dtobi

Wow, these look super sexy!

BTW: you can make beautiful visual staging indicators with the action group triggers and some nice B9 lights (see example craft Explorer). It has three lights on its back. Whenever a stage is spent (fuel tank is empty, not engines have burnt out) a light will go on.

I was searching the forums and google to see if someone had already done that. Nothing! Mechjeb can auto stage with some guesstimates but few people use it (I don't) and its guesstimates are useless if you work with external tanks without engines attached.

It is the same for all engines. Even stock engines don't gimbal when you activate them with an action group. I don't know how to fix that. Sorry.

I just disabled surface attachment. That should do the trick.

Fixed it!...

The reason I made the auto staging devices: I hate it to monitor the external tanks just to find out when it has drained. It is cumbersome and doesn't work from IVA. The staging and action group triggers solve that.

The new update is out! Changes: V0.7 Automatic staging and action groups plus minor fixes * Added staging and action group trigger thingys (see pictures) * Removed surface attachment property from fuel breakers * Adjusted drag values for fuel tanks and caps a bit until I found out that all values of the stock parts are bogus. If someone wants to make a sane suggestion - go ahead. See first post for more info on auto staging devices.

I started making a plugin that can disable a fuel line with an action group. To achieve that, I'd like to look at all children of my "disabler part". However, every time I try to activate the disabling funcion I get the following error in the debug log: FileNotFoundException: Could not load file or assembly 'System.Collections, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a' or one of its dependencies. The function body looks like this: [KSPEvent(guiName = "Deactivate Fuel Flow", guiActive = true)] public void deactivateFuelFlow() { print("Fuel Controller: deactivate flow."); foreach (Part c in this.part.children){ if (c is FuelLine) { print("FuelLine Child found!"); ((FuelLine)c).BreakLine(); } } } It doesn't even print the "Fuel Controller: deactivate flow.". However it prints the debug messages that I put into the onStart method of the class. Commenting out the line " ((FuelLine)c).BreakLine();" changes nothing at all. I'm sure that I am missing something easy and essential. Can someone help?

The tank volumes aren't guesstimates but are the result of the actual geometric volume of the cylinders. The larger tank is higher and wider. In total that makes a much larger volume.

I'll first review the drag values of the stock parts and of B9. These have been my reference so far. Maybe the values for the small and large sizes are off. We'll see. I'll keep you posted.

I think I can fix that. --> Try the next release again. Thanks for the hint.

That's probaby because they are sooooo thin. Maybe I can change the size of the attachment point to make it better.

Great to see you mastered it. Have you already tried the new and stronger x3 engine?

I need to fix that in the next release. Are you using FAR?

I made a new release with a non-rotating BB2 engine. Can you try if this engine also creates lag? BTW: the heat animation works on the BB2 (it doesn't for the rotating BB1).

Unfortunately not. I can't reproduce the error. Can you send me your craft file?

Is your shuttle flipping forward or back?

What exactly is the issue? You can look at the example craft in the download file, too.

There is a new engine now (x3) and a new large example craft. Look at the album in the first post. I hope you like it. TWR and efficiency are the same as the mainsail.

The new update is out.

Thanks. I'll remove all duplicates in the next release.

I am pretty sure that you have way too much thrust on your tank side. In addition the shuttle is too high on the tank. The shuttles engines must be able to turn the shuttle as the CoM shifts. Your CoM is almost at the same height as the shuttle engines. The best thing the engines can do here is pushing the shuttle sideways but they can hardly turn it. Try reducing the thrust on your tank side or increase the thrust on the shuttle side. In addition try to have the CoM higher. I hope this helps.

It sounds as if your TWR is bad. You also might want to add some more boosters because the stock boosters are just not good enough. For my KM Atlantis I used four boosters instead of two. It looks nice, too. I think you'll like what I am currently adding for the next release... A stronger version of the X2. I has the same efficiency and TRW as the mainsail. It packs 500kN. So three of these will be exactly the same as the mainsail or the large BB1. Using four or five will give you quite some more thrust.

Sure! Have you read my previous post about the CoM and the position of the external tank? Could you post some pictures of your craft, including a side view with CoM and CoT?