[WIP] Coatl Aerospace ProbesPlus Dev Thread [Beta] 10/19/2020 (1.8-1.10)

[rasta013]

1 minute ago, akron said:

I totally understand. The original E200 are based on a somewhat unique NASA design (Odyssey) that I haven't really seen anywhere else so I decided to model it. It's probably not as practical in KSP, hence this new E200B. 

Well to be 100% completely honest, the 2x1 is a lot easier layout to work with in KSP exactly because of pointy thingies everywhere but visually speaking I always thought the 1x3 type layout was a lot sexier if you can make 'em fit.  I'll sometimes go out of my way to move stuff around just to use it. LOL

[akron]

1 minute ago, rasta013 said:

Well to be 100% completely honest, the 2x1 is a lot easier layout to work with in KSP exactly because of pointy thingies everywhere but visually speaking I always thought the 1x3 type layout was a lot sexier if you can make 'em fit.  I'll sometimes go out of my way to move stuff around just to use it. LOL

Basing a design entirely using the Barquetta and the 1x3 panel essentially means you dedicate one side just for the solar panel. If you make your design with NASA's Odyssey in mind, and only use one solar panel, it's actually not bad; specially for missions closer to the sun.

There is a quick Github update with the new solar panel and a couple of other CFG balancing tweaks.

~Cheers

[Sgt.Shutesie]

@akron Might I suggest the nimbus spacecraft as a future project? It's a meteorological satellite from 50 years ago (there were 7 of them), it looks like it has a lot of capacity for possible science experiments. The solar panels also look awesome.

[rasta013]

5 minutes ago, Sgt.Shutesie said:

Might I suggest the nimbus spacecraft as a future project? It's a meteorological satellite from 50 years ago (there were 7 of them), it looks like it has a lot of capacity for possible science experiments. The solar panels also look awesome.

The bottom of that kind of reminds me of Universal Storage...LOL

[akron]

2 hours ago, Sgt.Shutesie said:

@akron Might I suggest the nimbus spacecraft as a future project? It's a meteorological satellite from 50 years ago (there were 7 of them), it looks like it has a lot of capacity for possible science experiments. The solar panels also look awesome.

 

Oh yeah, that's pretty cool. I'll keep this in mind when I do my SCANSat update. I'll do some meteorology type stuff there too

It does look a little like Universal Storage!

Edited May 15, 2016 by akron

[akron]

Could I get some feedback on this part. I am trying to keep an overall design to the mod parts, but if it looks too repetitive, let me know. I haven't committed to this design yet. There is some texture weirdness that I can fix, but I wanted to get some feedback first. This is the Reconnaissance Orbital Telescoping Focusing Lens (CA-ROTFL), a perpendicular-mount version of DMagic's Orbital telescope:

[BetaguyGZT]

Okay, now you're just showing off.  Nice!

[akron]

32 minutes ago, BetaguyGZT said:

Okay, now you're just showing off.  Nice!

It's all for you guys!

Update

SWIS and ROTFL (wip) are now in-game. SWIS still has a lot of science definitions missing, but about half of them or so are done. The Github Repo has been updated with the new files, test it out and let me know your thoughts. The telescope uses the stock science module because DMagic's was doing weird things, I think due to the fact that his is animated and this one is not. Not sure what the deal is, but the stock module works fine. This last few parts gave me some trouble. The solar panels had to be exported and tested like 10 times because I forgot how to do them; now I have cheat-sheet. SWIS was doing weird things with the mesh's transparency. I finally figured it out, I just changed the material type in Unity. It is only visible when close up though. Nothing I can do about that, I think.

~Cheers

 

[VenomousRequiem]

Woah, how long has there been a Voyager science boom! I wanted to use it the second I discovered it's existence.

[akron]

3 minutes ago, VenomousRequiem said:

Woah, how long has there been a Voyager science boom! I wanted to use it the second I discovered it's existence.

It has been finished for a while, but it was recently released with the 0.13RC dev build in Github. I actually forgot it was not part of 0.12 until like a week ago 

[rasta013]

7 hours ago, akron said:

Could I get some feedback on this part. I am trying to keep an overall design to the mod parts, but if it looks too repetitive, let me know. I haven't committed to this design yet. There is some texture weirdness that I can fix, but I wanted to get some feedback first. This is the Reconnaissance Orbital Telescoping Focusing Lens (CA-ROTFL), a perpendicular-mount version of DMagic's Orbital telescope:

So the lens shade and RCT truss look similar to DMagic's but what're you gonna do?  Any good telescope used in space is going to be round, have a lens shade over the primary optical tube and is going to be a RCT design with supporting truss for the front hyperbolic mirror.  From one telescope to another you can't really make them look very much different.  The extra housing work along the base with the gold foil trim goes more than far enough for my tastes to differentiate yours from his. In other words...looks awesome as always! 

The SWIS looks really cool.  I seriously dig that vertical design and screened housing.  Very unique and I shall be putting one on the first probe I can!

[BetaguyGZT]

Going to apply the update immediately! Stunning work as always ... wow.  Got my work cut out for me to get up to this level. Such lovely attention to detail ... gosh.

There was some weirdness I wanted to report with the IR instrument. It seems that when snapping it to its' bottom, then moving it so that it's on its' side with the aperture rotated outward and pointed prograde it would "sink in" and I'd have to CTRL-Z to undo, otherwise I'd lose the part entirely inside whatever it was being attached to. It did this on multiple surfaces, so it wasn't just wonkiness on one part. Just passing it along. That was a previous version of the mod, so maybe you've already fixed it.  

Thanks for everything you've put into this wonderful mod thus far. I'm sure I speak for everyone when I express my appreciation for the time you spend working on it, and how much enjoyment it gives in-game as well as outside of the game watching its' progress. I'm learning a lot just watching how you do it.  

[akron]

1 hour ago, rasta013 said:

So the lens shade and RCT truss look similar to DMagic's but what're you gonna do?  Any good telescope used in space is going to be round, have a lens shade over the primary optical tube and is going to be a RCT design with supporting truss for the front hyperbolic mirror.  From one telescope to another you can't really make them look very much different.  The extra housing work along the base with the gold foil trim goes more than far enough for my tastes to differentiate yours from his. In other words...looks awesome as always! 

The SWIS looks really cool.  I seriously dig that vertical design and screened housing.  Very unique and I shall be putting one on the first probe I can!

Well, in this particular case, we both based our models on the same source, HiRISE, so they are bound to look similar. My version more closely matches the original, but my main reason for doing another version of this telescope is to have a perpendicular-mounted option as well as DMagic's original parallel mount. Each can be used on different designs. Thanks for the compliments! I just want to make sure that my parts don't all look the same, specially because I use the foil texture quite a bit. I am trying to diversify a little without breaking the mod's continuity.

1 hour ago, BetaguyGZT said:

Going to apply the update immediately! Stunning work as always ... wow.  Got my work cut out for me to get up to this level. Such lovely attention to detail ... gosh.

There was some weirdness I wanted to report with the IR instrument. It seems that when snapping it to its' bottom, then moving it so that it's on its' side with the aperture rotated outward and pointed prograde it would "sink in" and I'd have to CTRL-Z to undo, otherwise I'd lose the part entirely inside whatever it was being attached to. It did this on multiple surfaces, so it wasn't just wonkiness on one part. Just passing it along. That was a previous version of the mod, so maybe you've already fixed it.  

Thanks for everything you've put into this wonderful mod thus far. I'm sure I speak for everyone when I express my appreciation for the time you spend working on it, and how much enjoyment it gives in-game as well as outside of the game watching its' progress. I'm learning a lot just watching how you do it.  

Nah, stop it. There are much better mods out there with a higher quality bar to aim for.

I will test the IR spec as you described, thanks. I have seen some similar weirdness too, but when placing landing gear so it may be a KSP thing instead. If you want to see how I did any of my parts or textures, let me know. Just please be aware that I use a lot of cheaty, kinda lazy methods when texturing/UV mapping that are definitely not the "proper way."

Thanks!

One last thing before I call it a night. Here is a WIP of the texture for the LUV (Long-Range Ultraviolet Spectrometer). If you spot something that's weird or have a suggestion, let me know before I finish it tomorrow night so I have a chance to change/improve it. I might change the foil around the electronics

~Cheers

[BetaguyGZT]

Just now, akron said:

Well, in this particular case, we both based our models on the same source, HiRISE, so they are bound to look similar. My version more closely matches the original, but my main reason for doing another version of this telescope is to have a perpendicular-mounted option as well as DMagic's original parallel mount. Each can be used on different designs. Thanks for the compliments! I just want to make sure that my parts don't all look the same, specially because I use the foil texture quite a bit. I am trying to diversify a little without breaking the mod's continuity.

Nah, stop it. There are much better mods out there with a higher quality bar to aim for.

I will test the IR spec as you described, thanks. I have seen some similar weirdness too, but when placing landing gear so it may be a KSP thing instead. If you want to see how I did any of my parts or textures, let me know. Just please be aware that I use a lot of cheaty, kinda lazy methods when texturing/UV mapping that are definitely not the "proper way."

Thanks!

One last thing before I call it a night. Here is a WIP of the texture for the LUV (Long-Range Ultraviolet Spectrometer). If you spot something that's weird or have a suggestion, let me know before I finish it tomorrow night so I have a chance to change/improve it. I might change the foil around the electronics

~Cheers

Lub. Lub lub.   We wants it. Hehe!

[akron]

10 hours ago, BetaguyGZT said:

Lub. Lub lub.   We wants it. Hehe!

Thou shall gets it. I will try to get it up on Github this evening

[akron]

Update

Initial LUV released! Go test!

 

[akron]

@CobaltWolf Brought up some feedback on the size of the IR Spec, it being too large. Any other thoughts on that or the size of it or other parts?

[Virtualgenius]

I know your busy with the science stuff but I would really love an engine and tank combo from you PLEASE as my OCD cant seem to match anything nicely with your stuff to make it look cool 

Edited May 17, 2016 by Virtualgenius

[BetaguyGZT]

4 hours ago, akron said:

@CobaltWolf Brought up some feedback on the size of the IR Spec, it being too large. Any other thoughts on that or the size of it or other parts?

I like it the way it is, personally. But I've enabled TweakScale's "global" setting (in example.cfg), so I can make it whatever size I need. The default size it comes as is great, though.

[CobaltWolf]

3 hours ago, BetaguyGZT said:

I like it the way it is, personally. But I've enabled TweakScale's "global" setting (in example.cfg), so I can make it whatever size I need. The default size it comes as is great, though.

I think the thing to remember @akron (stupid mobile wont tag) is that the size of an experiment should scale with its science value. Don't make the player lug a big thing around just for a few science points.

[akron]

6 hours ago, Virtualgenius said:

I know your busy with the science stuff but I would really love an engine and tank combo from you PLEASE as my OCD cant seem to match anything nicely with your stuff to make it look cool 

I'll see what I can do. I've used BDB parts as launchers and service modules for my own career mode and it looks good. I'd have to go through and see what engines are not already being covered by @CobaltWolf in BDB. I'm thinking a hypergolic upper stage, or a Mono-prop service module are due pretty soon

5 hours ago, BetaguyGZT said:

I like it the way it is, personally. But I've enabled TweakScale's "global" setting (in example.cfg), so I can make it whatever size I need. The default size it comes as is great, though.

1 hour ago, CobaltWolf said:

I think the thing to remember @akron (stupid mobile wont tag) is that the size of an experiment should scale with its science value. Don't make the player lug a big thing around just for a few science points.

I think the current plan is to make the IR-spec smaller and the ELIX larger

 

Edited May 17, 2016 by akron

[CobaltWolf]

Well the little Marquart got resized to 0.3125m, and I started on the Ranger course correction engine yesterday. Other than that I don't have much covered. Like you I've focused on cores, communications and science parts.

[davidy12]

On May 16, 2016 at 10:27 PM, VenomousRequiem said:

Woah, how long has there been a Voyager science boom! I wanted to use it the second I discovered it's existence.

GORGEOUS!!!

 

Though their is one problem @akron, how do we stow it inside a rocket when the RTG and camera/magnetometer thingy clip downwards...

[VenomousRequiem]

10 minutes ago, davidy12 said:

GORGEOUS!!!

 

Though their is one problem @akron, how do we stow it inside a rocket when the RTG and camera/magnetometer thingy clip downwards...

Talking about the science boom? It's how the real one was, because it was mounted on an SRB(Which is included in BDB by the way... Star 48 I think?) which would make up that gap between the spacecraft and it's Centaur.

Edit:

I'm not sure how accurate Andegraf is sometimes, but it proves my point:

Edited May 17, 2016 by VenomousRequiem

[akron]

4 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

Well the little Marquart got resized to 0.3125m, and I started on the Ranger course correction engine yesterday. Other than that I don't have much covered. Like you I've focused on cores, communications and science parts.

I may just do the Russian-inspired SM a little earlier then. Some thing along the lines of the Russian Fobos-Grunt/Mars/Zond. If someone has another suggestion for a good Maneuvering system/SM/Upper stage design for probes, send it my way.

1 hour ago, davidy12 said:

GORGEOUS!!!

Though their is one problem @akron, how do we stow it inside a rocket when the RTG and camera/magnetometer thingy clip downwards...

Like @VenomousRequiem posted, the "arms" fold back towards the kick motor which I believe is actually a Star 37E. Here's another pic:

 

An this is how I used to stack it on my test KSP install which has no other part mods except DMOS, so no BDB parts for the awesomeness:

Edited May 17, 2016 by akron