Hooligan Labs

This is actually very relevant to my work on a submarine mod! Please read this: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/23774-0-21-Hooligan-Labs-Balloon-on-Duna-and-More%21?p=572089&viewfull=1#post572089 Do you think the buoyant force in KSP actually works properly? If so, what would be the "density" for air and salt water? It would be possible to generate either in my plugin, perhaps.

Ah good catch! It is reasonable to assume that Kerbin and Laythe have salty oceans. If anyone can figure out what Eve's "rocket fuel ocean" should have as density that would also help. Only the KSP devs may know that secret, though...

Thanks for the link! It is funny to know that negatives work for my airship. I never tested that. Right now, every part in a vessel has a powerful (and magical) upwards buoyancy when it's in water. This causes such instability when attempting to go underwater. It is like having every part of your vessel be an airship balloon with weak glue holding it together. I am in the process of making a completely separate plugin (HLBallast). The first thing I do is zero out buoyancy for everything that does not hold crew (and thus air). The vessel should float much more realistically... that is to say it would hardly float at all. Attaching a "ballast tank" will allow for control very similar to the airship. The ballast tank can be adjusted from 0 to 100% ballast target, opposite of the way the airship works. Based on a suggestion from Khaos, the ballast is a resource that can be added to a ballast tank if it is "splashed" on a planet. This ballast liquid does nothing but weigh 1.021 tons on Eve (assuming hydrazine) or 1.000 tons/m3 on Kerbin, Laythe or elsewhere (assuming water). Any % of a ballast tank that is not filled with liquid will be buoyant air. I plan on using KSP's standard buoyancy (however it works) but if it is unusable I will do something like with the airship. It should work like a real sub in the end. Altitude control (renamed depth control) and trim controls will be present. It might be even possible to save while floating above the ocean floor! But I make no promises yet. The colliders for the fins are actually rectangles, so yes there are invisible boxes around all of them. Sorry, mesh colliders would not work for that animated part, as it turned out after I had already modeled it.

Nice! I love landing airships at places like the dirt landing strip. It feels so much easier than trying to bring a spaceplane in. Yes indeed.

Important submarine research was done today! First of all, going underwater is really hard. Even metal struts are buoyant in KSP! Also, it looks like water density / pressure is not measured... So we cannot calculate the additional weight that a filled ballast tank would have based on the planet's liquid density. This narrows down how a submarine could be done... 1) A "submarine control" part would allow for controlling the entire vessel's buoyancy. And / Or 2) Individual ballast tanks to adjust Yes it could be. It would need a lot stripped out, like buoyant force, and have to figure out exactly what resources are going in. But that should be about it. Source code is included with the mod download for anyone interested.

I want to see the results! Someday we're going to get all of the screenshots/vessels/missions posted onto the wiki. You know, as backup, and for easy perusing of the awesome. I'd go something like this... float resourcePercent = PartResource.amount / PartResource.maxAmount; float animationPercent = this.m_Animation[this.animationName].time / this.m_Animation[this.animationName].length if (resourcePercent < animationPercent * 0.99) // Slight hysterisis included this.AniState = AnimationState.PlayForwards; elseif (resourcePercent > animationPercent * 1.01) this.AniState = AnimationState.PlayBackwards; else this.AniState = AnimationState.Stop; // Would need to add this to logic This would fall under what Bac9 describes as "high-tech". That is a heck of a rant he wrote. Feel free to try that code. I think I'll do a submarine part first. Since it's been, you know, requested for a really long time. Finally, for everyone asking about the launch pad you're going to have to check the thread for Extraplanetary Launchpads. I did not make that mod, though I kind of wish I did.

As requested! This video may, shall we say, elevate your thinking? My signature has a link to the forum thread and videos of airships on in every atmosphere!

Maybe this will help! Also you can control the balloons individually by right-clicking them or setting action bindings. Good for blimp shapes. Cirrus is the biggest. If you want to put stuff on the side of the balloon, try the Octo.

More tables up: http://hlairship.wikia.com/wiki/Airship_Lift_Tables I'm starting to get the hang of this. It's two way actually! And rather comfortable both ways.

Part of the plugin is a change in drag when deployed for the Una and Ray. You can edit this in the part.cfg file. Also in the .cfg file you can reduce the necessary air pressure for it to deploy. That is exactly correct. The table is based on the pressure formula given on the official KSP wiki. Now, in test it has been found that airships somehow lift better than it would seem on paper, so aim for this much tonnage and you should be fine. You can image that when the Firespitter mod came out we were in CAHOOTS.

Started updating the lift table, experimenting with wiki-ness. This will get you started: http://hlairship.wikia.com/wiki/Airship_Lift_Tables

Try it and find out? I will update, I'm trying out doing this with a Wiki page. Note that the airship envelopes themselves weigh much less, so for conservative airship designs you should still be fine. The physics are still the same, so expect to lift, say, 1/6th as much on Duna as on Kerbin.

Release 2.2.0: The Realism Update. Download from KSPort! - Airship envelope volumes recalculated! - The Cirrus now expands to be much larger, reflecting what its deployed volume should be! - Based on recent graphene research, mass has been recalculated to be much less! - The plugin now appropriately handles the difference between kilograms and metric tons. As a result, envelopes have far less lift per volume than they did before. - Now there is a new variable in the part.cfg files, envelopeVolumeScale, which allows parts to have lift similar to what they used to. This has been set to a default of 40, as in it has the lift of an envelope 40 times larger than it. - Added a new "Real" Cirrus part as an example of setting the envelopeVolumeScale to 1. - Overall, expect less performance from the envelopes than before. Much less from the rigid envelopes. The undeployed Cirrus is the same size. How much bigger is the Cirrus when deployed now? Big! For example, here is how much the Cirrus lifts the with the volume scaled by 40: 172 tons to 2km altitude. This is how much it lifts with a "realistic" buoyancy (scale of 1): 3 tons to 2km altitude. I'll share more soon.

Working As Intended. (Just kidding )

I love them too. One of my pre-made airships that is included with the download uses the electric prop for getting around Jool. Sometimes it seems Eve was made for airships. No, those are fair questions. I haven't had a lot of time, but I have tested a bit in 0.21 with no problems. If anyone has any issues, please share.

Nice! I was wondering if the Cirrus would actually work low in Jool's atmosphere. The pressure there is so immense, and the Cirrus so powerful, that I didn't know if control would be possible.

It is probably that cursed requirement that KSP has, ships must touch the ground or water before they can launch.

I like all the designs, including the recovery craft! Hm, camera controls look straightforward enough... https://github.com/Anatid/XML-Documentation-for-the-KSP-API/blob/master/FlightCamera.cs Though it may be one of those things where something that seems obvious is totally messed up when you try to use it. It could be worth a shot if I get some time. I'll talk to the #kspmodders on esper about it.

It sounds like underwater is not really worth exploring right now. A shame! But you see something like this and think it's possible... I should do a FAQ. I'll see about posting it to the front page soon.

So is there a call for submarine parts? Back from traveling. Also, how is testing of the beta parts going? Any more feedback?

In the meantime, my Party Starter mod will fill your ship with Kerbonauts before launch.

Fantastic! Honestly, I think this is even more realistic than what JP Aerospace is attempting in real life. Keep at it Khaos! Don't feel like you can't draw on crazy sci-fi. I do so without almost any appology. Just Google "Futuristic Blimp"

Have you attempted placing the pad upside down? Wait, bad idea. You would then need a really wide structure to keep it off the ground.

I forget, are you using Vanguard for animation? Maybe need an updated version?

That is looking good! By the way, did you get your questions answered?