Boom_Mcsplodey

Thanks for the info. As far as CoM/CoL goes I know to try to keep the CoL right behind the CoM. I also know a similar thing can be said about main landing gear. My basic understanding of flaps and slats in the real world is that they're used to temporarily increase lift to allow for lower speeds at takeoff and landing, but this seems to be some of the most advanced stuff in the game. I'll have to take a close look at that thread.

Is there an up-to-date comprehensive guide to building spaceplanes with FAR floating around somewhere out there? I've been trying my hardest to build planes and am having no luck at all. Most of the time my planes will end up barreling off the end of the runway at 200m/s without ever being able to pitch up beforehand. If I'm lucky they'll survive that launch and won't pitch up and down wildly enough to crash straight into the sea. I've managed to brute force some SSTOs to orbit but am left with no payload, range, or rendezvous capabilities. If those planes survive reentry without breaking up they crash land because they can't fly slow enough without dropping like rocks. This is all beyond frustrating and I don't even know where to start fixing it. I know there must be a way to read the FAR analysis to help fix stability and maneuverability issues. I also know there's a way to use flaps, slats, and more complex control surfaces to make takeoff and landing easier. The problem is that I can't find any decent guides or tutorials on the subject. Most of the guides I've found will say stuff like "make sure the numbers in this dialog box are green" and "smooth out this curve" without actually explaining how to do any of that. Does anyone know of some complete but straightforward guides on this stuff? A "FAR spaceplanes for dummies" of sorts?

I think a good idea for an add-on would be some sort of refillable liquid coolant system. I searched around and couldn't seem to find anything quite like what I had in mind, and I certainly don't have any idea how to make add-ons myself. Something like this would fill a gap where ablative heat shields just don't work as well like: Reusable off-Kerbin spaceplanes and landers where ablative heat shields can't be replenished or just don't fit well on crafts. Interplanetary ships that need to cool down repeatedly during aerobraking. Emergency cooling for reactors when radiators alone won't cut it or have to be retracted. Coolant could be something like liquid nitrogen. A coolant generator would need to be fed raw materials and power and would need enough radiators to dissipate the heat generated while its running. If it is landed on a body with an atmosphere it could just be able to collect gas from that, or a separate part could be made for this situation. Another option would be to have a coolant generator run in tandem with a fuel refinery to collect the refinery's byproducts. This would be ideal if used as a part of Karbonite, Kethane, or some other resource-collection and fuel expansion. A separate compressor-storage tank system could be completely ignored by just making a mechanic that allows cryogenic fuels to be boiled off as parts overheat. Both mechanics could also be included where a dedicated coolant resource provides better cooling than cryogenic fuels. This would be useful in late-game interplanetary ships with engines powered by exotic fuels. Again, something like this could exist and I just haven't heard of it. If you think you can make an add-on like this feel free to try.

Computer specs: Intel Core i7-2675QM CPU @ 2.20GHz 6GB RAM 64-bit Windows 7 there's also a sticker here that says "ATI Mobility Radeon Premium Graphics" I got the computer to run stuff like AutoCAD, Inventor, Solidworks, etc. for engineering school, not gaming. I'll have to try deleting redundant/unnecessary parts. I know a lot of the Extraplanetary Launchpads stuff can go with MKS installed. All those gigantic parts from B9 can probably go too if I end up using that mod. Part of the problem is probably just my tendency to make very detailed crafts and dock them together in orbit. The worst slowdowns are when I'm flying spaceplanes through the upper atmosphere and the "plasma trail" animations are in full effect. What I'm really going for with the game is a realistic but not super-hardcore way to build colonies around the solar system and a fun (read: not hardcore) flight simulator aspect (I eventually want to get a joystick to make flying more immersive). I've tried Active Texture Management before with a little improvement and I'll probably just forget about Lazor Systems since I've had numerous unrelated problems with it in the past.

I've had KSP for a while now but my computer is a four year old off the shelf laptop not specifically made for gaming. When I bought it it was on the higher end of average (something about a dedicated graphics processor?) but it's starting to show its age. I started trying to make a bunch of spaceplanes and giant interplanetary freighters with a couple of mods, but flying them slows the game down to a crawl while my computer's fan goes full tilt. I know part of this was due to poor CPU optimization which can't really be improved with mods and I'm unsure if newer versions of the game fix this. I've heard that 64 bit KSP mostly gets rid of this kind of thing, but still seems to be unstable and has only a small selection of mods. My question is what are some mods I could use to help the main version of the game run faster and more smoothly? Some of the gameplay mods I'd like to run are: KAS MKS/OKS Karbonite and Karbonite+ Freight Transportation Technologies Umbra Space Industries Alcubierre Warp Drive Extraplanetary Launchpads A decent spaceplane parts pack. OPT Space Plane Parts looks promising since B9 seems to have been forgotten. A mod that adds more solar systems or at least more outer planets and moons. Lazor System or something similar to help with maneuvering, docking, etc. but nothing completely autonomous like MechJeb. Any help would be much appreciated since I really want to get back into this game without being limited to the simplest of rockets.

Thanks. No more gravity hacking for this guy.

I think something is wrong with the download. For some reason I'm not getting a Gamedata folder in the ExtraplanetaryLaunchpads folder. I tried installing it anyway but the parts were all solid white and didn't work. When I open it in Winrar I have: Internals Parts Plugins Resources Ships Textures EL_MM.cfg License.txt README.txt seat_tasks.cfg Settings.cfg Is anyone else having this problem? Is there even supposed to be a Gamedata folder?