What about surface ships? (General question)

[adsii1970]

Ok, folks, now since Hooligan Labs and .90 are not playing nice... I have a question. What mod do I need to make surface ships? I have heard from some through Facebook that all I needed was to use air intakes. So, any information you surface ship builders have would be much appreciated. What I would like to do is to construct ships capable of carrying large cargoes to Kerbin destinations.

Also, for submersibles, it seems the ballast from Procedural Airships works pretty good.

[RainDreamer]

So wait, are you asking for surface airships, or land ship, or just general ship that float on water?

For ships operating on water, try boat parts mod.

[adsii1970]

So wait, are you asking for surface airships, or land ship, or just general ship that float on water?

For ships operating on water, try boat parts mod.

Wouldn't a land ship be called...wait for it... a "rover" of sorts? Wouldn't airships be called either aircraft or dirigibles, if using an lighter than air craft? Sorry, I could not resist! Hopefully I didn't offend you.

Yes, I am talking about ships that float on water. Are there any issues with .90 that you are aware of?

[RainDreamer]

Lol, I was just a bit confused about the word "surface", since that can refer to a variety of planet surfaces.

I do not use the boat part myself, but the thread doesn't seem to be flooded with bug report, so I assume it works fine? You can say...it is floating. Ok , bad pun.

[adsii1970]

Lol, I was just a bit confused about the word "surface", since that can refer to a variety of planet surfaces.

I do not use the boat part myself, but the thread doesn't seem to be flooded with bug report, so I assume it works fine? You can say...it is floating. Ok , bad pun.

No problem, I like punny people! Life is too short not to have fun when you can!

[Slam_Jones]

Lol, "Surface Ship" is definitely misleading. Lots of folks on here have made ships, though. Zekes makes replica battleships. Cupcake make Laythe-based stuff. I've made a few floating things too.

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[adsii1970]

Lol, "Surface Ship" is definitely misleading. Lots of folks on here have made ships, though. Zekes makes replica battleships. Cupcake make Laythe-based stuff. I've made a few floating things too.

http://imgur.com/a/QEDUM

http://imgur.com/a/LFBjY

http://imgur.com/a/k8mYp

What mod are you using?

[Greys]

There are and have been various mods that add stuff for operating on the ocean, but at this point the most important one is Better Bouyancy by Ferram of Aerospace

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/105094-0-90-Better-Buoyancy-v1-0-Simple-Water-Fixes-12-27-14

What this does is change how bouyancy is calculated, but also make the ocean surface significantly less lethal, which permits your boats to travel at higher speed with less risk. I also recommend for any vehicle that is in contact with a service you get a mod that either changes the stock UI, or offers an additional UI, which will dislay your speed in more common terms, specifically Kilometers per Hour or Miles per Hour, it's just very easy to not have a good grasp of how fast you're going when looking at meters per second, for example 60mph, highway speed in much of the USA, is 26.~m/s, it's pretty easy to make a rover that goes 20, with mods I've made rovers that do 90m/s, throw a rocket on and you can make a rover do 300m/s, that's almost 700mph, more than ten times highway speed. I'm told FAR has this option built in, there's also Speed Unit Changer, but it's somewhat out of date.

With these two things you don't really need anything else, you can made jetboats out of stock parts, but I would also recommend some mod to launch in the water; you can do this with Firespitter, though I've never gotten the feature to work, and you should be able to use ExtraPlanetary Launchpads to build a little dock. or even just a place closer to the beach.

Bonus points for launching your boats via airship.

The only thing that I am not aware of to complete the paradigm is a mod which adds appropriate boat based propulsion, that is to say, propellers. For the most part your boats will need to be driven by jets, maybe aircraft propellers from the handful of mods that offer them. The great thing about these is that water in KSP isn't actually water, it has this weird attribute of being full of air; jets, and air intakes, work just fine underwater. Because reasons.

Finally, I'm not entirely sure, but my understanding of the stock behavior and mods in play says that your boat will have no real inclination to go.... forward. Boats don't normally go fast enough for normal aerodynamics effects to be powerful, and I'm not aware of anything that would make hydrodynamic effects.... exist. Boats will be kinda like pucks skimming over the water, they'll just as readily go sideways as any other direction, and turning will be dangerous at any significant speed. turn slowly, and slow down when you want to turn. Probably a good idea to use MechJeb's Smart SAS to keep the ship pointing in the right direction for long trips as well.

edit: I have discussed it with Ferram and keels should work just fine in water, they should behave not as if they're travelling through air, which would make them underpowered and useless; but as if they're travelling through a dense water like fluid; thusly they will have sufficient force available at boatly speeds to be useful. Because this is true, rudders will also work for steering, and hypothetically hydrofoils should work fine. You will require FAR for this though. With only Better Bouyancy you won't get the whole water experience

Edited January 31, 2015 by Greys

[Slam_Jones]

What mod are you using?

I'm using Kolonization for most of those parts, but I haven't installed any water-related mods. Most stuff has natural buoyancy as long as you keep it lightish. Just make sure to pack on the chutes so it lands nice and soft, preferably under 5 m/s.

On a lot of my bases, I put some girders and structural plates under it to cushion the landing and keep it stable (kind of like a keel on a sailboat).

[Van Disaster]

Greys - Kerbinside has a few water launch spots, one is a ramp and there's a couple of bouys which have the amusing habit of launching your watercraft from the seabed, it appears.

[Greys]

So I wrote an edit for my above post, and then went to work without applying it... sooo

it's live now, basically I was wrong about keels, FAR makes wings act like they're underwater when they're underwater, so keels, rudders, probably hydrofoils, all that should work correctly as long as you have FAR, and BB may enhance this further. Customized parts may be necessary to have appropriate behaviors and more importantly mass.