[WIP][1.8.x] SSTULabs - Low Part Count Solutions (Orbiters, Landers, Lifters) - Dev Thread [11-18-18]

[Shadowmage]

Yah, I've got enough engines planned that I need to keep sneaking them in every few weeks.  Also have nearly two weeks to finish up the SC-C stuff according to my timeline, which as those parts are mostly done, should be enough time to squeeze in an engine

Hoping to have the geometry wrapped up sometime this week, and textures by the end of next week.  Will likely see it in-game and usable sometime within those dates

Next up (in a few weeks): H1 -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketdyne_H-1  -- Mid/low-tech medium sized lifter engine.  After that?  Probably the Merlin line of engines (at least a B, C, C-vacuum, D, and D-vacuum variants).  Will likely have placeholders available in-game for these engines until they are done (as there are some serious gaps in my engine lineup that need filled...).

Its looking more and more like I will be moving to use the LH2 patch as 'stock'.  Probably not in its current form (that would be for RO/RSS), but very similar -- the fuel/tank masses just make much more sense for those engines, and make for much more realistic rocket builds.  I guess final balance would depend on the balance of other LH2 engine packs (e.g. CryoEngines), as I would like to keep my stuff as broadly compatible as possible.

 

What other stuff am I missing for the DIRECT/Jupiter/Ares/Constellation rocket designs?  Seems like I should have most of the bases covered already or by near-future/planned stuff.

[Jimbodiah]

Merlins would be cool, specially if you can make placeholders in the meantime. I was going to suggest those but thought you would be sticking to the NASA stuff.

LH2 in addition to LF would have SSTU depart from the bland LF/O of stock fuels, and make for some other design issues (less weight, more volume, so larger tanks etc). Nertea is using a 15:1 ratio right now, but that makes for some hefty tank volumes (see my pic a few posts/pages back). KSPI also uses 10:1 and has it's own boil-off method, Nertea uses something else. I think it would be cool if everyone came together on this and made a single standard for LH2 and/or boil-off (not so much a plug-in, but a standard for amount/sec and Ec drain etc). Right now I can't combine Nert's engines with your tanks, or the other way around, without diving into the cfgs to change the ratio (or have tanks with manual ratio edits, leaving dead space.

Constellation: RS68 and J2X engines check, Orion/SM check, tanks check, fairings check, booster errrr...   Modular SRBs are all that is left. I could use some smaller ones to be honest. And those nice nose cones that I keep bugging you about    I can think of some other Constellation parts, but those would be for the Station core later (Mars EDS + hab, nuclear engines).

[Shadowmage]

That is a bit disappointing;  When I made my LH2 patch, I purposely based the ratio off of CryoEngines, which was 10:1.  Apparently Nertea must have changed things around a bit (I don't spend too much time reading the forums, so very possible that I missed it).  Will take a look at it, but 15:1 sounds a bit off (10:1 unit ratio gave a 7:1 mass ratio IIRC, which is close to the 6:1 used by most hydrolox rockets; 15:1 will likely be off by quite a bit).

[Jimbodiah]

Nertea is playing around with it trying to find a balance. Fraz came up with all kinds of equations etc to balance the fuel volume/mass/tank weights/pricing. He's playing around with it as well. So maybe a good time to bash all the heads together to come up with a standard. It's in his NF prop balance topic. I think 10:1 is a good ratio for tank sizes as well, as with 15:1 I got huge freaking rockets, despite being lighter (and having better TWR) than a 10:1 version.

[Shadowmage]

1:15 unit ratio gives a 4.7:1 mass ratio, which, after a bit of research, appears to be within the usable range.  It is a bit off from most of the engines that I've studied, but well within the range of reality.  Most seem to run in the 5:1 to 7:1 range, with 6:1 being common (RS-25, RS-68...).  8:1 is stoichiometric (no uncombusted fuel or ox in the exhaust), and would likely be not-so-good for most engines.  So perhaps the ratio change is a bit more towards the realistic side.  (https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=23214.0).

I suppose I'll have to take a look at some things and see how they weigh out; it might be the piece of balance I was missing for nerfing LH2 a bit with real-world ISP values.

Either way, knowing that the Cryo-engines ratios have changed, I'll likely change things up in the near future to keep consistent and compatible.

 

[Jimbodiah]

With 15:1 the advantage of LH2 over LF only increases. You will have to alter tank masses to balance it out a bit. NF has different weights for lifting (non-cooled) and orbital (cooled aka Zero Boil-off, ZBO) tanks as a balance. 

[ComatoseJedi]

I haven't had a problem with cryo engines and this set of parts. With MFT, you get an option for utilization of how much fuel goes into a tank. From there, you choose how much you'd want to put in there, so the very hefty volumes of fuel are only present if you do not change the utilization bar percentage. But, as with everything else, this is how it works on my end. Just like TAC-LS put a patch for every part that can hold a kerbal to have life support in it (even the SSTU parts), but Jim couldn't get that to work. 

[Jimbodiah]

The tac patch does not work as minimumcrew is zero on sstu pods, so I made a patch for sstu parts which does work and also made more realistic values instead of the 1day standard tac values.

[JoseEduardo]

16 hours ago, Shadowmage said:

Yah, I've got enough engines planned that I need to keep sneaking them in every few weeks.  Also have nearly two weeks to finish up the SC-C stuff according to my timeline, which as those parts are mostly done, should be enough time to squeeze in an engine

Hoping to have the geometry wrapped up sometime this week, and textures by the end of next week.  Will likely see it in-game and usable sometime within those dates

Next up (in a few weeks): H1 -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketdyne_H-1  -- Mid/low-tech medium sized lifter engine.  After that?  Probably the Merlin line of engines (at least a B, C, C-vacuum, D, and D-vacuum variants).  Will likely have placeholders available in-game for these engines until they are done (as there are some serious gaps in my engine lineup that need filled...).

Its looking more and more like I will be moving to use the LH2 patch as 'stock'.  Probably not in its current form (that would be for RO/RSS), but very similar -- the fuel/tank masses just make much more sense for those engines, and make for much more realistic rocket builds.  I guess final balance would depend on the balance of other LH2 engine packs (e.g. CryoEngines), as I would like to keep my stuff as broadly compatible as possible.

 

What other stuff am I missing for the DIRECT/Jupiter/Ares/Constellation rocket designs?  Seems like I should have most of the bases covered already or by near-future/planned stuff.

with J-2X and RS-68 Ares I, IV and V, and DIRECT V2 should be all covered pretty nice  some early SLS designs using J-2X should also be able to be made with the current available mounts

plus, it will allow some madness like a Saturn V using F-1B and J-2X... just saying

(on the elite front, I'm with a Type-7 making money for a Python  and the beauty of that game makes me want to wait for x64 kerbal even more )

Edited January 20, 2016 by JoseEduardo

[Shadowmage]

16 hours ago, Jimbodiah said:

Merlins would be cool, specially if you can make placeholders in the meantime. I was going to suggest those but thought you would be sticking to the NASA stuff.

The main reason I've done NASA engines so far -- those are the only engines I can find detailed schematics for, such as: http://www.alternatewars.com/BBOW/Space_Engines/F-1_DWG.gif

Those detailed diagrams are the only thing that has allowed me to make reasonable engine models.  You can tell the difference on those engines where I've had no blueprint-like drawings to go from.. they are generally a bit imprecise (AJ10's, RS-68, F1B), compared to those where I've had enough information for decent recreation (F-1, RS-25(mostly), J-2, RL10's).  Sadly, the J-2X fits squarely in the former category (there are no good diagrams to go off of, only a few decent quality concept renders and very few real-images of the engine, and NONE of the information is coherent, I've seen at least 4 different designs for that engine).

For stuff like the Merlins... I'm mostly out of luck, I've never seen any blueprint-like drawings of them, nor any 'scale plan view' of them at all -- only pictures/images, which are much... much... harder to work from.  All of the old NASA stuff has the benefit of being declassified... If I dig deep enough I can get quite a bit of the raw engineering data on them, and have even ran across a few actual engineering blueprints for some select parts (not a whole engine yet, unfortunately).  The newer engines, and any of those privately funded, have no such information available.  Nor have I seen any such information from any of the Russian engines, regardless of how old they are.

 

3 hours ago, JoseEduardo said:

with J-2X and RS-68 Ares I, IV and V, and DIRECT V2 should be all covered pretty nice  some early SLS designs using J-2X should also be able to be made with the current available mounts

plus, it will allow some madness like a Saturn V using F-1B and J-2X... just saying

(on the elite front, I'm with a Type-7 making money for a Python  and the beauty of that game makes me want to wait for x64 kerbal even more )

Yah, I desparately need 64-bit support in KSP.  So sick of running KSP in OpenGL mode with its lack of AA.  Looks terrible, flickering jagged edges all over the place.  Sadly, openGL mode is the only way I can get KSP to run at all given my usual mod set (which isn't even that big!) (d3d11 has too many graphical bugs and unreadable text/font issues).

Python -- well worth the investment for trading.  Was even a decent fighter craft before they nerfed the usefulness out of it (like Feb/March of last year).  But for trading?  Still a good investment.  Hauls a good amount, durable, and IIRC, can land at medium pads (outpost trading!).  And not entirely terrible in a fight... just nowhere near what it used to be (used to turn like a cobra, boost like an asp, haul like a t7, and shield tank like an anaconda, with a weapon loadout only challenged by the anaconda itself; was one heck of a ship...).  Their nerfing of the python was actually my last day in the game;  even though I'de stepped up to a t9 for trading, the fact that they completely gimped a ship I had spent -weeks- working towards (and only got to enjoy for a few days)... really killed my interest in the game (and my faith in their development practices).  Perhaps it was overpowered... but that should have been sorted out LONG before it went live on the public servers.

[Shadowmage]

16 hours ago, Jimbodiah said:

With 15:1 the advantage of LH2 over LF only increases. You will have to alter tank masses to balance it out a bit. NF has different weights for lifting (non-cooled) and orbital (cooled aka Zero Boil-off, ZBO) tanks as a balance. 

Actually, 15:1 is -worse- from an efficiency standpoint.  It means you need MORE lh2 for every unit of oxygen, which means even bigger tanks, which results in even worse tank mass fraction.  And as engines rely on the 'mass' of the propellants, you are using even more volume per-mass-unit -- more flow rates / volume of fuel per second for the same mass of propellant moving through the engine.  (That is all a very gross simplification, but enough to outline the effects of the balance change).

[Jimbodiah]

LH is a lot lighter, so despite having huge tanks (current setup), the craft is still lighter in total (less oxidizer needed), giving more TWR and more dV. You're going toward RO sized ships with 15:1.

[Shadowmage]

You'll get more dV out of the same ship at 10:1 than you will at 15:1;  at least that is what all of my calculations point out (more mass is fuel).  Even if you use the same -mass- of the vessel, it will be worse, as more of that mass will be tankage/dry mass with the now even-larger lh2 tanks.  Once again, dV is based on useful propellant mass, and with less useful propellant mass, your dV decreases.

 

a 5m x 5m tank at 10:1 results in a total fuel mass of:  31.7t  with a dry mass of: 5t (arbitrarily chosen), results in a tank mass fraction of: 0.1577287066246057

a 5m x 5m tank at 15:1 results in a total fuel mass of:  23.8t  with a dry mass of: 5t (arbitrarily chosen), results in a tank mass fraction of: 0.2100840336134454

At a set ISP (will use 445 for example), this results in dV for the theoretical single stage of:

10:1 -- 8710.834688

15:1 -- 7647.763763

 

Edit:  I'm not trying to say which is better for balance -- merely pointing out that there is no logical way that the change in ratio will increase performance.

Further Edit:  Will run some tests with a set tankage mass fraction (e.g. tankage mass based on propellant mass rather than volume), but I'm betting the results will be very similar.

 

Edit:

Apparently if the tankage mass-fraction is constant (which... it is not in real life as far as I know; tankage fraction is higher for LH2 than it is for RP1, due to the necessity for the tank to support its own weight, larger tanks = more structural weight), there is zero net change in dV for a given vessel.

Numbers for constant mass-fraction setup for a 5x5m tank (0.15 mass fraction):

10:1 - 5.595 dry, 37.3 fuel, 42.889t total - 8900.970334 dV @ 455 ISP

15:1 - 4.195 dry, 28.0 fuel, 32.167t total -- 8900.970334 dV @ 455 ISP

 

So.. depending upon how the tankage mass is balanced, there may be no change to vessel dV, but generally (and realistically), the dV will decrease as the F:O ratio increases (ignoring actual consumption ratios and how those effect efficiency, as those are not simulated at all in KSP).  From my research yesterday, the changing of the propellant ratios can actually have a very noticeable impact on ISP, and there are different 'ideal' ratios for sea-level and vacuum (ideal for a given engine design, can change for a different engine).

 

Further edit:

This really would need a study of the vessel as a whole; because as Jimbodiah points out, the higher LH2 ratio tank ends up being lighter for the same DV (at a fixed mass ratio), but that is all without accounting for any payload (and a theoretical 0-mass engine), nor accounting for the increased performance / freed up payload capacity of the lower stages from the lighter upper stage.  So my examples are likely not directly applicable as to how it would play out in game / in use.

Ahh... rocket science... such fun   (yes, I even enjoy the math/science end of it a bit too).

Either way, I've already swapped the LH2 patch over to a 15:1 ratio, however I do not believe it will change the resources on already in-flight fuel tanks (old engines will have the new ratio, just not old tanks).  This would apply to any saved craft as well;  for the MFTs / upper stages, it should be as easy as switching fuel types in the editor to fix it.  This change will be available with the next update, likely Saturday.

 

Edited January 21, 2016 by Shadowmage

[JoseEduardo]

3 hours ago, Shadowmage said:

The main reason I've done NASA engines so far -- those are the only engines I can find detailed schematics for, such as: http://www.alternatewars.com/BBOW/Space_Engines/F-1_DWG.gif

Those detailed diagrams are the only thing that has allowed me to make reasonable engine models.  You can tell the difference on those engines where I've had no blueprint-like drawings to go from.. they are generally a bit imprecise (AJ10's, RS-68, F1B), compared to those where I've had enough information for decent recreation (F-1, RS-25(mostly), J-2, RL10's).  Sadly, the J-2X fits squarely in the former category (there are no good diagrams to go off of, only a few decent quality concept renders and very few real-images of the engine, and NONE of the information is coherent, I've seen at least 4 different designs for that engine).

For stuff like the Merlins... I'm mostly out of luck, I've never seen any blueprint-like drawings of them, nor any 'scale plan view' of them at all -- only pictures/images, which are much... much... harder to work from.  All of the old NASA stuff has the benefit of being declassified... If I dig deep enough I can get quite a bit of the raw engineering data on them, and have even ran across a few actual engineering blueprints for some select parts (not a whole engine yet, unfortunately).  The newer engines, and any of those privately funded, have no such information available.  Nor have I seen any such information from any of the Russian engines, regardless of how old they are.

 

Yah, I desparately need 64-bit support in KSP.  So sick of running KSP in OpenGL mode with its lack of AA.  Looks terrible, flickering jagged edges all over the place.  Sadly, openGL mode is the only way I can get KSP to run at all given my usual mod set (which isn't even that big!) (d3d11 has too many graphical bugs and unreadable text/font issues).

Python -- well worth the investment for trading.  Was even a decent fighter craft before they nerfed the usefulness out of it (like Feb/March of last year).  But for trading?  Still a good investment.  Hauls a good amount, durable, and IIRC, can land at medium pads (outpost trading!).  And not entirely terrible in a fight... just nowhere near what it used to be (used to turn like a cobra, boost like an asp, haul like a t7, and shield tank like an anaconda, with a weapon loadout only challenged by the anaconda itself; was one heck of a ship...).  Their nerfing of the python was actually my last day in the game;  even though I'de stepped up to a t9 for trading, the fact that they completely gimped a ship I had spent -weeks- working towards (and only got to enjoy for a few days)... really killed my interest in the game (and my faith in their development practices).  Perhaps it was overpowered... but that should have been sorted out LONG before it went live on the public servers.

I might have seen it wrong, but I remember seeing it having 6 maneuverability dashes in the shipyard, more maneuverable than my Viper Mk IV (bought for the Millenium Falcon style ), that's for sure...

I'm using eddb to get me some profitable routes, like netting 3500 credit for each ton hauled in a loop route, so if I make a round trip hauling 200ton of each indicated goods I will net 700k after doing just a 10 to 15 minute A->B->A route, if I really work towards it I might have it this weekend  but since last weekend I raged because I got killed by a diamondback on my T6 and lost a few millions (insurance and goods) and raged it on my cat I'm taking it a lot slower and less ragefully

another reason for me to seek a python is that I'm really tired of being interdicted by any NPC (got interdicted in my T7 by a sidewinder threatening to kill me, like.. wth...), I'm looking forward to having a ship able to haul like the T-7 but kill almost everyone who dreams of interdicting me

plus, it looks like a micro-star destroyer, it's win-win... if only I could get a Vader costume when they launch the customizable characters...

[Shadowmage]

So, I had to try it out, and with very specific texture layouts (and fairing configurations), it might be possible to swap around the fairing textures a bit and have them look decent (don't mind the extra-shiny; I merely didn't apply the spec mask for the test-texture):

I haven't tried/used any normal-maps on them yet, they would probably still get distorted a bit depending upon the size/configuration of the texture, but I'll try them out when I get around to making the fairing textures.

I did implement texture swapping for the stock-based fairing parts (SC-GEN-FR-*), however when I tried the texture above.... well, the stock UV mapping is very strange.  Could certainly do some other colors though...gray, blue, black...

Edit: will look into enabling texture-swapping for the node fairings perhaps for this weekends' release.

Edited January 21, 2016 by Shadowmage

[Sudragon]

Yeah. when 1.1 drops, it's going to be interesting on the forums till it all shakes out. On the other hand, Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak just arrived and there's always Civ...or XCOM...

[JoseEduardo]

10 hours ago, Shadowmage said:

So, I had to try it out, and with very specific texture layouts (and fairing configurations), it might be possible to swap around the fairing textures a bit and have them look decent (don't mind the extra-shiny; I merely didn't apply the spec mask for the test-texture):

I haven't tried/used any normal-maps on them yet, they would probably still get distorted a bit depending upon the size/configuration of the texture, but I'll try them out when I get around to making the fairing textures.

I did implement texture swapping for the stock-based fairing parts (SC-GEN-FR-*), however when I tried the texture above.... well, the stock UV mapping is very strange.  Could certainly do some other colors though...gray, blue, black...

Edit: will look into enabling texture-swapping for the node fairings perhaps for this weekends' release.

sweeeeeeet

do you have any plans of having checkered textures too (like early SLS designs using J-2X)? would just change the normal map, since Saturn, DIRECT, Ares and early SLS all used interstages with stringed structures, don't know about current SLS, from the looks of the Block 1 it will be "clean" but either painted orange or having the foam over it

[Jimbodiah]

Looks very good to me!

[Shadowmage]

1 hour ago, JoseEduardo said:

sweeeeeeet

do you have any plans of having checkered textures too (like early SLS designs using J-2X)? would just change the normal map, since Saturn, DIRECT, Ares and early SLS all used interstages with stringed structures, don't know about current SLS, from the looks of the Block 1 it will be "clean" but either painted orange or having the foam over it

Nope, and nope.  Checkers will not work due to the mismatched horizontal/vertical scaling, neither will normal maps (at least not generically, esp. for resizable fairings with different top/bottom diameters).  Note that I mentioned that 'very specific laid out textures, for specific fairing configurations';  Not everything will work for every fairing.

Even if you wanted specific textures for a single specific fairing, there is still no way for checkers or normal maps to work without distortion due to how the fairings can change their radius/height/etc.  The only time you could use a specially designed fairing texture with normals or horizontal stripes would be if you disabled the ability to change the size of the fairing completely.  Static mesh = easy to make proper textures for.  Dynamic mesh = good luck, not happening...

Basically, the ONLY kind of texture that would be cleanly supported for generic fairing use would be wide vertical stripes (in even divisors of the # of cylinder sides; so 2, 4, 8, or 12 stripes only), and even then edges of the stripes HAVE to run exactly down the UV seams or they will result in ugly distortion when radius are scaled differently.  For this reason normal-mapped stringers will -not- work, as they cannot all run down the UV seams, and any not on the seams will get some really ugly distortion (unacceptable for me anyway)..... this is all why I didn't want to get into custom fairing textures in the first place... very very few people understand the difficulty of UV mapping a dynamic mesh, and what that means regarding what textures can be used due to the limitations brought about by the UV mapping.

 

Once again, I have to go back to -- you are free to try out this stuff yourself (and see how badly it turns out), but I'm not going to spend my time on it, as I already know how bad it will look (and I consider how it would look to be unacceptable; texture distortion makes me (mentally) ill when I look at it).

[Shadowmage]

17 hours ago, JoseEduardo said:

I might have seen it wrong, but I remember seeing it having 6 maneuverability dashes in the shipyard, more maneuverable than my Viper Mk IV (bought for the Millenium Falcon style ), that's for sure...

I'm using eddb to get me some profitable routes, like netting 3500 credit for each ton hauled in a loop route, so if I make a round trip hauling 200ton of each indicated goods I will net 700k after doing just a 10 to 15 minute A->B->A route, if I really work towards it I might have it this weekend  but since last weekend I raged because I got killed by a diamondback on my T6 and lost a few millions (insurance and goods) and raged it on my cat I'm taking it a lot slower and less ragefully

another reason for me to seek a python is that I'm really tired of being interdicted by any NPC (got interdicted in my T7 by a sidewinder threatening to kill me, like.. wth...), I'm looking forward to having a ship able to haul like the T-7 but kill almost everyone who dreams of interdicting me

plus, it looks like a micro-star destroyer, it's win-win... if only I could get a Vader costume when they launch the customizable characters...

Heh, it used to -actually- turn like a cobra, not just say it on its stat-sheet, and could nearly keep up with it speed wise... none of this 240m/s stuff.  And the shields used to be about 2x what an anaconda had, IIRC.  It was a beautiful and deadly craft.  However, I only played in solo mode (I refuse to play games/on servers with non-consensual PVP; I don't play to try and compete with no-lifers, I play to have fun, not aggravation), and as such, even in trading ships (t6/t7), interdictions were merely an inconvenience and loss of time; there was never any real danger of being destroyed (even if a conda interdicted my t6, it was just boost-boost-boost-wait-jump, rarely would I even get hit).

But... anyhow.. yah, the python is quite a nice trading ship even in its current form.  Def sturdy enough to take a few hits while you spool up the FSD, and if you don't mind the extra mass, you can even put a few guns on it and have some teeth of your own.  Thing will chew through Cobras and anything smaller in about 2 energy bars worth of lazering; poor little sidewinders pretty much just go 'pop' when you turn the guns on them (of course, I liked lots of beam lasers, with MC's for backup/sniping... beams melt things really well).

One other decent alternative for a T6 is running rare-goods.  Not sure if it is still as hot as it was, but I was able to pull in ~5 mil for about a 1 hour rares loop (in a T6!).  Was a -ton- of traveling, and I could only do it once or twice before I got burned out on the traveling... but it was a good swap from the normal station->station trading.

Ahh... I really liked the premise of E:D, just wish they would have gone some other route than grief-gank-fest for their open servers, and developed some -real- PVE content.

 

[Jimbodiah]

Staaahp, or I may have to buy it... Used to play the old version on my Apple IIc, think I still have the box somewhere.

Edited January 21, 2016 by Jimbodiah

[JoseEduardo]

about the textures, no problem, having a Saturn-like is awesome already

as for Elite, yeah, same here... I don't see the fun of going around being killed by 7 year olds (either mentally or physically) trying to have fun by ruining your fun and liquiding you off, or people that don't do anything other than playing Elite 16 hours a day killing everyone they see, hence why I only play invite-only GTA Online sessions... I still like the player-driven (somewhat) story and economy, enough interaction without people ruining your fun, especially considering that if you have a group of friends you have a third option, party mode, where you can play coop without any other player trying to be a douche...

that one time I got killed by the diamondback I got interdicted like 6 times in a row, in the last one I accidentally pressed the mousewheel button and got to use my mouse to change the camera, since I couldn't figure out what I did wrong I had no control and got killed....

as for rare goods, I dropped out of that, got a rare trading route to follow and was getting 1m/hour, then I looked over at EDDB and found a loop route worth 4.2k/ton, went from making 1m/hour to 420k/15 minutes going back and forth 

[Shadowmage]

-Might- have an updated release tonight, if I can manage to clean up a few things (and if testing goes well).  Nothing particularly fancy, but lots of updates, and even a few bugfixes.  Will also include a finished texture for the SC-C-SM (others are still WIP).  No, sorry, the J-2X is nowhere near usable yet.. might get a prototype for Sat's release, though it will likely be sometime next week before it is usable. 

Might also include a set of fairing textures (for the node fairings), and the necessary in-editor swapping for those (still WIP, but works enough for testing).  Likely will end up being a set of textures with different stripe patterns (as a single pattern would not work for all setups).  But this way you should be able to get any kind of stripe setup that you want.  Aim to also include a few flat-color textures that can be used for the node-fairings and the stock-fairing-derived parts.

Will know more a bit later today (after I'm home from work...).  Currently working on cleaning up some of the SC-C geometry details and texturing for the OM and DM.  OM has had its EVA hatch size increased, DM has had the periscope removed (might add it on a second variant in the future/as a mesh-switch option... but for now the DM will be fairly.... plain).  Hope to get these cleaned up enough to be included in the release as well, but there is still a ton of work to do on them.

[Shadowmage]

If you were looking for a game to kill time while waiting for 1.1, and don't mind a bit of slow-paced simulator, I would recommend giving it a try.  The game is quite beautiful, though it takes quite a bit of horsepower to make it playable while looking good.  Game play is fairly immersive, and the things they have implemented have been done fairly well (aside from the 'airplanes in space' flight model... bleh).  I would stay in solo/private group mode though unless you don't mind being blown up for no reason (and losing your ship and credits).

However, it is fairly slow paced.  If you want to upgrade to a new ship you have to spend time... a lot of time... either doing combat/missions or doing trading runs.  Combat is fun for a bit, and even trading can have its moments.  Even the starter ship, if flown (extremely) well, can hold its own against the largest of ships (just don't get hit... at all...).

Oh.. and a galaxy with many -billions- of star systems to explore.  Yes, Billions, with a B.  Seriously; just staring at the galaxy map and locating the constellations/starts/etc that you are familiar with can be its own fun for a bit.

Overall I have mixed feelings about the game, but would recommend it to hardcore space/sim players who don't mind the time investment and are okay with using their imagination to fill in the content blanks.

[Shadowmage]

And, I had to take a few minutes to try out Unity-5, just to see what it had to offer.  First test was to import the J-2 model and setup the material/etc with the existing textures.

-Lots- of shiny.  Yes, reflections work.  Will have a bit of learning to do to set things up to look properly (and not all plastic-wrapped-looking), but overall I'm fairly impressed with the first test of the system.  I still cannot find how to assign AO maps to a second UV set, so I'm still not sure how to setup texture-sharing with this system (doesn't seem possible with the stock 'standard' shader.. it specifically uses UV0 for ao), but will look into that when I'm actually working on the stuff.

However, this does mean that doing all of the texture conversion and re-creating materials/etc after 1.1 is released... could take some time.