Racer319

tavert thanks for all the helpful suggestions! and Duxwing i obviously know what mechjeb is, but it's ascent profiles are not perfectly optimized, and depending on your ship design they could be quite bad, so I want to try to improve on this. tavert: I have been writing the program in Java, and I'm not sure why you recommend other languages. It seems like the most complicated math I will have to do is to solve differential equations and find derivatives, which I can estimate very closely with simple algorithms, so I don't really see the need the need for a higher level language. Although this might just be because I don't have any experience with them.

I'm planning on finding a 2D solution that accounts for the gravity turn, but right now it's 1D. I'm using 4th Order Runge-Kutta for integration, specific impulse, gravity as a function of altitude, atmospheric density, etc... basically I want to fully solve the problem. I haven't completely thought it out yet, but I think I'll use some form of a gradient descent algorithm for optimization as it scales nicely with lots of variables. About the drag, I was referring to Stokes Drag at low velocity. From past research, I believe drag transitions to velocity squared somewhere around 10-20 m/s, for example: a basketball's drag will probably vary with velocity, while a baseball is velocity squared. I know how to handle these equations pretty well, but supersonic and hypersonic effects are beyond me. It sounds like the game currently ignores effects at transonic speeds, thank god for me. That will make things much simpler. It sounds like the KSP drag equation is Fd = (Cd)(v2)(p)(some constant) where: Cd = drag coefficient v = velocity p = atmospheric density and it just ignores mach effects, cross section, and angle of attack? If so, I will need a value for Cd for each test ship, or at least a decent estimate. It sounds like a list of parts might be enough to calculate this? Let me know if you think that could work. Eventually I think I can make this work with multi-stage rockets, but that's probably quite a long way off.

is possible with gyroscopes (or with arms and legs). Since the force from radiation pressure is extremely small, sure it might impart some minuscule amount of angular momentum over time, but could that not be easily corrected with gyroscopes?

Hey everyone! I have some free time, so I'm writing a program that will take parameters for a ship, planet, and atmosphere and return the ideal launch path. Now that I'm starting to code the physics for it, I have a few questions about the drag force. As far as I know, in the real world drag varies with velocity squared at high speeds and just with velocity at low speeds. I'm guessing in KSP it's just v^2 the whole time, but does anyone know for sure? Also if you have any advice or suggestions I'd be happy to hear it.

I'm starting a video series to play through KSP in "Story Mode." I'm starting with very few parts, and as I complete objectives I will bring in new and better ones (Vanilla and Mods). Tell me what you guys think! Episode 00