Removing ablator causes them to turn black.

[Majorjim!]

Hi all,

If you remove ablator to save weight as you never need anywhere near the amount is there, they turn black in game even though no heat has touched them.

Has anyone noticed this before?

Edited August 26, 2015 by Claw

[Claw]

Yep. I think this one isn't a bug so much as an incomplete feature. Fortunately it's just cosmetic.

Cheers,

~Claw

[fchurca]

I prefer to imagine some poor intern spending hours on end torching the excess ablator off

[TheGamingNoobster]

I prefer to imagine some poor intern spending hours on end torching the excess ablator off

I like that. Very Kerbal. They start of burning the ablator with an oxy-torch and end up using the atmosphere to do it once the graduate

[sal_vager]

I prefer to imagine some poor intern spending hours on end torching the excess ablator off

...

It's a feature!

But seriously, the effect is a shader set to the difference between the current and total ablator value, and in that sense it's working as intended, please make a feedback request on the tracker if you feel this should be changed.

[Claw]

Turning black in flight is definitely desired.

I took the report to mean "when I change ablator in the editor, it turns black." In which case, I don't believe that is intended, but just unfinished.

Cheers,

-Claw

[sal_vager]

To make the heatshield stay at its normal colour with a reduced ablator you'd need to track the difference between a new variable, call it "user_set_ablator" maybe, and zero.

It'd mean tweaked heat shields would turn black much sooner, or even instantly if players are really cutting back on mass, some might not consider that realistic, after all they may assume they are removing material from the back, not making the heat shield material itself more susceptible to heat.

Trying to fix that with a separate zero value for the shader would mean the heat shields could have zero ablator and still look okay, that'd be confusing.

As a rough indicator of remaining ablator the discolouration works well enough, and the thought of pre-burnt heat shields is hilarious.

[Alshain]

To make the heatshield stay at its normal colour with a reduced ablator you'd need to track the difference between a new variable, call it "user_set_ablator" maybe, and zero.

You want to know something really funny.

They already do that, they just fail to alter it on launch so it is always equal to the part's max amount. But really there is no reason to have the parts max amount in persistence after launch. The reason it is like that is because the Resource node is universal, it's used in tanks, batteries, everything that contains an amount of something. Since batteries and tanks can be refilled it needs to know the max amount for the part, but for ablators that is not the case, they can't be refilled. So to correct this, all they have to do is alter that max amount when the craft is first launched.

A mod should be able to do this really easily. You just have to filter resource containers with the name "Ablator" on launch and set the two values equal.

From Persistance.sfs

                RESOURCE
                {
                    name = Ablator
                    amount = 120
                    maxAmount = 200
                    flowState = True
                    isTweakable = True
                    hideFlow = False
                    flowMode = Both
                }

Edited August 26, 2015 by Alshain

[sal_vager]

That might be an artefact of the resource module, all the fuel tanks and other resource containers also track the max amount, but of course you can't restore ablator, at least not yet.

[Alshain]

That might be an artefact of the resource module, all the fuel tanks and other resource containers also track the max amount, but of course you can't restore ablator, at least not yet.

You caught me while I was editing, but yes.

[Majorjim!]

OK thanks all, so an incomplete feature it is then.

[Alshain]

OK thanks all, so an incomplete feature it is then.

I'm looking into making that mod. No promises, I'm not that great with the API yet.

[Majorjim!]

I'm looking into making that mod. No promises, I'm not that great with the API yet.

That would be great, I will keep an eye out for it.

[Stoney3K]

but of course you can't restore ablator, at least not yet.

Maybe we can equip afore-mentioned intern with a stack of heat shield tiles and some gaffer tape to get that done on EVA in the future.

[vger]

Trying to fix that with a separate zero value for the shader would mean the heat shields could have zero ablator and still look okay, that'd be confusing.

As a rough indicator of remaining ablator the discolouration works well enough, and the thought of pre-burnt heat shields is hilarious.

Seems like the value for the shader should be completely independent of "how much" ablator is present. Pretty sure that if it got hot enough, it's going to turn black at the same rate whether you start off with 1 unit or 1000.

[sal_vager]

Make a request for this behaviour on the tracker then, it's still working, even if it's not working as you'd expect