapes and sizes. We are limited in many ways by the parts we currently have, but it hasn't stopped people from getting creative. Personally, I think maybe 4 sizes of heat shields would be all that's necessary. I do like the idea of giving players a choice to add "heat paneling" to parts, such as wings.

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I'm pretty sure it was mentioned somewhere that fairings act as heatshields. Being that fairings are procedural, you can just create your own heatshield from the fairing parts, can't you? You can at least protect capsules and probes that way.

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My apologies.

I honestly don't think we need that many shapes and sizes. We are limited in many ways by the parts we currently have, but it hasn't stopped people from getting creative. Personally, I think maybe 4 sizes of heat shields would be all that's necessary. I do like the idea of giving players a choice to add "heat paneling" to parts, such as wings.

So, that's four sizes for:

0.625, 1.25, 2.5, 3.75, Mk.2, Mk.3.

Plus special shapes for pods and cockpits.

27 parts. Plus panelling for the wings.

That's clutter.

That leaves sliders, as suggested earlier, or the assumption that the parts are sufficiently shielded already.

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I'm pretty sure it was mentioned somewhere that fairings act as heatshields. Being that fairings are procedural, you can just create your own heatshield from the fairing parts, can't you? You can at least protect capsules and probes that way.

Well, while fairings surely need to have some heat resistance , they are not supposed to be able to do a reentry ... and remember that the objective of fairings is to decrease drag, something that is somewhat in odds with the function of a heatshield ;)

That said, and on topic, I do think that the devs are underestimating the need for some kind of dedicated shielding ... especially when one of them comes to say to Squadcast that so far he wasn't able to do a fully successful reentry with a spaceplane on the experimentals on default settings :(

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  • 2 weeks later...

So now that re-entry heat is being added and the capsules have new heat shields to protect them from this, how will spaceplanes be able to work?

Are the parts the make them up more heat resistant than rocket parts? Or are the heat shields not needed if you're careful?

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You should be fine if you plan your angle of descend carefully. It worked just fine with the deadly reentry and FAR. You had to be careful to enter at a shallow angle and bleed of speed by gliding in the thin atmosphere before descending for a landing.

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In one of those squadcasts, maxmaps said that space planes wings are coated with some protective thing that will make them work somewhat like the heatshield, given that you have an acceptable reentry angle. But, hey, don't quote me on that!

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Yeah- I believe they have shielding- buts general shielding and not directional. Try to preform deceleration maneuvers in the upper atmosphere to bleed off speed (roll left/right. Pitching up/down) to increase drag and slow down and ultimately reducing re-entry heat.

As for spaceplanes coming from the mun/minmus- I suggest digging into the atmosphere to slow down enough that your apo shrinks to the point you don't shoot back off into space. Once you dig in- skip out of the atmo for a short while. Then let yourself descend again and follow the first mention re-entry style to safely return.

For interplanetary spacecraft- your going to be risking it but try to aim for 20km or so and try to hit the atmosphere head on at high speeds- bank down or roll to bleed speed. Since every second counts while your re-entering.

Air brakes would be nice though -.- so I expect them in 1.0.

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One of the great advatanges of spaceplanes is that you can more precisely control your descent.

Drop until things start to cook, then level off and wait for the speed to bleed off before descending further. It works in FAR/DRE; it should work in the new aero.

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In one of those squadcasts, maxmaps said that space planes wings are coated with some protective thing that will make them work somewhat like the heatshield, given that you have an acceptable reentry angle. But, hey, don't quote me on that!

Yeah, but didn't he also say that he had not yet successfully reentered with a spaceplane under the new aero?

Happy landings!

p.s. Sorry, I did quote you on that. :)

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"No dedicated spaceplane heatshield parts" doesn't equal "No shielding on space planes". It just means that it will likely be a directional shielding coating the underside... which will make reentry quite easy at reasonable angles/descent trajectories. Of course, if your plane doesn't fly well (entirely possible in new aero), you may be in trouble. Otherwise, I assume they will go out of their way to ensure ssto spaceplanes can still be a thing.

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Yeah, but didn't he also say that he had not yet successfully reentered with a spaceplane under the new aero?

Has Max ever succesfully landed anything in this game? From what I've seen, it seems his fingers smash the whole keyboard at once whenever he tries something that needs precision.

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We currently have:

Cargo bays that protect their contents (in 1.0)

Improved aerodynamics that will hopefully only cause drag-heat on parts with leading edges (in 1.0)

Most of the stock parts tolerate temps of 3000 K+ (Including all stock wings at ~3400 K, structural panels at 3200 K and some parts up to 5000 K such as modular girders)

While I can see that this may not be adequate if you want an impactor to hit Kerbal a multiple KM/sec, I do not see why this should not be sufficient for most other cases.

From this page:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_thermal_protection_system

"The Space Shuttle thermal protection system (TPS) is the barrier that protected the Space Shuttle Orbiter during the searing 1,650 °C (3,000 °F) heat of atmospheric reentry. A secondary goal was to protect from the heat and cold of space while on orbit.[1]"

So, that 3400 degrees for stock wings and 3000 degrees for stock MK2-3 parts seems like it already includes at least as much of a heat shield as is used by the space shuttle.

So, if you find that your reentry vector is such that it could not be survived by the space shuttle, then I would agree that you probably need a dedicated heat-shield, but I also suspect that there is not really anything realistic that could help your craft survive in that situation.

Add in that LKO is much slower than LEO(LEO is close to 8km/sec, while LKO seems to be a little above 2km/sec) and additional heat-shielding starts to seem pretty silly.

Correction:

I failed to notice that Kerbal part temps are in Kelvin, 3000 degrees kelvin is 2726.85c or 4940.33F

As such the only stock parts I have found that do not make the space shuttle thermal protection system look like easily flammable kindling are the probe cores that can only withstand a measly 1200K (1700F or 926C)

Edited by Terwin
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Am I missing something about the assumptions made in this thread? It seems that the conversation has moved toward Heat Shields not being separate parts, but if that's the sentiment, then I would say this is inaccurate:

Heat Shields - as Separate Parts - direct from the Squad Cast:

jNFCnBN.jpg

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It depends. If increasing the heat resistance of a part also increases the mass and cost of the part, then that would be a fair tradeoff, and not something you'd want to do to every part "just because." It would be a design decision, especially if it can be done to varying degrees. Yes, arbitrarily letting the player pick values would be bad without constraining them by difficulty, but we don't know that squad is doing that. In fact, we don't know anything at all beyond reentry heat being an adjustable thing and no discrete heat shields.

Squad has been talking and thinking about reentry heat without dedicated heat shield parts for over two years. I'm not going to assume that I'll think that whatever conclusion they've come to in that time is a good one, but I'm not going to assume it's a bad one either. I'm sure in two years they've at least come up with more options (and pros/cons to those options) than you talk about here.

Well Stated. I completely agree with you.

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I can't speak for everyone... but the OP was "No shielding for spaceplanes"... in that specific train of thought, I was addressing the idea of heatshields as distinct parts *for spaceplanes*... I can only imagine those who were less explicit are talking about the same thing (or confused by others who were less explicit).

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We currently have:

Cargo bays that protect their contents (in 1.0)

Improved aerodynamics that will hopefully only cause drag-heat on parts with leading edges (in 1.0)

Most of the stock parts tolerate temps of 3000 K+ (Including all stock wings at ~3400 K, structural panels at 3200 K and some parts up to 5000 K such as modular girders)

While I can see that this may not be adequate if you want an impactor to hit Kerbal a multiple KM/sec, I do not see why this should not be sufficient for most other cases.

From this page:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_thermal_protection_system

"The Space Shuttle thermal protection system (TPS) is the barrier that protected the Space Shuttle Orbiter during the searing 1,650 °C (3,000 °F) heat of atmospheric reentry. A secondary goal was to protect from the heat and cold of space while on orbit.[1]"

So, that 3400 degrees for stock wings and 3000 degrees for stock MK2-3 parts seems like it already includes at least as much of a heat shield as is used by the space shuttle.

So, if you find that your reentry vector is such that it could not be survived by the space shuttle, then I would agree that you probably need a dedicated heat-shield, but I also suspect that there is not really anything realistic that could help your craft survive in that situation.

Add in that LKO is much slower than LEO(LEO is close to 8km/sec, while LKO seems to be a little above 2km/sec) and additional heat-shielding starts to seem pretty silly.

Correction:

I failed to notice that Kerbal part temps are in Kelvin, 3000 degrees kelvin is 2726.85c or 4940.33F

As such the only stock parts I have found that do not make the space shuttle thermal protection system look like easily flammable kindling are the probe cores that can only withstand a measly 1200K (1700F or 926C)

Spaceplanes are obviously designed to reenter like the shuttle, at lest an gentle deorbit from LKO. You might not be able to do crazy stuff like aerobrake at Laythe against its orbital direction (meet Laythe on the left side of Jool) and similar who brings speed up to 6 km/s, neither push nose down hard and max out the g meter to not overshoot KSC.

However an normal landing should work well.

I hope they changes heat resistance too, grinders should not manage to high temprature so you can land an spaceplane on Duna or Eve but not an rover without heat-shield. This will complicate deployment as you will probably need one engine below the shield in addition to the braking sky crane. Or you do something crazy like putting the rover upside down and have the parachute turn it.

you might not be able to do

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LOL, it would be more accurate to say 1.0 means the original planned feature set is complete. It doesn't mean the game development is finished.

Original Planned Feature Set

1. Rockets

2. Snacks

...

54. Reentry Heat

55. No heat shields for spaceplanes

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