capi3101

Alright - I'm verifying that NavUtilities 0.5_RC_3 does not work in KSP 1.0.2 while using blizzy78's Toolbar 1.7.9. Took an aircraft out on a parts testing mission this evening, performed the mission, was getting ready to go home. In Staging View, when I selected "Show HSI Window" (thinking this option would bring up the ILS interface), my entire flight UI disappeared from view (kinda like what happens when you push F2) with the exception of the fuel readouts and buttons in the upper-right hand corner. Pushing ESC wouldn't even bring up the normal menu options (resume, revert, etc.). The other parts of the mod (runway and glideslope selection, customizable runways and so forth) appear to be functional as menus in as much as I could tell. But, without the ILS interface, there's no way to be certain about that. Certainly willing to perform additional tests if y'all need me to.

Alright; will try that out when I get a chance. Probably won't happen until about 03Z at the earliest.

They're useful when you want to go from one point to another on a planet's surface but you aren't sure of your ability to land safely in the area - such as when you accept a contract to survey crap on Kerbin and one of the points turns out to be in an area with a 37 degree grade...

Which option? I'd be willing to test this out; I'm sure I'm not the only one.

I've seen that myself before; usually when it happens to me it's because I've reached the part where my plane begins its slow transformation into a rocket, and I've got the CoM too far aft. This is the region where having a sufficiently-sized fin/rudder helps matters tremendously. Granted, that was pre-1.0 FAR where I was experiencing that phenomenon and I haven't had sufficient time to play with the new FAR to see if everything still applies or not. Start with a fin with an area somewhere between 10-20% of the total main wing area and go from there; you want at least a quarter of the fin area as rudder. Might also try dedicated SAS units - 1.5 kNm per tonne of plane stowed in a bay is what I go with (the only rule of thumb from the old soup that I used to use with pre-1.0 FAR, and I'm convinced it helped). Might suggest closer to the nose to help draw the CoM forward. EDIT: Mostly ninja'd - same general advice, different way of putting it.

Yesterday, I took Bob's Wacky Sciencemobile 7 out for a little spin: There's not much else to this contraption that you can't see already; I originally designed it to drive around KSC and hit the individual building biomes for everything I could get - 4 Sci Jrs, 4 Goo Pods, 4 Thermometers and the Crew Report make a fair chunk of science per spin. Twin jet thrust, which is more than it conceivably needs - usually I just run the engines when I want to accelerate and let it coast to wherever it's going. The side chutes are there as an emergency braking system. Uses the little bush plane landing gears with a tricycle configuration. A low-tech craft to be sure, but she works quite well. Anyway, it turned out to be a fair rover. Drove it to a ground survey contract 100 klicks from KSC last night, did its business and drove it home; the screenie there was taken on the way back. Got readings for the Grasslands biome while I was out there. Made ~√50,000 and enough science to unlock solar panels and the OKTO probe core. Promptly got a contract to get science from around Kerbin, so I used my newly unlocked OKTO to make a basic half-tonne antenna- and thermometer-equipped sci probe and sent it into orbit. Got another science from around Kerbin contract, so I did it again; that mission's already paid for itself a couple of times. Sent four tourists into orbit on two separate flights; I'm pretty sure that those tourist contracts aren't paying off money-wise but they are doing a fair bit for my rep. Got the Level 2 Tracking Station unlocked (finally), so that's something. Still need to head for the Mun, especially seeing as how I now have tourists wanting to go there...

Might be worth my while to import all the wackiness I built for 0.90 and see how it all performs - and then see what can be done to fix things. Does mean more time in the litterbox, though. So what exactly does the new FAR do over new stock aero (can somebody give me a summary)?

Didn't have much time to play over the weekend due to the weather. Installed the Euler version of new FAR. Didn't care for it much. An attempt to launch two tourists into a sub-orbital trajectory failed miserably, this with a rocket that would've definitely worked in 1.0.2's stock aero. It also didn't play very nice with StageRecovery. Downloaded the new new FAR version this morning; we'll see how it works.

Okay; I'll check out the new version. Bit of a relief actually - I had just gotten StageRecovery working before installing new FAR, and it had quit working again (which was aggravating). So I want straight lines, green can be inclined or not but yellow needs to be level with the ground - got it. I'd actually seen that thing about the area rule the weekend before 1.0 came out (still trying to see if there was a way that could tell you when you had too much wing) and I was going to ask y'all about it because I really didn't understand it. It's just "make sure the area of the cross section doesn't change over the length of the plane", right? And since the wing contributes x amount of area, the area of the fuselage needs to be reduced by the same amount to ensure it stays stable in the trans-sonic range, right? Assuming that's right, my question was going to be one of how do you that with stock parts, and is it necessary to do so?

Haven't had much of a chance to play with the new FAR yet. Did a little the other day, and I noticed green and yellow squiggly lines are now showing up in the SPH. What are those things all about? I've also read that new FAR and B9 Procedural Wings aren't getting along with one another very well. Any pitfalls to watch for there?

Alright...just downloaded the new FAR version for KSP 1.0.2; I'll give it a shot next time I can play. The weather where I live has been crappy of late. Tonight is no exception.

To be wholly honest, I'm still having luck with Geschosskopf's Sci Lander design from 0.23; with a set of FL-T400s on the sides it can get to either of Kerbin's moons, get into orbit, land, launch and return to Kerbin on its own. The tricky bit is getting it into orbit; these days you can do it by putting the whole assembly into a fairing; I use Procedural Fairings myself and haven't yet tried out the stock fairings to see how well they'd work (if at all). I've also started placing a service bay between the cockpit and the girder and putting all the extra instruments and in there; heat shields go under the sci jrs and another one goes on the bottom of the girder. The beauty of the Sci Lander design is that it puts a lot of mass up towards the top of the rocket inherently, making any booster less prone to flipping out of control. Does make the rocket wide, which is in general a no-no, but in this case it works (in my experience at least).

There's a lot of factors that may be at work here. The most common cause I've seen of folks flipping out so far, however, has been CoM too far aft (i.e. the dart problem). To better diagnose problems and give you advice as to what you should do, we really do need to see a screenie. Here's another question: about what altitude are you at when you begin your turn, when do you cross 45 degrees, and what's your rough altitude when the first stage is done burning?

Yesterday I launched Jeb and Bob to collect science data from a high Kerbin orbit...at least, that was the intent. Didn't realize until the craft was coming in for splashdown that I'd forgotten to load Bob into the capsule. Or that I'd forgotten to take a crew report at the apoapsis... I was able to unlock Fuel Ducts, though, which gave me back the ability to make asparagus (checked for a new version of StageRecovery first, which was good since there was an update - one that gave me a shot at actually recovering stages). Launched a three-passenger tour bus to orbit with a booster I could rely on to make it. Ran a parts test while I was at it on an XL chute; I got the chute test completed but tore it off in the process, so it was a good thing I'd packed spares specifically for that eventuality. Safely got the tourists back to Kerbin, though the craft landed in the mountains, so that was a "just barely" sort of event. Also put out a pair of Stayputnik and jet-powered ground markers for KSC 09 and KSC 27. Used them to get Jeb back to the Runway safely from a parts test, which was the last thing I did yesterday. Raised enough capital to unlock the Level 2 Tracking Station, so at this point I'm Munbound. A current set of contracts has me flying tourists to both Mun and Minmus. I'm reasonably sure I can design a ship at this point that will fulfill said contracts; my main concern is that I haven't unlocked solar panels yet. I'm also finding myself a little short on funds, so I'm hoping the final rocket won't be too expensive...

If you're using RCS Build Aid at this point, you want to design your craft such that A) your CoM does not shift during flight (i.e. the "DCoM Offset" should say 0.00 m) and with the mod in Translation mode, the torque is as close to zero as you can get it for the left, right, up and down directions. You can go ahead and use a twelve-port configuration (four on the CoM to translate, eight to turn) to get the best of both worlds, provided you can stick to those general guidelines; in fact if you're working with a craft that's both beefy and difficult to turn (say if you've got something with no inherent torque controlling the ship like an OKTO2) you'll probably want the twelve-point configuration. Just bear in mind that when you put that the mod will tell you you've got torque after you set the first quad of thrusters on the end of the craft, and then the challenge becomes finding a spot on the other end that cancels out the torque. If you run out of craft, put the second set of thrusters as far down as you can get them and start adjusting the position of the first set. It's an interative process. Something else you might want to check is torque levels based on the various reference points - there's a button marked Reference that'll let you switch between CoM and DCoM. If you have no torque on both reference points, you can rely on your craft to be completely controllable under all circumstances. If not - and this happens usually when you can't get the CoM to not shift - you'll need to base your thruster placement on which Reference point best matches the intended condition of the craft when you go to dock it. If your goal is to dock a full fuel module, it'll probably still have most of its mass, so you use CoM. If your goal is to dock a nearly empty space capsule, you're probably going to want to use DCoM. SAS becomes necessary if and only if your craft is in a state between the two. Now, for SAS planning - use your two reference points and find where and in what direction the greatest amount of torque RCS Build aid is telling you will occur with the design. Take the amount of torque and multiply it by 1.5 - that's how much counter-torque you'll need to have available with SAS units. Reaction wheels provide 5 kNm of counter-torque, Stabilizers provide 15, and Big ASAS provides 30. Add what you need and then re-balance your ship's RCS. Hopefully that's all helpful; just like anything else in KSP, there's a lot of factors to consider when it comes to RCS placement, but it gets easier to know about how to set things up after you've gained some experience. Best of luck.

If you're not adverse to mods, I'd suggest you try out RCS Build Aid; it was designed for this very purpose. Also comes in real handy if/when you want to start puttering around with spaceplanes. It is mostly working in 1.0.2 though for best results (for the moment anyway) you'll want blizzy78's toolbar as well. I've generally found that the Apollo-style, 4 multi-directional thrusters on the CoM works best. Now, if you've got a massive vessel that doesn't turn particularly easily, you might want to consider sets on either end to assist with rotation (and RCS Build aid would help you position them with a minimal amount of unintentional torque). By and large though, for docking purposes you'll want RCS mainly for translation, and that works best with sets near the CoM. I might also suggest NavyFish's Docking Port Alignment Indicator as another vastly useful mod when it comes to simplifying the docking process. That one is definitely supported in 1.0.2, and it makes docking much easier; when he featured that mod, Scott Manley put the interface over the navball because he didn't need it with DPAI in action - that's how useful it is.

Sent out Bob in his Wacky Sciencemobile 7 yesterday to collect more science from around KSC after unlocking thermometers. This gave me enough science to unlock struts (thank God) and I was finally able to launch some halfway decent orbital payloads - including a fully loaded orbital sci probe, the proceeds of which I used to finish up the 45-point science tier. Going to have to unlock something better than the Stayputnik in the near future, though; lack of SAS is generally bad these days. Also learned that you've got to be really careful when you drive something into the water...those Sci Jrs have a really painfully low impact tolerance. I'm just about out of biomes to sci-mine at KSC (at least I think I am...); going to have to get Mun-bound soon... Also sent Jeb up with a tourist contract that ended...badly. I'm not ashamed to say that I play with reverts.

Well, turdbiscuit then. I knew I didn't like the new stock aerodynamics very much...now I've got more reason to switch back.

You'll want Turbojet engines before a traditional KSP spaceplane becomes a possibility; the Basic Jet engine won't get too much above 300 m/s. You'll want to get up to about 20 kilometers as quickly as you can, then level out and begin your acceleration run. At about Mach 4 (somewhere between 1,200 and 1,300 m/s) and at least 30k, switch on your rockets and keep the jets going for as long as you can run them. Spaceplanes with the new soup behave similarly to the way they did in FAR prior to 1.0, so they'll take some getting used to. Expect a new plane design to want to fly backwards the first few times you try it out, and then try to move the Center of Mass towards the nose. Try to balance the plane's fuel load so the CoM's position doesn't shift a whole lot. 1 Turbojet and 100kN of rocket per 10 tonnes, .01 intake per jet, 40 units of both Liquid Fuel and Oxidizer per tonne of plane. When you get RAPIERs, its the same except it's one RAPIER per nine tonnes of plane. Wing-wise, you want enough that your takeoff speed is not much slower than 100 m/s; if you can take off earlier, you'll have too much drag ongoing when you get up to switchover altitude. 125 is optimal, IMHO. I generally base the wing I need off of the mass of the plane and the length of the fuselage; that's a fairly complex set of formulas though. Plan for roughly a 15% payload fraction, the payload being pretty much anything you stick in the fuselage itself. SSTO rockets...those can be done pretty much repeatably by the time you've got ahold of the LV-T45 engine; they're possible (though tricky) with the LV-T30. Start a pitchover around 5k such that you're at 45 degrees at 15k, and then pitch down to 20 degrees when you're at least 35 seconds to Apoapsis. Hold it there until you're 45 to Apoapsis, then drop to 10 degrees. With 55 seconds to Apoapsis, you want to be burning along the horizon. You'll need somewhere between 3500-4000 m/s of delta-V to make orbit this way, depending on how well you fly it.

So, what's the word for us poor sods who are flat broke and have a Byzantine setup? And by Byzantine, let's say...Dual core, 4 GB of memory with nothing better than an onboard video card, which itself is equivalent to something that was considered low-end before development on KSP ever began? I can try that OpenGL thing and see what does...

Got 1.0.2 up and running. Still need to update a few mods that were working in 1.0.0 but are whining in 1.0.2. Got started with a new career game (my 1.0.0 career game was short to say the least). Did the usual array of early missions for cash and early science. Built "Bob's Wacky Sciencemobile 7" using a quad of Sci Jrs and Goo Pods for a body, a Mk1 Cockpit for a pod, bush-plane tricycle gear for wheels and a pair of Basic Jets attached to FL-T100s for propulsion and drove it around KSC to pick up a fair amount of science, enough to get the Stayputnik and batteries unlocked at least. Last thing I did was launch a Kerbal tour bus - six tourists all on sub-orbital flights plus Jeb as the pilot. Rocket suffered from some floppiness on account of the fact that I didn't have struts just yet, but it worked well enough and made it back safely to Kerbin. I was a bit concerned when the thing nosed down so that the heat shield wasn't protecting any of the pods, but they all survived and the flight ended successfully. Also got Val into orbit. Today's plan - drive around the Sci-Mobile some more; there's some more KSC biomes I've yet to hit. Try to get struts. Think about heading towards Mun when I get an opportunity.

Decided to try my hand at launching a 0.23 Geschosskopf science bomb lander in 1.0, using Procedural Fairings to cover the payload. CoM on the launcher went a little too far aft in flight and those little AV-R8s didn't cut it as far as keeping the correct end of the rocket pointed towards space. Did not go to space today. Did make one addition to the usual sci-lander design - an extra-large heat shield. I wanted to see A) how much it would cut into the design's delta-V and if it would really guard all the little dangly science bits or not. Since I didn't even make it into space, I didn't get either question answered. The plan is to re-design the launcher tonight, so maybe I'll have better luck then.

The observations most folks have been getting so far generally put the new LKO delta-V requirement between 3500-4000 m/s of delta-V, depending on how well you fly. The 4500 figure is indeed based on the old aerodynamic system, and it'll probably be a while until folks will have time to update the delta-V maps.

Okay...so yeah, your pitching surfaces are both pretty close to your CoM and in-line with the main wing (the second of which, since you're going with a tail-less delta design, is to be expected). I might suggest moving the wings back a little and compensating for the shift in CoL with a pair of canards; those would help your pitch issues anyway since they'd be well forward of the CoM. Maybe slightly above the plane of the main wing if you can manage it. Speaking of the main wing, it looks a little on the small side to me. Ordinarily I'd diagnose issues there by take-off speed, but you've got an excess of thrust available to you at takeoff (myself, I'd launch a 40-tonne plane with two turbojets and two RAPIERs), so that's out. The only other way I know to go about figuring out how much wing you need is to calculate the wing area for a reasonable wing loading, which A) is probably something that's not necessary in the new stock aero and something I haven't figured out how to do yet with stock parts... Definitely would not be using an Elevon 1 for a plane that size as a main pitching surface, IMHO (unless it's working for you).

Perfectly viable way to play the game. And I've been told I rely too heavily on the math before... Okay...so the takeoff speed would suggest you've got about the amount of wing you need. I would think that you'd want to be going higher and faster before switching over to closed cycle, though; don't know if the new stock will let RAPIERs get going faster or not. Anyways, 950-1120 m/s at switchover gives you a requirement of somewhere around ~1250-1450 m/s of delta-V to make it into space. Your plane is a rocket at that point, so Tsiolkovsky will be able to tell you how much fuel you need once you're up at that point. Long and the short of it - your plane needs more gas, IMHO.