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

[Stone Blue]

3 hours ago, MOARdV said:

Give the frog a top hat and have most of its experiment texts be a variant of "Ribbit".  Some would include early 20th century pop songs...  And the "door" of the experiment can be theatre curtains.

 

Edited December 11, 2019 by Stone Blue

[Pappystein]

3 hours ago, OrbitalManeuvers said:

Hmm, if that's the intention then it's certainly not a logical one. Why would there be an engine in the middle of the upper stage? Seems to me like the intention is to be able to separate the capsule and leave the lab in orbit. 

That is one of those "Depends on the Day of the week" type questions.   MOS/MOL/whatever has soo many variants and permutations that it is hard.   Further the Gemini SM's are not really setup REAL like.   (Please peeps, don't spam wanting a new SM!  I beg you)

Currently the best way to do Gemini with MOL or MOS is to use the Short SM, with a 1.875m docking port to join the actual Station Stack.    I do not put a decoupler between the SM and the Docking port and use the RCS from the MOS/MOL Ferry version.... OR alternatively I put the Rumble-seat on the Gemini Capsule (making it 1.875tm, and then use the MOS/MOL Ferry tank + it's 4 way RCS and a Docking port with no need to change "real" crafts....

I prefer the Rumble seat option because it is a Mid-G capsule (in between a Standard Gemini or S-G and the Big G that holds 6 extra Kerbals... or should.)   

 

The MOS/MOL Ferry tank has a decoupler between it and the heatshield of the Rumble Seat.

 

[Gargamel]

Some off topic posts have been moved to their own thread.

[CobaltWolf]

21 hours ago, OrbitalManeuvers said:

[dev branch]

For the Gemini MOL, is there meant to be a decoupler between the Service Module and the Equipment module?

19 hours ago, biohazard15 said:

MOL variant from wiki and craft file uses its RCS thrusters for deorbit burn, thus it doesn't really need a decoupler between SM and EM. Of course, nothing stops you from adding one if you wish

19 hours ago, OrbitalManeuvers said:

Hmm, if that's the intention then it's certainly not a logical one. Why would there be an engine in the middle of the upper stage? Seems to me like the intention is to be able to separate the capsule and leave the lab in orbit. 

15 hours ago, Pappystein said:

That is one of those "Depends on the Day of the week" type questions.   MOS/MOL/whatever has soo many variants and permutations that it is hard.   Further the Gemini SM's are not really setup REAL like.   (Please peeps, don't spam wanting a new SM!  I beg you)

Currently the best way to do Gemini with MOL or MOS is to use the Short SM, with a 1.875m docking port to join the actual Station Stack.    I do not put a decoupler between the SM and the Docking port and use the RCS from the MOS/MOL Ferry version.... OR alternatively I put the Rumble-seat on the Gemini Capsule (making it 1.875tm, and then use the MOS/MOL Ferry tank + it's 4 way RCS and a Docking port with no need to change "real" crafts....

I prefer the Rumble seat option because it is a Mid-G capsule (in between a Standard Gemini or S-G and the Big G that holds 6 extra Kerbals... or should.)  

The MOS/MOL Ferry tank has a decoupler between it and the heatshield of the Rumble Seat.

I'm not quite following - what's the issue?

 

 

On 12/10/2019 at 10:42 AM, Jall said:

Improved mystery goo or something? It still has an “organic” feel to it without actually being an animal experiment.

21 hours ago, Dragon01 said:

Come on, it's a frog. Frogs already have a lot of comedy value, nevermind space frogs.  It could be less about doing anything with the frog, but rather about recording the frog's reactions to the situations.

20 hours ago, biohazard15 said:

Add a baby kraken instead of frog?

19 hours ago, MOARdV said:

Give the frog a top hat and have most of its experiment texts be a variant of "Ribbit".  Some would include early 20th century pop songs...  And the "door" of the experiment can be theatre curtains.

Yeah I still haven't really decided. I'm doing Biosatellite as part of the update as well (since I'm making the Discovery-type recovery vehicle already) so maybe I can represent them as part of a two part program - OFO being like a basic experiment that transmits data back, and Biosatellite (with the experiment kind of incorrectly housed in the body and not the recovery capsule) giving you full science returns but only if returned.

 

 

Some more progress on Pioneer Venus

[OrbitalManeuvers]

1 hour ago, CobaltWolf said:

I'm not quite following - what's the issue?

Well my original question is about this build: https://github.com/friznit/Unofficial-BDB-Wiki/wiki/MOL   The service module is an engine, and in the pictured build there's no way to decouple it from the Equipment Module. So just trying to figure out what the design intention was ... e.g. is the capsule meant to decouple with the engine and be able to deorbit without the station? Or is that part simply there for geometry?

I fully realize how pedantic these types of questions are ... I just like to at least try to use parts as they were designed, before just doing whatever I want anyway

[CobaltWolf]

6 minutes ago, OrbitalManeuvers said:

Well my original question is about this build: https://github.com/friznit/Unofficial-BDB-Wiki/wiki/MOL   The service module is an engine, and in the pictured build there's no way to decouple it from the Equipment Module. So just trying to figure out what the design intention was ... e.g. is the capsule meant to decouple with the engine and be able to deorbit without the station? Or is that part simply there for geometry?

I fully realize how pedantic these types of questions are ... I just like to at least try to use parts as they were designed, before just doing whatever I want anyway

Ah, yeah I mean... so I think first off by way of explanation, that service module was added several years ago, long before the actual MOL was ever added.

In real life, it would have a packet of 6 retro solids for deorbiting (even if the MOL wasn't necessarily going to get reused, I assume that just deorbited due to drag later) but in BDB it doesn't have one. I think the lack of any decoupler is an oversight on my part since I never actually thought about what would go there; the wiki reflects that I guess.

[OrbitalManeuvers]

1 minute ago, CobaltWolf said:

In real life, it would have a packet of 6 retro solids for deorbiting

Gotcha - thanks for the insight! I wasn't sure if the lab/telescope was intended to outlast the capsule, but sounds like the whole kit and kaboodle would have been deorbited together, and the capsule separated just for reentry. In any event, it's fascinating just to see these ideas they had floating around.

[ltajax]

@CobaltWolf Was playing around with your dev build of the new vanguard one probe and noticed that its solar panels are not working. I've tried the older version of the probe in the same build and the panels on that are working fine so i don't think its an issue with kopernicus or jnsq. I went over the probe CFG's for both versions and there entries for the new one look correct compared to the older one so i'm not sure exactly what has happened. Im running ksp 1.7.3

[OrbitalManeuvers]

New datertaters on the MOL ... or at least new to me. Vintage Space did an episode on the MOL a few years ago, and she states that the plan was to separate the Gemini-B from the lab at the end of the mission, and return in just the Gemini capsule. Link below should start at the right place.

Oh wow that put a HUGE preview in the message ... lol ... not my intention

[CobaltWolf]

1 hour ago, OrbitalManeuvers said:

New datertaters on the MOL ... or at least new to me. Vintage Space did an episode on the MOL a few years ago, and she states that the plan was to separate the Gemini-B from the lab at the end of the mission, and return in just the Gemini capsule. Link below should start at the right place.

Oh wow that put a HUGE preview in the message ... lol ... not my intention

Yes, I meant to include an image in my last post and got distracted   So, yes. They would leave immediately at the end of the mission and the lab would be allowed to decay, or whatever they wanted to do with it.

 

7 hours ago, ltajax said:

@CobaltWolf Was playing around with your dev build of the new vanguard one probe and noticed that its solar panels are not working. I've tried the older version of the probe in the same build and the panels on that are working fine so i don't think its an issue with kopernicus or jnsq. I went over the probe CFG's for both versions and there entries for the new one look correct compared to the older one so i'm not sure exactly what has happened. Im running ksp 1.7.3

Hmm. I'll have to take a look. I think it might need to be converted to the spherical panel type that @Gotmachine showed to me. I think the only thing I've implemented it on was the IDCSP.

[CobaltWolf]

Daily-ish Pioneer Venus update. I think... half? of the experiments are in some stage of "textured" and... yeah. There's a lot of weird stuff in this part set that's making me frustrated.

[OrbitalManeuvers]

2 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

I meant to include an image in my last post

Thanks for the images! Hadn't seen those.

Man, the hatch in the heat shield ... wonder how that would have worked out. Those guys weren't just thinking outside the box ... they were building the box. 

Here's a 50 second video looking into the cockpit of a Gemini-B capsule, and you can see the hatch:  (link broken on purpose, no one needs his thumbnail in here)   h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgbLT7NMvW4

 

[CobaltWolf]

30 minutes ago, OrbitalManeuvers said:

Thanks for the images! Hadn't seen those.

Man, the hatch in the heat shield ... wonder how that would have worked out. Those guys weren't just thinking outside the box ... they were building the box. 

Here's a 50 second video looking into the cockpit of a Gemini-B capsule, and you can see the hatch:  (link broken on purpose, no one needs his thumbnail in here)   h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgbLT7NMvW4

Yeah, but it was tested successfully on the MOL Boilerplate flight - with a refurbished capsule at that!

Holes in heatshields are a solvable problem - the VA capsule from the TKS had a hole in the hatch and I believe was autonomously demonstrated several times. And an even better example - the Space Shuttle made, what, 135 flights with at least three holes for landing gear?

When I get around to making an actual Gemini I'll have to try and represent the tunnel and have an option for the heatshield hatch.

Edited December 12, 2019 by CobaltWolf

[alberro+]

Sorry to ask, but is the Atlas V already done? The Atlas from Launcher’s Pack has a super weak Centaur.

[Hay]

34 minutes ago, alberro+ said:

Sorry to ask, but is the Atlas V already done? The Atlas from Launcher’s Pack has a super weak Centaur.

Yes, BDB has a complete Atlas V

[Guest]

Don't expect miracles out of this one's Centaur, though. This stage has weak thrust IRL and there's no way around it. You can use the two engine version for a bit of a kick, but it's just not very powerful.

@CobaltWolf, what's the deal with Agena D's secondary engines? I can't seem to find them, neither in part list nor in the mod folder. 

[Friznit]

42 minutes ago, Dragon01 said:

Don't expect miracles out of this one's Centaur, though. This stage has weak thrust IRL and there's no way around it. You can use the two engine version for a bit of a kick, but it's just not very powerful.

@CobaltWolf, what's the deal with Agena D's secondary engines? I can't seem to find them, neither in part list nor in the mod folder. 

They're considered part of the Gemini Agena Target Vehicle, which is still on the To Do list.  The old ones are still there but soft deprecated.

Edited December 13, 2019 by Friznit

[Marcelo Silveira]

1 hour ago, alberro+ said:

Sorry to ask, but is the Atlas V already done? The Atlas from Launcher’s Pack has a super weak Centaur.

Yes, it has a very nice Atlas V with a modular centaur. You can put an RL-10 to have more realism or any other engine, hey, you can even add an F-1 engine that would REALLY solve the low TWR issue. 

Spoiler

That's a problem with the centaur's upper stage engine, the RL-10. The centaur III used on the Atlas V has an acceleration of only 4.3 m/s² and that is without a payload.  Upper stage rocket engines have to be efficient, not powerful, that means high Isp. And with high Isp you will have lower thrust, that is how rocket engines work. You can't have both high Isp and high thrust in a real rocket and ksp simulates that.

 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Marcelo Silveira said:

You can't have both high Isp and high thrust in a real rocket and ksp simulates that.

This is not true. You can very much have both high Isp and high thrust. It just results in a bigger (and heavier) engine. A J-2, for example, would handily solve the Centaur's TWR problems, if you can fit one inside the interstage.

The "thrust versus Isp" misconception stems from the concept of thrust power, which is, well, thrust times Isp. For a constant thrust power, this is true, but nobody says you can't add more power if you need to (it just has its own costs). 

[CobaltWolf]

3 hours ago, alberro+ said:

Sorry to ask, but is the Atlas V already done? The Atlas from Launcher’s Pack has a super weak Centaur.

2 hours ago, Hay said:

Yes, BDB has a complete Atlas V

2 hours ago, Dragon01 said:

Don't expect miracles out of this one's Centaur, though. This stage has weak thrust IRL and there's no way around it. You can use the two engine version for a bit of a kick, but it's just not very powerful.

Yeah, Atlas V just has a dummy low TWR on the upper stage. I believe it sometimes circularizes after apoapsis.

 

2 hours ago, Dragon01 said:

@CobaltWolf, what's the deal with Agena D's secondary engines? I can't seem to find them, neither in part list nor in the mod folder. 

2 hours ago, Friznit said:

They're considered part of the Gemini Agena Target Vehicle, which is still on the To Do list.  The old ones are still there but soft deprecated.

Indeed, as far as I know the secondary engines weren't used as part of the Agena's that were meant to serve as upper stages, only the GATV and maybe some Air Force payloads - though I've never see evidence of that tbh.

As for why GATV hasn't gotten done... idk I'm just not really hype to do it I guess.

[CobaltWolf]

Ok, streaming tomorrow morning some time between like... 7:30 and 9 AM Eastern?

 

Lot of cool stuff coming down the pipeline, I think. No Pioneer-Venus quite yet (I wouldn't even make a dent in how much is left for that...) but some cool stuff to tide y'all over...

Test pattern for Redstone. The parts that come closest to the IRL Redstone were actually all on the WRESAT sheet, so I took the opportunity to make variants for all of them.
(So, specifically here, the Sparta Aft Unit, 0.625m adapter, 0.625m interstage and WRESAT)

WRESAT with a kind of ahistorical brass look to it? I just thought it would look cool.

 

And then, these Ranger Lander parts that I kinda threw together today on a whim, using up some space left over on the Ranger texture sheets. This isn't connected to any historical proposal, at least that I know of.

The inspiration for some of these parts is likely obvious. They are:

• Ranger Lander Legs
• Ranger Lander Solar Panel (fixed)
• Ranger Lander Solar Panel (tracking)
• Ranger Lander Terminal Propulsion System
• Ranger Lander Communications Dish
• Ranger Lander Short Truss (basically a cut down Ranger Block 1 Truss)

 

And then I'd really like to get this new-and-improved refresh of OSO done. But there's a lot less.

[biohazard15]

Nice!

Hopefully SurveyoRanger would be balanced for 2.5x rescale, not stock.

[Pappystein]

12 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

 

Indeed, as far as I know the secondary engines weren't used as part of the Agena's that were meant to serve as upper stages, only the GATV and maybe some Air Force payloads - though I've never see evidence of that tbh.

As for why GATV hasn't gotten done... idk I'm just not really hype to do it I guess.

To my knowledge the Agena Supplemental Propulsion unit was not used on any FLOW Air Force/NSA/NRO projects.     NASA developed the pods as a way to fine tune the orbit of GATV because smaller engines spool up and down quicker.  Now that is not to say some NRO project didn't try to repurposed this Civilian Development.   But at the point we are talking about Lockheed was already trying to strip mass off the Agena to improve performance (and allow for a Bigger engine bell!)   By the time they got down to using a severely lightened restart system for the XLR81 engine, a new light weight solid state GCU, and rebalanced the entire structure... Well Ascent Agena doesn't have the ability to use these pods... without a major loss of performance.   But then again... *engage huge dripping pile of sarcasm*  Ascent Agena didn't launch *WINK WINK NUDGE NUDGE*   Nope, they were not ordered in a disguised fashion at all.  They were not ordered as "Agena" when every previous Agena Launch was ordered as "Agena A", "Agena B" or "Agena D."  Nope not at all!      *sarcasm disengaged*

Based on several documents in circulation all the Big Fairing Titan B launches flew with Ascent Agena.   That is to say the Titan 33B and 34Bs.  

Here is a pretty complete (I think) list of changes to the Agena D to make Ascent Agena.   I have tried to highlight the things I am unsure of by asking questions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

4

Spoiler

• Much shorter Digital Guidance Control unit (GCU)  No Vacuum tubes and no helium sphere
• Command and Inertial Guidance vs Radio Controlled.  
• new Battery bay created in space between the new bottom of the GCU and the top of the Fuel tank (overall length of Agena is the same if using the same XLR81 engine as Agena D)
• new aft structure to allow for larger expansion ratio nozzle on the 8096 variant of the LR81 engine.  No batteries in this structure 
• New RCS system that improved precise control with payloads (Variable thrust for the aft control points?  Honestly am unsure as they never say it is a new RCS...  Just that the Control of the Stage attitude has been improved)
• Switch from Nitric Acid (IRFNA-III?) to NTO for Oxidizer  (Change in fuel may result in different mixture ratio but combined fuel/oxidizer tank combined volume remains largely the same???)
• Plumbing along tank conduit to allow forward RCS points (not fitted for but designed to capable of being fitted with I think)  This results in a longer conduit on one side vs the Agena B/D tank (This might be Shuttle agena and not Ascent Agena...  Many Shuttle Agena and Ascent Agena documents are cross polinated with incorrect facts from the two separate programs)
• Total mass reduced by almost 100kg(???) vs Agena D.  Slight bump in thrust but a big bump in ISP with the 8096 engines.   I believe the mass change does not include the forward RCS plumbing or the 8096 engine!

And here is a list of what Cobaltwolf *NEEDS* to make for Ascent Agena:

Spoiler

NOTHING!  He has already made the 8096 family of engines (I THINK those big bell LR81s are 8096s)... Creating a new GCU for a VISUAL effect and making a thin 0.9375m battery are NOT NEEDED.   Just use the existing model with B9PS....  

 

30 minutes ago, biohazard15 said:

Nice!

Hopefully SurveyoRanger would be balanced for 2.5x rescale, not stock.

biohazard15,  Most everything in BDB (and stock) are balanced for 2.5x.   You can generally play BDB in 2.7x as well... 

[blowfish]

19 hours ago, Dragon01 said:

This is not true. You can very much have both high Isp and high thrust. It just results in a bigger (and heavier) engine. A J-2, for example, would handily solve the Centaur's TWR problems, if you can fit one inside the interstage.

The "thrust versus Isp" misconception stems from the concept of thrust power, which is, well, thrust times Isp. For a constant thrust power, this is true, but nobody says you can't add more power if you need to (it just has its own costs). 

So a few things:

1) Engines are expensive.  If you’re packing more engine than you really need you’re wasting money

2) Higher TWR engines aren’t going to be more expensive for the same thrust.  Hard to justify in an upper stage where additional TWR doesn’t really gain you anything.

3) For launchers optimized for GTO (like Atlas V) you can really get away with long burn times. The burn will be split in two anyway (one to insert into a parking orbit and one to get to GTO) so upper stage burn times that would be awful for pure LEO are just fine for GTO.  And computer guidance systems don’t get bored the way human KSP players do

[CobaltWolf]

Dev stream starting up!

(Centaur revamp when?)