Balloon into orbit

[Cheif Operations Director]

27 minutes ago, linuxgurugamer said:

Ummm, really?

Balloons really can't  lift that much compared to volume.  You can't just "strap on a few balloons".  You would need a huge amount of balloons to do anything significant with any rocket, let alone a Saturn V.

Stalling moar boosters to a rocket is also not useful in the real world

[linuxgurugamer]

32 minutes ago, Cheif Operations Director said:

Stalling moar boosters to a rocket is also not useful in the real world

But boosters  are hugely more useful at limiting loads than balloons

[Cheif Operations Director]

Just now, linuxgurugamer said:

But boosters  are hugely more useful at limiting loads than balloons

As I've stated you strapping ballons to a rocket such as the Saturn V would save Delta V

[linuxgurugamer]

Just now, Cheif Operations Director said:

As I've stated you strapping ballons to a rocket such as the Saturn V would save Delta V

Be prepared to strap on a huge number of balloons.

To give you an example, the Hindenburg had a total useful lift capacity of 21,076 POUNDS, which is about 10.5 tons.

The Saturn V weighed 6.54 MILLION pounds, which was 3270 tons.

So, using simple division, you would need about 310 Hindenburg's to be able to lift the Saturn V

Now, the Saturn V was about 111 meters tall, and 10 meters in diameter

The Hindenburg was 245 meters long, and about 42.1 meters in diameter.

So the Hindenburg was more than 2x as long as the Saturn V, and 4x as wide.

I'll leave the rest to your imagination

But, to make it a bit more real:

Imagine more than 600 Saturn V rockets, all standing next to each other.  That's still far less than the total volume of the Hindenburgs that would be needed.

 

Balloons are useful for small things, but not for getting large payloads to space

 

[Blaarkies]

Expecting balloons to be able to lift a Saturn V is not something anyone just overlooks (because of the square cube law), but yet thats what they posted 

Edited August 1, 2018 by Blaarkies

[Cheif Operations Director]

1 hour ago, linuxgurugamer said:

Be prepared to strap on a huge number of balloons.

To give you an example, the Hindenburg had a total useful lift capacity of 21,076 POUNDS, which is about 10.5 tons.

The Saturn V weighed 6.54 MILLION pounds, which was 3270 tons.

So, using simple division, you would need about 310 Hindenburg's to be able to lift the Saturn V

Now, the Saturn V was about 111 meters tall, and 10 meters in diameter

The Hindenburg was 245 meters long, and about 42.1 meters in diameter.

So the Hindenburg was more than 2x as long as the Saturn V, and 4x as wide.

I'll leave the rest to your imagination

But, to make it a bit more real:

Imagine more than 600 Saturn V rockets, all standing next to each other.  That's still far less than the total volume of the Hindenburgs that would be needed.

 

Balloons are useful for small things, but not for getting large payloads to space

 

Fair enough. My point as to lifting smaller relays and science ballons still stands

[snip]

Edited July 31, 2018 by Snark
Redacted by moderator.

[sumghai]

[MOD - Just a friendly reminder, folks. Please focus your discussions on the technical aspects of the proposal at hand, rather than trying to determine each other's motives. Thanks!]

Here's an interesting StackExchange discussion on balloon-launched rockets:

https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/1635/could-it-be-possible-to-launch-a-rocket-from-a-balloon

Essentially, while it is technically possible to launch a rocket from a balloon, the fact of the matter is such a system would not provide enough savings in fuel and delta-V to be financially viable.

In the context of KSP, this would mean balloon-assisted launch systems would only be viable for very small sounding rockets (i.e. much smaller than the smallest 0.625m diameter rocket parts in-game). And since gameplay would very quickly advance into spaceflight beyond Kerbin, it makes little sense for development time to be invested in a feature that the vast majority of players would very quickly outstrip.

[Cheif Operations Director]

3 minutes ago, sumghai said:

[MOD - Just a friendly reminder, folks. Please focus your discussions on the technical aspects of the proposal at hand, rather than trying to determine each other's motives. Thanks!]

Here's an interesting StackExchange discussion on balloon-launched rockets:

https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/1635/could-it-be-possible-to-launch-a-rocket-from-a-balloon

Essentially, while it is technically possible to launch a rocket from a balloon, the fact of the matter is such a system would not provide enough savings in fuel and delta-V to be financially viable.

In the context of KSP, this would mean balloon-assisted launch systems would only be viable for very small sounding rockets (i.e. much smaller than the smallest 0.625m diameter rocket parts in-game). And since gameplay would very quickly advance into spaceflight beyond Kerbin, it makes little sense for development time to be invested in a feature that the vast majority of players would very quickly outstrip.

You could bring them as an inflatable module like the airlock. Then bring them to other planets. Then you could have weather ballons on jool or a floating station in jools atmosphere. 

Pull a bespin

You may need to bring 100 balloons but it's worth it for a floating city 

[DoctorDavinci]

14 minutes ago, Cheif Operations Director said:

You could bring them as an inflatable module like the airlock. Then bring them to other planets. Then you could have weather ballons on jool or a floating station in jools atmosphere. 

Pull a bespin

You may need to bring 100 balloons but it's worth it for a floating city 

Cloud city is held in the habitable zone of Bespin via a combination of 100's of repulsor lifts and Ion Engines 

But hey, this is KSP, would be nice to have the option of a balloon city regardless if it is realistic

EDIT: Wouldn't be long until someone decided to strap a bunch of baloons to a command chair ... I remember many years ago seeing that done IRL ... some dude tied a bunch of helium baloons to a lawn chair 

Edited July 31, 2018 by DoctorDavinci

[Cheif Operations Director]

2 minutes ago, DoctorDavinci said:

Cloud city is held in the habitable zone of Bespin via a combination of 100's of repulsor lifts and Ion Engines 

But hey, this is KSP, would be nice to have the option of a ballon city regardless if it is realistic

We could actually do that. Jools atmosphere is thick if I'm not mistaken meaning the ballons would be buoyant. Hence the city would be very close to the top of the atmosphere. This would allow for a ton of solar panels and also the floor of the city to be made out of xenon fuel tanks. Then just a bunch of ion engines. All you would need is a refuel about once every 100 years and given the fact that it may be better (for science purposes) to just relaunch the craft  and gather the science while in burns up

We could have MASSIVE cities if done right floating around on eve and jool.

[DoctorDavinci]

21 minutes ago, Cheif Operations Director said:

We could have MASSIVE cities if done right floating around on eve and jool.

This is something I shall ponder ... great idea for a mod

Edited July 31, 2018 by DoctorDavinci

[Snark]

24 minutes ago, Cheif Operations Director said:

Jools atmosphere is thick if I'm not mistaken meaning the ballons would be buoyant.

It's a game with imaginary planets with unspecified elements making up their atmospheres, so of course we can posit anything we want.

IRL, using balloons on a gas-giant world like Jupiter wouldn't work.  For the balloon to be buoyant, it would have to be full of a gas that's less dense than the surrounding atmosphere.  Jupiter's atmosphere is mostly hydrogen, which is literally the lowest-density gas it is possible to have-- there's nothing lighter than that.  So a balloon that's buoyant the same way that a helium-filled balloon is buoyant on Earth simply wouldn't be possible.

Of course, it may be possible to have a hot-air balloon (i.e. inflate it with the surrounding atmosphere, then keep it heated to lower the density)... but then you've got the problem of how to have a lightweight heat source that could provide lots of power indefinitely.

But that's IRL.  Of course one could hypothesize that Jool's atmosphere is made of some dense gas, unlike Jupiter, and/or that any kerbal balloons are full of some magical super-light stuff. 

In the end, whether it's a good idea or not to add it to the game basically comes down to:  is it doing the players a service, or a disservice?  Time spent implementing a balloons feature would be time spent not working on something else, such as rockets and such.  There may be some players who'd like to have balloons, who may be in favor of such a feature; but there are also plenty of players who play KSP for the rockets, and who would prefer not to have Squad spending their resources on such a feature.  (I'd be in that category, myself.)

[Cheif Operations Director]

7 minutes ago, Snark said:

It's a game with imaginary planets with unspecified elements making up their atmospheres, so of course we can posit anything we want.

IRL, using balloons on a gas-giant world like Jupiter wouldn't work.  For the balloon to be buoyant, it would have to be full of a gas that's less dense than the surrounding atmosphere.  Jupiter's atmosphere is mostly hydrogen, which is literally the lowest-density gas it is possible to have-- there's nothing lighter than that.  So a balloon that's buoyant the same way that a helium-filled balloon is buoyant on Earth simply wouldn't be possible.

Of course, it may be possible to have a hot-air balloon (i.e. inflate it with the surrounding atmosphere, then keep it heated to lower the density)... but then you've got the problem of how to have a lightweight heat source that could provide lots of power indefinitely.

But that's IRL.  Of course one could hypothesize that Jool's atmosphere is made of some dense gas, unlike Jupiter, and/or that any kerbal balloons are full of some magical super-light stuff. 

In the end, whether it's a good idea or not to add it to the game basically comes down to:  is it doing the players a service, or a disservice?  Time spent implementing a balloons feature would be time spent not working on something else, such as rockets and such.  There may be some players who'd like to have balloons, who may be in favor of such a feature; but there are also plenty of players who play KSP for the rockets, and who would prefer not to have Squad spending their resources on such a feature.  (I'd be in that category, myself.)

I wonder if you could create a lighter material than hydrogen seeing as protons neutrons and electrons are all made of smaller particles,

[Snark]

Just now, Cheif Operations Director said:

I wonder if you could create a lighter material than hydrogen seeing as protons neutrons and electrons are all made of smaller particles,

In reality?  No.  In a Star Trek fantasy, or imaginary-kerbal-video-game-world?  Sure. 

But this is getting seriously away from KSP and kinda leaving the topic of "doing this in KSP".  If we wanna talk real-life physics, perhaps would be better served by having a topic over in Science & Spaceflight?

 

[mikegarrison]

It's really silly to complain when somebody points out there is a mod that does what you just asked for. Among other reasons, it means that if the mod is done well you can find out a lot about what it would be like if it were stock.

Anyway, if you play around with Keballoons you quickly realize the huge problem -- KSP does not have any wind. Balloons without wind are just broken. The Kerballoons go straight up and come straight down and that's all they do. You can't try to balloon around Kerbin (or Eve or Duna etc.) because with no wind, the balloon just sits there.

[Snark]

3 minutes ago, mikegarrison said:

Anyway, if you play around with Keballoons you quickly realize the huge problem -- KSP does not have any wind. Balloons without wind are just broken. The Kerballoons go straight up and come straight down and that's all they do. You can't try to balloon around Kerbin (or Eve or Duna etc.) because with no wind, the balloon just sits there.

What if you strap a Juno to it?

[MR L A]

2 hours ago, linuxgurugamer said:

Ummm, really?

Balloons really can't  lift that much compared to volume.  You can't just "strap on a few balloons".  You would need a huge amount of balloons to do anything significant with any rocket, let alone a Saturn V.

This is KSP. Do you really expect the amount the balloons would be able to lift to be anything like irl?

Plus a "few" probably translates to "as many as my computer can handle" or just one GIANT one using procedural parts or something.

Point is, an extra mechanic or part is never going to be a negative thing really. People can simply not use it if they don't like it OR they can get creative like the rest of us. Thinking about it, I bet a balloon part would come in SUPER handy for Eve returns.

[Snark]

2 minutes ago, MR L A said:

Point is, an extra mechanic or part is never going to be a negative thing really.

Sure it is.  Everything that is implemented means that something else doesn't get implemented.  There's a cost there.  Implementing balloons means skipping something involving rockets and spaceflight.

So it is a negative... if the number of people who would have preferred something else exceeds the number of people who prefer the balloon.  Nothing in software development is free.

So the key here is... how do the numbers break down, i.e. what do KSP players, in the aggregate, want?  None of us actually have the data, so nobody here is in a position to say, at least not with authority.

Certainly we can speculate.  For example, personally, I speculate that more KSP players are interested in rockets and would like rocket stuff, than are interested in balloons and would prefer balloon stuff.  But that's merely a surmise on my part, I can't prove that it's correct. 

5 minutes ago, MR L A said:

Thinking about it, I bet a balloon part would come in SUPER handy for Eve returns.

Well, sure... but so would having a jet engine that can burn Eve's atmosphere.  Eve's hard because the designers of the stock game wanted it to be-- that's kind of the point.  Providing a way to make it easier would defeat that purpose.

(And that's one of the nice things about having mods in the game:  people who don't like the default behavior can tweak it to suit them.  For example, there are multiple mods that provide jet engines that do work on Eve, and they can be fun to play with.)

I think balloons are an interesting idea, and I think it's great that they're available in a mod.  Personally, I'd prefer not to have them in the stock game-- I think that they're a thing that's better served by a mod, like jet engines that work without an oxygen-bearing atmosphere.

[MR L A]

1 minute ago, Snark said:

Sure it is.  Everything that is implemented means that something else doesn't get implemented. 

That isn't a negative or how negatives work. That is neutral. We're essentially trading one thing for another. If we just lost one thing, that would be a negative.

2 minutes ago, Snark said:

Providing a way to make it easier would defeat that purpose.

Yes, this is exactly how science works. Something that, despite the game being science based, people seem to forget is that science makes things easier. If we want to add irl science progression to the game (or even science now half a century old) it will make the game easier. It depends on what you want from KSP tbh.

[Cheif Operations Director]

6 minutes ago, MR L A said:

That isn't a negative or how negatives work. That is neutral. We're essentially trading one thing for another. If we just lost one thing, that would be a negative.

Yes, this is exactly how science works. Something that, despite the game being science based, people seem to forget is that science makes things easier. If we want to add irl science progression to the game (or even science now half a century old) it will make the game easier. It depends on what you want from KSP tbh.

I concur but ballons should be at the end of the tree

12 minutes ago, Snark said:

Sure it is.  Everything that is implemented means that something else doesn't get implemented.  There's a cost there.  Implementing balloons means skipping something involving rockets and spaceflight.

So it is a negative... if the number of people who would have preferred something else exceeds the number of people who prefer the balloon.  Nothing in software development is free.

So the key here is... how do the numbers break down, i.e. what do KSP players, in the aggregate, want?  None of us actually have the data, so nobody here is in a position to say, at least not with authority.

Certainly we can speculate.  For example, personally, I speculate that more KSP players are interested in rockets and would like rocket stuff, than are interested in balloons and would prefer balloon stuff.  But that's merely a surmise on my part, I can't prove that it's correct. 

Well, sure... but so would having a jet engine that can burn Eve's atmosphere.  Eve's hard because the designers of the stock game wanted it to be-- that's kind of the point.  Providing a way to make it easier would defeat that purpose.

(And that's one of the nice things about having mods in the game:  people who don't like the default behavior can tweak it to suit them.  For example, there are multiple mods that provide jet engines that do work on Eve, and they can be fun to play with.)

I think balloons are an interesting idea, and I think it's great that they're available in a mod.  Personally, I'd prefer not to have them in the stock game-- I think that they're a thing that's better served by a mod, like jet engines that work without an oxygen-bearing atmosphere.

A jet engine that works without an oxygen atmosphere is just a rocket engine

[Snark]

8 minutes ago, MR L A said:

That isn't a negative or how negatives work. That is neutral. We're essentially trading one thing for another. If we just lost one thing, that would be a negative.

No, it's a negative if the thing you give up is more "valuable" than the thing that you gain.

Software development costs money.  A lot of it.  Suppose the KSP team spent a bunch of money and a bunch of time to develop a feature that nobody wanted... and by doing so, didn't develop some feature that lots of folks wanted and would love.  That would be a huge negative.  It would be a losing proposition from the company's perspective (lots of money spent on something that doesn't generate significant revenue), and also from the players' perspective (they miss out on getting a feature they would have liked).

Speaking as someone who's been shipping commercial software for a living for the past quarter-century... in my experience, that is how negatives work.

8 minutes ago, MR L A said:

Yes, this is exactly how science works. Something that, despite the game being science based, people seem to forget is that science makes things easier. If we want to add irl science progression to the game (or even science now half a century old) it will make the game easier.

Sure.  But KSP is, indeed, a game, and "game balance" is also something they have to consider.  We can posit that in the future, someone invents teleportation technology and you can instantly jump to any location in the solar system at the press of a button for zero cost.  Even if that actually turns out to be physically possible, it sure wouldn't be a fun game-- at least, not for me.

8 minutes ago, MR L A said:

It depends on what you want from KSP tbh.

Absolutely!  100% in agreement with you there. 

And the thing is... different people want very different things from the game.  For example, I like KSP precisely because it's challenging-- adding something that makes taking off from Eve really easy would kill my entire motivation for going to Eve.  Whereas someone else, who has different priorities than I do, might find Eve to be so hard and intimidating that it's un-fun, and they may really want a way to make it easier.

When we talk about adding a feature to the stock game (as opposed to a mod), then what becomes important is, what do most players want?  Do most players want Eve to be easier?  Or do most players enjoy the challenge?  That's what's important when Squad needs to make that sort of decision.

So, either most players want balloons, so Squad should add the feature-- or most players would prefer rocket stuff, in which case they shouldn't.

3 minutes ago, Cheif Operations Director said:

A jet engine that works without an oxygen atmosphere is just a rocket engine

No.  A rocket engine is closed-cycle and doesn't use the surrounding atmosphere.  I'm talking about mods like Karbonite and Kethane, which add atmospheric engines that work just like jet engines do in terms of gameplay (i.e. they have Isp much much higher than a rocket, and only work when in atmosphere)-- they simply happen to be able to function in atmospheres other than Kerbin or Laythe.

Having an engine like that makes it possible to build a spaceplane on Eve that works pretty much like a spaceplane on Kerbin:  i.e. very highly fuel-efficient jet engines that work up to a certain altitude, and then rocket engines (with much lower Isp, but which work in a vacuum) that can make the jump to space.

It's an interesting gameplay dynamic.  I've tried it out, and it was fun for a career or two, just for the sake of variety.  However, on the whole, in my own gameplay I prefer for Eve to be difficult, so I'm not in the habit of using those mods on a regular basis.

[Superfluous J]

4 hours ago, linuxgurugamer said:

But boosters  are hugely more useful at limiting loads than balloons

Not if you have MOAR BALLOONS.

[Cheif Operations Director]

5 hours ago, Snark said:

No.  A rocket engine is closed-cycle and doesn't use the surrounding atmosphere.  I'm talking about mods like Karbonite and Kethane, which add atmospheric engines that work just like jet engines do in terms of gameplay (i.e. they have Isp much much higher than a rocket, and only work when in atmosphere)-- they simply happen to be able to function in atmospheres other than Kerbin or Laythe.

Having an engine like that makes it possible to build a spaceplane on Eve that works pretty much like a spaceplane on Kerbin:  i.e. very highly fuel-efficient jet engines that work up to a certain altitude, and then rocket engines (with much lower Isp, but which work in a vacuum) that can make the jump to space.

It's an interesting gameplay dynamic.  I've tried it out, and it was fun for a career or two, just for the sake of variety.  However, on the whole, in my own gameplay I prefer for Eve to be difficult, so I'm not in the habit of using those mods on a regular basis.

A jet engine  the outside air to combust yes?

This requires oxygen if eve or etc has none then their is no way for a jet engine to work on eve. It needs its own oxidezer hence it is a rocket engine. Open-cycle rocket engines do exist they are called turbopumps like the Merlin. A Raptor SpaceX engine is closed cycle.

 

a jet engine could only work if they brought the oxidiser along and the atmosphere would be the fuel other than that a jet can not work in these environments.

Edited August 1, 2018 by sumghai
Edited quoted post down to just the relevant portion

[FireKerb]

Firstly, sorry for getting angry. It was just some personal matters leaking into forum stuff.

 

A reverse jet engine, where you get the fuel from the atmosphere and bring your own oxidizer would probably work on Eve, especially considering that the seas are made of explodium.

[Cassel]

On July 31, 2018 at 3:10 AM, Blaarkies said:

That might be a good idea to not dismiss arguments from others that know how to code, that know how much effort it takes to add something this simple. Its all good to have cool stuff in the game, but the majority of the players want other stuff before they want balloons

[snipped]

Why do you want anyone in here to tell Devs how this idea should be coded? It is their job to find best way, not ours.

Balloons are simple, if you deploy one it should go up, both in physics bubble and while you are in time warp mode.
Height limit for balloon should be pressure inside vs pressure outside, this can be calculated while you are in physics mode, so even if you hit time warp balloon will "autopilot" (like rocket with huge speed, it goes up even if you abandon mission) to that height and stay there until you change pressure (pump more helium or drop gas from balloon).

If we would have small balloons that would be bouncy and hard to break we could use them as CST-100 does or we could even use them for submarines to change buoyancy.

Edited August 1, 2018 by goldenpeach
redacted by moderator