Orion aka "Ol' Boom-boom"

[Canopus]

This could maybe help you:http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/27587-WIP-KASPAR-Standardized-Cargo-Rack-System-for-modders He is developing a cargo system that uses individual crates. Maybe its possible to use this as magazines with a different model. you would have to "refuel" your craft by attaching new magazines.

[nyrath]

Making the individual magazines jettison-able is taking too much time. Heck with it, I'll do that in the future, when I've gained more skill at mod making.

For now I'll just make a single "fuel tank".

I may have to scale this down, I'm not sure it will fit in the VAB.

[Mekan1k]

Looks great! Have you got pictures of the engine working?

[nyrath]

Looks great! Have you got pictures of the engine working?

Alas, no. First I have to hack together a .dll to implement the explosions, the pusher animation, and the nuclear bomb magazines.

[Psyckosama]

Oh my god, the 10m is just awesome. GO WITH IT!

Really this thing is just awesome

Edited May 17, 2013 by Psyckosama

[nyrath]

{ Marvin the Martian voice } Dee-lays, dee-lays. All these tiny little problems keep cropping up. As Londo Molari would say, it is like being nibbled to death by cats.

I've spent several hours trying to troubleshoot a Blender into Unity import problem. Fixed it but it took too long. If your Blender file has too many images stored in the UV cache, when you import into Unity you'll have a phantom extra material that will make parts of your rocket transparent.

And I've just discovered that my rudimentary part.cfg file for the atomic bomb magazines will only attach to the cockpit part, it refuses to link to the crew capsule.

All these little things are keeping me from hacking the .dll for the motor.

[Canopus]

This is amazing! The first thing i'm going to do with it will be a massive mission to the Joolian moons.

[Itsdavyjones]

oh man, can't wait for it to come out.

[DasMike]

First, thanks so much for working on this, I've been waiting for a Project Orion style propulsion system for such a long time! Quick question though, are the textures you're using going to be the ones that come with the first release? I like how intricate they look, but the textures on the engine itself seem a little stretched out - - If you have the time, would you consider maybe releasing the textures so we can edit them perhaps? I'd like to make a texture that gives the engine a "stock" part look to it.

[nyrath]

Quick question though, are the textures you're using going to be the ones that come with the first release? I like how intricate they look, but the textures on the engine itself seem a little stretched out - - If you have the time, would you consider maybe releasing the textures so we can edit them perhaps? I'd like to make a texture that gives the engine a "stock" part look to it.

Sure, I'll release the textures as well. I'll try to remember to release the the sketchy UV map diagram that Blender makes.

The textures on the engine are stretched out because if I made the UV map with equal spacing the engine textures look fine but the yellow radiation trefoil is stretched out the other way.

I used intricate textures to give a visual impression that this thing is incredibly huge, because it is. But I can see it does not look very "stock" like.

Meanwhile I'm plowing my way through the Plug-In section of the forum to try and get up to speed. I did finally stumble over part.FindModelAnimators() which was a big help.

[LaydeeDem]

Impressive! My only issue with it is that you need to apply an edge split to you model to get rid of the awkward shadows.

[nyrath]

Well, things are progressing in a typically Kerbal fashion.

After lots of skull sweat, I managed to comprehend the code that NovaSilisko so generously supplied to me. I did note a couple of places I'd rearrange the code, the big one was that I'd store the defining values of the nuclear pulse units (sounds so much more reassuring than "atom bomb") in the magazine code, not the engine code. Reason being that various Orion designs use different yields on their bombs, which is easier to accommodate by swapping types of bomb magazines instead of swapping engine modules. And other various things.

Then I was a few hours in MonoDevelop, trying to get the code to compile. As it turns out Unity's API changed slightly so NovaSilisko's code suddenly had syntax errors. But I finally got it to compile.

I slipped the mods into KSP. I fired up the VAB, stacked a control module on top of a bomb magazine, on top of an Orion engine, then sent it to the launch pad.

Where it blew up before I could launch it. The magazine went kaboom, the poor control module flew up a couple of meters then fell onto the top of the engine, and I was left staring at the engine module standing on the launch pad. Second launch attempt did the same thing. Third is pictured above, this time the engine blew first, the magazine fell and exploded, but the capsule survived.

The astronaut's face is rather calm and cool, I would not look so calm if I knew I was on top of a stack of 3,600 atom bombs that was falling to the ground.

Mission report said:

[00:00:00]: Structural failure on linkage between UKAF Nuclear Pulse Motor and UKAF Nuclear Pulse Fuel Tank

[00:00:00]: UKAF Nuclear Pulse Fuel Tank collided into UKAF Nuclear Pulse Motor

[00:00:01]: Fredory Kerman was killed

[00:00:01]: Mk 1 Cockpit collided into UKAF Nuclear Pulse Motor

Maybe I should not have set the explosionPotential to 1.0 in the part.cfg file.

Back to the drawing board.

Edited May 18, 2013 by nyrath

[Mekan1k]

...

Very Kerbal indeed.

[nyrath]

Looks like the .dll doesn't want to activate.

I tried using support towers. At least when I use them, the rocket does not instantly explode.

Now, if the engines are the first stage, hitting the space bar does not apparently activate the rocket. It is supposed to use the 'z' key to start launching bombs. But nothing happens.

If the supports are the first stage, they let go, the rocket falls, and blows up.

[Nuke]

needs point away from face decal and it would be perfect

[nyrath]

Yeah, null reference error.

    private Transform pusherPlate;

    //=======
    protected override void onFlightStart()
    {
        this.pusherPlate = base.transform.FindChild("model").FindChild("obj_pusherplate");
		if (this.pusherPlate == null)
		{
			MonoBehaviour.print("onFlightStart() ***ERROR: failure to retrieve pusher plate transform");
		}
    }

the error message is printing. According to Unity, the engine does indeed contain a component named obj_pusherplate. Looking more closely...

[nyrath]

Don't get all excited, the blasted thing still doesn't work. The lack of documentation for the API is driving me crazy. And every day I learn something new and weird about the 3D engine.

Did you know if you have a part with a mass of 280 tons, it will spontaneously detach from the part it is sitting on, then collide with it because the orbits are slightly different. While they are sitting on the launch pad?

I tried adding struts to hold them together. Then they started jiggling so hard that the capsule on top fell off. While sitting on the launch pad.

Until I can figure this out, I've hard-coded the fuel tank's mass at 50 tons.

The code to animate the pusher plate not only does not work, it apparently crashes the .dll. I'm sure it is due to something clumsy on my part. It uses a Transform to move the plate, but it is having trouble finding the transform.

The sound code works, but the explosions do not. The FXGroup "explosionGroup" is not cooperating. I tried using FXMonger.Explode(this, new Vector3d(0f, -12.6133f, 0f), 1f); and again it seemed to crash the .dll.

And I still have to figure out how to create and update a fuel indicator.

At least the heat animation works.

I'll try to figure out more tomorrow, I'm just spinning my wheels now.

[Canopus]

I hope you figure it out. I'm so excited for this mod!

[nyrath]

A wee bit of progress.

I'm not sure, but I think I kludged my way out of the "ship snapping in two on the launch pad" problem. I edited the Orion engine and Orion magazine config files, and set their breakingForce and breakingTorque to 15000.

The good news is that I finally got the pusher plate to animate moving back and forth. The bad news is that broke the glowing heat animation. This is not surprising since both the motion and the heat are animations on the same part, just one alters part position, the other alters the color balance of the part texture. Arrgh.

I still cannot get the blasted explosions to appear.

Then I'll have to play with the pulse unit parameters. Right now they do 1000 kiloNewtons per pulse, which means you can launch and get into Kerbal escape orbit in no time at all. But there is no fine control, it is all or nothing. The impulse also makes the acceleration indicator jerk perilously close to the red zone, poor Kerbalnaut!

And there are dozens of fine details I have not yet tackled. Like currently it ignores the thrust setting. Instead it sets off pulse units one per second as long as you manually hold down the "Z" key. That is not going to work in time warp.

The bomb inventory indicator also refuses to show up.

later edit

{facepalm}

Now I see what the problem is with the explosions. As the rocket climbs into the air, the explosions are occuring on the launch pad, instead of behind the pusher plate as they should. Boy do I feel stupid.

Edited May 20, 2013 by nyrath

[Fyrem]

Nyrath, your development story is just a fun to read as the mod will be to play with!

Keep up the good work.

[nyrath]

As I suspected, it was a local-to-global coordinate problem.

Again, don't get excited, this thing is still full of bugs and needs lots of work.

I'm also going to try and move the parameters for the nuclear pulse units into the part.cfg file, so it will be easy to make a family of propulsion systems. And also so end-users can play with things.

I did notice something a little odd. The explosions occur, and ball of debris streaks rapidly backwards. Until you reach the limits of the atmosphere, then suddenly the debris travels with you.

[Lord_Stimpy]

This is looking to be pretty awesome.

Great website too, i remember reading through it a few years back, found the link on a sci-fi modelling forum.

[Tommygun]

This will be a fun mod to play with.

Can you actually land with it and will it destroy anything too close to it on takeoffs and landings?

It makes me think of Fallout and the Brotherhood of Steal every time I see it.

[Mekan1k]

I see those pictures, and I think only one thing: Those Geiger counters are singing now.

[nyrath]

This will be a fun mod to play with.

Can you actually land with it and will it destroy anything too close to it on takeoffs and landings?

Currently I'm not sure how to make it devastate the area it lands in. So in theory you can land.

In practice, every time I land the blasted thing, it blows up.

I'm going to need help figuring out appropriate values for the parts.cfg files. I can make it semi-realistic, but I do not want something that will "break the game" (that is, be so disgustingly over-powered that it is no fun to play). But first I have to track down and kill some programming bugs.

I see those pictures, and I think only one thing: Those Geiger counters are singing now.

No kidding. Like it says in the catalog: It has a remarkable specific impulse, but will drastically decrease the property values downwind of the launch site

Having said that, Kerbals seem to be immune to radiation, so they just have to worry about being vaporized.

Edited May 21, 2013 by nyrath