Pappystein

The Mighty Titan. The Rocket family that put the US on the path to the moon… but was really the best launch vehicle for large objects in space. Until It wasn’t. This will be a series of articles covering the entire Titan family, flown and in cases we have good data, un-flown variants. Now as the Titan family is partially shadowed in secrecy due to it’s work as a Nuclear missile and as a launch platform for NRO satellites, sometimes I will have to use conjecture to describe certain rockets. This conjecture is based in interconnected facts even if the conjecture itself is a guess. I am not the first person who has summarized the Titan family and I won’t be the last. One of my sources is the SpaceLaunchReport.com website by Ed Kyle. While I do not rely on his research and summation, It is a good starting place for people interested in Titan, Atlas, Thor/Delta Launch vehicles. But first here is a link to the previous post in this series: The Titan Missile; Genesis from a backup to the long arm of SAC

If it is something you like I am glad to provide. If you have an alternative suggestion for how I should post I will gladly look into any constructive suggestions. This is part of my way of giving back to the community if you will. Sadly it is hard to justify injecting pictures into the document as the wall of text becomes too big to be a READABLE post. And while pictures may = a thousand words. Pictures can only SHOW history, they can't tell you what was actually going on.... My next post of the like will be at-least a couple days away as there is a lot of editing (the document is already split into 6 posts!) I am indeed covering all the standard sized Titans. HOPEFULLY the post will clear up a LOT of confusion that exists on the Titan Family. It will also point out some "standard" parts that are still missing from Titan in BDB. Some we can kit-bash, or has easy substitutions, others, not so much. I may later cover LDC but there is much less "engineering" documentation on LDC and more "marketing" documentation which is risking quoting a lot of incorrect data.

I read, I process and I try to see how one thing fits with the next. I use critical and "outside the box" thinking plus logic, to self analyze anything I read. None of these things are taught in any school I have heard of. In fact it is a large reason why I don't have a degree in Aerospace or Electronic Engineering of one form or another.... or for that matter a 4 year degree at all. Anything else I would say sounds like bragging. So instead, let me give you an example of how I come up with my data points. Engineering documents can be very confusing... If you ignore all the math formulas the document can either be a waste of time or a treasure trove of data. The example I am going to use is the Titan CT3 and Titan IV. They had new engines that few documents seem to want to talk about. In fact I have found no all up comparison (or complete data set) for the AJ-11A engines on the CT3 and Titan IV Rockets. I used 4 sets of documents to come up with my proposed suggestions for changes to both BDB and the Wiki that put requests in for yesterday. One such document that I read last week talked about the KH-10 and the Titan IIIM and how the man rating hardware on the LR87-AJ-11 would add about 380kg of mass to the first stage and a smaller mass to the 2nd stage for the LR91. But that the improvements in thrust vs the then production standard AJ-9 would offset the extra mass. Then read a document on Titan IV stating that the LR87-AJ-11A for Titan IV and CT3 did not have the man rating hardware and it was designed out of the appropriate stages. Knowing that the man rating hardware was used in two ways on Titan rockets can be gleaned from all the NASA Gemini Titan LV documents. They lowered the pressure in the Turbo-pumps(which lowers thrust) and added many built in test features. So the differences between the LR87-AJ-11 used on all the Titan 23, 24, 33 and 34 rockets EXCEPT 23G, and the LR87-AJ-11A used on Commercial Titan 3 and Titan IV, are the 11A has higher thrust and the entire stage weighs less because the built in test equipment was either removed or lighter replacements added in (new technology.) That makes the -11A engine a significant upgrade over the -11 even though the thrust is only about 10% more. It is the mass + the thrust increase that make it significant. I combined 4 sets of documents to come up with these facts and figures. ONE was a NASA document about the Titan IIIM as well as the proposed Titan IIIE. Another was a series of 3 documents on man-rating the Titan II to become the GLV and the third was a document from Martin Marietta talking about the proposed Titan IV as well as another document from the same source on the Commercial Titan 3 (CT3.) You will notice, that I have to make several assumptions here. My data on man rating the engines comes from the AJ-5 to AJ-7 program. That was how NASA man rated the original Gemini Titan II LV. The man rating hardware in the early Titan III(2x) family massed 380kg in the first stage. DID it mass 380kg at the end of the Titan III 2x/3x program? Sadly we have to ASSUME so since no document states the stages got lighter as they "improved production"... but it is the first assumption. Now we have to ignore most of the data on the Titan CT3 because it's first stage was quoted as a "Titan IIIM first stage" when it really wasn't. Most the data on this stage just quotes the same info as the original Titan 24B data for the stage (including the base AJ-11 engine!) So we really can't do a stage mass vs stage mass calculation because every public source seems to use Titan 24B data... and quote the wrong engine version. Titan CT3's first stage was built to Titan IV standards, but with smaller tanks (and a shorter length similar to the earlier IIIM tanks.) As the Titan IV first stage is stretched with more fuel... again we can't do a mass vs mass calculation worth mentioning. So I have a known-ish thrust gain of around 10% and a POSSIBLE mass reduction of 380kg in the first stage (that is about 840lbs for those of you trying to think in the Standard scale.) I have to make the assumptions that these changes are accurate sadly. Mind you none of this takes into account the Transistorization and later integrated circuits being used in the Avionics. That could be a further mass reduction. And something to consider. Hope that answers your question and does not sound like Bragging. I have gifts and talents. But each and every one of you do as well. Don't think I am special. I just have my talents, just like you do. Your talents make you equally special. And no I am not saying that to be humble. Just to point out that EACH of us has something that separates us from the REST of use... no matter how much we might try to hid it. For example, I may be able to make a 3d model in a CAD program. But I have no real capability at making 3d models for games like KSP. And don't ask about my ability to Texture. Cobaltwolf looked at my crude attempts and thankfully did not laugh in my face (he is too upstanding of a guy to do so mind you!) But he can make 3D art that is beautiful and actually looks like it was made in the real world. I can not and I have spent a lot of hours learning and trying... well failing. PS now you know I am going to have to do a document or series of documents on the Titan family.

First off I want to take a minute to thank all the people who are simulating history with KSP. While I am a published historian, that really isn't my cup of tea (I rather like making my own things instead of historically accurate flights.... generally) But several of you, have made amazing rockets based on real life and provided a lot of amazing screenshots of your flights. I really love how things get explained in them, and sometimes how funny anecdotes result from the particular launch. So thank you all who are posting the historical flights. Also thank you all to who post the what if and completely off the rails flights. You all have a great place here in this KSP forum. While I will be slowing down my "Historical" posts now that I am recovered from COVID and going back to work. I will still post them from time to time. I was working on a post for yesterday but it became rather long and I got distracted by some suggested edits I was also working on for Friznits wiki (enough so that I had to pull a ticket on both the Wiki and the BDB Githubs.) ================================================================================================== If you took one engine family out of the US rocket program, what single family’s removal would utterly emasculate the US rocket program from the 1950s to the 1990s?

Thought I would work on another Engine for today's BDB history post, where I post the history of some parts in BDB. well in this case it is the Engine that little is known about but the politics surrounding it created a near monopoly on the Flagship Rocket of NASA.... for 50 years. This engine was part of two rocket programs, and never flew. While test engines were burned on the stand, including an all up prototype first stage. The rocket engine itself never flew

1) it wasn't Idiocy it was having to convert from standard to Metric and back over and over. we get it 2) that explains why the Mariner solar panels are honkin huge compared to the earlier ones they are based on.

Before I get into the Addendum on the J-2: Here is the original Article J-2 an Addendum. So I realized that I forgot to mention one of the J-2X engine variants from the original J-2X program (not the 2nd program that became J-2S nor the 3rd program that is not even related to the J-2) The original J-2L was not the Linear Aerospike I mentioned above. Rather it was a L for LIGHTENED J-2. This involved some wizardry in improving the turbo-pumps to reduce the mass of the Engine. The Bell and other structures were left basically the same. It is the Turbopumps that would be the main focus for each of the first two J-2X programs in one form or another. And while not the final turbo pumps made for the J-2S, the J-2L's pumps were enough to consider making a new production standard. This was quickly swept under the rug as it where, when the original J-2X program was de-funded by NASA in early 1968, with only some basic hardware prototypes but not a complete engine manufactured. I also want to mention that both of the first J-2X programs were basically the same program with two separate times of funding by NASA. The interruption co-insides with the Apollo 1 Fire, and the fallout that NASA faced over it. The J-2X program was meant as a continuous (for the lifecycle of Saturn Rockets) improvement program to develop newer technologies to make the J-2 better, more powerful and cheaper. Not necessarily all at once. What grew out of the J-2X program was a slew of J-2 variants I covered above and the J-2X program is what gave NAA-Rocketdyne the leg up on the competition for the Space Shuttle Main Engine (RS-25 or SSME) Here is a concise list of the J-2 variants in BDB (and at-least prototyped in the real world) J-2srs 1 srs 2 and srs 3 (All just called J-2) J-2X J-2S J-2S Sea Level J-2T 200K and 250K J-2T 400K (Extras folder) Unknown if this was actually built but there are enough design drawings to confirm it was at-least designed for manufacturing. HG-3 and HG-3 SL (Extras folder just re-uses J-2S models and is not representative of how a real HG-3 would look) With the exception of the J-2T 400K these engines can drop in replace the J-2 on just about any launcher. The J-2T 400K is too large to easily use on the S-II stage and is only really viable in the single Engine S-IVB stage. NOT in BDB but in some way shape or form prototypes in the real world J-2L (lightened bell type) Some hardware but no complete engine was ever made as was quickly surpassed by the lighter and cheaper J-2S design. J-2L (Linear Aerospike aka XRS-2200) as stated above the XRS-2200 is almost a part for part reproduction of the J-2L design. The major differences occur at the Linear Aerospike itself given almost 20 years of engine technology growth (and improved metallurgy) The XRS-2200 actually used a produced but never flown J-2S power head.

OK so I had another small history nugget to share today. With the upcoming (it ill get here SOON(tm)) Saturn Update for BDB. I thought I should cover MLV. Now MLV is not a rocket, but rather a large series of Rockets with two designation systems. MLV and INT. And it is confusing what each means. Unlike the previous posts this one will be pretty short as I am NOT going to cover any MLV or INT variants in this but rather what MLV and INT stand for. MLV or Modified Launch vehicle is any rocket that uses Saturn V parts including one form or another of the Saturn S-IC stage. Direct S-IC replacement stages count. Conversely INT stands for INTermediate and represent anything that is Saturn IB or is a Saturn IB replacement. Thus even though the Saturn II, used the S-II stage, it is an INT rocket in the INT-17, INT-18, and INT-19 rocket proposals, as it was intended as a replacement for the Saturn IB Rocket.

So while I am finishing up my Covid lock-down (thankfully COVID wasn't too bad for me.) I though I would publish at-least one more historical paper on confusing things to hopefully make them less confusing. The Previous Article: Today's subject is the J-2 Engine. Like most of you I know of many J-2 variants, and confusingly many of them have the same name. Or multiple engines have the same name with a different suffex. But we should start at the start. NASA was looking for a new Hydrolox engine for their Saturn rocket. They wanted something more powerful than the anemic but efficient Pratt and Whitney RL10 that was developed by happenstance. A competition was opened, and won by Aerojet... The LR87-LH2 beat out all the competition on 10 of 11 critical requirements. The 11th requirement would be the killer however... as to meet the thrust requirements Aerojet would use TWO LR87s (much like they did under the Titan rockets!) instead of one. This extra complexity in plumbing and mass (actually not much extra of either but to the bean counters it was a doubling.) prevented the LR87-LH2 from ever flying on a Saturn Rocket. Add to the fact that at the time in question, Aerojet was in a CRASH* program to push through development for the afor mentioned Titan Rockets...... And Aerojet is set aside for the least technically complicated alternative choice, the Rocketdyne J2. The Decision to go with Rocketdyne is not without controversy. Pratt and Whitney already knew many of the particular issues with burning Hydrolox in a Rocket engine. On paper their engine was about as efficient and powerful as the proposed Rocketdyne J-2. But Like Aerojet, Pratt and Whitney was currently devoting a lot of their engineering to solving problems with another rocket already... in this case the Centaur. Only Rocketdyne had the engineering capacity to direct to a new Large Hydrolox project so by default Rocketdyne was tapped to engineer and manufacture the J-2. I am not going to spend a lot of time here talking further on the politics of why Rocketdyne was selected (and bear in mind that it is Politics that determined their selection...) Rather I am going to jump right into the meat. The varinats: Production J-2 Only one version of the J-2 was produced and launched. During it's life-cycle we saw a steady improvement in thrust and a directly correlated improvement in ISP. Beyond these changes to the turbopumps and plumbing to improve thrust, the J-2 engines that flew were all broadly identical. There were 2 sucessive updates over the base engine resulting in the following power and ISP performance: Initial Production: 889.6kn 418isp VAC Early launches 1000kn 419isp VAC Final Launches 1023kn 425isp VAC PROPOSED J-2: There were lots of proposals to alter the J-2. Some of which got to the hardware stage: First off is the J-2X (not to be confused by the entirely new rocket engine that is loosely based on the J-2 for the old Constelation program!) J-2X isn't a single engine but rather a series of programs designed to improve performance or lighten mass of the engine (or both.) In it's initial run in the late 1960s (66 to 68 I believe,) Plumbing, pref-light man-hours and basic mass was reduced. To improve performance three engineering choices were presented, an inflatable "Air Mat" bell extension, A retracted fixed bell extension (like used on the RL10B-2) and a multi part bell extension like used on portions of the LGM-119 Peacekeeper (MX) missile. were proposed. Due to early cancelation (program was to run until 1970) a crash decision had to be made as to what to test. As Rocketdyne was the only company looking at leveraging the Goodyear inflatable nozzle ideas they chose the "Air Mat" While two J-2Xs were built with two sizes of Goodyear "Air Mat" extensions, they were never actually fired due to the end of J-2 Testing in the High Altitude chamber at Arnold. Instead Nitrogen was pumped through shutdown engines to test the effect on the "Air Mat" it reliably extended giving hope that this technology could work. This engine is in BDB 1.7 as the J-2X. The SECOND J-2X program, would not keep it's name for long. It quickly evolved into the J-2 (Simplified) program. The J-2 (Simplified) program took what was learned from the initial J-2X program and applied it to standard J-2 Engines. This further evolved the J-2's plumbing and connections and resulted in a reduction in man hours of work before flight by over 50% over the standard J-2 engine. This helps to drive down launch costs so it is an important improvement. The 2nd J-2X program would now be called the J-2S (s standing for Simplified.) And even though the J-2 testing was long canceled, as part of the Space Shuttle program several J-2S engines were built and test-fired. The J-2S is indirectly the first step on the road to the Rocketdyne RS25 SSME. The J-2S is in BDB 1.7 as J-2S. The J-2S was NOT the last gasp of the J-2 for use on proposed Saturn Rockets. During the initial J-2X program, new engine ideas were allowed to propagate and build into a series of 4 engines. Some of which would not be fired until the late 1980s. Not all are represented in BDB but all are presented here. The AEROSPIKE is a unique bell-less engine. It can be made in two ways, the linear aerospike and the toroidal aerospike. Each has advantages and disadvantages. for example, the Toroidal Aerospike is the heavier of the two options and can not be easily "enlarged" as thrust is directly proportional to it's size. The Linear aerospike is less efficient but adds an ease of control and ease of increasing thrust by small changes in length. TWO Aerospike engines were designed, the J-2T, and the J-2L. Hopefully it is obvious that the J-2T is the toroidal and the J-2L is the Linear aerospike. Rocketdyne chose to go for efficiency and made the J-2T Toroidal Aerospike. Initially in prototype form it was good for 200,000 lbf (or 889.6kn also the same performance as the initial J-2) After some re-working of the J-2S powerhead behind the aerospike, the J-2T was good for 250k lbf. Hence in BDB the engine is called J-2T-200K or J-2T-250K depending on upgrades. Sadly while there are pictures of the J-2T in an engine test stand burning, there are no clean pictures of an un-lit J-2T or pictures close enough to actually see what it looks like while burning. As part of their advanced projects NAA Rocketdyne looked at enlarging the J-2T and found that by increasing it's size by a small percentage they could net 400,000 lbf thrust (about 1780kn) While no hardware was built to this standard it would be possible to mount a single one of these on the MS-IVB stage. and by mass would be only slightly heavier than a standard J-2 for a huge increase in thrust and efficiency. But remember the J-2L was never built (and is not in BDB.) Add twenty years and you get the X-33 Aerospace plane program. One of NASA's many wastes of money to keep the boys and girls making rockets to still make rockets. It calls for a Linear Aerospike in the design. A Linear Aerospike called the RS-2200.... Who is made by Rocketdyne and is almost a part for part reproduction... of the J-2L! The J-2L err excuse me the XRS-2200. Here ends our tale of the J-2. ERR WAIT no there are two more J-2s to talk about. During the MLV program, various proposals for re-using Saturn hardware came into existence. One, the Saturn INT-17,18 and 19 programs would use the Saturn S-II stage from the Saturn V as the first stage of a new rocket. Now the J-2 Engine is incredibly efficient in a vacuum. But gives up that efficency at higher pressures like say Sea level. So as part in parcel to this proposal it was proposed to make a sea level bell for the J-2, and latter the J-2S was included in this. The new bell would be approximately 50% shorter and offer an improved thrust and ISP at sea level. The trade off would be that in a Vacuum the engine was sigificantly (almost 100 isp) less efficient. But since the S-II stage was not meant to get all the way to space, the gains out weighed the losses. The Sea Level J-2S engine is in BDB 1.7 The Last J-2 to mention, is a J-2 only in hereditary design process. Rocketdyne decided to see what would happen if they changed the J-2s combustion cycle and increase pressure via a new turbopump arrangement. The result, was the HG-3. This engine, owing everything to the knowledge gained on the J-2 was related to the J-2 only in that a for mentioned knowledge. No pictures have ever been uncovered of the HG-3 and the one drawing seen has a large triangular blob where the Turbopumps would be and thus can hardly call the drawing accurate. The neat fact is the HG-3 would be about the same size as a J-2, would hit 315k lbf of thrust or 1400kn... And have an ISP of a staggering 451 in Vacuum. A Sea Level bell version would power the Saturn INT-17 mentioned above. If I had to imagine how the HG-3 would look, I might see a smaller version of the RS25/SSME bell on a J-2S with the turbopumps enlarged slightly. But that is just my head-canon visualization. The HG-3 would be scaled up to become the RS-25/SSME after some further changes and tweaks. Now the real confusing one! The modern J-2X has nothing in common with the original J-2 other than they looked at the original J-2 designs and said "Lets make a clean sheet engine and call it a J-2X to confuse everyone" cause you know they were supposed to put the old J-2 back in production with new materials... At-least the F-1B is mostly a F-1A with new parts.... *a CRASH program (and the word CRASH is always capitalized) is an official US military program of paramount requirements that supersedes all other projects. If your company is part of a crash program 100% of your workforce that can be MUST BE assigned to the CRASH program. In the case of Aerojet, the CRASH development of the LR87/LR91 AJ5 engines too up so much effort that by the time they were ready to make space launchers out of the Titan the improved AJ-9 was so delayed that it flew on only a few flights. The first 3 Titan III flights flew on Titan 2 engines, and by the end of the first Generation Titan III, the AJ-9 engines were progressively being upgraded to flight test models for the AJ-11. BUT to be clear, NO Titan III flew with an AJ-11 engine and only three flew with the AJ-5 engines. The AJ-11 engines were introduced into production for the Titan 23 series and later (excluding the 23G.)

On the Subject of Agena, Agena is one of the most boring stages to make. There are so few parts to make one. HOWEVER Agena is one of the most useful stages.... Although I submit the JPL 6K stage is equally useful (and a lot less boring to look at!) You have the TRU/GCU (Officially in USAF nomenclature it is a GUIDANCE CONTROL UNIT or GCU which is what I call it in all my posts.) Bell/Lockheed may call it a TRU. you have 2 and ONLY 2 tanks. you have a single tank butt - Engine assembly) you have 2 Equipment Racks. That is Agena in a nutshell. What isn't covered, is what makes Agena such a great upper stage: Agena SOT (Drop) tank expansion more than doubles the d/V Agena can achive Engine upgrades? There are what, 7 in game right now with a potential of 5 more via simple bell extensions (8096C/L) AFT rack SPS engines, developed for Gemini Agena Target Vehicle can further improve performance via extra thrust when you need it. Ignoring the Harvester Signals Intelligence Birds, Agena makes a great Communication Satellite bus. (Now why isn't there a JX2 antenna at 0.9375m diameter!?) Agena is one of the few USEFUL upper stages with Storable propellant. Sure, not as much fun as a Centaur.... but no Boiloff to worry about. The Variants: First off there is the "experimental" Agena A. Each Agena A was custom built for it's specific mission. No two were identical. Some had extra batteries in the aft skirt, others carried extra RCS. STANDARDIZATION: Agena B and Agena D early production. The Guidance and Control Unit was updated to a unified standard (and would remain unchanged until the complete transistorization in the Ascent Agena.) An improved larger fuel tank Forward equipment rack was added. This was originally for Engine restart hardware as an alternative to the battery/RCS Aft Skirt, an Aft Rack was developed. This is the primary visual difference between a standard Agena B and a Standard Agena D hybrid stage Gemini Agena Target Vehicle is developed. Utilizes the space frame of the Agena differently than the Standard B/D Agena. Spacecraft to Agena interfaces are custom built on Agena B but are standardized on Agena D for even better cost performance NASA: new versions of the Bell LR81 engine developed that uses small electrical bellows on the fuel and oxidizer tank for engine restart This empties the forward Equipment rack. Forward equipment rack is now used for batteries and experiments (as well as new light fixtures.) Forward Helium bottle is superfluous and removed. GCU is still hybrid vacuum tube and Transistor Post GATV USAF: Forward equipment rack either empty or loaded with batteries Forward GCU Helium bottle is left in place for balance purposes but left empty. Development started on lightened Ascent Agena New restartable 8096 Engines using the electronic bellows developed for NASA Ascent Agena USAF only: Final 18 Agenas only! (listed as "AGENA" on order not "AGENA D" or some alternative) Forward equipment Rack is deleted shortening the over all length Updated to 8096B with HDA (that is IRFNA-IV in CRP for KSP) This alters tank size slightly (4") Overall mass down significantly as last of the Vacuum Tubes in the electronics are replaced with JFET or FET transistors. possible limited use of basic ICs at this time. Helium tank deleted from GCU, GCU's mass down 200kg! POST GATV NASA proposals: SOT / Drop Tank Agena Designed to be used on either expendable launchers or as part of a Space Shuttle Launching system Growth Agena. Large Diameter Agena variant proposed many times over the lifecycle of Agena. 3.05m (10ft) IRL diameter making it 1.875m in KSP scale. In addition to the SOT tankage, there is the Growth Agena, which is a full up 1.875m stage in KSP (3.05m/10ft IRL) This would require a whole ship-set of new parts, only re-using the Engines from the Basic Agena. Growth Agena can represent 2 other never flown "Agena" Derivatives. Agena 2000 (was to fly with an engine that was not made by Bell Textron) was in-fact a 1.875m KSP scale stage for Atlas V-Light. You can also make the very unknown (as in there is literally only vague references) Agena C which by said vague references was to be a 10ft Agena (3.05m AKA 1.875m in KSP scale.) Agena C was canceled in favor of the much less ambitious Agena D (and that was probably a good decision.) I hope this little short History of Agena as told by a guy who likes to dig into a bunch of crap and find these gems..... is helpful and showcases why Agena should be your upper stage of choice! HDA *MAY* have flown on the Ascent Agena. Not enough documentation on Ascent Agena is in public domain to know for certain however.. I assume above that it flew on Ascent Agena however 8096C and 8096L are two "hypothetical" engines, they use the same hardware but burn different fuel ratios for significantly different thrust profiles. 8096C and 8096L would have had 3 bell sizes and flown on Shuttle Agena or Later civilian Agena launches of one form or another.

So after a few launches, I thought I would provide some feedback ATLAS Stage and a Half Auto separate. Effin AWESOME! Just need to remember to enable it and choose your correct G-Load... I haven't tested it on all Atlas Variants but on the D/E early birds 4G works perfectly for me! I assume this was a Zorg/Blowfish invention given earlier comments so thanks!

err... The 8096C has a Fixed 100 or 150:1 bell currently. There is no deploy-able bell version. *Starts up KSP to verify sanity hasn't slipped away with the arrival of COVID....*

Related to the above: The XLR81 also covers the Ascent Agena which there isn't a lot of data on cause it was NRO only and only used on like the last 18 NRO Agena launches. Ascent Agena had the large bell 8096B engine and a stripped down GCU (most Guidance and control were from payload not the Agena itself anymore) Ascent Agena is actually the lightest weight and highest performing of all the actually launched Agena variants. And the only variant with no failures in the Agena stage (excluding the Limited Run Gemini Target Agena Vehicle.) If you dig into the Agena orders from the GAO documents that have been released it is easy to tell the Ascent Agenas. They are the last ones ordered and they are ordered as "AGENA" and not "AGENA A" , "AGENA D" etc. Even the GATVs were ordered as "AGENA D" for NASA. Completely un-related question. But you brought up the 8096C. Are we going to get the other two versions of the 8096C (same engine just different bell sizes / ISP.) IIRC the biggest 8096C is 300:1 which would make it a bit bigger than a RL10B-2's bell The one in game is 150:1 I think. Cobalt has my research on that somewhere. Giant Coloumbium nozzles FTW

I am not certain but it sounds like you want all the ENGINE VARIANTS to be visible as separate parts. That is not possible. All the active engines ARE available under engines. The only exceptions are a few engines that are being depreciated with the next update.

ish,. If you go up earlier this page you can clearly see posts talking about how 1.11 has major physics bugs.

I assume that this will be fixed by SQUAD in the near future. IE you will be able to have your Physics.cfg set back to defaults. Atleast I hope so!

In short you don't want to do that. The fuel ratios are already correct. You are messing with multiple unit types and assuming they are all the same when they are not. for example the 15:1 ratio of LH2 to Oxidizer IS a 3:1 ratio! EDITED: I will further add that Saturn IS under-scaled but the next major update IS SATURN. So have some chill time, sit back and await progress with the rest of us. We are getting a proper 5.625m Saturn V sometime soon(tm) Alternatively you can look at the RSS/RO threaeds as they have partial/full conversions for BDB's Saturn.

I do believe they are fixed. Joe, It sound like you built the Saturn Rocket in the wrong order. I suggest starting with the LEM, Build it completely, then put a decoupler on the LDE on the LEM, then Place the LEM in a SLA part. THEN put the SM engine in the top of the SLA Build up and Build down from there. You can open the SLA panels to work on placing antenna or any solar panels you want on your SM. When you are building your rocket you are attaching to the LEM's docking port node instead of the SLA node. Basically your SM is too low. Oh and if you use autostruts you won't have ANY wobble PPS: If the AJ10-137 engine-plate is not flush with the top of the SLA you have it attached to the wrong node.

Soon?(TM) I assume proper mounts and tanks for Timber-wind on Titan, Timber-wind on Saturn and the like.... Will come when they come. We know Cobaltwolf IRL is "fun" ATM, so I can only suggest patience. according to this chart there are several potential rockets to be integrated on.. Which require multiple parts and time to do. And I am surprised that Timberwind is even in BDB... It is after all the propulsion for an Exopheric Kinetic or chemical Laser Kill vehicle for SDI (aka STAR WARS)

I assume this means you have solved the issue? Glad to hear it

@Lisias has a small mod made to work with Tweakscale to force memory of things that KSP "overrides" maybe you need that installed? It sounds like exactly what the mod was developed for. https://spacedock.info/mod/2434/KSP-Recall But beyond that, you will need to provide logs for anyone to be able to help you. Instructions are in my signature below!

Kerbin Space Agency Flight number 2. Mercury Red Juno IVA. Due to serious issues with man-rating engines for first stages, The KSA had to re-use the A-7 Rocket from the Redstone in a quad package to loft this. As the Thor tank is slightly better than the Juno, Thor tanks were substituted in for the first stage. Since JPL had zero issues meeting the man rating standards on their 45K engine, that was used for the orbital injection stage. The Engineers and scientists were pretty certain it might make orbit.... If the solar winds were on it's side that is.

Don't know if this will interest anyone but I found some drawings of the Titan SRM assembly (to titan) on the Launch pads which includes the actual hardware used to hold the SRMs in place. https://commons.erau.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=3080&context=space-congress-proceedings I was looking for how Titan would attach Soltan (I think it would have been a smaller version of the UA12x attachment/decoupler structure.) Given, how in these drawings the Titan side attachment is much smaller than the SRM side attachment there might be a case for that.

I think you are reading it wrong. But more importantly adding 50% more of zero is still zero. Most of the "proposed" setups in this case being entirely new stages that have not been built into BDB. Only Gamma re-uses a non uniquely Hydrolox stage and coverts it with parts (internal ones that we can't see) from another Hydrolox stage. That being said, I Think, EXCEPTING VEGA, things look OK. To your comment about Titan, in every case that I have data for, the Titan Hydrolox stage would have been 2.5m or larger KSP scale, not 1.875m so... new stage new parts not re-using any of the non hydrolox parts. Remember, the Hydrolox LR87 was developed for SATURN not TITAN. And I am Hoping that we get a 4x S-IVB engine plate for 4 LR87 Hydrolox engines... or a 10x S-II plate for the same reason or alternatively we get the DUAL LR87 Hydrolox that the production model would have likely been I know an argument could be made that LDC /Hercules parts need the boiloff function somewhat similar to Centaur as it is a kitbash of several different proposals including one Hydrolox one. And I haven't checked to see if they have any such Boiloff setting in the cfgs. Here are the two NON LDC Hydrolox Titan proposals over the years I have any sort of hard data on (thanks to Ed Kyle for making nice graphics showing size and dimensions) as you can see 2x of the 4 Hydrolox Titans actually subsitute CENTAUR for the 2nd stage and that is what makes them Hydrolox. The other two, both cases have over large diameters meaning not standard Titan I through IV hardware http://www.spacelaunchreport.com/titannot.html

So I have literally JUST gotten up but the last half hour in bed I was thinking on this and I think (I haven't looked into it yet) the Boiloff module IS the insulation. Meaning all that needs to happen is the Centaur Boiloff module needs to be copied to Vega tanks At this point this is just a semi-conscious guess. will edit when I look into it in a few minutes EDITED AS PROMISED: The B9 Fuel switch boil-off add-on is not adding internal insulation. THIS is where we are seeing no insulation from. And this is PROBABLY RIGHT. You are dumping Hydrolox into what is basically a Kerolox tank setup. BDB is just forcing you to actually use Hydrolox Tanks. The issue is, certain tanks (I am thinking Specifically of Vega.) would need more than what the B9 Patch offers . Given Gamma (the Hydrolox Vega) was made up with Centaur D insulation I feel it should have the same or better boiloff parameters as Centaur D tanks. I say better because smaller = more controllable thermodynamics. But actually since some of the documents on Gamma state that it would actually have a lower boil off than Centaur.... But that is a function of the pressure vs Volume dynamics not better insulation.