Space Plane stuffs!!

[CaptainTurbomuffin]

SPH UI improvements, more gadgets to insert into service bays, shuttles!

-Center of Lift including the lift of non-wing parts.

As we all know now, with the new aero, not only wings, but the fuselage also applies lift. Sadly, the display CoL function has not been updated, and it still only shows the lift of wings. It can cause troubles, as the Blue vector we currently see is incorrect. (Expect for Mk.2 fuselages. they were wings originally, and lift applied by them is displayed.) Image: the lift of those grey things is negligible. The lift of the fuselage however, is not. INCORRECT

-Col including flaps

If you just want to make a plane with flaps, and you engage the flaps in the editor, to see how the plane will behavie during take-off, nothing happens. The difference should be displayed between these setups:

-Be able to line up the camera with the Center of Thrust, or insert a line.

If you have ever tried to build a space shuttle, you may know how important it is to make the CoT exactly point towards the CoM. To check it, you had to position the camera into the CoT and see whether he balls are lined up or not. You can't do this perfectly, and it's also tricky. This could be a lot easier if you could have the camera perfectly positioned into the Cot, by pressing a button. But the best would be to be able to insert a line into the vector, so you could exactly see whar it is pointing at. Image: Before

Image: after

-CoT adjustment in-flight; with a computer.

Using that line, you've perfectly lined up the Cot with the CoM in the editor. But during flight, Fuel is being drained, and the CoM moves away. You have to adjust your CoT if you don't want to flip out of control. This was always done by reducing the thrust of your main engine, when you felt that the shuttle wants to flip over. 'Feeling' this is one thing, and slightly reducing the thrust is either not enough, or too much. I suggest a new Command&Control stuff, a stabilizer or balancer computer (that could be placed in service bays ^^). This could be authorized to control the thrust of some engines, and it would limit their thrust, so the total CoT of all engines (including those that are not controlled by this computer) will be pointing exactly towards the CoM. For example, in this shuttle, it would slowly reduce the thrust of the Rhino engine, as fuel is being drained, and my CoT will point towards my CoM, perfectly. This computer would ignore gimbal. So if the CoT is not lined up, because of gimbal, it wouldn't correct that. Better than clicking on the thrust limiter, randomly.

-CoT adjustment, with an automatic hinge

I have seen several reqests for shuttle-engines, with very high gimbal, for STS-like shuttle desgins, where all engines are in the shuttle itself. My idea is better. You wouldn't recieve very high, op gimbal, but you could use any of your engines with it. A hinge, similar to the previously mentioned computer, but it angles the engines on it, instead of limiting their thrust. (Or maybe it could only be controlled by that computer?) This would also be a lot better than Infernal Robotics Hinges. Because it's automatic, you wouldn't have to pay attention on angling it manually, 'feeling' when the craft would flip over, and corrigating it if you moved it too far, or not enough far back. Also, becaue it's automatic, you couldn't use it for attitude control, so it wouldn't give op gimbal.

-Heat exchanger

Another radial gadget. You place a pump, and you can determine wich part(s) the pump will cool down. You would also need tanks of <cold heat exchanger fluid, maybe He?> The pump will cool down the part it's connected to, with a limited performance. The more pumps cooling the part, the quicker they will cool it down, the more parts a pump is cooling, the slower they will be cooled. Cooling the parts consumes the cold fluid, and you will get hot fluid instead. If all your cold fluid is used up, the system stops working. (Hot fluid could may be cooled back with radiators?) This could be an alternate to radiators, a much more efficient, safe, but limited.

-More nose cones.

The current 2.5m nosecone is bad. I suggest an advanced nose cone 2m, with A and B variants. Also, a simple 3m nose cone, and low profile adapter.

-More large parts

Big-S structural wings, canards, 'Type A wings'; 2m ramjet, RAPIER, Basic jet; 2m intakes.

Interstages

"Cannot activate engine while stowed" <-- froget this! We could make interstages like these before.

Also, could we close fairings anywhere, while having a large, empty hole on top of them, again, to use them as interstages?

-Mode hotkeys

When setting up action groups, you often have to switch between consruction and action group modes. Hotkeys, please!

The age of spaceplanes has come!!

Edited September 4, 2015 by CaptainTurbomuffin

[Hcube]

I voted for everything except the heat exchannger, wich sounds too complex for stock and would better fit in a mod like RO.

I aalso didn't vote for the CoT stuff, because it is not really essential, and some mods like TCA (thrust controlled avionics) do it very well. Sure, i'd love to have those CoT computers you suggest, but i'd rather like the developers to spend more time on other stuff you posted, and bugfixes

[klgraham1013]

Mk3 wings that are actually lego-style.

[KrazyKrl]

I voted for...

CoL accounting for body lift also (seems like just an oversight when the new aero was installed.)

CoL accounting for flaps (also seems like a simple oversight)

We need more large parts (like a large 2.5m or 3m turbofan, high thrust, high efficiency, low speed). (A large 2.5m NERVA; which would probably mass about 1/2 an orange tank, and be about the size of 1/2 an orange tank.)

And Interstages (I've made several posts about them, but i believe the auto-fairings from engines should use the new fairings instead.)

One thing that would be nice though. The SSME has 15 degrees of gimbal; more gimballing on engines would be nice. Along with a feature that tells the engine "Set gimbal to thrust through CoM." This feature would, of course, decrease gimbal authority in some directions, but would keep the thrust force vector through the CoM; except for steering.

[EdusacconBR]

i like all of them, except the hinge one, i prefer the op gimbal thing

[CaptainTurbomuffin]

i like all of them, except the hinge one, i prefer the op gimbal thing

Now, it's kinda pointless, as it was announced that we'll have op gimbal. But when I wrote this, it wasn't. I still think that it would be better.