[WIP] Inline Ballutes

[riocrokite]

presents

[Work in Progress]

Link to a release thread

Inline Ballutes = Parachute + Balloon

Usage: In real life ballutes are used to aerocapture ( slow down a spaceship) in upper thin atmosphere utilizing low heat and high aerodynamic surface. This is a different technique than a heat shield which has to withstand a lot of heat due to passing through much denser atmosphere. [NASA pdf document]

Due to popular interest I've decided to work on release of inline ballutes as a separate mod. For now I plan 2 or 3 sizes (3.75m, 2.5m and maybe 1.25m)

Goals: It should work more like a heat shield replacement( or addition to), not like replacement for a parachute (so all-in-one thingy). The reason behind this is that I don't want to render stock parachutes obsolete.

Preliminary stats:

1.25m ballute - 0.6t - 50m diameter - good for 15t, average for 30t etc

2.5m ballute - 1.35t - 90m diameter - good for 30t, average for 60t etc

3.75m ballute - 2.7t - 150m diameter - good for 60t, average for 100t etc

[for comparison heat shields weight atm: 1.25m = 0.3t, 2.5m = 1.3t, 3.75m = 2.8t]

- writing custom module (?)

Credits:

Enceos - texturing

Edited September 19, 2015 by riocrokite

[Enceos]

Looking nice already

[riocrokite]

cheers, although this is texture from stork mod. If you are still interested in texturing I can send you models shortly:)

Edited September 11, 2015 by riocrokite

[mariohm1311]

I'm going to kill you!!!!!!!

[riocrokite]

I'm going to kill you!!!!!!!

Yah I know:) Well tbh I don't plan on releasing other shapes so I can change the mod title to 'inline toroidal ballutes' if that helps.

edit: I differentiated a bit 2.5m and 3.75m models. Now I can go and work on stork pod

There are 2 tanks which store liquid nitrogen or hydrogen and a pump to inflate ballute quickly. Then 4 or 6 spools depending on a model:

Edited September 11, 2015 by riocrokite

[mariohm1311]

Wow, that's a beautiful base!

[riocrokite]

comparison between sizes, sorry no textures:

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Edited September 11, 2015 by riocrokite

[Gaalidas]

Hey, the texturing looks awesome even as it is in that first image.

Now, if those balloons could be made to not only act like parachutes, but have the ability to hold a lighter craft aloft for an extended amount of time, or lift a craft if deployed from the surface, then we'd have a serious winner.

Edited September 11, 2015 by Gaalidas

[nothingSpecial]

Oh my.

Well.

Oh.

I'm speechless, but this is definitely good.

[Nansuchao]

Shut up and take my money!!!

... and provide a download link please...

Great idea! Congratulations!

[riocrokite]

Oh my.

Well.

Oh.

I'm speechless, but this is definitely good.

Shut up and take my money!!!

... and provide a download link please...

Great idea! Congratulations!

cheers, I'll release it when there's a texture ready.

Hey, the texturing looks awesome even as it is in that first image.

Now, if those balloons could be made to not only act like parachutes, but have the ability to hold a lighter craft aloft for an extended amount of time, or lift a craft if deployed from the surface, then we'd have a serious winner.

Gaalidas,

Textures are from stork mod, rest is just grey. However I would like texturing to be different for this mini-mod. Enceos offered help so I've contacted him about it and we'll see how it goes. I'm no texture pro lol

As for plugin I don't have enough motivation (and time/skills) to work on it, I guess if there's interest someone might sooner or later write it or adapt hooligan labs mod for it.

Since the models already work pretty well with stock module I'm happy with it

[Whirligig Girl]

This could potentially be extremely useful for the

Alternis Kerbol Tylo Landing Challenge

Where Tylo has 4 gees of gravity, and a thin atmosphere.

[Gaalidas]

cheers, I'll release it when there's a texture ready.

Gaalidas,

Textures are from stork mod, rest is just grey. However I would like texturing to be different for this mini-mod. Enceos offered help so I've contacted him about it and we'll see how it goes. I'm no texture pro lol

As for plugin I don't have enough motivation (and time/skills) to work on it, I guess if there's interest someone might sooner or later write it or adapt hooligan labs mod for it.

Since the models already work pretty well with stock module I'm happy with it

Fair enough. After all, it's basically a parachute with an alternate model. You could probably get away with using just about any model you could imagine in that role as long as you recompiled the model as a parachute. For a set of textures that isn't even made for that model, though, it looks pretty nice as is.

[riocrokite]

Added temporary grey texture so it's available for testing and balancing.

Download is here:

https://github.com/riocrokite/InlineBallutes/releases/tag/0.1

Testers needed. This should work more or less in stock and FAR however not very well. Thus I'll appreciate suggestions for tweaking configs so it could work with stock and FAR aerodynamics.

Edited September 12, 2015 by riocrokite

[Enceos]

Yah I know:) Well tbh I don't plan on releasing other shapes so I can change the mod title to 'inline toroidal ballutes' if that helps.

These kind of models are called "Trailing Ballutes", might as well name this pack accordingly. The other blunt shaped type is called "Calmped Ballute", we won't use it here.

[riocrokite]

These kind of models are called "Trailing Ballutes", might as well name this pack accordingly. The other blunt shaped type is called "Calmped Ballute", we won't use it here.

Yah. I have to keep in mind for possible expansion of the mod in the future. So maybe Stork Ballutes

Anyway maybe someone has a time to read and analyze this document:

https://www.google.be/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCAQFjAAahUKEwj2ioXYj_LHAhVFvRoKHZmYA_I&url=https%3A%2F%2Fsolarsystem.nasa.gov%2Fdocs%2F55_medlock.pdf&usg=AFQjCNH-yfzfWF1NwASY8BHdYSRDNqIq0g

There's mentioned dual use ballute (aerocapture and aerobraking). I think both those uses implies ballute could be deployed and cut only once (unlike parachute which can be repackaged after aerobraking). However I just glimpsed over text so any input is appreciated.

[billkerbinsky]

Yah. I have to keep in mind for possible expansion of the mod in the future. So maybe Stork Ballutes

Anyway maybe someone has a time to read and analyze this document:

https://www.google.be/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCAQFjAAahUKEwj2ioXYj_LHAhVFvRoKHZmYA_I&url=https%3A%2F%2Fsolarsystem.nasa.gov%2Fdocs%2F55_medlock.pdf&usg=AFQjCNH-yfzfWF1NwASY8BHdYSRDNqIq0g

There's mentioned dual use ballute (aerocapture and aerobraking). I think both those uses implies ballute could be deployed and cut only once.... However I just glimpsed over text so any input is appreciated.

Yep. Looks like the basic idea seems to be that you would send a package with a ballute, a lander, and an orbiter into the target atmosphere (the paper looks specifically at Mars, Titan, and Neptune) from a hyperbolic/flyby trajectory, deploy the ballute, let go of the orbiter early on once it was slowed enough for aerocapture, and then use the ballute to slow the lander to the point where propulsive or parachute landing would be possible. The orbiter would go into an elliptical orbit and could raise its Pe above the atmosphere with a small burn at Ap.

[tater]

Added temporary grey texture so it's available for testing and balancing.

Download is here:

https://github.com/riocrokite/InlineBallutes/releases/tag/0.1

Testers needed. This should work more or less in stock and FAR however not very well. Thus I'll appreciate suggestions for tweaking configs so it could work with stock and FAR aerodynamics.

Is it set up for career, or just sandbox?

[rabidninjawombat]

Grabbing the download and will test this evening Rio , and report back

[MatterBeam]

This seems very interesting for my RSS career. How's the FAR performance going?

[Kibble]

Oh I loved that paper, the idea seems astoundingly pragmatic! Good luck on the mod version~

[riocrokite]

Is it set up for career, or just sandbox?

sandbox for now, although it's easy to change required tech and price in config files

Oh I loved that paper, the idea seems astoundingly pragmatic! Good luck on the mod version~

cheers

Grabbing the download and will test this evening Rio , and report back

cheers, any feedback is appreciated

This seems very interesting for my RSS career. How's the FAR performance going?

I feel that same diameter value will get you worse performance under FAR. I haven't got much time to investigate this, but I feel that FAR is taking values from this lines:

preDeployedDiameter = 60
        deployedDiameter = 60

Stock is taking diameter values from those lines:

    MODULE
    {
        name = ModuleDragModifier
        dragCubeName = SEMIDEPLOYED
        dragModifier = 30
    }
    MODULE
    {
        name = ModuleDragModifier
        dragCubeName = DEPLOYED
        dragModifier = 30
    }

The problem with this is that FAR is replacing Stock module with RealChuteLite integrated into FAR and it has some static values assigned to it (max temperature, materiala etc). So I'll have to check whether there is a chance to override them.

---

All in all the question is whether we want ballutes to be :

- more 'op' so they are able to replace parachutes as well = aerobraking, aerocapture, landing or what have you

- less 'op' so they can be able to save you some dV in aerobraking phase however they are not suitable for aerocapture (not enough drag near the ground) so you still have to use them in tandem with parachutes

[riocrokite]

Did some read up on ballutes, wanted to obtain their stats compared to parachute so we can tweak values correctly and see how it fares:

stat name - ballute - parachute

material - zylon - nylon

max temp - 650 - 220 C

density - 1.54 - 1.15 g/cm3 (zylon weighs 70% more for given surface since parachute = half sphere vs sphere for ballute)

Drag = 1-5x less than conical ribbon (standard chute) for low speeds (below mach2). However can withstand much higher speeds with constant drag (unlike parachute that probably couldn't withstand higher speeds as well as couldn't behave properly - oscillation and deformation from shockwave + unbearable heat at higher speeds)

So when comparing against stock parachute, the ballute should weigh 70% more for the same drag reference area. Then its drag should vary and peak around mach 1-2 but still at low speeds it should be around 1/5 of the parachute of the same drag area. I'll continue comparing stuff next week to obtain more accurate numbers for stock balance pass.

Edited September 13, 2015 by riocrokite

[Errol]

Would it be possible to make the ballutes repacked with an engineer?

[riocrokite]

Would it be possible to make the ballutes repacked with an engineer?

Should work with FAR now just as stock parachutes can be repacked.