Aerospikes are such good vacuum engines now

[selfish_meme]

They should be called Vacuumspikes, one outperforms 2 Terriers by some 60 Thrust for the same weight and nearly the same ISP. They are seriously good Lander engines now, nearly all the craft in my Tylo challenge use them. I thought they were supposed to be good across a range of atmospheres not none.

[KerikBalm]

Wasn't it always like this?

Now they are worse than the best vacuum engines, this wasn't so before (excepting the ion and nuclear engines).

They are supposed to have nearly optimal nozzle characteristics for all pressures, from dense atmosphere, to vacuum.

Compare it to a poodle, their TWR is similar, their vacuum Isp is 10 seconds worse, and their atmospheric Isp is way better.

The terrier's TWR is too low IMO, it got buffed, but not a lot,

The aerospike got a bigger TWR buff. Previously, I thought the aerospike was rather poor because as an engine intended for use in the atmosphere (as well as the vacuum, but previously it had the best atmospheric Isp, now its more properly modeled such that other engines have equal or better atmospheric performance at the expense of vacuum performance), but it lacked the TWR to serve well in an early stage.

They thus reduced the weight, giving it more TWR. I would have preferred an increase in thrust, as it still doesn't have much lifting power for something in an early stage.

The mass reduction then results in it competing with the LV-909 more when you want to keep your dry mass down.

As a whole though, its much better now.

Still not great thrust, but I like it in an asparagus/parallel stage design with the aerospikes near the core/as the core stage.

High thrust engines optimized for atmo performance (LV-T30s) fire alongside the aerospike, and then are discarded as they become inefficient in the higher atmo, while the aerospike keeps burning

[Streetwind]

Squad has previously stated that they want to introduce at least a small amount of performance progression into the tech tree. The aerospike appears all the way at the end and turns out to be an upgrade to one of the early engines in one (but not all) use case. Sounds perfectly fine to me.

[selfish_meme]

From what I read that sounds right, they should not have decreased the weight but increased the thrust especially at above mach 3 in atmosphere, then it would make a better SSTO engine while not competing with the Terrier for pure vacuum purposes. I agree the Terrier could do with a little Buff too.

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Maybe they could add the Armadillo Aerospace engine being developed for Project Morpheus to the end of the tech tree, though it uses different fuel.

[mikegarrison]

Aerospikes were always great landing engines pre-1.0. Low profile and great ISP in atmosphere and out. They are actually nerfed a bit from what they used to be, because they aren't as insensitive to the atmosphere as they once were.

They always had the difficulty of not being stackable, though. With no lower node, you can't use them like normal engines.

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Squad has previously stated that they want to introduce at least a small amount of performance progression into the tech tree. The aerospike appears all the way at the end and turns out to be an upgrade to one of the early engines in one (but not all) use case. Sounds perfectly fine to me.

I wish they did a lot more of this. IMO they need to decide whether KSP is a sandbox game or a career game. I would prefer it if the later tech parts were all better and lighter that the parts you start out with. It's silly that you do all that science only to build rockets that are bigger than you started with, but basically no better.

[worir4]

Aerospikes were always great landing engines pre-1.0. Low profile and great ISP in atmosphere and out. They are actually nerfed a bit from what they used to be, because they aren't as insensitive to the atmosphere as they once were.

They always had the difficulty of not being stackable, though. With no lower node, you can't use them like normal engines.

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I wish they did a lot more of this. IMO they need to decide whether KSP is a sandbox game or a career game. I would prefer it if the later tech parts were all better and lighter that the parts you start out with. It's silly that you do all that science only to build rockets that are bigger than you started with, but basically no better.

If they did this then loads of parts would become redundant and I remember they said they didn't want to do that (I think in an old SQUAD cast Max said it)

[cantab]

I just see no reason it can't have a bottom stack node.

[Red Iron Crown]

The mass of the aerospike got dropped in 1.0.4, giving it a much more competitive TWR. Though I can't say I've used it all that much, most of my orbital stuff is pretty small so a LV909 will suffice (if anything, a half LV909 would be useful, but LV404: Engine not found).

I just see no reason it can't have a bottom stack node.

Very much this. Would make it much more practical as a lander engine.

[More Boosters]

I thought that was a good reason to use LV-909 still?

[Starhawk]

I always thought that the lack of a bottom node was to offset the fact that they were OP in previous versions.

Now that they are better balanced with the rest of the engines, I agree that they should have a bottom node.

LV404: Engine not found

I laughed and laughed.

Happy landings!

[TMS]

...(if anything, a half LV909 would be useful, but LV404: Engine not found).

Very, very good.

Here, have a space cookie.

[Whirligig Girl]

I complained quite some time ago that they balanced the Aerospike completely wrong for 1.0. The Isp should be roughly the same for both atm and vac. The Aerospike should be the best Eve lifter engine.

[spudman2]

What if there were a couple nodes on the tech tree that unlocked no new parts, but reduced cost of all parts by 5 or 10 percent. Or maybe reduce mass by 10%, or boost Isp by 10%.

(10% may be a bit much, but you get the idea.)

[Yukon0009]

There is a method to attaching things to the bottom of an aerospike.

[Red Iron Crown]

There is a method to attaching things to the bottom of an aerospike.

Please share it.

[SciMan]

I complained quite some time ago that they balanced the Aerospike completely wrong for 1.0. The Isp should be roughly the same for both atm and vac. The Aerospike should be the best Eve lifter engine.

Agreed. Looking at the description for the Aerospike, it would be very reasonable to assume that it's the best engine to use for getting off the surface of Eve. However, it doesn't have enough THRUST to lift enough fuel for it to be usable for that purpose, and it's ISP falls off too quickly. Sure it's got better TWR now, but that's not what's needed.

It's like trying to use an outboard motor to power a ocean-going cargo ship. There's just not enough power, no matter how light it may be.

I think the aerospike should have a bottom stack node. How else are you supposed to get it to Eve? Side mounted inside a fairing? I don't think an Eve return vessel will fit in a stock fairing.

Additionally, it's specs should be adjusted like this:

Mass = 2.5 (maybe even a bit more)

Max thrust = 300

ISP @ Vacuum = 335

ISP @ Kerbin SL = 330

ISP @ Eve SL = 275 <== This plus the high thrust is what makes it a good Eve engine.

It might seem OP at first glance. Allow me to demonstrate that it's not actually OP.

It's got high mass, so it's bad for landers.

Vacuum ISP isn't highest in its class.

Bottom stack nodes just make sense, there's no reason you couldn't support the engine around the outside diameter just like the rest of them.

High mass also makes it an inferior choice to the LV-T30 or LV-T45 for small turbojet+rocket SSTOs.

Also, the KS-25x4 Mammoth has no business going to orbit, let alone all the way to Eve.

The use of it makes ships need 500 parts, which isn't fun.

Using anything else requires 1000+ parts. That's worse.

We should be able to do better than 500 parts for ANY single-planet return mission. Even ones to Jool moons.

The problem here is that the challenge isn't one of piloting ability or ability to design a suitable ship. It's a challenge of patience, because the ships end up needing so many parts that they make the game slow to a crawl even when you have a good computer.

A game's challenge should never be even remotely related to how good your computer is, yet in the case of Eve return missions, it is.

That needs fixing, and changing the Aerospike like I suggest should result in a massive reduction of part count required to get Eve return capability.

I'm not trying to reduce the difficulty or challenge of Eve return missions by suggesting an OP part.

I'm suggesting the balance of a part be changed in order to try to cut out the root cause of lag (which is part count, plain and simple).

Less ship parts, less lag, less tedium, same challenge. That's what I'm trying to do here.

[Yukon0009]

Basically, add a cubic strut to the side of the fuel tank the spike is attached to, ad decoupler, and offset it so that the decoupler is centered on the middle of the spike. The offset tools won't reach that far, so you wil need to move it by tilting the whole craft first.

[Sharpy]

There is a method to attaching things to the bottom of an aerospike.

care to share?

[Red Iron Crown]

That works visually but not aerodynamically. Neat trick, though.

[Yukon0009]

Actually, the spike functions normally, and decouples fine.

[Red Iron Crown]

I mean that the aero model treats that as a draggy radial connection rather than a near-dragless stack node connection.

[Majorjim!]

http://i1383.photobucket.com/albums/ah315/Yukon0009/screenshot216_zpsebmeqcdn.pngBasically, add a cubic strut to the side of the fuel tank the spike is attached to, ad decoupler, and offset it so that the decoupler is centered on the middle of the spike. The offset tools won't reach that far, so you wil need to move it by tilting the whole craft first.

Hey man, You don't need to rotate the whole craft to move things further with the offset tool. You only have to rotate the part itself.

[PhylumCnidaria]

All of my landers (one) use the Spark cause it's so tiny. but perhaps on much larger landers i'll slap on a few spikes. daym they look cool!

I'm not sure about the stats, but from experience only the lightest ships can be usefully propelled by an LV-909 whereas an oreospike can do some heavy lifting, especially on low gravity bodies like Minmus.

[Tatonf]

I agree that it should be more usefull on Eve but... Would it be a good idea to modify the engine so it would only be usefull in only one situation (ascending from Eve) ?

[mikegarrison]

I agree that it should be more usefull on Eve but... Would it be a good idea to modify the engine so it would only be usefull in only one situation (ascending from Eve) ?

I used to use aerospikes constantly with 0.90 and earlier versions. There were basically more powerful 909s that also worked well in the atmosphere. I never use them at all now.