[WIP] Minmus Mintchip Sprinkle, now with working DL.

[Whirligig Girl]

There's a small little subculture of mods, ones that, instead of making Kerbin bigger or better, try to make the universe smaller. Why? This is why:

I was tempted to call my little project B612, and this may become the project's name if I ever have more than one object of tiny size.

It's a small chunk of Minmus in a Medium-Kerbin-Orbit. It'll be a nice challenge for some early-career science, or an easy rendezvous for your final Kerbin SOI science. Right now, it has no custom science, but this will change.

But not only do I want you to have fun with it, I want you to help me with it. Like any alpha release, I need bugfinders and even bugfixers. Some bugs are inherent to what happens when you make a planet so extremely tiny.

For now, this adds no textures at all, but I might add some eventually when the need to differentiate between different planets becomes apparent. The "terrain" is also exactly identical to Minmus', but this may change as well! So many changes!

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Right now, here are its celestial body stats.

GravityASL: 0.3 Gees

Radius: 125 meters

RotationPeriod: 2 Hours

Orbital paramters:

ReferenceBody = Kerbin

Inclination = 17.15 degrees (Pretty darn angled)

Eccentricity = 0.25 (Pretty darn elliptical)

SemiMajorAxis = 180000 (from Kerbin's core, not surface)

Some bugs seem to be part of how Kittopia and Kopernicus fight eachother, but I think I've got much of that sorted out.

There's also a Monolith on the surface, and many people forget that Minmus itself does indeed have a floating monolith. I visited it once, but I've never seen anyone do a easter-egg hunt to that monolith before. Anyway, there's one on Sprinkle as well.

Source: KopernicusTech

Download

Install: unzip into Gamedata

Changelog:

0.1: Initial release.

0.1.1: Included missing KopernicusTech stuff. KopernicusTech is now included in the download.

Things I have tried:

-Landing

-Takeoff

-Rendezvous to orbit

-EVA walking and moving around

-Planting a flag

-Circumnavigating on foot

-Jumping up

-EVA-jetpacking into orbit

Things I have not tried:

-Intentionally crashing

-Roverjumps!

-Covering it with structural panels. (The first person to do/try this gets +Rep)

Beware of Pudding-Krakens. They seem to thrive in Sprinkle. They like to eat ships that go too far away from Kerbals, or even just go too fast.

So go crazy! It's really fun to play with! You're always well withing 2.5km, not even the SOI is far enough away! Though that does beg the question of what happens when you're outside the SOI and another ship is 2.5km away...

EDIT: Found this image by GhostGriffin on deviantart, meant to apply to normal Minmus, but still. http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2014/045/3/c/jeblovespudding_small_by_ghostgriffin-d76h1f2.png

Edited February 23, 2015 by GregroxMun

[Tommygun]

Fun little project, I think I'd mod minmus into a giant peach, but that's just me.

[Whirligig Girl]

Why a peach? Anyway, here's a list of bugs I found.

-Crafts clip through the terrain and explode at high speed.

-Other crafts clip through the terrain and explode if gone beyond a certain distance from the ship focusing on.

-Switching crafts may cause other crafts on the surface to clip through and orbit the center of the planet. Very very glitchy stuff of course. Black hole glitchy.

-Sometimes switching from a surface craft to an orbit craft will make the surface craft float above the surface, some kind of exception (not a nullref thugh)

I think some of these bugs are caused by the fact that in addition to the 2.5km limit, there's also a closer limit that removes all but very basic physics from an object. Also, I think the terrain might literally despawn at that distance. I suspect the problem is simple enough that a plugin could fix it. But I can't write plugins because I'm a scrub.

I now must make it smaller.

Edited February 23, 2015 by GregroxMun

[Renegrade]

I now must make it smaller.

Now it is time to take smaller strides!

Thank you so very much

[Wabbit]

This is awesome! I must try to make tinymoons everywhere now... The fanart will be great! Jeb just standing on top, with a flag planted.

Just a question... Is it possible to make a tall craft that reaches out of its SOI?

[Gaalidas]

This is awesome! I must try to make tinymoons everywhere now... The fanart will be great! Jeb just standing on top, with a flag planted.

Just a question... Is it possible to make a tall craft that reaches out of its SOI?

Potentially, yes. That's why this is kind of a dangerous project. If, however, small-worlds became stable enough, this could mean the beginning of being able to add large-scale asteroids (beyond Class-E) that have their own very tiny gravity fields and (like planets in this game) are not moveable by the player's crafts. It could be similar to some of the really huge asteroids in our own system's asteroid belt which are large enough to actually pull at the orbits of other smaller rocks moving past them. In the future, we might even be able to simulate a planetary formation (the impact and compress era of a planet's early stages) with a small planet being orbited by dozens of small potato-roids. Exciting stuff there.

The sketches remind me of my early years watching the animated films "The Little Prince" in which the planet's inhabitant could run the entirety of his planet in less than a minute without even breaking a sweat. Of course, the illusion breaks down when you take into account that the gravity produced by that planet would have had to be so incredibly tiny that the little prince would have tripped on a rock and ended up in a stable orbit with no way of getting down, even though he'd be only 10 feet off the ground. The atmospheric range of this planet would probably have been, roughly, 10 centimeters. Unless... it was incredibly dense... yeah, that's gotta be it. the planet was so dense in the center that it produced the same odd gravitational pull that you get on Kerbin, which is way too small to produce the gravitational pull that is normally produced by planets the size and density of Earth.

You totally lost me on the B612 reference though.

[Renegrade]

Hmm.. gettin' some issues here, B-612 is significantly bigger than it should be on my install.

Am I missing some sort of pre-requesite? I just have MM, sprinkle.cfg, and KopernicusTech_v0.121 (plus a handful of other mods like VOID, FAR, RCS Build Aid, and Claw's fixes)

Ship destroyed upon entering SOI. The uh pudding lumps were.. flickering between two states.. one slightly smaller than the other.

The sketches remind me of my early years watching the animated films "The Little Prince" in which the planet's inhabitant could run the entirety of his planet in less than a minute without even breaking a sweat. Of course, the illusion breaks down when you take into account that the gravity produced by that planet would have had to be so incredibly tiny that the little prince would have tripped on a rock and ended up in a stable orbit with no way of getting down, even though he'd be only 10 feet off the ground. The atmospheric range of this planet would probably have been, roughly, 10 centimeters. Unless... it was incredibly dense... yeah, that's gotta be it. the planet was so dense in the center that it produced the same odd gravitational pull that you get on Kerbin, which is way too small to produce the gravitational pull that is normally produced by planets the size and density of Earth.

You totally lost me on the B612 reference though.

*cough* You've actually described the reference in the first paragraph I quoted It's the suspected ID of the Little Prince's asteroid.

I ran figures on B-612 and assuming it's 1.75m radius and 9.81m/s surface gravity (as xkcd suggested), then it would be about 450 megatons and have an escape velocity of 5.86m/s (21.096km/h). You'd reach orbital velocity for a 0m altitude at about 4.14m/s (heh) and 3.38m/s (12.168km/h) at about half a person's height ... I think that's like a brisk jog?

(note that as insane as that density would be, it's still much, much lower than a neutron star's density)

Edited February 23, 2015 by Renegrade

[kiwiak]

Interesting project.

[Nicholander]

I got the best idea: Give this a tiny little asteroid moon!

[Whirligig Girl]

Crap. I forgot about the Kittopia config. Better reupload

- - - Updated - - -

Fixed the download. Unzip to Gamedata.

EDIT: Now there's a 20m Minmus. And a 3.25m version.

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Edited February 23, 2015 by GregroxMun

[Whirligig Girl]

Potentially, yes. That's why this is kind of a dangerous project. If, however, small-worlds became stable enough, this could mean the beginning of being able to add large-scale asteroids (beyond Class-E) that have their own very tiny gravity fields and (like planets in this game) are not moveable by the player's crafts. It could be similar to some of the really huge asteroids in our own system's asteroid belt which are large enough to actually pull at the orbits of other smaller rocks moving past them. In the future, we might even be able to simulate a planetary formation (the impact and compress era of a planet's early stages) with a small planet being orbited by dozens of small potato-roids. Exciting stuff there.

The sketches remind me of my early years watching the animated films "The Little Prince" in which the planet's inhabitant could run the entirety of his planet in less than a minute without even breaking a sweat. Of course, the illusion breaks down when you take into account that the gravity produced by that planet would have had to be so incredibly tiny that the little prince would have tripped on a rock and ended up in a stable orbit with no way of getting down, even though he'd be only 10 feet off the ground. The atmospheric range of this planet would probably have been, roughly, 10 centimeters. Unless... it was incredibly dense... yeah, that's gotta be it. the planet was so dense in the center that it produced the same odd gravitational pull that you get on Kerbin, which is way too small to produce the gravitational pull that is normally produced by planets the size and density of Earth.

You totally lost me on the B612 reference though.

B612 is the name of the asteroid the Little Prince was on, that's what the B612 society is named after. And The Little Prince is a book, not a movie. (Though it may have had an adaptation, the original is a book)

[Whirligig Girl]

I finally found what is essentially the limit of these rescales. It's too glitchy to land on or walk on. We really just can't get much smaller.

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We're now at 1.75m radius, the same as that proposed by Randall Monroe in XKCD What If number 68, about a tiny planet. And I am very sad to say that it is too glitchy. Crafts can not land on it and Kerbals can not walk very far without being destroyed.

[Renegrade]

I finally found what is essentially the limit of these rescales. It's too glitchy to land on or walk on. We really just can't get much smaller.

http://imgur.com/a/tjL5y

We're now at 1.75m radius, the same as that proposed by Randall Monroe in XKCD What If number 68, about a tiny planet. And I am very sad to say that it is too glitchy. Crafts can not land on it and Kerbals can not walk very far without being destroyed.

It's a shame it's glitchy, but the screenshots are still fun

Good work

I wish it were easier to do these sorts of things, it's fun to play with mass and scale.

EDIT: I'm in orbit of Sprinkles now (47x38.7m orbit @16m/s, orbital period is a whole minute. Gilly can suck it). The new download worked perfectly It's a crazy-fast orbit for moving at Gilly speeds!

Edited February 24, 2015 by Renegrade

[Whirligig Girl]

It's a shame it's glitchy, but the screenshots are still fun

Good work

I wish it were easier to do these sorts of things, it's fun to play with mass and scale.

EDIT: I'm in orbit of Sprinkles now (47x38.7m orbit @16m/s, orbital period is a whole minute. Gilly can suck it). The new download worked perfectly It's a crazy-fast orbit for moving at Gilly speeds!

Tremendously glad I could entertain.

- - - Updated - - -

I have a hunch that if you could somehow completely flatten the terrain down to only six squares, then it might be able to work as long as you're careful on the squares. Of course, I have absolutely no idea how to do that.

[daniel l.]

This is pretty awesome, I had the same idea once but couldnt get planetfactory to do it,

[Whirligig Girl]

This is pretty awesome, I had the same idea once but couldnt get planetfactory to do it,

PlanetFactory is not supported anymore. Of course you couldn't get it to work.

[Tommygun]

Why a peach?

Oh, I guess I'm getting my stories mixed up. "The Little Prince" and "James and the Giant Peach".

I could see some fun potential combining this with that Kerbin-Side mod.

Having odd buildings or trees coming out of the side of a planet.

[Renegrade]

Tremendously glad I could entertain.

It's very much so. Thank you I've built a Sprinkles station now hehe. The science values are a bit mad and landing on it is insanely crazy (I guess looking like Minmus doesn't help when it has gravity higher than Duna's at the surface ).

Here's my notes so far:

Plane change from 80km parking orbit: about 800 (assuming you don't launch into it's inclination directly)

Theoretical landing delta-v: 21 (from 40m up. beware high grav!)

Safe orbit: 40m seemed good?

Safe orbit params: 1:02 mins, 17s in darkness (27.36%), gravity at that alt: 1.69m/s^2, escape from that alt: 23.61

Escape: 27.12m/s from surface

I noticed that SOI operations tend to go a little glitchy (like with regular planets, going through an SOI at high warp) - which thanks to the big physics range, sometimes results in unplanned rapid explodyness~

I have a hunch that if you could somehow completely flatten the terrain down to only six squares, then it might be able to work as long as you're careful on the squares. Of course, I have absolutely no idea how to do that.

Six squares? PQS squares or something? O.o

[Whirligig Girl]

It's very much so. Thank you I've built a Sprinkles station now hehe. The science values are a bit mad and landing on it is insanely crazy (I guess looking like Minmus doesn't help when it has gravity higher than Duna's at the surface ).

Here's my notes so far:

Plane change from 80km parking orbit: about 800 (assuming you don't launch into it's inclination directly)

Theoretical landing delta-v: 21 (from 40m up. beware high grav!)

Safe orbit: 40m seemed good?

Safe orbit params: 1:02 mins, 17s in darkness (27.36%), gravity at that alt: 1.69m/s^2, escape from that alt: 23.61

Escape: 27.12m/s from surface

I noticed that SOI operations tend to go a little glitchy (like with regular planets, going through an SOI at high warp) - which thanks to the big physics range, sometimes results in unplanned rapid explodyness~

Six squares? PQS squares or something? O.o

You don't plane-change from orbit, you launch into the inclined orbit. Just like a satellite contract.

And yes, six squares.

Now because it is once again a snow-day, I can devote today once again to this project, or rather, a new one. I think I can do it. #savethemagicboulder

[Renegrade]

You don't plane-change from orbit, you launch into the inclined orbit. Just like a satellite contract.

Yep, as I noted above.

As for the um magic boulder, what was it in game terms? a ground scatter object?

[Mekan1k]

... That's... I don't know what that is.

[Whirligig Girl]

Yep, as I noted above.

As for the um magic boulder, what was it in game terms? a ground scatter object?

It was an object on rails. It had a collider. Probably a particularly odd PQSCity object. But that's not what my Magic Boulder will be. (I was busy all day and didn't get to work on this)

[Renegrade]

Updated navigational data:

AP: 1,650km

PE: 750km

Inclination change at 70km: 684.687 80km: 679.634 (best to launch directly to 107.15 or 72.85 when at AN/DN obviously)

Transfer: 790.575 (transfer to Sprinkle AP from 70km, then raise PE to match Sprinkle's)

I tried increasing the surface gravity to 1.0g; that was an..interesting experience for landing.

[Whirligig Girl]

Here's an alternate 40m version (diamter). It's not tested yet, but it should work as well as any other config this small. Made for Yargnit's challenge. https://www.dropbox.com/s/8cxmqnkceboi0xv/GregroxTinySprinkles.zip?dl=0

[Whirligig Girl]

Shoutout to Yargnit for this image:

It was epic when it finally worked!