[1.12.5] Bluedog Design Bureau - Stockalike Saturn, Apollo, and more! (v1.14.0 "металл" 30/Sep/2024)

[MaverickSawyer]

I hold down the SHIFT key while placing the boosters with 3x symmetry. It's tricky and finicky, but you can put them evenly spaced around the core. Then, I use the offset tool to slide the boosters down/aft relative to the decouplers and then slide the decouplers to a position that looks right. Boosters pop off without any issues.

 

As for properly timing the staging, recommend SmartParts. Using the fuel sensor, set one for 3% solid fuel remaining. This is right about when the rapid tailoff in thrust starts to happen, so use that to fire your airstart boosters. Set a second one to 0% to stage off the first trio of the groundstarts and to trigger a 1 second delay on a timer part, then use that timer to jettison the second trio of groundstarts. End result looks remarkably close to the real thing.

[MaverickSawyer]

Hmm... the mini decoupler seems to have a SEVERE lateral kick to the left (in the VAB) when firing..

[Drakenex]

On 7/6/2017 at 7:40 PM, DarthVader said:

I'ma leave this here: http://imgur.com/a/vR7DO

I've been there too. IRL Titan fairings were a little oversized

[minepagan]

1 hour ago, Drakenex said:

I've been there too. IRL Titan fairings were a little oversized

Tight fairings are for Soviets. We show our technological superiority by launching unnecessarily-oversized fairings, demonstrating that our freedom rockets are so good that they have payload to spare.

[MaverickSawyer]

At that size, I'd probably wind up making an excessively clustered rocket behind the fairing. After all, that fairing punches a pretty big hole in the sky... Might as well make use of that hole!

 

In all fairness, though, I lean towards the "Honey I shrunk the space probe!" end of the spectrum. 

[CobaltWolf]

Uhhh... having trouble embedding tonight... but cool stuff happened today!

http://imgur.com/uOhIe

Edited July 8, 2017 by CobaltWolf

[CobaltWolf]

Some people have asked me what my plans are for BDB. Right now, they are roughly as follows:

This update:
Finish polishing Agena, Apollo, Titan, Mercury, Gemini, Skylab. Full release of Skylab and a number of revamped parts, with a couple new ones.

Next update:
LDC Titan, Atlas revamp, Centaur revamp, Vega touchups, MOL revamp, Big G, Gemini Lander

Of course, these are all subject to change.

[Kerbal01]

17 hours ago, Drakenex said:

I've been there too. IRL Titan fairings were a little oversized

That didn't work (TWR sucked) so I eventually launched it on a Saturn V INT-21/Centaur T. 20 tons direct to GEO in 2xscale.

[Kerbal01]

@CobaltWolf Can you make a tankbutt/vernierless version of the RS-27?

[CobaltWolf]

2 minutes ago, DarthVader said:

@CobaltWolf Can you make a tankbutt/vernierless version of the RS-27?

No. But I can force @Jso to add partUpgrades to the H-1D and H-1C that reflect the improved performance of the RS-27 and RS-27A.

[Kerbal01]

5 minutes ago, CobaltWolf said:

No. But I can force @Jso to add partUpgrades to the H-1D and H-1C that reflect the improved performance of the RS-27 and RS-27A.

will that work in sandbox?

 

[minepagan]

2 minutes ago, DarthVader said:

will that work in sandbox?

 

There's a mod that lets you use different "marks" (upgrades) of a part, should be useful for replica building like this

[Kerbal01]

2 minutes ago, minepagan said:

There's a mod that lets you use different "marks" (upgrades) of a part, should be useful for replica building like this

I think Real Fuels does this.

[CobaltWolf]

6 minutes ago, DarthVader said:

will that work in sandbox?

If you're in sandbox what does it matter? Just use the best versions of the parts? We have the J-2S and F-1A split up still because we had to do a lot of balance testing with them when Saturn was still in development.

[Kerbal01]

initial tests dropping in the H-1 engines for the LR-89/105 met with miserable failure when the booster pack failed to sep.

[CobaltWolf]

5 minutes ago, DarthVader said:

initial tests dropping in the H-1 engines for the LR-89/105 met with miserable failure when the booster pack failed to sep.

I should make the colliders actually match the models...

[zakkpaz]

3 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

Some people have asked me what my plans are for BDB. Right now, they are roughly as follows:

This update:
Finish polishing Agena, Apollo, Titan, Mercury, Gemini, Skylab. Full release of Skylab and a number of revamped parts, with a couple new ones.

Next update:
LDC Titan, Atlas revamp, Centaur revamp, Vega touchups, MOL revamp, Big G, Gemini Lander

Of course, these are all subject to change.

 

Would any of those new parts be a nuclear engine for the SC-IVB? because I've been itching for a nuclear upper stage

[Kerbal01]

4 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

I should make the colliders actually match the models...

get on it then. Chop chop.

[CobaltWolf]

35 minutes ago, DarthVader said:

get on it then. Chop chop.

/blocked

[Kerbal01]

11 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

/blocked

[Pappystein]

On 7/7/2017 at 5:04 PM, MaverickSawyer said:

I hold down the SHIFT key while placing the boosters with 3x symmetry. It's tricky and finicky, but you can put them evenly spaced around the core. Then, I use the offset tool to slide the boosters down/aft relative to the decouplers and then slide the decouplers to a position that looks right. Boosters pop off without any issues.

 

As for properly timing the staging, recommend SmartParts. Using the fuel sensor, set one for 3% solid fuel remaining. This is right about when the rapid tailoff in thrust starts to happen, so use that to fire your airstart boosters. Set a second one to 0% to stage off the first trio of the groundstarts and to trigger a 1 second delay on a timer part, then use that timer to jettison the second trio of groundstarts. End result looks remarkably close to the real thing.

 

I would add two things to this.  

1) if you don't want to use smart parts you should probably stage the SRMs like real life.  all 9x at the same time.  Whether or not you have some that are air ignited!  

2) I too do the SRMs in 3x symmetry 3x times.  BUT you almost HAVE to have Editor Extensions installed to safely eject the larger GEM rockets from the 1.5m Thor EELT body

 

[CobaltWolf]

[Enorats]

Out of curiosity, is the Sarnus V and accompanying Apollo-like hardware supposed to be balanced for the stock game, or something else entirely? It felt massively overpowered in the stock game, but after booting up a 2.5x game it's almost spot on perfect. Stage 2 has about 500 dv left in a 90 km orbit, stage 3 has a similar amount leftover after the TMI burn, achieving munar orbit takes half the fuel out of the service module, the landing burn left the descent stage with around 500, the ascent stage had a measly 90 left upon docking, and the return to kerbin left the craft with only 240 dv at the end of the mission. Now, granted - I drained about 3/4 of the ablator out of the heat shield (as I always do), so that reduced the mass somewhat making those numbers all slightly higher than they would have been. I sorta regretted that when I came blazing back into Kerbin's atmosphere at a whopping 4800 m/s instead of a more normal 3000, but somehow survived as heat shields seem nearly indestructible even when out of ablator.

[Daelkyr]

It's "balanced" to stock proportions. Meaning that it's ridiculously overpowered for Stock size solar system. 2.5x ~ 3x rescale will put you in the sweet spot, as you've already found.

Edited July 11, 2017 by Daelkyr

[CobaltWolf]

1 hour ago, Enorats said:

Out of curiosity, is the Sarnus V and accompanying Apollo-like hardware supposed to be balanced for the stock game, or something else entirely? It felt massively overpowered in the stock game, but after booting up a 2.5x game it's almost spot on perfect. Stage 2 has about 500 dv left in a 90 km orbit, stage 3 has a similar amount leftover after the TMI burn, achieving munar orbit takes half the fuel out of the service module, the landing burn left the descent stage with around 500, the ascent stage had a measly 90 left upon docking, and the return to kerbin left the craft with only 240 dv at the end of the mission. Now, granted - I drained about 3/4 of the ablator out of the heat shield (as I always do), so that reduced the mass somewhat making those numbers all slightly higher than they would have been. I sorta regretted that when I came blazing back into Kerbin's atmosphere at a whopping 4800 m/s instead of a more normal 3000, but somehow survived as heat shields seem nearly indestructible even when out of ablator.

What Daelkyr said. They're balanced against the stock parts, not the stock system.