Modular Fuel System Continued v3.3 (OBSOLETE)

[DasBananenbrot]

Note that in RF/RO engine throttles are limited (by type, techlevel, and the individual engine). Some can't throttle at all, some can throttle deeply; most U and L don't get any throttling until TL4 or so. As before, note that stock RCS is (a) modular and ( defaults to hydrazine, which is *not* ALL_VESSEL.

Does this answer your question?

[ModZero]

I found another bug, throttled engines now cannot be throttled back. Their minimum thrust is set to 100%. They only quit when they run out of fuel.

Is is RealFuels, or Realism Overhaul that has the bug?

Sounds like

Note that in RF/RO engine throttles are limited (by type, techlevel, and the individual engine). Some can't throttle at all, some can throttle deeply;

[Deredere]

So can you use real fuels without realism overhaul? I'm scared of altering the game dynamic too heavily but I do like the sound of real fuels, but I can't get a grip on how exactly RF and RO overlap.

[HoneyFox]

I found another bug, throttled engines now cannot be throttled back. Their minimum thrust is set to 100%. They only quit when they run out of fuel.

Is is RealFuels, or Realism Overhaul that has the bug?

Check the previous post, this might be intended...

[NathanKell]

HoneyFox: I think I've fixed your null (although I hadn't encountered it myself, I think I see where...)

MFT v4 pre10: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ch8sw3iqtzv9dt7/ModularFuelTanks_v4_pre10.zip

OR

RF v4 pre10: https://www.dropbox.com/s/g49soc45iraz5ji/RealFuels_v4_pre10.zip

unchanged since pre9:

RO: https://www.dropbox.com/s/yt5f90v47cqpwfx/RealismOverhaul_v3pre2.zip

Note that in RF/RO engine throttles are limited (by type, techlevel, and the individual engine). Some can't throttle at all, some can throttle deeply; most U and L don't get any throttling until TL4 or so. As before, note that stock RCS is (a) modular and ( defaults to hydrazine, which is *not* ALL_VESSEL.

Link to stretchy pre for use with these: https://www.dropbox.com/s/rcemfqzq1ci4tnw/StretchySRB_v8pre1.zip

=======

Regarding throttling. Yes, working as designed. Note the "some can't throttle at all" part.

When you're configuring an engine (on the action editor screen), do note what it says min throttle is.

Deredere: Yes, you can. Although if you're using RF, you already have altered things pretty severely (mass ratios have changed a lot). RF really only makes sense if you're playing on Real Solar System or with KIDS, IMO.

RO does three main things:

1. Includes a set of engine configs

2. Makes solar panels, batteries, RTGs, reaction wheels, and so forth have realistic stats

3. Rescales parts and adds new parts that are rescales.

[jrandom]

As before, note that stock RCS is (a) modular and ( defaults to hydrazine, which is *not* ALL_VESSEL.

So that's why my RCS wasn't working on that SSTO model I built last night! I thought something had broken, but nope -- my hydrazine tank was attached in such a way that it wasn't flowing right. Good to know.

Any plans on altering the B9 SABRE engines in the RO/RF .cfgs with tech levels and realism and things and stuff? (Or are they correct as-is?)

[SFJackBauer]

*Rubbing hands*

Working now on adding throttling and engine ignitor to the RealEngines cfgs.

Having to care about the max acceleration your stage (with a non-throttleable engine) reaches at the burnout moment adds another layer of challenge when designing rockets

EDIT - Some .git folders and files came with the latest Stretchy.

[jrandom]

*Rubbing hands*

Working now on adding throttling and engine ignitor to the RealEngines cfgs.

Having to care about the max acceleration your stage (with a non-throttleable engine) reaches at the burnout moment adds another layer of challenge when designing rockets

Will the part descriptions be updated so I know which engines have this behavior? MechJeb tells me the maximum twr of a stage, so I can plan for that so long as I know an engine won't shut off.

[HoneyFox]

*Rubbing hands*

Working now on adding throttling and engine ignitor to the RealEngines cfgs.

Having to care about the max acceleration your stage (with a non-throttleable engine) reaches at the burnout moment adds another layer of challenge when designing rockets

EDIT - Some .git folders and files came with the latest Stretchy.

Thanks a lot... I took a look at the spreadsheet given by NK and was knocked a little...

Besides, I found that today's programming time was fully taken by EI debugging... i've just found that it doesn't work normally with engines not having EI configs provided by MFS.

The bug, well how should i describe it in short...

Normally the OnLoad() of a part module seems to be only called when in loading phase of the KSP application. And judging by debug output, my nodes are loaded correctly at that moment. BTW during that process I load all these nodes' info into a List<>.

But when i come to VAB/SPH, and try to pick one engine from the part list, the part module no longer has any record in its list. And thus causes some trouble.

It seems like KSP cannot preserve the content of that list during cloning parts. And i checked the "part.partInfo.partPrefab" also, it doesn't have any record in its list either. Do any of you have advice on this? I know it's quite off-topic to ask here...

EDIT: Ok, once i use List<string> to store these info it works... though i have to implement some manual serialize/deserialize functions...

Really don't understand how KSP judge if a type can be cloned... i've added IConfigNode and [serializable] and even [serializableField] but still no joy.

Edited December 24, 2013 by HoneyFox

[SFJackBauer]

Normally a class would implement ICloneable to indicate it supports cloning, but I have no idea how KSP works internally so I don't know if it is applicable here.

[Bothersome]

I took me a nap after I posted what I thought was a bug and just come back and read all the replies. Thanks all for the replies and much appreciated....

OH MY GOD, now I gotta go back to the drawing board to redesign all my rockets!!??!! This getting to the moon thing is starting to get difficult. I'm playing career mode here ya know.

OK, never let it be said I don't like a challenge.

[seanth]

I am new to the idea of the Modular Fuel System. Can this be adapted to have capsules have atmospheres in that a capsule would hold oxygen, co2 and nitrogen "fuels", but the maximum amount of those combined would have to equal the available volume in the capsule?

[Bothersome]

seanth, I think so. A tank has so much volumn of space inside it. You can put whatever combination of fuels in that tank until the volumn is full.

Nathan, I think this mod is breaking career mode because even at tech level 4 there are no engines that will throttle back to 0%. The LV-909 will go back to 10% but that's not gonna enough. You have to have engines that can shut off with throttle.

[NathanKell]

Uh, that's what deactivate engine is for.

Bind toggle engine to an action Group in vab. Then shut off engine when done burning and turn it on again for next burn.

Heck, before engine ignitor is fully in RO you even get unlimited restarts!

[Bothersome]

Yeah, I kind of figured that's what you were trying to get at. But that's not really a good idea. The engines need to cut off at 0 throttle. I only have 10 command slots for things (call them switches in the capsule). I need them for other things. I know you want an engine to have minimum power when it's on, and there is probably no way to go from 0 to say 40% throttle and then smoothly up from there to 100%. We're still going to need to compromise that because of the severe lack of switches in our capsules. Do you really want to take the fun out of the game for the sake of simulation? I'm all for simulation, and if it can be done on the throttle, I'm all for it. But those command buttons are reserved for other stuff.

[jrandom]

For engines that have a minimum throttle setting but that can be cut off, I think having 0% throttle act as a cut-off is a good compromise. I too often run out of custom action slots quite frequently.

[jrandom]

I'm not entirely sure where to ask this, so I thought I'd start here. This is with the latest RSS/RO/MFS/RF -- I'm using an engine configuration I've used in the past, just not recently. Today I'm getting the behavior that the four small SABRE engines are intake-air deprived (completely), but the large SABRE engine works fine. I can't seem to figure out why the four small ones aren't working correctly.

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[SFJackBauer]

Engine exhaust FX is firing even after shutting down an engine. The engine has a minimum throttle defined. It does not happen when the fuel tank depletes though.

Also it seems in the latest experimental the maxTechLevel bugfix didn't got in.

Nevermind, works when creating a new vessel.

Edited December 24, 2013 by SFJackBauer

[evilphish]

Another bug incoming:

In orbit around the Mün my craft sometimes spontaneously disappears, quicksave and return to space center are not possible due to the craft being "under acceleration" all the time. This problem is also reproducible if I enter map view and try to set up maneuver nodes or just hover the mousepointer a bit over the current orbit path.

Weird enough, I have not used ModuleFuels to change any of the quantities in my vessels tanks. Sometimes the craft doesn't disappear but the mass is weirdly shifted, if you accelerate it starts veering to one side even though right clicking the tanks does not show anything out of balance. This is accompanied by the usual maneuver path jumping all over the place in mapview.

The log shows lots of

"PartModule is null" Warnings when this happens. Is this maybe the same as Honeys bug or closely related?

This was tested with your latest build 10.

[HoneyFox]

Normally a class would implement ICloneable to indicate it supports cloning, but I have no idea how KSP works internally so I don't know if it is applicable here.

I've already tried to implement the ICloneable interface too, but it still doesn't work.

Anyway, the current solution by serializing these information into a string and deserializing them back before using is acceptable.

Edited December 25, 2013 by HoneyFox

[walkinator]

why are the inline remote guidance units the wrong sizes?

[walkinator]

I've noticed several bugs with the realism overhaul pre release. 1 engines don't clearly specify weather or not you can throttle them. some of them say that the minimum thrust is 0 but they won't throttle down. engines that are shut down continue to show burning animations. Kerbin's atmosphere isn't visible.

[walkinator]

Placing fuel tanks on with symmetry seems buggy. Only one fuel tank will be filled and the others will say "this fuel tank cannot hold resources".

[jrandom]

Another problem with the shut-off-engine-with-minimum-throttle approach: the maneuver node system tends to freak out and not correctly display how long a burn should last for (I assume because the engine is deactivated). Is there any way to have the engine run at its minimum-rated thrust for any non-zero throttle setting but kill thrust when the throttle is zero? That would fix... quite a few problems, I think.

[HoneyFox]

Another problem with the shut-off-engine-with-minimum-throttle approach: the maneuver node system tends to freak out and not correctly display how long a burn should last for (I assume because the engine is deactivated). Is there any way to have the engine run at its minimum-rated thrust for any non-zero throttle setting but kill thrust when the throttle is zero? That would fix... quite a few problems, I think.

That might need a system that can dynamically change the minThrust value of engines according to the mainThrottle. This doesn't solve the accidentally killing thrust issue when trying to apply small throttle. but at least relief a lot for intended shutdown operations.