So... what exactly do non-folding radiators do? Kinda solved, fishing for additional info. Thx!

[Rune]

I was trying to decide which ones to put on (painfully little text to go by), and I decided to crack open the configs to take a look. The folding radiators were quite straightforward, with weird thermal stats like heavy insulation, high temperature, and a special module that I imagine is what pulls heat form the rest of the ship regardless of location, after the one that look quite clearly like the animation for the model.

heatConductivity = 0.001 //They have built in insulators	
	skinInternalConductionMult = 2000	
	radiatorHeadroom = 0.75
	thermalMassModifier = 2.5

	MODULE
	{
		name = ModuleDeployableRadiator
		animationName = Deploy
		retractable = true
		pivotName = Pivot
		raycastTransformName = Panel_006
		windResistance = 5
		trackingSpeed = 0.1	
	}	

	MODULE
	{
		name = ModuleActiveRadiator
		maxEnergyTransfer = 12500
	}

Then I opened the non-folding ones and... yeah, they have a couple of extra lines:

	heatConductivity = 0.75	
	thermalMassModifier = 5
	radiatorHeadroom = 0.5

So... Do those actually do something? The folding radiators do have them, but they have two modules to go with them. If they do draw heat significantly better than say, a wing, is the effect comparable to what the folding radiators do? I have a hard time believing that... without extra modules, they would only draw heat from the parts connecting to it, and then only if said parts were hotter, right? Even if they have the numbers to radiate better than the average part?

Rune. That would make the choice easy... but the part a waste of texture.

Edited June 23, 2015 by Rune

[Majorjim!]

S N I P

Personally I don't care what they do. They are two great new parts for building!

[sal_vager]

They radiate, and they don't fold...

Seriously, they draw heat from hot parts (thanks to that new module) and get hot themselves, radiating that heat to the atmosphere or to space, and unlike the folding panels they are not blown apart by excessive gaseous velocity.

[Rune]

Personally I don't care what they do. They are two great new parts for building!

Give an aeronautical engineer a thermodynamic simulation in his favourite game, and sadly, this is what happens. I am such a nerd. ^^'

Rune. They do look nice, but I want to know how they work!

- - - Updated - - -

They radiate, and they don't fold...

Seriously, they draw heat from hot parts (thanks to that new module) and get hot themselves, radiating that heat to the atmosphere or to space, and unlike the folding panels they are not blown apart by excessive gaseous velocity.

See, but they don't have the module. Any module. Just extra thermal stats. So maybe they are just great convectors of dubious use when your nukes are on the other side of the ship?

Rune. I hope the word "convector" exists.

[basic.syntax]

Rune may find some general background illumination, in RoverDude's posts starting about here.

[sal_vager]

They don't have the module in the cfg no, that's right, but all the coolers have the module, also the static coolers are useful for panel van fans.

[Rune]

They don't have the module in the cfg no, that's right, but all the coolers have the module, also the static coolers are useful for panel van fans.

That's the kind of answer I was looking for, there is another module that isn't in the .cfg. I hope you are right, because I am taking it as fact. Any chance you can point me to the relevant stat to judge their total emissivity in, say, Watts? So I can see how better the best ones are.

Rune. And thanks!

[sal_vager]

I wouldn't have the foggiest about converting them to watts, sorry, but I think all temperatures in KSP are in kelvin now.

=================================== v1.0.0 ============================================================

- All game temperatures changed from ‘Kervin’ to proper Kelvin.

[Rune]

I wouldn't have the foggiest about converting them to watts, sorry, but I think all temperatures in KSP are in kelvin now.

Oh, no, I don't care a fig about the specific unit. Call it Kwatts. I mean in the .cfg, one of those numbers (or a combination of them) has to determine how much heat they dissipate per unit of time at a given temperature, right? Like, say, mass. Or thermalMassModifier, but that's equal among the same type of radiator. Wonder what it does. Anyhow, I'm hunting for that one so I can compare among the different models, and see if, say, four of the small ones dissipate more or less than one of the big ones. Or what number of fixed radiators you need to get the same performance as a single deployable one. If there was some indication like a made up number in the description of the part ingame...

Rune. I need numbers, man! I'm an engineering looking for a fix! xD

[sal_vager]

Well, the emissiveConstant controls heat emission, and heatConcuctivity controls heat passing from part to part, but as you can see they reference other numbers not in the cfg.

Drop NathanKell a PM, he may be able to help you