AHHans

Well, that was apparently fixed sometime between 1.7.3 and 1.8.1.

O.K. I looked into it again, and indeed in 1.8.1 doing SAS point to target with the off-axis docking port leads to the "expected" misalignment. But doing the same in 1.9.1 just led to a successful docking. The docking port kept pointing straight at the target. So I checked the 1.9.0 changelog and indeed I found the following line: * Fix SAS target mode misalignment when control point is not the vessel root So, yes, that seems to be fixed. And if I see it correctly they also fixed the misalignment of the prograde marker on the navball that I mentioned. (But I haven't tested that extensively.) You're welcome, so do I, and indeed. AKA: I'm happy to have been of help. I also hope that the recent bugfixes make it to the console version soon (but I'm not willing to hold my breath until then). And I totally agree that there are many more - and IMHO more annoying - bugs to be fixed.

Yes, but: I just gave it a test run and a) a few week of Rimworld - Royalty and my piloting skills are shot to hell, and b) is that fixed?!? My spaceplane doesn't seem to behave in 1.9.1 like I remember it doing... But a real investigation of this will have to wait till tomorrow!

Ah! Yes, that is indeed still/also an issue in the PC version: when selecting SAS "point to target" then it will indeed not point in the right direction if the control point is not in line with the CoM. That hasn't been a big issue for me, because as far as I can tell it only affects the direction that SAS points toward and only when using "point to target" ("point to prograde / retrograde" is correct / as I expect it to be). The actual control of the craft - e.g. in which direction the craft moves when I use RCS translate or in which direction it rotates when I rotate it - is also correct, as are the displays on the navball. So what I do is to manually keep the craft oriented the right way. It is somewhat more complicated but I consider it "good training". But I don't know of a workaround or fix that will automatically point in the right direction in this case. P.S. The craft where I have this issue the most is with my shuttle spaceplanes, like the one I used for the K-Prize challenge. (In there I also commented about that in the "hidden" section about docking to the Gateway Station.)

Ah, yes. Especially when you shine it at e.g. the lung tissue. *evilgrin* In the last few days I often think back to what a high-school (well, in the US it would have been junior high school) biology teacher told us once: "You can kill viruses easily, just point a flame-thrower at them."

Ah, O.K. On PC (well, on Linux, but I don't expect the other versions to be different) this seems to be fixed: I didn't even knew this issue existed, and many of my craft have docking ports that are not in line with the CoM. (In other words: I'm sure that I would have noticed that if it still were an issue.) The one thing I did notice during docking is that the prograde / retrograde marker on the navball is not from the control-point docking port to the target docking port - as the target direction marker is - but from the local CoM to the target.

No, you can. The re-root tool works on subassemblies as well as on your main craft. (Also took me a while to figure that out.) You first need to put the "ghost" version somewhere - preferably somewhere where you can get to the part that you want as the new root - and then you can use the re-root tool on it. The part of a subassembly with the active attachment node is the root part of that subassembly. So if you want then don't call it "root" but "attachable part". P.S. In stock the shielded docking port has only the one attachment node and it cannot be used as a root part for a subassembly because of that.

Ah. Even the "normal" movement works differently in the VAB than outside (the hinges have a limited move speed etc.), so that I usually test this stuff on the launchpad anyhow...

Well, you need to select the row where you want to add the point before you can add a point, and select the point that you want to delete before you click on "remove point". But I guess you knew that. If it still doesn't work for you, then my guess is that your install got corrupted somehow. Do the two buttons highlight / become active when you select the communotron row?

What exactly are you planning to do? And why do you want the ".loadmeta" file anyway? KSP rebuilds that when it isn't around anyway. If my grep-fu is correct, then my current career save has 242 vessels, and the only mod I use is KAC.

Instead of double clicking you can also use the two buttons after "Point:" in the row on top to add or remove a dot that triggers the action.

Hi @ReigningArrow, welcome to the Forums. I play on PC, so it might be different there, but I'm not aware of an actual bug concerning the control point not being in line with the CoM. Can you explain that a bit?

Interesting article in The Economist: Tracking covid-19 excess deaths across countries They looked at the total number of reported deaths, calculated the excess over the average of the last 10 years and compared that to the reported number of COVID-19 deaths. There seem to be a lot more COVID-19 related deaths than reported. With New York being the exception from that rule. P.S. Germany only has - even preliminary - mortality statistics up to mid-March. *grrr*

??? What exactly do you do when you:

Let's see: Blue = Lift from wings Well, you got that. With "direction of lift" == perpendicular to the plane of the lifting part. Red = Drag That's also an easy one. Here is "direction of drag" == in the direction of the apparent wind. Yellow = Lift from control surfaces Like blue, but can change direction when the control surface moves Cyan = Body lift from non-wing parts If you move a non-wing part at an angle through the air then it will generate not only drag but also some lift. Think e.g. about a structural panel that's angled like a wing. (But I'm not 100% sure about that, so feel free to correct me.) Green = Indication of rotation direction and angular speed See KSP 1.9.0 / BG 1.4.0 changelog: "* Blade rotation axis shown as green arrow in aero debug display. Length is logarithmically proportional to rotation velocity (vessel relative)." Pink = "Cheated extra thrust/lift of propeller and helicopter fan blades" The game engine can only handle a rather small rotational velocity (it is approximating the rotational motions with linear motions), that would result in rather small lift from any kind of realistically sized propeller or helicopter blades. (Real propellers rotate much faster.) So SQUAD "cheated" some extra lift onto the propeller and helicopter blade parts to give the propellers/rotors some reasonable thrust.

No. All aircraft - real world or KSP - need to be trimmed to fly straight and level without any additional control input. As I wrote: an aerodynamically stable airplane has a pitch-down torque from the placement of the CoM and CoL which needs to be counteracted by torque from the aerodynamic forces. With a given mass distribution (position of CoM) a certain trim setting will keep a plane flying level at a certain speed. If it flies slower then the torque from the aerodynamic forces is weaker and the plane pitches down, thus gaining speed which increases the "aerodynamic torque" pitching it up again. And vice versa. (And, yes, oscillating around that is a common issue.) You can apply this trim by designing it into the craft (e.g. by pitching the elevators in the SPH), by setting manual trim during flight (with <Alt>-W/<Alt>-S on windows), by using SAS, or by manually "pulling up the stick" (well, that wouldn't really be "trim", but it would work).

Yes, that is important to make sure that the plane is stable in flight, i.e. that it doesn't want to flip around and fly backwards. But this stability also means that it wants to pitch down, and you'll need aerodynamic control to counteract this tendency to pitch down. Your plane is "too stable": it wants to pitch down more than you can counteract with the control surfaces that you have available. You need move the CoM and the CoL quite a bit closer together for it to fly well. But to make things even more complicated: check how your CoM shifts when you burn fuel. If that causes the CoM to move behind the CoL then you'll get an unstable plane. Another issue that doesn't affect airplane much but is an issue for spaceplanes is that when you fly high and fast the center of the aerodynamic forces is less dominated by lift and more by drag, so if you have lots of lift at the back of the plane and comparatively more drag at the front, then it may happen that the plane becomes unstable when you get above - say - 25 km and mach 3. And finally: the FAT-455 wings are not very heat-resistant, so there is a good chance that they overheat and explode either already during ascent to orbit or during reentry.

Hi @Super4Jet, welcome to the forums. In the second screenshot on the imgur gallery the "reach the designated synchronous orbit" is not ticked. Your orbit is close to the requested orbit, but not close enough. You need to fine-tune your orbit somewhat more. I suggest to set up a maneuver node at a place where your orbit and the requested orbit are close, fiddle with the node until the resulting orbit matches as good as you can make it, and then fly the manuever node.

Hi @Hank82, welcome to the Forums. The Science Junior (which is also called the materials bay in some career-mode contracts) works essentially like all the other experiments: when you run it, then it will generate "experiment results". To actually earn the science you need to get them to the KSC. This can either be done by transmitting them via radio - which will give only part of the maximum possible results - or you need to recover the results on Kerbin. The latter can be done by recovering the Science Junior itself on Kerbin, or by transferring the results from the the Science Junior to another part that is then in turn recovered. This transfer can either be done by using an Experiment Storage Unit and collecting all science results on the vessel into that storage, or by using a Kerbal on EVA that is close to the Science Junior, right-clicking on the Science Junior, and grabbing the results (the data) from there. That way you can use any command capsule to store science experiments.

Two comments: if you want help with designing your ship, then why don't you start a thread in the Gameplay Questions and Tutorials subforum? That's what it is for. The other is that I guess your vector engine is oversteering which makes it hard to hold a direction. I suggest that you try limiting the gimbal range on the vector. Congrats! And you sound like you didn't forget to bring parachutes. (Which puts you one ahead of me. )

You know, one thing I like about KSP - well, after I got over my "You all are doing this wrong!" phase - is that there are many different ways to play the game. All of them work well for someone and you cannot say that one is better or worse than another. P.S. Of course my way to play KSP is the best way, and you are all just ignorant louts to not acknowledge that.

You mean you are playing on a console (like X-Box or so)? Then I don't think this is a breaking-ground specific question, so I'd suggest to ask in the Technical Support (PlayStation 4, XBox One) subforum. On PC you can set that in the settings menu under "Input" -> "Vessel"

It's a bug! Let me copy an earlier PSA:

Don't worry, we won't hold being from Germany against you. (SCNR!) (Check my location if you don't get the joke.) Your English is fine! And when we don't understand a question then we'll just ask for clarification. As to your actual question: I think that @Curveball Anders and @4x4cheesecake already answered that. If not then please ask again.

Hallo Ihrs Wie Ihr seht, ist das Deutsche Subforum hier ziemlich tot. Das liegt weniger daran das niemand aus Deutschland in den KSP Foren aktiv ist, sondern das die meisten gut genug Englisch koennen und sich im allgemeinen (und daher Englischsprachigen) Bereich der Foren aufhalten. Wenn Ihr also eine Frage habt, dann wuerde ich Euch raten die Frage auf Englisch in den allgemeinen Unterforen zu stellen. Niemand wird es Euch dort uebelnehmen wenn Ihr in schlechtem Englisch schreibt. Wenn Ihr Euch nicht sicher seid dass Euer Englisch verstaendlich ist, dann schreibt die Frage so gut es geht auf Englisch und dann nochmal auf Deutsch. Wie gesagt, es liest da wahrscheinlich auch jemand aus Deutschland mit. Wenn Ihr Euch mit Englisch ganz schwer tut, dann waere mein Vorschlag eine Frage auf Deutsch zu schreiben, sie mit Google Translate oder so auf Englisch zu uebersetzen und beides in das allgemeine Subforum zu schreiben. Im Zweifel mit der Bitte die Diskussion hier im deutschen Subforum zu fuehren. P.S. Ja, wie Ihr sehen koennt verwende ich eine Englische Tastatur. Wenn man oefter programmiert und die eckigen und geschweiften Klammern ("{[]}") tippen will ist das einfach bequemer...