Test track/room for SPH

[abowl]

Hey

Was thinking about how long it takes, not really that long really, when you are making something from scratch and want to test every little detail. Enough wheel? landing legs reach? etc. and you have to revert to SPH, etc. and wait for the loading.

What if we could speed up this process? What if there was made a kind of test room that loaded much faster, or even had seemless transition from SPH and back. This way testing vehicles etc. could become well, it would take less time, because the loading time is cut. I know the devs spend alot of time thinking about this in their own development process. The time you wait for code to compile is wasted time. Its the same when creating rockets of course. The time we spend waiting for the entire world to load just because we need to test some wheels or a rover, well, its down time.

Anyway i go on too much of a rant. Basically it would be awesome i think with some kind of small test room with minor obstacles for testing rovers and or similar. So you dont have to go to the launch pad every time and avoid the loading time.

[Venusgate]

I like this idea.

I think it would not be seamless, because editor does not have physics applied to the .craft file yet, but certainly if you had a featureless, wall gridded wind tunnel instead of loading all of the universe, testing would be a bit less time consuming.

The real question is, how high would you make it? Would you let it simulate low gravity conditions? Would there be a hot tub?

And also, would you allow low/null altitude part testing contracts to be completed this way?

[ZooNamedGames]

Definitely like this idea and I've had it myself.

To answer VenusGate, it would be simple, have a 20m by 20m range or an infinitely looping area for you to fly in, however there would be no ground or such. It would no manage low gravity as it is to skip tests on the runway, not on the Mun.

Lastly, science cannot be performed while in the sim.

[TheCanadianVendingMachine]

Uh, you can test heights on landing gear and that by setting them to down in the editor
And then checking if it hits the ground

[ZooNamedGames]

[quote name='TheCanadianVendingMachine']Uh, you can test heights on landing gear and that by setting them to down in the editor
And then checking if it hits the ground[/QUOTE]

But there's no physics applied, and moreoever, with the floor noncollideable you can pass right through it so it isn't a solid (literally and metaphorically) measuring point. Besides you might want to see if the wheels buckle or if the craft settles itself tail end or nose first. Nose first is important for a Space Shuttle as it prevents ground effect and repeated take offs, but tail first is better for crafts that will take off from a runway.

[Venusgate]

[quote name='TheCanadianVendingMachine']Uh, you can test heights on landing gear and that by setting them to down in the editor
And then checking if it hits the ground[/QUOTE]

You can't know if the weight of the craft is too much for the amount/class of struts you use. Additionally, a room with a "ground" would be nice for testing parachute speeds for given re-entry vehicles

[Vanamonde]

Moved to suggestions.