confused at mach

[harry c]

at what speed do we see the mach effects I went trans sonic and was able to see any however i got reentry plasma flying a plane at 1km/s at 24000m please help me clear this up

[musicpenguin]

what? mach 1 is 340.29 m/s so do the maths.

[Hitperson]

what? mach 1 is 340.29 m/s so do the maths.

the speed of sound depends on air pressure hence it changes at altitude.

[musicpenguin]

eh, Thats what google gave me.

[Vanamonde]

Why are people talking about Mach speeds in KSP anyway? In the game, sound's speed is infinite, as is light's speed.

[harry c]

I Know how fast the speed of sound is and how it changes by the medium through which it travels i was wondering why ,when i went trans sonic there were no effects. damn last time i ask something here.

[RawChicken]

KSP is not so real as some users would like it to be. There is no trans-sonic speed in KSP, so you never crossed the sound barrier. Kerbin is not the earth, and physics dont apply the same way along that part of the universe

[harry c]

Ok that makes sense there is no sound barrier but at what speed do I see the visual effects.

[RawChicken]

That is dependant of your speed and your altitude/atmospheric pressure.

Ive got flames at more or less 650 M/s at around 13 km

I dont know exactly hot to calculate this, I think no one does.

[Yargnit]

The game renders re-entry effects only above 10km and mach only below 10km regardless of speed. At sea level you'll start to see much effects appear on your aircraft between mach 0.75 and 0.8, increasing in effect until mach 1.

[Odinhentze2000]

Kerbin is 10 times smaller than earth so that explains a lot. and i guess you knew it already but I'm just trying to help too

[Van Disaster]

<obligatory>If you use FAR you'll definitely notice transonic & supersonic behaviour, although there's no visible effects at the moment. Mach 1 is dependent on atmosphere composition, as it should be. </obligatory>

[Red Iron Crown]

There definitely is a sound barrier in KSP, in that drag increases dramatically at that point. Turn on the AeroGUI in the alt-F12 menu and you can see your current Mach number and drag. The air-breathing engines' thrust curves are all keyed to Mach number rather than absolute speed.

Kerbin's size isn't really a factor, the atmosphere is fairly similar to Earth's.

There are two different visual effects: The whitish "Mach effects" and the reddish "reentry effects". The Mach effects start to appear as the craft approaches the sound barrier and continue for a while afterwards. They're harmless and are basically just a pretty effect. The reentry effects occur at much higher speeds, and they are an indication of significant atmospheric heating. Few parts can survive sustained exposure at those speeds (especially the frontmost part), it is best to keep climbing and get to thinner air or slow down.

[FullMetalMachinist]

Old thread is old.