Some stupid questions about the part.cfg file

[satcharna]

I've been googling for the better part of an hour, and the CFG File Documentation article on the wiki is rather outdated, so I thought I might ask here, no?

Basically, I've been trying to make a set of parts myself, but am not having much success, as I find myself struggling with the part.cfg. I was wondering if there is some way of searching or listing available particle effects, namely the fx_exhaustFlame files, that doesn't involve looking through other part.cfg files to discover them. In addition, I've been having more specific issues with one particular part, a "propeller" powered by electricity alone. No matter how small I set the ratio for propellant consumption, I get flameouts due to being deprived of electrical power. If I use the debug menu to set infinite fuel, it works fine, which makes me think it's consuming insanely large amounts of power for some reason, despite the tiny ratio (which I suppose makes sense, as there isn't any other fuel to compare ratios with).

If anyone could help me out, or point me at some good documentation, I would be very grateful.

[Mekan1k]

I think that is a unity thing....

[satcharna]

Which one?

[EndlessWaves]

You might be able to find all of the particle effects using Resources.FindObjectsOfTypeAll in a plugin.

As for the propeller you'll need to specify which module you're using. It's hard to troubleshoot without knowing what you're doing.

[lobsterbark]

You can't set a part to use a massless fuel, like electricity without it also using a fuel with mass. Otherwise, it doesn't have a mass to use in the specific impulse equation. You will have to set it to be an intake, and use intake air, or make your own custom resource, like in Firespitter.

[satcharna]

Thanks for the Unity Script link, I'll check it out right away.

I'm using ModuleEngines for the propeller. I'm rather new to this sort of addon, so I've added the module part inside the code quote below.

MODULE
{
	name = ModuleEngines
	thrustVectorTransformName = thrustTransform
	exhaustDamage = False
	ignitionThreshold = 0.1
	minThrust = 0
	maxThrust = 50
	heatProduction = 0
	PROPELLANT
	{
		name = ElectricCharge
       		ratio = 0.1
		DrawGauge = True
	}
	atmosphereCurve
 	{
   	 key = 0 720
 	}

}

I sort of worried that it might be because the electricity was massless after reading through the impulse formula, but when I looked at the resource files I didn't think it would be a problem. I'll look into using the Firespitter plugin, assuming Snjo doesn't object to me making custom parts for myself. Thank you all very much for your help!

[n4rf]

You can't set a part to use a massless fuel, like electricity without it also using a fuel with mass. Otherwise, it doesn't have a mass to use in the specific impulse equation. You will have to set it to be an intake, and use intake air, or make your own custom resource, like in Firespitter.

This.

I just spent an hour figuring this out for myself. You can't use a massless fuel. As the man said, you need a resource other than electricity. You can setup the engine to regenerate that fuel, too (I have yet to do this in my case)... and you can make the isp insanely high and the ratio for the fuel insanely low to mitigate things.

I'm personally playing with the idea of making an FTL or just a very powerful engine to travel interplanetary distances quickly at the expense of mass and electricity generation. My POC has to use Xenon (though very little) right now to function viably.

[nyrath]

You can't use a massless fuel.

Well, there is a reason for this.

The only propulsion system that uses propellant that has no mass is the photon drive. Which requires 300 megawatts of power for each pathetic Newton of thrust. Not kiloNewton, Newton. How many RTGs is that going to take?

Propulsion systems that do not use propellant at all are "reactionless drives." They would be great, were it not for the unfortunate fact that they violate the law of conservation of momentum.

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/reactionlessdrive.php

Science fiction writers who postulate that their SF universe has a reactionless drive have created another problem for themselves. These drives are so fuel efficient that it gives you the ability to shatter planets with the Naval equivalent of a rowboat.