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[1.12] KSP-RO - Realism Overhaul [16 May 2022]


Theysen

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I'm running 1.4.5 with RO and a gaggle of other mods, and I've run into a strange issue. I'm using parts largely from SSTU, and my RL-10s are burning fine until they reach less than 1,000 m/s delta-V left and then they continue consuming fuel but produce no thrust. No engine shutdown occurs and there is no shutdown error given (e.g., vapor in fuel lines).

Anyone ever had this issue before?

I'm not sure what mod may be causing this and my googling hasn't turned up anything so right now I'm just fishing for people who might have had the same experience (and hopefully fixed it).

Edited by Gremillion
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1 hour ago, Gremillion said:

I'm running 1.4.5 with RO and a gaggle of other mods, and I've run into a strange issue. I'm using parts largely from SSTU, and my RL-10s are burning fine until they reach less than 1,000 m/s delta-V left and then they continue consuming fuel but produce no thrust. No engine shutdown occurs and there is no shutdown error given (e.g., vapor in fuel lines).

Anyone ever had this issue before?

I'm not sure what mod may be causing this and my googling hasn't turned up anything so right now I'm just fishing for people who might have had the same experience (and hopefully fixed it).

What exactly do you mean when you say they aren't producing thrust?  Aside from the lack of error in the engine, does the engine's PAW say that thrust has dropped to 0?

Or is there another symptom?

(it may sound like a stupid question but I have an idea what might have happened which has nothing to do with the engine so I need to know exactly what it is you experienced to make you think there was no thrust)

Edit: And there may not be a solution possible if you're playing in KSP 1.4.5 unless you can get the most recent SSTU update to run with that version of KSP.

Edited by Starwaster
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5 minutes ago, Starwaster said:

What exactly do you mean when you say they aren't producing thrust?  Aside from the lack of error in the engine, does the engine's PAW say that thrust has dropped to 0?

Or is there another symptom?

(it may sound like a stupid question but I have an idea what might have happened which has nothing to do with the engine so I need to know exactly what it is you experienced to make you think there was no thrust)

Edit: And there may not be a solution possible if you're playing in KSP 1.4.5 unless you can get the most recent SSTU update to run with that version of KSP.

Orbital velocity stops increasing and control authority due to being under thrust ceases. Everything else remains the same as if the engines were still on, including consumption of fuel.

I am using an update of SSTU appropriate for 1.4.5. I have used this install configuration for a long time, but this error or whatever is new.

 

I realize I may have to reinstall and update, and that's nbd, but I figured I'd ask around first.

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1 minute ago, Gremillion said:

Orbital velocity stops increasing and control authority due to being under thrust ceases. Everything else remains the same as if the engines were still on, including consumption of fuel.

I am using an update of SSTU appropriate for 1.4.5. I have used this install configuration for a long time, but this error or whatever is new.

 

I realize I may have to reinstall and update, and that's nbd, but I figured I'd ask around first.

What I think is happening is that a tank's mass has dropped below zero. The actual part mass would already have been negative. Net mass at launch was positive but propellant depletion dropped it below zero. Unity RigidBody has to have positive mass in order for any forces to operate on it. This is also the same thing that causes rockets to occasionally become 'stuck' to the launch pad.

You can test for this in the VAB by making whatever tank the engine in question is drawing from and make that tank root so you can remove all other parts from it. Then set the resource sliders to zero for that tank part. Then look at the vessel mass in the engineer's report or with a mod like MechJeb or Kerbal Engineer. 

Alternatively you can enable the infinite propellant cheat in the cheat menu and then see if you still have that thrust problem. (you could even make note of how much propellant was left when thrust stopped working and then reload and enable the cheat just before propellant level drops to that point)

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1 minute ago, Starwaster said:

What I think is happening is that a tank's mass has dropped below zero. The actual part mass would already have been negative. Net mass at launch was positive but propellant depletion dropped it below zero. Unity RigidBody has to have positive mass in order for any forces to operate on it. This is also the same thing that causes rockets to occasionally become 'stuck' to the launch pad.

You can test for this in the VAB by making whatever tank the engine in question is drawing from and make that tank root so you can remove all other parts from it. Then set the resource sliders to zero for that tank part. Then look at the vessel mass in the engineer's report or with a mod like MechJeb or Kerbal Engineer. 

Alternatively you can enable the infinite propellant cheat in the cheat menu and then see if you still have that thrust problem. (you could even make note of how much propellant was left when thrust stopped working and then reload and enable the cheat just before propellant level drops to that point)

What a lead! Thanks.

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Just now, Gremillion said:

What a lead! Thanks.

Sorry, I left something out!

The cause is a mod conflict between SSTU and Real Fuels. Both mods are trying to manage tank mass and only one should be allowed to do so. ShadowMage released an update which has SSTU opt out of mass (and cost? Maybe?) management if Real Fuels is installed and the SSTU has ModuleFuelTanks installed. 

BUT, I don't know if it will run on KSP 1.4.5

If you don't want to update KSP right now, there is a workaround which I had forgotten about which is to set the tank part's base mass to zero. Since the cause is that both SSTU and Real Fuels start out by removing the part's mass, they are both prevented from setting the part negative. (literally, we start out by  subtracting the tank's base mass from the part before we do any other mass manipulation. If the part has no mass then our mod's are not able to subtract mass)

If you need to I can come up with a patch that will take care of that. The part will still get mass because RF will calculate new tank mass for it.

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9 minutes ago, Starwaster said:

Sorry, I left something out!

The cause is a mod conflict between SSTU and Real Fuels. Both mods are trying to manage tank mass and only one should be allowed to do so. ShadowMage released an update which has SSTU opt out of mass (and cost? Maybe?) management if Real Fuels is installed and the SSTU has ModuleFuelTanks installed. 

BUT, I don't know if it will run on KSP 1.4.5

If you don't want to update KSP right now, there is a workaround which I had forgotten about which is to set the tank part's base mass to zero. Since the cause is that both SSTU and Real Fuels start out by removing the part's mass, they are both prevented from setting the part negative. (literally, we start out by  subtracting the tank's base mass from the part before we do any other mass manipulation. If the part has no mass then our mod's are not able to subtract mass)

If you need to I can come up with a patch that will take care of that. The part will still get mass because RF will calculate new tank mass for it.

Great advice. This sounds very much like my problem because I've had some bizarre negative numbers before (add boilerplate mass, delta-V goes up in the VAB, for example).

It sounds like the actual fix is to update the game. Having said that, if it's not a lot of trouble it would be nice to have a patch so I can at least see if that's the issue without changing the entire install.

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46 minutes ago, Starwaster said:

Sorry, I left something out!

The cause is a mod conflict between SSTU and Real Fuels. Both mods are trying to manage tank mass and only one should be allowed to do so. ShadowMage released an update which has SSTU opt out of mass (and cost? Maybe?) management if Real Fuels is installed and the SSTU has ModuleFuelTanks installed. 

BUT, I don't know if it will run on KSP 1.4.5

If you don't want to update KSP right now, there is a workaround which I had forgotten about which is to set the tank part's base mass to zero. Since the cause is that both SSTU and Real Fuels start out by removing the part's mass, they are both prevented from setting the part negative. (literally, we start out by  subtracting the tank's base mass from the part before we do any other mass manipulation. If the part has no mass then our mod's are not able to subtract mass)

If you need to I can come up with a patch that will take care of that. The part will still get mass because RF will calculate new tank mass for it.

Bingo:

3VXQUwr.jpg

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Ahah! The previous rocket family (100-200t to LEO class) worked because I maintain a standard excess delta-V when designing my rockets of about 300 m/s. With these big rockets, they could circularize their payload at the standard altitude without hitting the negatives due to the substantial excess fuel needed to 300 m/s for large payloads, but once I tried to make a smaller family (20-80t to LEO), that margin wasn't enough anymore and I started hitting the negatives.

At the very least it's easy to modify this myself, as I know the fuel fraction for balloon tanks and can just add lead mass until I reach it. Badabing.

But I will still probably upgrade soon (RO had not been released for anything higher than 1.4.5 when I first developed this build), anyway.

4 minutes ago, Starwaster said:

@Gremillion


@PART[*]:HAS[@MODULE[SSTUModularPart],@MODULE[ModuleFuelTanks]:HAS[~basemass[<0]]]:FINAL
{
	@mass = 0
}

 

Thanks!

Just want to make sure: Where's the right place to put this?

Edited by Gremillion
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58 minutes ago, Gremillion said:

Ahah! The previous rocket family (100-200t to LEO class) worked because I maintain a standard excess delta-V when designing my rockets of about 300 m/s. With these big rockets, they could circularize their payload at the standard altitude without hitting the negatives due to the substantial excess fuel needed to 300 m/s for large payloads, but once I tried to make a smaller family (20-80t to LEO), that margin wasn't enough anymore and I started hitting the negatives.

At the very least it's easy to modify this myself, as I know the fuel fraction for balloon tanks and can just add lead mass until I reach it. Badabing.

But I will still probably upgrade soon (RO had not been released for anything higher than 1.4.5 when I first developed this build), anyway.

Thanks!

Just want to make sure: Where's the right place to put this?

Anywhere in your GameData folder. I prefer to put things like that in a folder called zzzMyTweaks (zzz to ensure that it runs as last as possible)

I think I started that practice back in 0.25 and regularly add to it to ensure a consistent experience whenever I upgrade KSP. It has 47 subfolders (for various mods or categories) and 273 files. 

You won't need it once you're upgraded to the latest SSTU so don't bury it too deeply that you can't find it to delete it.

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2 hours ago, Starwaster said:

Anywhere in your GameData folder. I prefer to put things like that in a folder called zzzMyTweaks (zzz to ensure that it runs as last as possible)

I think I started that practice back in 0.25 and regularly add to it to ensure a consistent experience whenever I upgrade KSP. It has 47 subfolders (for various mods or categories) and 273 files. 

You won't need it once you're upgraded to the latest SSTU so don't bury it too deeply that you can't find it to delete it.

I rolled up my sleeves and updated to 1.6.1 (max version for RSS/RO), and am using the latest SSTU update (which is technically for 1.7.2, but is the only one with the fix for this), and it does not seem to have fixed the negative masses issue. For now, I'm going to use your patch (thank you very much!) and I'll figure out what else to do later.

Also, I'm going to stop cluttering up the RO thread. Thanks for putting up with me, guys!

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15 hours ago, Gremillion said:

I rolled up my sleeves and updated to 1.6.1 (max version for RSS/RO), and am using the latest SSTU update (which is technically for 1.7.2, but is the only one with the fix for this), and it does not seem to have fixed the negative masses issue. For now, I'm going to use your patch (thank you very much!) and I'll figure out what else to do later.

Also, I'm going to stop cluttering up the RO thread. Thanks for putting up with me, guys!

I inquired about that in the SSTU thread because as far as I was aware all you need i the SSTU update and that's all I have myself and it's fixed for me. 

But did you install that as a complete reinstall to remove the possibility of older files sticking around? Because the update (I think) also depends on a few things being turned off in the patch... maybe try completely deleting all trace of SSTU before installing the latest one.

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12 minutes ago, Starwaster said:

I inquired about that in the SSTU thread because as far as I was aware all you need i the SSTU update and that's all I have myself and it's fixed for me. 

But did you install that as a complete reinstall to remove the possibility of older files sticking around? Because the update (I think) also depends on a few things being turned off in the patch... maybe try completely deleting all trace of SSTU before installing the latest one.

Ripped out my entire KSP folder and fresh installed from there. I don't mess around. :wink:

Also, I really appreciate you taking the time to help. It's a pain in the booty but hopefully the install I end up with will be worth it. I'm trying to get as close to a simulation (for launch vehicles at least) as I can.

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1 hour ago, Gremillion said:

Ripped out my entire KSP folder and fresh installed from there. I don't mess around. :wink:

Also, I really appreciate you taking the time to help. It's a pain in the booty but hopefully the install I end up with will be worth it. I'm trying to get as close to a simulation (for launch vehicles at least) as I can.

You did that and still had the negative mass issue?

Can you upload a copy of your log files (either KSP.log or preferably output_log.txt if it exists) and from your GameData folder ModuleManager.ConfigCache file? Preferably to DropBox or to some other upload site. (DropBox is best because you get lots of free storage and it doesn't try to serve up ads to people needing to download from it)

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1 minute ago, Starwaster said:

You did that and still had the negative mass issue?

Can you upload a copy of your log files (either KSP.log or preferably output_log.txt if it exists) and from your GameData folder ModuleManager.ConfigCache file? Preferably to DropBox or to some other upload site. (DropBox is best because you get lots of free storage and it doesn't try to serve up ads to people needing to download from it)

Log.
Cache.

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@Gremillion scoured the logs and the cache and don't see why it's happening but things aren't being patched that need to be. (sound familiar?)

@PART[*]:HAS[@MODULE[ModuleFuelTanks],@MODULE[SSTUModularPart]]:FINAL
{
	@MODULE[SSTUModularPart]
	{
		%subtractMass = false
		%subtractCost = false
	}
}

The above patch should render the mass = 0 patch unnecessary. You should be able to safely remove or disable it.

If the above patch does NOT fix the issue then you don't have the right version of SSTU installed. What that does is basically tell SSTUModularPart to opt out of all mass and cost manipulations so that ModuleFuelTanks can take over responsibility for it.

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1 minute ago, Starwaster said:

@Gremillion scoured the logs and the cache and don't see why it's happening but things aren't being patched that need to be. (sound familiar?)


@PART[*]:HAS[@MODULE[ModuleFuelTanks],@MODULE[SSTUModularPart]]:FINAL
{
	@MODULE[SSTUModularPart]
	{
		%subtractMass = false
		%subtractCost = false
	}
}

The above patch should render the mass = 0 patch unnecessary. You should be able to safely remove or disable it.

If the above patch does NOT fix the issue then you don't have the right version of SSTU installed. What that does is basically tell SSTUModularPart to opt out of all mass and cost manipulations so that ModuleFuelTanks can take over responsibility for it.

You're a saint.

I'm using 0.10.46.158 right now, which is listed as the right patch to support 1.6.x. 

Ahah! Success!

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