parts [1.12.x] Sounding Rockets! Start small. Dream big!

[Smurfalot]

The mini battery pack needs a little balancing, the Z-100 is only twice the mass at half the cost and has 20 times the juice as this thing.

Maybe giving it 50 charge is a bit much, but how about some love to make it balance better?

- - - Updated - - -

Also...while trying these out I realized that I seem to have forgotten some basic rocket engineering 101 and cannot find where to look it up.

For rockets, the Center of Lift should preferably be below the center of mass right, can they overlap as long as it is not above and still be stable? What about the Center of Thrust and Center of Lift?

[RoverDude]

The mini battery pack needs a little balancing, the Z-100 is only twice the mass at half the cost and has 20 times the juice as this thing.

Maybe giving it 50 charge is a bit much, but how about some love to make it balance better?

- - - Updated - - -

Also...while trying these out I realized that I seem to have forgotten some basic rocket engineering 101 and cannot find where to look it up.

For rockets, the Center of Lift should preferably be below the center of mass right, can they overlap as long as it is not above and still be stable? What about the Center of Thrust and Center of Lift?

By design because they are a starter battery.

I don't know if anyone noticed my post in the middle of this Gfurst-Roverdude conversation about Aerodynamics:rolleyes:

Discussed earlier in the thread, keeping those as-is. If anything I might up their mass/form factor a bit.

[UnanimousCoward]

Also...while trying these out I realized that I seem to have forgotten some basic rocket engineering 101 and cannot find where to look it up.

For rockets, the Center of Lift should preferably be below the center of mass right, can they overlap as long as it is not above and still be stable? What about the Center of Thrust and Center of Lift?

As I understand it, ideally the CoL should be below the CoM, but above the CoT. You can maybe actually get away with having the CoL above the CoM a little as long as your rocket goes straight up - the slightest tilt in any direction and it'll probably flip out. Spin can also help to keep it stable with a high CoL. You also have to bear in mind how the CoM shifts as fuel gets used up - although normally for rockets the CoM moves upwards, making them more stable.

[UnanimousCoward]

So, I found a workaround for the double chute issue with the smaller nosecone parachute when using FAR or Gfurst's RealChute patch:

@PART[SR_Nosecone_35]:FINAL
{
    !MODEL,1 {}
}

It removes the pack chute model. It's a bit of an ugly hack, and I'm sure there's a more elegant way to do it - but at least it works.

Edited May 12, 2015 by UnanimousCoward
edit mm code

[prog]

It removes the pack chute model. It's a bit of an ugly hack, and I'm sure there's a more elegant way to do it - but at least it works.

I'm not MM expert but I think using selection by index should help to make it more clean.

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Checked this

@PART[sR_Nosecone*]

{

-MODEL,1 {}

}

Works as expected. More clean way will be to add check to apply this patch only if FAR is installed.

Edited May 12, 2015 by prog

[UnanimousCoward]

I'm not MM expert but I think using selection by index should help to make it more clean.

- - - Updated - - -

Checked this

@PART[sR_Nosecone*]

{

-MODEL,1 {}

}

Works as expected. More clean way will be to add check to apply this patch only if FAR is installed.

Yeah - I'm learning MM as I go, and I was just editing my MM code to use the index when you posted this.

I didn't use "SR_Nosecone*" because the problem only affects the smaller nosecone. For some reason, the large nosecone works fine, even though it uses the same pack chute model.

The reason it doesn't specify that it needs FAR is that I wanted it to work for Gfurst's RealChute patch as well. I could have used "NEEDS:[FerramAerospaceResearch|RealChute]", I suppose, but that doesn't check whether you're actually using Gfurst's patch; as far as I know there's no way to do that.

In any event, AFAIK it would only make a slight visual change if you're not using FAR/Gfurst's patch, so it's not going to affect gameplay. I guess the cleanest way would be to post modified versions of both my FAR patch and Gfurst's RealChute patch...

Edited May 12, 2015 by UnanimousCoward

[UnanimousCoward]

With regard to the problems people are having with fragile components, I don't think the components are too fragile - at least in some cases. It's been mentioned before: it's down to some weird interaction between the truss and the terrain.

In my tinkering, I've been increasing the crash tolerance of the parts. I've noticed that no matter what its crash tolerance is, the truss sometimes explodes on impact with the ground - even if its crash tolerance is 100 m/s and it lands at 4 m/s! In every case, this appears in the log:

Vessel 1 crashed through terrain on Kerbin

...

SR.PayloadTruss.35 Exploded!! - blast awesomeness: 0.1

A bit of googling indicates that it's to do with the terrain mesh. So, if you've been having this problem - go to the KSP settings and make sure terrain detail is set to "high". It's helped for me.

As has also been mentioned before, if it happens with water landings, Better Buoyancy should help.

Edited May 14, 2015 by UnanimousCoward
typo

[Toreador]

I've created a modified ScienceDefs.cfg

This pretty much reduces the science to a minuscule amount (Cap of 1 for each biome) and the experiments only work in a atmosphere (Obviously not in space).

This is for people who just want to play with the rockets without the experiments becoming OP.

Just replace the contents of ScienceDefs.cfg with this.

EXPERIMENT_DEFINITION
{
    id = SRExperiment01
    title = Meteorological Experiments
    baseValue = 1
    scienceCap = 1
    dataScale = 1
    requireAtmosphere = True
    situationMask = 12
    biomeMask = 62
    RESULTS
    {
        default = You perform a series of experiments on the local weather patterns.
    }
}


EXPERIMENT_DEFINITION
{
    id = SRExperiment02
    title = Aeronomical Experiments
    baseValue = 1
    scienceCap = 1
    dataScale = 1
    requireAtmosphere = True
    situationMask = 12
    biomeMask = 12
    RESULTS
    {
        default = You perform a series of experiments on gravitational effects and atmospheric data.
    }
}


EXPERIMENT_DEFINITION
{
    id = SRExperiment03
    title = Materials Experiments
    baseValue = 1
    scienceCap = 1
    dataScale = 0
    requireAtmosphere = True
    situationMask = 12
    biomeMask = 12
    RESULTS
    {
        default = You perform a series of experiments on various structural and biological compounds.
    }
}


EXPERIMENT_DEFINITION
{
    id = SRExperiment04
    title = Engineering Experiments
    baseValue = 1
    scienceCap = 1
    dataScale = 1
    requireAtmosphere = True
    situationMask = 12
    biomeMask = 12
    RESULTS
    {
        default = You perform a series of tests on experimental rocket components.
    }
}

Edited May 16, 2015 by Toreador

[RoverDude]

0.2.1 is up

Science experiments are larger, heavier, and one-time-use only.

All rockets are a bit more sturdy!

[Gfurst]

Science experiments are larger, heavier, and one-time-use only.

All rockets are a bit more sturdy!

Nooooooo, I like the atmosphere idea better, since they science farm doesn't add a whole lot.

And you can also use on planes, low profile payload, also helps a lot with the science grind for early career.

[Smurfalot]

Nooooooo, I like the atmosphere idea better, since they science farm doesn't add a whole lot.

And you can also use on planes, low profile payload, also helps a lot with the science grind for early career.

I might accidentally skip this update lol.

[RoverDude]

lol

Done because it's start tech. Bring a scientist next time

[Toreador]

Ha. I nerfed it even more than that. I love the idea of shooting up little model rockets but I don't really want much science from it.

[futrtrubl]

Seems balanced to me. Send one time use experiments on dinky little rockets. This still have use later on as scientists can reset them.

[Drew Kerman]

I personally treat these experiment packages as recoverable only, no transmission. But, to each their own. If anyone hates the one-time only use that's easy to patch out with MM by changing the rerunnable property of the experiment module in the part.cfg from false to true

[Andrew_C]

Hi, just popped in to say I love this mod, it really adds a bit of desperately needed variety to the early game science grind. Haven't tried the new version yet, but I certainly understand the rationale behind the changes, and I mostly treated them as single use anyway.

[BigD145]

Your dropbox is a bit out of date.

[Doctor Axel]

Hecka looking forward to the return of your balloon parts. =) Will those be returning as a component of this mod or will they be getting their own mod?

[RoverDude]

Debating on what I want to do with balloons tbh, but they would likely be bundled with this mod as I am trying to do more consolidation

[Gfurst]

Guys good news, I've finished polishing my patches and tweaks, you can now download [thread=120235]in this thread[/thread].

Several patches for SR, for balance and compatibility with both FAR and Realchutes.

@Roverdude

About those balancing, what do you think about them, now I've learned a bit of git and github, should I push them to you?

[AcidEric]

@RoverDude I saw this Skylark science rocket today at the National Space Center in leicester and my first thought was 'oh there's one on RoverDude's sounding rockets'

[Bit Fiddler]

2 things first off could yo uadd the old style science packages back in? or can I get them somewhere and do it myself? and secondly I cant get these to work. What al I doing wrong?

2 boosters, 1 parachute cone, 1 payload rack with 2 science boxes plus fairing parts.

but I can't launch it. the normal "space bar" to activate engines does not work. so I attach it to a probe core and use the "staging" but then the first booster fires but nothing after this. I do not see anything for Sounding rockets in the "pods" section. what am I doing wrong?

[waerth]

If you need some inspiration a .625 engine for that liquid fuel booster would be great

Also more science instruments (I dont mind if you repack the same ones in more different colours )

ps I send you a pm

[RoverDude]

Guys good news, I've finished polishing my patches and tweaks, you can now download [thread=120235]in this thread[/thread].

Several patches for SR, for balance and compatibility with both FAR and Realchutes.

@Roverdude

About those balancing, what do you think about them, now I've learned a bit of git and github, should I push them to you?

Sure, happy to take patches and if the FAR/RC ones are MM I can bundle those.

@RoverDude I saw this Skylark science rocket today at the National Space Center in leicester and my first thought was 'oh there's one on RoverDude's sounding rockets'

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y92/AcidEric/Astrophotography/National%20space%20center/20150522_132901_zpst8ad1tsw.jpg

Very cool!

2 things first off could yo uadd the old style science packages back in? or can I get them somewhere and do it myself? and secondly I cant get these to work. What al I doing wrong?

2 boosters, 1 parachute cone, 1 payload rack with 2 science boxes plus fairing parts.

but I can't launch it. the normal "space bar" to activate engines does not work. so I attach it to a probe core and use the "staging" but then the first booster fires but nothing after this. I do not see anything for Sounding rockets in the "pods" section. what am I doing wrong?

Payload rack as the root part is best, then slap in the probe controller this includes. Rather than add the older inline packages back, a better question is why the radial ones are causing issues? I include these because by having the internals component based, you get to learn fun things about balance, etc. - the idea of the mod being that you get to do lots of rocketry experimentation on the cheap and in the small.

- - - Updated - - -

If you need some inspiration a .625 engine for that liquid fuel booster would be great

Also more science instruments (I dont mind if you repack the same ones in more different colours )

ps I send you a pm

Never added one in as we already have a 0.625m stock engine

[waerth]

Never added one in as we already have a 0.625m stock engine

I understand. but with me redoing the tech tree for myself I seem in need of one ... hmmmmm ... I will try rescaling your smaller engine

W