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ARS

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Posts posted by ARS

    how to make an helix work

    in KSP1 Gameplay Questions and Tutorials

    Posted

    Controlling helicopter is actually very easy once you get used to it (just like EVA). Most people can't figure how to actually increase/ decrease speed, so they added thruster for that. This is a bad idea, don't add another engine. It makes the chopper even more uncontrollable. The rotor is what provides you thrust and lift. In basic, the rotor must be placed directly on the center of mass. During takeoff, do not use full throttle, start slow, steadily raise the throttle until the chopper visibly lifting off. To move forward tilt the chopper slightly downward (slowly press W) so the rotor that provides lifting force downward can push the chopper forward. To move backward, tilt the chopper slightly upward (slowly press S) this will allow the rotor to "brake" the forward movement until it begin to push the chopper backward. Turn the chopper around with A or D before performing the same process to move forward or backward to change the heading. Adding engine for pushing forward is just asking for trouble since it means there are now 2 source of thrust on the chopper that leads to different vector, making it more difficult to control. The main rotor is your lifting engine and your main engine. It not only provides lift, but also thrust by tilting

    I suggest you use stock aircraft landing gear or structural parts with high impact tolerance (with friction pads) as the landing gear. The thing is, it's very difficult to control your chopper to hover and then lower it to the ground slowly (assuming you play stock). Take note of how much throttle needed at minimum to lift your chopper, this can save you when you try to land. Landing can be done by slowing your chopper first until horizontal velocity becomes as low as possible before cutting of throttle (don't turn off the engine) when your vertical velocity start to drop, raise the throttle (don't forget to deploy your landing gear beforehand) if you think you are going down too fast, don't be shy to throttle higher until you regain some vertical velocity and your rate of descent begin slows down during which you can lower the throttle again (Repeat until you touch the ground, for small chopper, recommended safe landing speed is same like small aircraft (depend on your landing gear))

    In short, the control for chopper is as follows (asssuming you're already airborne with 0 m/s horizontal velocity):

    To move forward: Tilt the chopper slightly downward (W)

    To move backward/ brake: Tilt the chopper slightly upward (S)

    Change heading: (A/D + Forward/backward for speed adjusting)

    Strafe left/right: (Q/E, to cancel strafing, just tilt on opposite direction)

    Safe tilting angle is around 15-30 degrees, but in emergency can be pushed to 45 degrees. Beyond that, there's a risk of uncontrollable spin (unless the chopper is very tiny and lightweight)

    How Overpowered Scifi Space Combat Would Be

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    If I had to express my opinion, I think the space combat would be fought primarily by kinetic weapons (railguns, coilguns, etc.) over extremely long distance. Energy weapon tend to get weaker with distance, judging from collimation and energy dissipation, while missiles has limited propellant, which, since the target spacecraft could maneuver away (and has way more deltaV than missiles), even tracking would be ineffective if the target could outmaneuver it, not to mention the missile could be shot down (and warships tend to fit defense turrets for that reason). Even if missile explodes, the fragment it creates may not be any different than a hail of highspeed micrometeorite strikes, which, a military-grade warship operating in space is certainly equipped to deal with that. A good weapon would be guided railgun, firing a kinetic slug with course correction thrusters. The initial firing will immediately close the distance to the target before course correction will be made to compensate if the target in maneuvering away for evasive action. No need for explosives, since kinetic energy will do the job. A hull breach is much more catastrophic for spacecraft than shockwave explosions

    Can you make Xenon gas?

    in KSP1 Gameplay Questions and Tutorials

    Posted · Edited by ARS

    1 hour ago, Cant think of a username said:

    Ok so are there any mod that can?

    Do you want a renewable resource that's suitable for long range mission? AFAIK, I never come across a mod that allows you to make xenon gas (I could be wrong though). But if you want mods for sustainable long range mission fuel material, I can think of 3:

    1. Buzzard Collector: this mod adds a gigantic (and by gigantic, I mean it. They are roughly 3-5 times the width of ISS) deployable collector dish, available in S/M/L sizes. The dish is extremely fragile, and can only be used in space. When supplied with electricity, it can (very slowly) turn Kerbol wind into fuel (it only generates liquid fuel, which, in vacuum, can only be used by nuke engine). Think of it like a "fuel panel" (that consumes electricity)

    2. Solaris Hypernautics: this mod adds 2 new fuel resources: virtual particles and dust, alongside miscellaneous parts such as fuel tanks, boosters, and engines associated with those resources. It's easier to place on craft  than buzzard because of much smaller part sizes, but the resource chain is more demanding and/or complicated. Virtual particle requires reactor that consumes electricity to generate said particle, and just that. The trade off is, the thrust is extremely low (even lower than ion) and the electricity demand is extremely high (even more than ion). Luckily, said reactor can also consume xenon to generate electricity (xenon consumption rate is roughly lower than ion engine and much more higher electricity output than fuel cell). The dust resource is more complex: it requires dust collectors placed on the outside your craft to gather dust particles (only work in vacuum) and storing them in dust tanks. The part gathers dust passively, but you can feed it electricity to speed up the process (mind you, the output in passive is so low you need multiple collectors to get reasonable output per minute). After that, you use dust compressor to turn said dust into ore (also costs electricity) before storing it on ore tanks, and then use ISRU to turn said ore into LF, LF/OX or monoprop. The hardest part is setting the balance of collector parts vs resource consumption, but if you did it right, your craft is essentially self-sustaining in terms of fuel

    3. GN Drive: this is the "cheat engine" mod for KSP (pun intended). It adds GN particle resources, which can be used for propulsion. The engine is extremely broken because: it naturally regenerates the particle at no cost, sometimes at a rate much higher than particle consumption, act as a reactor with respectable electricity output, can be used as antigrav engine that allows your ship to ignore gravity, and can be overdrived to provide even more thrust. So broken that sometimes it's easier to bolt this engine on unflyable design than fixing it, and the design will fly with flying colors through sheer thrust. Any craft becomes SSTA (to anywhere) with this thing strapped on. The overdrive mode is also handy for testing aerodynamic heating (you can literally reach escape velocity in level flight). The only limitation is your design's resistance against aerodynamic heating and large G-forces (30G with this thing overdrived is normal) as well as it's massive price tag: 40,000,000 kerbucks apiece

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    Does fixed forward mounted weapon makes sense for space warship?

    In a lot of science fiction, there's bound to be a ship with gigantic forward mounted weapon that can only be aimed by reorienting the whole ship like WW2 era tank destroyer. These weapons tend to be very powerful (as in, fleet-melting level) or just plain necessary when dealing with slow moving capital ships in space warfare where ordinary guns and missiles has no effect on them

    The reason that I get is that, due to it's power, these weapons tend to be large, thus making turret mount impossible, so it's placed as spinal mount. If anything, the space environment also supports the placement of such weapon since it's easier to orient large structure in space by using RCS thrusters

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    Is it true that human body will melt (corroded away, chipped bit by bit) when exposed to heavy nuclear radiation? Like when you're exposed into the open core of nuclear reactor, with the radiation level steadily rising, assuming you aren't killed by intense heat first, does the increasing radiation level in your body caused it to eventually melt? 

    What did you do in KSP1 today?

    in KSP1 Discussion

    Posted

    Been a while since the last time I'm active in KSP. Decided to return recently. So a lot has been changed in the game, and I started my game building highspeed exploration aircraft. 5 crew capacity, unmanned-capable and cargo bay to carry ground scientific instruments

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    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    Thanks, @p1t1o, @K^2. I double check that values and the results are pretty close to each other

    3 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

     Is it possible to truly colonize a world with less than Earth gravity? Are humans up to it? I know the standard stuff, loss of bone density in 0g, etc. but I wanted to see what else there is on the topic. What alterations would occur to human proportions, growth, lifespan (not due to time dilation in a gravitational field, I mean because of potential health effects), muscle strength, etc?

    Possible, as long as we are willing to accept the permanent alteration towards the colonists in the long term (subsequent generations tend to adapt). Generally, compared to earth, those live in lower gravity would grow taller, but weaker (especially in zero g). Lifespan is not gonna change much as long as there's plenty of supplies and keeping the body healthy by daily exercise, unless some major thing happens on the colony such as loss of life support

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    If we colonize other celestial bodies on solar system, realistically speaking, assuming we can easily send stuff and personnel to earth orbit, does the number of colonist sent to farther celestial body should increase or decrease? (Up to a minimum number required for developing population) Assuming if we aim to make a sustainable population in a self-sufficient colony in a single trip (assume stuff such as prefabricated bases, supplies and resources are non-issue)

    Also unrelated, but assuming if you can sneak into space shuttle cargo bay as it launched (Don't ask how), could you survive all the way into space with nothing but pressurized G-suit and oxygen supply, and not strapped on any seat like on the cockpit (just holding on railings inside cargo bay). Assuming you have been to space before

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    20 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

    What about a double fired laser?  First shot isn't the killing energy blast - it's purpose is to 'clear the air' or create a plasma channel - perhaps like the leader that precedes a lightning blast - and then the kill shot from the ground station uses the cleared path to take out the target?

    Doesn't that makes double the power requirement? Laser ionizes the air, but I doubt that double fired laser since if you ionize the air on the firing line with the first shot, then there would be little to no air to ionize for the second shot. If you shoot the second shot fast enough, there's not enough air to ionize, but if wait a bit before the second shot, then what's the point if it's no different than the first shot?

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    If we build a laser weapon, which one is harder: shooting it from the ground to hit something in space or shooting it from space to hit something on the ground?

    Also, since mass is less of a concern in space in terms of structural stability (you can build any shape you want, unlike on earth), assuming there's a way to transport large amount of mass to space, does heavy armor (that actually designed to get hit and endure the attack) is still relevant in space combat (because you can armor stuff as much as you want without compromising structural stability due to the lack of gravity, especially on things that moves at the snail's pace in the first place such as motherships), or has it been taken over by speed and maneuverability? (especially due to how easy it is to move something around in space due to the lack of gravity)

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    On stealth aircraft that's difficult to detect with radar (such as stealth bombers), assuming that it's detected visually by conventional aircraft, and they open fire using onboard machine guns instead of attempting missile lock at such close range engagement, will the damage from machine gun fire that riddled stealth aircraft's outer skin with bullets make it more visible to radar (compromising it's stealth)?

    Also, I've seen this clip: in a scene involving a dogfight between 2 fighter aircrafts, A is behind B and launched a semi active radar homing missile (clearly because the pilot of A said Fox 1), but then the pilot of B used flares to deflect said missile (clearly because pilot B said Flares!). Can SARH missile be deflected that way? Or is it possible to mix chaff in flare dischargers to confuse the radar homing of said missile? Because AFAIK, modern SARH missile can differentiate between actual aircraft and chaffs since chaffs usually slows down dramatically once it's released (for info, aircraft A is Su-30, while aircraft B is Su-27)

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    Post-WW2 warships has shifted the defense doctrine from heavy armor to point defenses with the advent of antiship missiles. The focus of warship defense is now focused on interception and evasion (CIWS, CAP, EW, decoys) rather than endurance (heavy armor, torpedo bulkhead, citadel armor). Now I wonder, if the modern-era warship do get hit by modern antiship missile, in terms of endurance compared to WW2-era heavy armor battleships, which one will outlast the other? (assuming both are hit by the same number of missiles and no missile are intercepted)

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    During Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, one of the topic that's brought up post-disaster involves discussing the possibility to bring the crew back had the damage to the port wing is confirmed beforehand. Aside from launching 2nd shuttle to rescue them, one of the method involves altering reentry trajectory to minimize the exposure of the damaged port wing towards the atmosphere. I am curious as how it's done, considering there's a gaping hole on port wing's thermal shield (which is intended to be exposed towards the atmosphere). Is there a way to orient the shuttle during reentry to prevent the obvious hot spot on the wing to contact atmosphere? Does it mean exposing the non-shielded portion of the shuttle towards the atmosphere? If the shuttle is oriented in such a way, will the center of mass of the shuttle force it to return to "normal" (and dangerous) reentry profile? A shallow reentry angle could minimize the heat exposure, but it also makes the heat shield being exposed towards heat far longer (and there's a possibility to overshoot), while steep reentry angle expose the shuttle towards shorter heat duration but obviously a no-no since that heat is at a much much higher temperature that'll ensure it'll disintegrate

    For Questions That Don't Merit Their Own Thread

    in Science & Spaceflight

    Posted

    Does a non-hydrodynamical shape (no-sharp edges, but isn't streamlined) create a noise strong enough to be picked by submarine when it's just stand still underwater? Imagine a non-hydrodynamic stuff like undersea research station. It has curves and no sharp edges, but is not streamlined against water currents (It's just an assortment of metal tubes and tanks for habitat's structure) and it's just anchored on the seabed using cables like naval mines. Assuming there's nothing onboard that makes noise, if there's ocean current around it, will submarines picked the noise?

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