Tech tree expansion?

[KerikBalm]

So... with 0.23, I set myself on a goal of sending a mission to Moho at the first transfer window on day 6.

I scienced as fast as I could in the Kerbin system... and was able to unlock the parts needed to make an effective ship to get there...

I then pretty much finished up the tech tree on the mun and minmus, and my ship is still not even close to Moho.

So then the next transfer windows... (jool, Duna, Eeloo)... theres a lot of science to gain, and nothing to "spend" it on.

Keeping with realism, I don't think we should add any technology that has not actually been invented (even if it was never put to use, like NERVA rockets -yes, antimatter engines-no)

So post your ideas for even higher tier'd parts please.

Here are mine:

* LANTR nuclear engines (LOX-Augmented Nuclear Thermal Rocket) - a dual mode nuclear thermal rocket - the primary mode would work just like the current LV-N rocket, high ISP, low thrust, drains only liquid fuel? (add liquid fuel only rocket fuel tanks?), the secondary mode increases thrust greatly, but offers less vacuum ISP and a bit higher atmospheric ISP (ie, an afterburner on a nuclear thermal rocket), a bit heavier, but may eliminate the need for additional booster engines in some applications

* Robotics - let an unmanned probe take surface samples, maybe even fix wheels/landing legs, and plant flags too.

* Large Aerospikes (would give better performance than a quad coupler + 4 aerospikes, or at least would give equal performance, but allow for reduced part count)

* Airbags/"hard landing techniques" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Exploration_Rover#Airbags

For when shock absorbing landings struts just don't give you enough lithobraking power.

* Electric propellors/ducted fans? -Could work on Duna/Eve/Jool?

* Nuclear thermal jet engines? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Pluto

Could work on Duna/Eve/Jool?

* VASIMR rockets - two modes, a low ISP/high thrust and low thrust/High ISP mode

* Fission reactors (basically, a radioisotope generator on steroids, hugh power production for VASIMR engines, Ions, etc

* High def cameras - let a robotic probe give you data that counts as an EV report (but it can't max it out, like most data transmissions?)

* Balloons? float to the top of an atmosphere before launching?

* Resource extraction capabilities? send a refrigeration unit to Laythe, get liquid oxygen/oxidizer? Add a moon like titan with methane lakes, and have that be a source of liquid fuel, etc.... (or just incoporate the kethane mod?)

I would be very very temped to add some sort of fusion power research, that would only be accessible after you've collected almost all the science possible from the Kerbin system.

[Xavven]

I think you have a great list there. Squad seems to base their stock parts on at least somewhat realistic technology and I favor that theme. The ones on your list that I like the most would be propellers and balloons. I'm eager to try out an orbital airship, something that has been proposed by several agencies in real life as an inexpensive way to get to orbit. This would also make perfect sense for an Eve explorer and/or lander.

I'd like to see something similar to the Kethane mod built into stock. I am reading a book right now entitled The Case for Mars in which it describes a real process called "methanation" in which electricity and a catalyst is used to convert CO₂ to CH₄ and O₂ (methane and oxygen). Methanation is a perfect application for manufacturing a methane-based rocket fuel a hypothetical return trip from Mars, because Mars' atmosphere is 95% CO₂.

EDIT: Sorry, the methanation process still calls for liquid hydrogen to be brought to the surface, but it's still substantially reduces the payload because you don't have to move the oxidizer.

[Merinsan]

I'd like some solar sails!

And they should be huge, just so it looks cool!

[Streetwind]

Two thirds of what you suggest already exists in mods - give them a browse

But I agree that the stock tree needs some expansion. Thankfully we're getting said expansion with 0.24... probably. There's a ton of new parts coming, it's just a question of whether they stuff em into already existing nodes or make new ones. I hope it'll be the latter. We already have way too much science points and not enough nodes to spend it on.

[TerLoki]

I'm liking the ideas in here (heck, I always run Kethane and Near Future Propulsion anyway), but I must suck at getting science, because I have yet to max out the tree and I've visited every body in the system with at least an orbital probe. Guess I need to go grab some more Mun rocks.

[Xavven]

I'm liking the ideas in here (heck, I always run Kethane and Near Future Propulsion anyway), but I must suck at getting science, because I have yet to max out the tree and I've visited every body in the system with at least an orbital probe. Guess I need to go grab some more Mun rocks.

Not to get too far off topic, but manned missions give you a lot more science because of three things: crew reports, EVAs, and surface samples. On top of that, are you returning the science or transmitting? Finally, are you remembering to run all your science three times per planet/moon? Once in "space high over ___", once in "space near ___" (have to be at about 20,000m altitude) and once on the surface?

[KerikBalm]

Well, so far the only idea I'd object to, is the solar sail.

#1) no complete designs for solar sails have been made, to be anywhere near practial, they'd have to be made of an extremely thing/lightweight material, yet not transparent.

Aluminum foil is far to heavy for instance (not to mention it would lack the durability to be used in a sail), we simply don't have the materials technology to make one.

Nuclear jet engines have been made

VASIMR engines have been made, and actually used on spacecraft (along with a variety of electric propulsion methods)

NERVA engines have been made (ie, the real life equivalent to the LV-N) and tested, although not actually flown in space - and liquid oxygen "afterburning" nuclear thermal engines have been designed, the technology was developed enough for them to have made them in the 70s if they wanted to (or rather, if the funding and regulatory agencies wanted to)

Real designs, reactions, etc, have been developed with "in situ resource utilization" in mind. If you had an atmosphere that was 20% oxygen, it would be real simple to make liquid oxygen on site, likewise, it would be real simple to fill a rocket fuel tank (but not oxidizer tank) on Titan. Mars would be harder, but still feasible.

Solar sails... still beyond our technical capabilities.

2) Solar sails would have ridiculously low acceleration.... even with 100x physics warp... you'd never get anywhere, unless they were made unrealistically powerful. They've already had to make ion engines unrealistically powerful

- to produce 0.5 kN of thrust at 4200 ISP, you'd need about 10 megawatts - assuming 100% efficiency when such thrusters actually operate at 60-80%, a solar panel of the size of a gigantor would produce around 10 kilowatts (assuming the light intensity is similar to that on Earth, but even with much brighter light it wouldn't work out, as the output would not scale linearly) Ion drives in game are about 1000 times more powerful than they should be... you should need a nuclear reactor (not just a RTG) on the craft to supply enough power to operate a couple of them.

A solar sail just wouldn't work unless it was unrealistic to even more orders of magnitude.

I also wonder if the science "currency" isn't heading in the completely wrong direction. Its not like taking a surface sample of the Moon would help us design nuclear rockets.

But the more scientific output a program has, the more funding its likely to get.

Thus, if you do more science, you can afford more expensive rockets (since they will eventually have an economy where part cost matters). Or you spend the money to expand research facilities.

Then you have various achievements or contract completions to speed certain research topics. "Necessity is the mother of Invention" maybe a flight that hints at the use for a part will boost your research toward that part

ie you get pressure/atmospheric analysis from duna, +x to research of drogue chutes/airbags

you get pressure/atmospheric analysis from EVE, +x to research of aerospike engines/ballons/nuclear/electric air breathing propulsion systems.

Laythe data gets you +x to research of rapiers...

Minmus/moon probe landings give you + research to various landing legs,

etc etc....

[justidutch]

One possible end-game result, or near-end-game, I thought of is a space elevator. I know there's organizations talking about it, but also it's quite far off. So, although it's not a real-world technology yet, It could be a cool thing to work towards. I know I'll get slammed for this...

[MajorThomas]

Some great tech tree ideas here!

Not to get too far off topic, but manned missions give you a lot more science because of three things: crew reports, EVAs, and surface samples. On top of that, are you returning the science or transmitting? Finally, are you remembering to run all your science three times per planet/moon? Once in "space high over ___", once in "space near ___" (have to be at about 20,000m altitude) and once on the surface?

Not to mention, probes take lots of power, making them pretty useless before you unlock solar panels. But manned missions to the Mun and Minmus can yield lots of science before you unlock solar panels.

[Goldham]

Balloons on a Rocket?

Thats so Kerbal. Squad add now!

[Superfluous J]

I'd like some solar sails!

And they should be huge, just so it looks cool!

Until you can have continuous on-rails acceleration (which I doubt will ever be in the game), Solar Sails will be totally, utterly, completely useless. If you think the multi-hour acceleration of ion engines is bad, try multi-day acceleration. Or multi-month.

"But with 4x physics warp it's only 3 weeks..."

[Jank]

Aquatics... by which I mean tech which is supposed to be aquatic.

[Highlad]

Aquatics... by which I mean tech which is supposed to be aquatic.

Yeah, this would be pretty cool. Perhaps not in the spirit of the game when used on kerbin, but it certainly would be cool to say, break through an ice layer and explore the depths below.

If you think about some of the ideal missions to titan, they would bring an underwater probe.

[KerikBalm]

I think you mean ideal missions to Europa... Titan has lakes of Methane and other hydrocarbons, not water (they hypothesize that there might be a subsurface liquid water/ammonia mixture... but I haven't heard of any ideas to go down and have a look, unlike Europa)

Enceladus would also be interesting to look at

[DocMoriarty]

Since you can completely open the research tree just by researching the Mun, Minmus and Kerbin there is no point to fly anywhere. It should be massively rebalanced at some point so that you really have to go to Duna or else to finish the research tree.

[thomasjkenney]

Upgrades to existing parts. This could be "improvements in materials and construction techniques" to make fuel tanks lighter, improve performance of engines, etc. This wouldn't be a very big deal, so I'd still like to see some new stuff, too. Maybe slurp up that mod with the habitat modules? Or a full-blown O'Neill pack?

[TheBeardyMan]

Technologies that require specific experiments to be performed instead of accumulating generic science points e.g:

* Jool Internal Combustion Engine: after completing an atmosphere survey of Jool, you can build a jet engine that draws oxidizer from a fuel tank and hydrocarbon fuel via an atmospheric intake.

* Duna Internal Combustion Engine: after completing an atmosphere survey of Duna, you can build a jet engine that draws one reactant from a fuel tank and another from Duna's atmosphere via an intake (not sure what the reactants would be).

* Eve Internal Combustion Engine: after completing an atmosphere survey of Eve, you can build a jet engine that draws one reactant from a fuel tank and another from Eve's atmosphere via an intake (not sure what the reactants would be).

* Advanced Atmospheric Navigation: after completing an atmosphere survey of any planet or moon with an atmosphere, you can build a module that will take aerobraking into account when predicting your orbit around it.

Also:

* Ballast tanks and dive planes for building submarines to explore the oceans of Laythe and Eve.

[Merinsan]

Well, so far the only idea I'd object to, is the solar sail.

Solar sails... still beyond our technical capabilities.

Solar sails have been used already:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_sail#IKAROS_2010

Although I understand all the concerns about how impractical they would be to use. They'd still look cool though!

[NERVAfan]

Well, so far the only idea I'd object to, is the solar sail.

#1) no complete designs for solar sails have been made, to be anywhere near practial, they'd have to be made of an extremely thing/lightweight material, yet not transparent.

Aluminum foil is far to heavy for instance (not to mention it would lack the durability to be used in a sail), we simply don't have the materials technology to make one.

Actually, a solar sail has actually been made and flown in space: JAXA (the Japanese space agency)'s IKAROS mission. The solar sail was only 7.5 micrometers thick (made of polyimide film). They launched it on the same rocket as the Akatsuki Venus probe and measured its acceleration while it flew toward and past Venus.

NASA also demonstrated deploying a solar sail in space with the NanoSail-D2 mission (a 3U Cubesat), but it was in LEO and so I'm not sure it accelerated much because of air resistance...

The Planetary Society has a solar-sail built and waiting for launch (LightSail-1) and there's a NASA solar sail (Sunjammer/Solar Sail Demonstrator) planned to launch in 2015.

Anyway, point is, solar sails are totally a real technology: I'd say more so than VASIMR and most nuclear propulsion options (NERVA was never flown in space, but it was pretty heavily developed, so you could make an argument for that one...)

EDIT: ninja'd by Merinsan.

As for the physics warp thing, doesn't KSP Interstellar have solar sails that operate under "full" time warp? (I don't have the mod, so don't know for sure, but that's what I've read...)

Edited February 25, 2014 by NERVAfan
ninja

[Vanamonde]

This thread of suggestions moved to the suggestions thread sub-forum.

[KerikBalm]

VASIMR engines have been constructed, and one is planned to be fitted as a station keeping engine on the ISS in 2015.

NERVA engines were built and operated at full thrust (in test rigs on earth) back in 1966.

Meanwhile, that solar sail barely produces any delta-V change. You can't test solar sails on earth the way you an test a much higher thrust engine.

In theory, any reflective surface will function as a solar sail... I still don't see them producing any real delta-V any time soon, or being practical in KSP.

If they could operate while at 10000x time warp, then, sure, why not (but if they could, then they should do the same with ion engines, and reduce ion engine thrust dramatically)

I'm also not a fan of the duna/eve/jool ICE engines previously suggested.

I'd rather do just a generic electric ducted fan/propellor, that would be useful for exploring the planet, but not signficantly contributing to attaining orbit.

[Highlad]

I think you mean ideal missions to Europa... Titan has lakes of Methane and other hydrocarbons, not water (they hypothesize that there might be a subsurface liquid water/ammonia mixture... but I haven't heard of any ideas to go down and have a look, unlike Europa)

Enceladus would also be interesting to look at

yeah, oops, my bad. I was thinking of europa but said titan

[MR4Y]

Well, so far the only idea I'd object to, is the solar sail.

#1) no complete designs for solar sails have been made, to be anywhere near practial, they'd have to be made of an extremely thing/lightweight material, yet not transparent.

Aluminum foil is far to heavy for instance (not to mention it would lack the durability to be used in a sail), we simply don't have the materials technology to make one.

Nuclear jet engines have been made

VASIMR engines have been made, and actually used on spacecraft (along with a variety of electric propulsion methods)

NERVA engines have been made (ie, the real life equivalent to the LV-N) and tested, although not actually flown in space - and liquid oxygen "afterburning" nuclear thermal engines have been designed, the technology was developed enough for them to have made them in the 70s if they wanted to (or rather, if the funding and regulatory agencies wanted to)

Real designs, reactions, etc, have been developed with "in situ resource utilization" in mind. If you had an atmosphere that was 20% oxygen, it would be real simple to make liquid oxygen on site, likewise, it would be real simple to fill a rocket fuel tank (but not oxidizer tank) on Titan. Mars would be harder, but still feasible.

Solar sails... still beyond our technical capabilities.

2) Solar sails would have ridiculously low acceleration.... even with 100x physics warp... you'd never get anywhere, unless they were made unrealistically powerful. They've already had to make ion engines unrealistically powerful

- to produce 0.5 kN of thrust at 4200 ISP, you'd need about 10 megawatts - assuming 100% efficiency when such thrusters actually operate at 60-80%, a solar panel of the size of a gigantor would produce around 10 kilowatts (assuming the light intensity is similar to that on Earth, but even with much brighter light it wouldn't work out, as the output would not scale linearly) Ion drives in game are about 1000 times more powerful than they should be... you should need a nuclear reactor (not just a RTG) on the craft to supply enough power to operate a couple of them.

A solar sail just wouldn't work unless it was unrealistic to even more orders of magnitude.

*cough* This...is a *cough* video game.

I also wonder if the science "currency" isn't heading in the completely wrong direction. Its not like taking a surface sample of the Moon would help us design nuclear rockets.

But the more scientific output a program has, the more funding its likely to get.

Thus, if you do more science, you can afford more expensive rockets (since they will eventually have an economy where part cost matters). Or you spend the money to expand research facilities.

Then you have various achievements or contract completions to speed certain research topics. "Necessity is the mother of Invention" maybe a flight that hints at the use for a part will boost your research toward that part

ie you get pressure/atmospheric analysis from duna, +x to research of drogue chutes/airbags

you get pressure/atmospheric analysis from EVE, +x to research of aerospike engines/ballons/nuclear/electric air breathing propulsion systems.

Laythe data gets you +x to research of rapiers...

Minmus/moon probe landings give you + research to various landing legs,

etc etc....

Before even considering that, the techtree needs to be fixed. I still wonder how you can develop working NERVA engines before you make auto folding ladders.

[KerikBalm]

It is a video game, but its one of the more "cereberal" and realistic ones.

We don't want to make this like descent freespace/wingcommander/ etc.

Putting in OP'd propulsion methods takes all the fun and challenge out of it.

You don't want it to be: get to orbit, deploy solar sail, go visit every celestial body in one flight.

The challenge of designing the rockets, the staging, the rendevous maneuvers, gravity assists aerobraking and launch windows is what makes it fun IMO.

Which is why that KSP interstellar mod that adds the Alcubierre drive goes way to far IMO.

You don't want it to be: point ship at target, fly there, drop out of warp. If that is what you want, there is eve-online.

I agree that some of these parts shouldn't need research, like landing legs....

There should be more default parts, science should be used to get funding, which you can use to unlock specialized parts.

*some* "acheivements" should give a boost to certain research though.

[dadtaxi]

On the lower (beginner?) end of the tech tree I like the idea put forward elsewhere that the thermometer and barometer ( and maybe for gravioli ) have a tech tree of their own

i.e.

single measurement ---> auto logging ...... maybe with a data logging module?

which still maintains the measurement/sampling separation

parallel this with a data transmission percentage increase as you 'tech up' your antennae/power usage/power generation and its a more realistic copy of historical science advancement.

Even pre-WW2 had temperature and pressure logging and that was pre-orbit (let alone moon) capable.

This i believe would provide more focus on pre-mun missions ( ie polar orbit anyone? ) for the absolute beginner, and then later interstellar satellite missions