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KSP Interstellar Extended Continued Development Thread


FreeThinker

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I m doing some preliminary testing of KSPI extended and SETI and found a major issue.

The tweakscaled KSPI extended parts suffer from the same ProceduralParts incompatibility as many stock parts (eg basic jet).

I tested with the Small Molten Salt Reactor tweakscaled to 1.25m below a procedural liquid tank.

After saving and reloading the craft, the tweakscaled reactor leaves a major gap.

It is as if the reactor model was positioned using the non-tweakscaled size and only after that positioning, the model is shrunk to the tweakscaled size.

If you do it the other way around, attaching an upscaled reactor to a procedural part, it clips inside the procedural part instead of leaving a gap.

Since SETI uses only procedural parts for tanks and structural elements, this is a major compatibility problem.

When faced with this problem before (basic jet engine), I came up with a stop gap workaround, but did not have the models to implement it:

Since tweakscale does not like procedural parts, there needs to be something like a washer between the tweakscaled part and the procedural part.

So it would go like this: procedural part - washer with the right diameter, not tweakscaled - tweakscaled part, eg reactor

So it would essentially require washers for every concievable diameter. And it would best be a model which is very flat and has an unobstrusive color (eg grey).

edit: One of the models of the Infernal Robotics Washer could fit as a stop gap washer. They are blackish and thin and distributed under GNU GPL, so I could just make a bunch of rescaled versions for the structural tab...

Edited by Yemo
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edit: One of the models of the Infernal Robotics Washer could fit as a stop gap washer. They are blackish and thin and distributed under GNU GPL, so I could just make a bunch of rescaled versions for the structural tab...

Intresting solution, but the real problem seems to be procedural parts. Is this a know/reported problem at procedural parts? Also don't the washes rotate?

Edited by FreeThinker
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Intresting solution, but the real problem seems to be procedural parts. Is this a know/reported problem at procedural parts? Also don't the washes rotate?

It was mentioned in PP before, but nothing came of it. Not sure whether it is a pp or a tweakscale issue, as the gap/clipping is based on the difference between the original part size and the tweakscaled size.

The washers rotate in IR, but I would have to create new configs anyway, without the IR module.

Though I do not know how the model looks when scaled up to 5m or so...

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Based on the molecular mass, we know the Base Isp Multiplier of Hydrazine is 0.25.

Not at all. The exhaust gasses ultimately formed are the only thing that matters, not the way the fuel is stored.

The exhaust gasses are a 1:2 mixture of Nitrogen and Hydrogen. The gas-mixture is lighter than the the exhaust-gasses you get from Meth/LOX, but lighter than from ammonia. The ISP multiplier needs to be over 0.5 but less than 0.64- I'll calculate an exact value below...

EDIT: See below- the correct initial ISP multiplier is 0.412 before applying the Thrust multiplier.

For the Thrust multiplier I took the highest single propellant Multiplier which is 2.2 and multiplied it with Hydrazine Base Isp to get a effective Isp of 0.55 .

That's optimistic for the Thrustmultiplier- but your starting ISP is too low in the first place... That's probably about right for the final effective ISP, but the Thrust/MW is going to be too high this way...

It's probably a lot higher but as I said I want to be conservative. Now the remaining question is, why wasn't Hydrazine mentioned as a NTR propellant anywhere? Besides the Toxicity, which just makes it more expansive, the real problem might be a technical/risk issues. In contrast to other propellants, it's not as stable. Perhaps it can spontaneously react even before reaching the combustion chamber, which would result in catastrophic failure!

I think it's just the toxicity issue- and the fact that people are afraid of the "nuclear" part of "Nuclear Thermal Hydrazine Rocket". The stability of Hydrazine isn't really much of an issue as long as you keep it cold and separated from the atmosphere- in fact it's much easier to store than Hydrogen...

The people in the know are concerned about the toxicity (but know the radiation is not really as big a risk as it's made out to be), whereas the ignorant masses are extremely fearful of radioactivity but don't realize just how dangerous Hydrazine is... It's a bad combination of radiation and toxicity that makes people on both sides of the knowledge-barrier shy away from it as a fuel...

Just try to Imagine 100 Ton Hydrazine tank exploding next to a thermal ncuclear reactor, it would be an very effective dirty nuclear fuel poison bomb :P

Would that be enough to make your nervous? ;)

The radiation wouldn't carry very far- and the radiation wouldn't be too bad for a nuclear reactor that had never operated before. However the Hydrazine would have me, excuse my language, ....ting my pants. That stuff is absorbed right through the skin- you don't even have to BREATHE it. Get a gram of the stuff on your skin, and you're dead within a day...

Regards,

Northstar

- - - Updated - - -

OK, so regarding Hydrazine's ISP before accounting for the energy released from the decay reaction... (13 GW for a 1 ton/second Thermal Rocket)

Nitrogen has a base ISP multiplier of 0.3273

Hydrogen has a base ISP of 1.0

The mass-ratio of the propellants in the exhaust is 28.0134 : 4.03176 (approximately 7:1)

So, you can get the mass-weighted base ISP as follows:

[(.3273 * 28.0134) + 1 * 4.03176] / 32.04516 = 0.412

So, the base ISP multiplier should be 0.412 before you apply the Thrust multiplier (and with it an increase in effective ISP...)

I'm glad I actually bothered to do out the numbers here, because while my approximations are usually correct in a general sense (i.e. 0.25 was far too low) they can often be off in relative values (i.e. it's NOT higher than 0.5)

Now what about the Thrust multiplier?

- - - Updated - - -

OK, so I'm going to compare the relative amounts of energy you get from combusting Hydrogen and Oxygen at 3000 K vs. breaking down Hydrazine at that temperature, to give a better idea of the approximate range the Thrust multiplier should fall into...

Enthalpies of Formation:

Steam: -241.826 kJ/mol

Hydrazine: -50.6 kJ/mol

Entropies of Formation:

Steam: 188.7 J/mol*K

Hydrazine: -121.2 J/mol*K

When it comes to performing the inverse reactions (

The values for steam (gaseous H2[//sub]O) come from the following table:

http://www.mrbigler.com/misc/energy-of-formation.PDF

Regards,

Northstar

Edited by Northstar1989
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Nitrogen has a base ISP multiplier of 0.3273

Hydrogen has a base ISP of 1.0

The mass-ratio of the propellants in the exhaust is 28.0134 : 4.03176 (approximately 7:1)

Wouldn't the fact you create a lot of additional gas in itself help create additional thrust? seem to me that more gas = more presure = more thrust

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Uploaded Version 0.8.1 for Kerbal Space Program 0.90

Released on 2015-03-25

  • Added Support for Kip Engineering Non-Androgynous Docking Port Set : Thermal Nozzle/Turbojet can be connect loss-less through a Non-Androgynous
  • Better SETI/NFT-E support Reactor Fuel usage is scaled to lower consumption, Refinery and Science Lab requires less power

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Uploaded Version 0.8.1 for Kerbal Space Program 0.90

Released on 2015-03-25

  • Added Support for Kip Engineering Non-Androgynous Docking Port Set : Thermal Nozzle/Turbojet can be connect loss-less through a Non-Androgynous
  • Better SETI/NFT-E support Reactor Fuel usage is scaled to lower consumption, Refinery and Science Lab requires less power

Ah, the non-androgynous ports made it!

Can not wait to test them out, reconfiguring engines in space is very cool and they do look great!

Thank you for the ongoing compatibility work!

While I wanted to start with SETI-KSPIextended integration a week ago, all the EC rebalancing and quite some loose ends (and the SETI-Greenhouse pet project) took their toll.

I hope to release 0.8.6 before the weekend and then concentrate on KSPI extended support and the compatibility washers.

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In that case the calculation of Ammonia and Methane has to be redone as well :(

The data we're using already comes from atomic Rockets, no? So their predictions already include those adjustments for us, as well as the effects of Hydrogen Bonding- no need to change anything there.

The following was supposed to be an edit of the previous post, but the KSP Forums were down last night...

Based on the molecular mass, we know the Base Isp Multiplier of Hydrazine is 0.25.

Not at all. The exhaust gasses ultimately formed are the only thing that matters, not the way the fuel is stored.

The exhaust gasses are a 1:2 mixture of Nitrogen and Hydrogen. The gas-mixture is lighter than the the exhaust-gasses you get from Meth/LOX, but lighter than from ammonia. The ISP multiplier needs to be over 0.5 but less than 0.64- I'll calculate an exact value below...

EDIT: See below- the correct initial ISP multiplier is 0.412 before applying the Thrust multiplier.

For the Thrust multiplier I took the highest single propellant Multiplier which is 2.2 and multiplied it with Hydrazine Base Isp to get a effective Isp of 0.55 .

That's optimistic for the Thrustmultiplier- but your starting ISP is too low in the first place... That's probably about right for the final effective ISP, but the Thrust/MW is going to be too high this way...

It's probably a lot higher but as I said I want to be conservative. Now the remaining question is, why wasn't Hydrazine mentioned as a NTR propellant anywhere? Besides the Toxicity, which just makes it more expansive, the real problem might be a technical/risk issues. In contrast to other propellants, it's not as stable. Perhaps it can spontaneously react even before reaching the combustion chamber, which would result in catastrophic failure!

I think it's just the toxicity issue- and the fact that people are afraid of the "nuclear" part of "Nuclear Thermal Hydrazine Rocket". The stability of Hydrazine isn't really much of an issue as long as you keep it cold and separated from the atmosphere- in fact it's much easier to store than Hydrogen...

The people in the know are concerned about the toxicity (but know the radiation is not really as big a risk as it's made out to be), whereas the ignorant masses are extremely fearful of radioactivity but don't realize just how dangerous Hydrazine is... It's a bad combination of radiation and toxicity that makes people on both sides of the knowledge-barrier shy away from it as a fuel...

Just try to Imagine 100 Ton Hydrazine tank exploding next to a thermal ncuclear reactor, it would be an very effective dirty nuclear fuel poison bomb :P

Would that be enough to make your nervous? ;)

The radiation wouldn't carry very far- and the radiation wouldn't be too bad for a nuclear reactor that had never operated before. However the Hydrazine would have me, excuse my language, ....ting my pants. That stuff is absorbed right through the skin- you don't even have to BREATHE it. Get a gram of the stuff on your skin, and you're dead within a day...

Regards,

Northstar

- - - Updated - - -

OK, so regarding Hydrazine's ISP before accounting for the energy released from the decay reaction... (13 GW for a 1 ton/second Thermal Rocket)

Nitrogen has a base ISP multiplier of 0.3273

Hydrogen has a base ISP of 1.0

The mass-ratio of the propellants in the exhaust is 28.0134 : 4.03176 (approximately 7:1)

So, you can get the mass-weighted base ISP as follows:

[(.3273 * 28.0134) + 1 * 4.03176] / 32.04516 = 0.412

So, the base ISP multiplier should be 0.412 before you apply the Thrust multiplier (and with it an increase in effective ISP...)

I'm glad I actually bothered to do out the numbers here, because while my approximations are usually correct in a general sense (i.e. 0.25 was far too low) they can often be off in relative values (i.e. it's NOT higher than 0.5)

Now what about the Thrust multiplier?

- - - Updated - - -

OK, so I'm going to compare the relative amounts of energy you get from combusting Hydrogen and Oxygen at 3000 K vs. breaking down Hydrazine at that temperature, to give a better idea of the approximate range the Thrust multiplier should fall into...

Enthalpies of Formation:

Steam: -241.826 kJ/mol

Hydrazine: -50.6 kJ/mol

Entropies of Formation:

Steam: 188.7 J/mol*K

Hydrazine: -121.2 J/mol*K

When it comes to performing the inverse reaction (breaking down Hydrazine) a NEGATIVE value is favorable for that inverse reaction, but for the formation-reactions (i.e. combustion of Hydro/LOX) a POSITIVE value is favorable. Anyways...

Energy released at 3000 K:

Hydrazine-breakdown: 50.6 kJ/mol + (121.2 J/mol*K * 3000 K) = 50.6 kJ/mol + 363600 J/mol = 50.6 kJ/mol + 363.6 kJ/mol = 414.2 kJ/mol

(note that Hydrazine-breakdown requires reversing the signs of the entropy and enthalpy for formation, or taking the absolute value of the energy consumed during the formation reaction- which is technically what I did before...)

Steam-formation: -241.826 kJ/mol + (188.7 J/mol*K * 3000 K) = 566100 J/mol - 241.826 kJ/mol = 566.1 kJ/mol - 241.826 kJ/mol = 324.274 kJ/mol

(note that the Enthalpy of Formation actually REDUCES the energy released- made up for by the high Standard Molar Entropy...)

So, the formation of steam only releases a bit over 3/4ths the energy of Hydrazine-breakdown on a per-mole basis: but it concentrates that energy into 56.25% of the mass, leading to a more energetic reaction on a per-kg basis... [(18 / 32) = 0.5625 --> 56.25%]

However, the base ISP for Water is 47.14% that of Hydrogen alone, whereas the base ISP should only be 41.2% that of Hydrogen with Hydrazine, like we discussed before... This means that the same amount of energy into the same mass of propellant will add less to the Thrust produced than with Hydrazine...

Taking ALL of this together, we get the following calculations for the Thrust multiplier...

First, we find the relative energy released per kg of propellant for Hydro/LOX (the portion that reacts) compared to Hydrazine:

(324.274 / 414.2) / 0.5625 = 1.3918

However, a realistic LOX-augmented NTR only reacts approximately half of its Hydrogen with Oxygen. This reduces the relative energy released per kg of propellants flowing through the NTR as follows:

1.3918 * (18/20) = 1.2526

This is as only approximately 90% of the fuel-mass flowing through a LOX-Augmented NTR in Hydro/LOX mode reacts. That is, if you pass 20 kg through in a second, 16 tons of it will be Oxygen that reacts, 2 tons will be Hydrogen that reacts, and 2 tons will be Hydrogen that remains unreacted...

And then we find the relative increase in Thrust of Hydro/LOX vs. Hydrazine based on the base ISP and using the following equations:

Power = 1/2 Thrust * Exhaust Velocity --> Thrust = 2 * Power / Exhaust Velocity

2 * 1.2526 / 0.4714 = 5.315

2 * 1 / 0.412 = 4.854

(note that the raw values above are completely meaningless, except as a relative standard of comparison)

Thus, the Thrust multiplier for Hydrazine should be 91.34% (4.854 / 5.315 = 0.9134) that for Hydro/LOX, or 1.977 * 0.9134 = 1.806

The values for steam (gaseous H2[//sub]O) come from the following table, by the way:

http://www.mrbigler.com/misc/energy-of-formation.PDF

Conclusions:

- The base ISP multiplier for Hydrazine in a Thermal Rocket should be 0.412

- The Thrust multiplier for Hydrazine in a Thermal Rocket should be 1.806

- The effective ISP of a Hydrazine Thermal Rocket is 74.4% (0.412 * 1.806 = 0.744) that of Hydrogen alone, at a significantly higher Thrust/MW...

Regards,

Northstar

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The data we're using already comes from atomic Rockets, no? So their predictions already include those adjustments for us, as well as the effects of Hydrogen Bonding- no need to change anything there.

The error I made was the base ISP of Methane and Ammonia. I too the the Molecular Mass of the starting Atom instead of it's composition of produced gases like you did with Hydrazine. Especially the Methane Thrust thrust multiplier I calculated is probably to high, because I assumed the base Isp too low.

- - - Updated - - -

The work you have done with this mod is fantastic.

Is there a way to disable/remove the "soot" mechanic?

Prevent Soot buidup by using clean propelants. You can remove soot buildup by flowing CO2 slowly through the engine (in CO2 cleaning mode)

- - - Updated - - -

Conclusions:

- The base ISP multiplier for Hydrazine in a Thermal Rocket should be 0.412

- The Thrust multiplier for Hydrazine in a Thermal Rocket should be 1.806

- The effective ISP of a Hydrazine Thermal Rocket is 74.4% (0.412 * 1.806 = 0.744) that of Hydrogen alone, at a significantly higher Thrust/MW...

Excelent calculation! Now we only need the Base Isp of Methane and Ammonia and Also correct ISP / Thrust multiplier of Methalox (Methane + Oxidiser). This will also be important for players that play with stock LiquidFuel/Oxidiser.

Edited by FreeThinker
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Prevent Soot buidup by using clean propelants. You can remove soot buildup by flowing CO2 slowly through the engine (in CO2 cleaning mode)

I understand how it works, but do not need the extra complexity and GUI clutter. Is that a "no" to there being a way to disable it?

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I understand how it works, but do not need the extra complexity and GUI clutter. Is that a "no" to there being a way to disable it?

Well it is not something hard coded, it's a property of the propellant. If you realy want to disable soot buildup, simply change the SootBuildup property of all propellants to 0. The best way to implement it is by using some MM script.

Edit: Also the GUI clutter is reduced in the latest version. I intend to improve it further in the future.

- - - Updated - - -

I think it's just the toxicity issue- and the fact that people are afraid of the "nuclear" part of "Nuclear Thermal Hydrazine Rocket". The stability of Hydrazine isn't really much of an issue as long as you keep it cold and separated from the atmosphere- in fact it's much easier to store than Hydrogen...

The people in the know are concerned about the toxicity (but know the radiation is not really as big a risk as it's made out to be), whereas the ignorant masses are extremely fearful of radioactivity but don't realize just how dangerous Hydrazine is... It's a bad combination of radiation and toxicity that makes people on both sides of the knowledge-barrier shy away from it as a fuel...

Since Hydrazine is probably the most efficient propellant (high density, non cryogenic, relatively high isp and thrust), to balance it, I think we should do something with the toxicity issues. My first idea is to apply a reputation penalty every second you use it in the lower atmosphere of kerbin. However, players might not care about reputation at all so I also want to punish players by making it cost a small amount of Science points. The rationale is that small Hydrazine gas leak accident are unavoidable which will inevitably poison/kill some poor Kerbal Scientists/ Engineers working at KSP and therefore reduce your acquired science. Hydrazine rockets will therefore be partially propelled by sacrificed kerbal scientists and engineers. That should teach players that their are consequences for their choices:sticktongue:

Edited by FreeThinker
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About upscaling non-androgynous docking ports to 2.5m:

Generally I would recommend making the normal version tweakscalable, since they do not attach to procedural parts, there is little risk involved.

I m no expert on working with the mesh and model definitions.

Though last I heard that the model one is a bit buggy.

From my own experiences, do not change the scale value if you do not know what you are doing with it (and I certainly dont, afaik it affects node positions and such).

That said, I would try it like this:

If the original docking port part has a diameter of 1.25m? and rescaleFactor = 1, then you only have to use @rescaleFactor = 2 to bring it up to 2.5m standard.

@FreeThinker: You need to clean out your inbox, I can not reply to you via pm.

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Well it is not something hard coded, it's a property of the propellant. If you realy want to disable soot buildup, simply change the SootBuildup property of all propellants to 0. The best way to implement it is by using some MM script.

Edit: Also the GUI clutter is reduced in the latest version. I intend to improve it further in the future.

- - - Updated - - -

Since Hydrazine is probably the most efficient propellant (high density, non crygenic, relatively high isp and thrust), to balance it, I think we should do something with the toxicity issues. My first idea is to apply a reputation penalty every second you use it in the lower atmosphere of kerbin. However, players might not care about reputation at all so I also want to punish players by making it cost a small amount of Science points. The rationale is that small Hydrazine gas leak accident are unavoidable which will inevitably poison/kill some poor Kerbal Scientists/ Engeneers working at KSP and therefore reduce your aquireded science. Hydrazine rockets will therefore be partialy propelled by sacrificed kerbal scientists and engeneers. That should teach players that their are consequences for their choices:sticktongue:

Hi FreeThinker,

Just a comment from a long-time KSPI player. I get that this is mod is now the product of your efforts and you are free to design it to your will, but I'm not personally on board with being "punished" by anyone for gameplay choices beyond the existing need to balance cost, design, and delta-v. That's a strong word to use on people who might just want to enjoy your efforts and try out cool concepts. Those are useful parameters for creating a challenge without going overboard - failed designs either explode, crash, run out of fuel, or are needlessly inefficient. The penalty for using the VISTA drive was an interesting outlier concept, but if more gameplay elements are going to start costing players anything more than funds, ISP, or delta-v, it is my opinion you'll alienate more potential players than gain. They will simply not use the gameplay element and go for the next best part. The same goes for adding too many secondary game mechanics ("soot"). And every element of rocket industry has inevitable accidents: will liquid fueling cost Kerbals? Deployment, or loss, of fission reactors? Will KSC be vaporized in an antimatter containment failure? I'm might not be someone "in the know", but working in environmental engineering, I can tell you that if you want realism and number of recorded fatalities, rocket fuel and radiation top hydrazine by a tragically massive number, and I'd prefer not to have to deal with that kind of mathematics every time I want to build, balance, and play around with fusion-powered space ships. Keeping them powered, fueled, and generally free from melting down is fun enough.

As always, your idea, your effort, your mod. I just don't want to see it killed by overcomplexity.

Just a thought from a member of the so-called "ignorant masses".

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Hi FreeThinker,

Just a comment from a long-time KSPI player. I get that this is mod is now the product of your efforts and you are free to design it to your will, but I'm not personally on board with being "punished" by anyone for gameplay choices beyond the existing need to balance cost, design, and delta-v. That's a strong word to use on people who might just want to enjoy your efforts and try out cool concepts. Those are useful parameters for creating a challenge without going overboard - failed designs either explode, crash, run out of fuel, or are needlessly inefficient. The penalty for using the VISTA drive was an interesting outlier concept, but if more gameplay elements are going to start costing players anything more than funds, ISP, or delta-v, it is my opinion you'll alienate more potential players than gain. They will simply not use the gameplay element and go for the next best part. The same goes for adding too many secondary game mechanics ("soot"). And every element of rocket industry has inevitable accidents: will liquid fueling cost Kerbals? Deployment, or loss, of fission reactors? Will KSC be vaporized in an antimatter containment failure? I'm might not be someone "in the know", but working in environmental engineering, I can tell you that if you want realism and number of recorded fatalities, rocket fuel and radiation top hydrazine by a tragically massive number, and I'd prefer not to have to deal with that kind of mathematics every time I want to build, balance, and play around with fusion-powered space ships. Keeping them powered, fueled, and generally free from melting down is fun enough.

As always, your idea, your effort, your mod. I just don't want to see it killed by overcomplexity.

Just a thought from a member of the so-called "ignorant masses".

Far from being a "hater", count me in to these masses. I suppose for the moment fans of the original, consistent KSPI have to accept that the last supported fork of KSPI is losing its consistency more and more. But: dont like it, dont use it. So i dont. There is hope for FractalUKs return after his workload has eased sufficiently as has happened before.

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About upscaling non-androgynous docking ports to 2.5m:

Generally I would recommend making the normal version tweakscalable, since they do not attach to procedural parts, there is little risk involved.

I m no expert on working with the mesh and model definitions.

Though last I heard that the model one is a bit buggy.

From my own experiences, do not change the scale value if you do not know what you are doing with it (and I certainly dont, afaik it affects node positions and such).

That said, I would try it like this:

If the original docking port part has a diameter of 1.25m? and rescaleFactor = 1, then you only have to use @rescaleFactor = 2 to bring it up to 2.5m standard.

I tried this, it doesn't work :(

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I get that this is mod is now the product of your efforts and you are free to design it to your will, but I'm not personally on board with being "punished" by anyone for gameplay choices beyond the existing need to balance cost, design, and delta-v. That's a strong word to use on people who might just want to enjoy your efforts and try out cool concepts. Those are useful parameters for creating a challenge without going overboard - failed designs either explode, crash, run out of fuel, or are needlessly inefficient.
Well the word "punished" might not what I aim for. It's more that I offer the choice of a controversial propellant which has superiour performance, but it needs to be balanced somehow, because nothing can be ideal, there is always some disadvantage. For hydrazine, this is it's toxic nature and instability at higher temperatures. Now the question is how to implement it.

- - - Updated - - -

And every element of rocket industry has inevitable accidents: will liquid fueling cost Kerbals? Deployment, or loss, of fission reactors? Will KSC be vaporized in an antimatter containment failure? I'm might not be someone "in the know", but working in environmental engineering, I can tell you that if you want realism and number of recorded fatalities, rocket fuel and radiation top hydrazine by a tragically massive number, and I'd prefer not to have to deal with that kind of mathematics every time I want to build, balance, and play around with fusion-powered space ships.
True, powerfull technologies are inherently dangerous. Anything intresting in rocketry is also a potential weapon / killer.

Therefore I'm looking into an abstract resource which is often overlooked so far, which is reputation. I think we can use it like a kind of (gold) credit which will allow you to use extrodinary powerfull but controversial technologies, which includes nuclear power, fusion, antimatter and also powerfull but toxic propellants like hydrazine. Spend it too much and your pilot and controllers might refuse to launch. , Only the most stupid kerbals might contine

Edited by FreeThinker
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Is there an Interstellar for dummies tutorial somewhere? Really looking for a connect this to that beginners guide to get me going. I thought I had it somewhat figured out but still having a hard time getting various things to work. Its not the mod I think its working just fine its purely my ignorance. I already have a comm satelite network equipped with docking rings just waiting for me to add on a power relay node to them.

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Is there an Interstellar for dummies tutorial somewhere? Really looking for a connect this to that beginners guide to get me going. I thought I had it somewhat figured out but still having a hard time getting various things to work. Its not the mod I think its working just fine its purely my ignorance. I already have a comm satelite network equipped with docking rings just waiting for me to add on a power relay node to them.

Well most of the explaination of the Interstellar Wiki should still be relevant

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My log is spamming:

[LOG 14:38:46.084] [ORS] Loading atmospheric data from pack: InterstellarAtmosphericPack

Is there a reason this might be happening?

Looking at the code it might occur when you use planetary bodies outside the stock planetary bodies.

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FreeThinker,

I'm an ardent supporter of most of your ideas- but we need to be careful not to "punish". Threadsinger was right before- we risk alienating our players by doing so. I think players can decide from a roleplaying perspective how to justify controversial technologies if they really want. I've used Orion Nuclear Pulse rockets in KSP before, for instance- and it's enough of a challenge to figure out how to get one of those far enough off the pad that it doesn't vaporize the Luanchpad in a miniature thermonuclear explosion without having to worry about a Science penalty for the radiation release on top of that...

To all the veteran KSP-Interstellar players out there watching from the sidelines, I can promise you we really haven't changed that much in KSP-Interstellar in the direction of added difficulty. FreeThinker did add a Soot mechanic for Methane- but we also buffed Ammonia's Thrust and ISP to more efficient levels that essentially replace the performance of Methane in the original version. And I will be watching and trying to temper FreeThinker's slightly-masochistic streak in future updates to make sure we don't end up with too many more things like Soot (which as is I can already understand might turn some players off...) For everything we made harder (Methane, for example) we made something else easier (you can now collect unlimited amounts of propellant from orbit using Propulsive Fluid Accumulators, for instance...) I suggest loading up KSP-I Extended and giving it a try!

Just remember that engineering-limitations on engines are nothing new to KSP-Interstellar: reactors have always run out of fuel, solar power satellites would already overheat, and the Vista engine KILLS anything within a couple kilometers downrange of its engine when firing...

Regards,

Northstar

- - - Updated - - -

FreeThinker,

Responding to your PM here since your inbox is full:

Hey Northstar1989, when can you calculate the Base ISP and trust multiplier of Methalox?

Yeah, I can take a look at the numbers somewhere down the line- but there are no good figures for Meth/LOX because it's never actually been done before in real life... (There's no reason it couldn't have- but Nuclear Thermal Rockets haven't gotten any actual use in reality yet, so...)

I'd like to get to that list of ISRU reactions I posted before first. We still have what, 6 or 7 reactions left to go? The new SootFactor mechanic should actually prove *highly* useful for the one allowing Solid Oxide CO2 electrolysis! (conversion of Carbon Dioxide into Oxygen and soot/graphite)

Regards,

Northstar

Edited by Northstar1989
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