Regenerative Cooler

[Temstar]

With the new heat model and atmospheric entry being quite the dangerous phase of the mission I think it's time we get some more options on cooling. Radiators are nice and all but I propose a more active cooling method: the Regenerative Cooler.

Essentially a regenerative cooler is the same idea as the regenerative cooling system built into rocket engines - cryogenic liquids as pumped through lots of thin pipes that are built into the part need to be cooled and take away the heat. In a rocket engine the heated gas is then piped into the engine to be fired, but in a stand alone regenerative cooler they would be simply dumped overboard.

To implement it in the game you basically have a small radial attached part similar to the fuel cell. Turn it on and it starts consuming liquid fuel using the standard fuel flow logic and give a dramatic cooling effect to the part it attaches to as well as sucking away fuel from a few part away, similar to a radiator.

The idea being that generally, only a few part on a craft experience huge heat loads - nose cone and leading edge during reentry, ISRU converters, engines during long burns etc. A small, powerful and togglable cooler specifically designed to cool these hottest parts at the expensive of fuel would give people more options on thermal control without all the fiddling around with max heat. You want to make a mark 1 sized SSTO? Now you can by actively cooling the cockpit during reentry so it doesn't melt.

This would also open the way for special science parts such as IR telescopes that must be actively cooled to very low temperature before they would work, thus simulating things such as Spitzer space telescope with its limited coolant load.

Edited December 10, 2015 by Temstar