Xyphos

not to toot my own horn, but also pointing out that my mod "FullAutoStrut" requires "Advanced Tweakables" to be enabled, and offers an easy enable button within the mod if it isn't, so you won't have to go searching for said game setting.

[re]start KSP, don't load a game, go to options, enable "Advanced Tweakables" now the part context menus will have extra features available, including the drain unit rate, start/stop/toggle, etc.

as a[n inactive] player/modder, I mostly make whatever comes to mind, primarily for my own reasons, and just happen to share with the rest of the world, in case someone else may enjoy it too, SpaceDock and CKAN make that all possible, so the majority of the credit goes to their dev team IMHO. Same applies to crafts on KerbalX. sharing is caring <3

SPOILER ALERT

Contrary to popular belief, the inflatable heat shield's size isn't supposed to shield large payloads in dense atmospheres, but rather aid in aerobraking small payloads in sparse atmospheres *cough*duna*cough* because of it's large surface area producing large amounts of drag. if you were to use it on Kerbin, Laythe, Eve, Jool or even Kerbol itself, you'll quickly notice that all the mass behind the high-drag shield will want to shift forward, causing it to flip over and expose the payload. the popular Kludge to this, is adding an inflatable heat shield to the rear of the payload, and attempt to balance the drag forces on both ends with control surfaces. also, it is worth noting that entry to Eve's surface doesn't require a heatshield at all, if you carefully aerobrake a few times to low suborbit prior to final entry; heatshields are only required for a single-pass "I gotta have it now" style insertion. however, the jettison of the shield after use is also quite cumbersome, as it is likely to detach and collide with the payload, breaking things in the process, so it's common practice to just ram it into the surface, or pack it with a few dozen sepratrons to push it away, both strategies won't work well on Eve, due to it's dense atmosphere. I personally suggest using it to safely aerobrake to low sub-orbit and jettisoning it within the vacuum of space before doing your final insertion. you will need a multi-stage vessel with over 8k dV just to reach LEO from the highest peak (see my signature for details) and over 12k dV from sea-level, but that's not counting the dV needed to return; a separate orbiter should be parked in an elliptical transfer orbit in which to rendezvous with your now stranded-in-orbit crew members, when/if they get there. currently, it is not possible to SSTO from Eve's surface without the use of mods, even using Breaking Ground's stock propellers to get it above 10km before going rocket-power is quite a challenge, one that I'm still undertaking since Breaking Ground's release. The best [stock] engines to use on Eve are the Mammoth, Vector, Aerospike, and maybe Swivel, with Swivel and Aerospike being best used above 10km. Mainsail, Skipper and Twin-Boar engines may also work, but aren't the best candidates. good luck, happy landings!

I've not tinkered much with the new open-style fairings, so I was wondering if a payload stored within one was still subject to aerodynamic forces. and if not, if said payload were to be pushed out with a robotic piston, would it then be subject to aerodynamic forces?

Everything Eeloo or Dres related; I play mostly sandbox mode, and there's very little interest for these two, both are pretty "meh" - Most of my time is spent flying Kerbals to the Jool system and back, maybe a visit to Moho for funsies, or (still) attempting an to build a working stock SSTO from Eve's sea level.

Sure, but I didn't know people liked this mod

I know what you speak of, but I'm not responsible for that ANNOYING behavior. I'm only suggesting inline splitters here. I suppose the devs would have to figure out a work-around, or just disable symmetry on it like the HubMax, which is also technically a "splitter"

I guess in mirror mode, I haven't had much luck with symmetry on these particular parts anyway.

@AlamoVampire aye, that's the idea, but on specific splitters

you know the bi, tri and quad splitters? IMHO, they could use a remesh with a selector; the bi doesn't change but the tri and quad could be made into inline forms; old 1.25m -> 1.25m tri | new 1.25m -> 1.25 tri (inline) o | ooo o o | old 2.5m -> 1.25m quad | new 2.5m->1.25m quad (inline) o o | oooo o o |

I don't play career much, but the last time I tried playing career, it was damn difficult when you first start out and just putting 1 kerbal in orbit with only a few low-tier parts was a huge challenge, but once you get the lab up there, it's game on! finally I can unlock the parts that I normally use in sandbox, but have actual missions to complete. I say keep it like it is, and if you think it's OP, then don't use it at all; orbital stations don't NEED the lab to BE a station.

since you're concerned about TWR, I assume you're speaking about rockets and not spaceplanes? 'SSTO' by itself is a very indescriptive generic term. if SSTO spaceplanes, the wings do all the lifting so a TWR of >0.6 is needed to stay aloft. RAPIER engines should be used since they're good upto 22~24km then switch to Closed cycle until >35km and from there, you should be able to reach LKO and beyond with LV-N's so do try to limit the amount of oxidizer on-board. if SSTO rockets, you will need a TWR of >1.0 to get off the ground, 1.2 is usually the bare minimum, I tend to aim for 2.0 minimum so I can yeet it off the pad without wasting fuel. in either case, TWR will greatly vary depending on the payload, fuel mass and engine(s) used. there used to be an SSTO payload fraction contest somewhere?

Lagtastic single core physics. Hello? Frame rate? Where are you? I know it's been said that multicore physics is impractical, but there's only so much a modern CPU can do in the short amount of time required. PS. I still say Unity was an awful choice for a game engine.

I know comets were added, but I've yet to find one.

back in my early days of playing (v0.90) I used to make ridiculously huge rockets with absurd payloads so I've gotten over 1000t to orbit before. however, my heaviest payload to orbit via reusable SSTO is 81t via https://kerbalx.com/Xyphos/Work-Horse-XXL EDIT: I probably should update that vessel to 1.10 without Making History due to the recent fairing update

so far, nothing has worked. the joints remain weak and thus, I only use the robotic parts for tiny simple things

I recommend Minmus first; it takes more dV to get to/from but it's much easier to land and take off there. the only word of caution is the higher orbit means faster/hotter re-entry so be careful. once you feel comfortable with landing and take-off, try Mun next. I speak from experience because I lost many kerbals attempting Mun landings first.

Was thinking of attempting The Grand Tour, landing and flagging [where possible] with all moons included. I wanted to know the optimal flight path using gravity assists. Moho seems pretty steep on the dV requirements, Eve might be doable with a [Breaking Ground] stratolauncher, and I've been everywhere else besides Dres and Eeloo

it is often better and more satisfying to make your own parts rather than request them and wait for someone to make it, if anyone bothers at all. to do this, you will need to download a 3d modeling application such as Blender which is a free, open-source application. There are tons of YouTube Tutorials that will teach you the basics of 3d modeling as well as a few advanced techniques. once your part has been modeled, with colliders (very important) you need to import it into [Unity], which is the game engine that KSP uses. As of this post, you should use the one labeled: Unity 2019.2.21 10 Feb, 2020 which is what KSP 1.9.x is currently using. with your 3d model imported into Unity, you now need to export it into a .mu file that the game can load and use, but Unity can't do that on it's own; there are some custom Part Tools addons for Unity that the game developers created, use, maintain and publish for their use and ours. (Thanks Devs!) and finally, with your 3d model exported to a .mu file, KSP needs some additional information about the 3d model in order for it to be a usable part. so you need to fire up your favorite text editor such as Notepad++ and create the .cfg file that will describe your part to the game engine. [More info] Also, please note that DDS texture format is no longer supported beyond KSP 1.8 but DXT1 and DXT5 still work. good luck, have fun, safe landings! I would also like to point out that due to the way Iris mechanics work [Shown Here] the opening for the bay would be much smaller than 5m as the shutters have to move somewhere; matter just doesn't disappear at the press of a button. the smaller opening than the actual enclosure wouldn't be a very suitable as a service bay or cargo bay, but still might have other uses.

last night, I attempted a gravity-assisted capture around Jool using Laythe, then fine-tuned my approach until I got a second encounter with Laythe and then this crash occured [EXC 19:25:02.910] StackOverflowException: The requested operation caused a stack overflow. Targeting+Sample.Create () (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Smooth.Pools.Pool`1[T].Borrow () (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting+Sample.Borrow (Targeting+Conic o1, Targeting+Conic o2, System.Double v) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting+Interval.Subdivide () (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) Targeting.add_crossing_subdivisions (System.Collections.Generic.List`1[T] intervals, Targeting+Interval ival, System.Boolean reversed) (at <55ba45dc3a43403382024deac8dcd0be>:0) those last few lines repeat until the crash occurs; apparently there's a non-breaking loop somewhere in the encounter code.

aye, the increased drag from an open cargobay makes a world of difference when you're attempting an aerobrake/aerocapture. it just a weird bug I experienced, been playing since 0.90 and never had this happen before

I solved the problem. Just as @Blaarkies said, the cargo bays were the major source of drag; for some unknown reason, the bays were closed and didn't have their deploy settings tampered with, but flew as if they were open. strange bug I guess? the solution was to rebuild the vessel with new cargo bays and it worked.

Normally, I don't have trouble building and/or flying SSTO SpacePlanes, but ever since the update, I can't get one into orbit, including ones built in previous versions. while testing, I had a TWR of ~2.2 and still couldn't get past ~340 m/s with Rapier engines, which eventually decreased speed the higher I went up. so what gives?