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

[VenomousRequiem]

2 minutes ago, akron said:

*Insert reaction image of a squinting Fry from Futurama with the caption "Not sure if trolling or if legitimate question"*

[legoclone09]

5 minutes ago, VenomousRequiem said:

 

8 minutes ago, akron said:

*Insert reaction image of a squinting Fry from Futurama with the caption "Not sure if trolling or if legitimate question"*

[Jimbodiah]

 

Edit:   Strong is the google in this one. Better you must do, or do not at all.

Edited November 1, 2016 by Jimbodiah

[Jeb1969]

On 10/30/2016 at 11:04 PM, akron said:

Oh no they've figured it out.

свежие новости

A little bit more modeling got done and in ways that are going to make UV and textures a nightmare! I guess it is fitting for Halloween. New are the Comm array+dish, solar panels+thermal system, SAS/Startracker assembly. The thermal system is not yet modeled, I'll work on that pretty soon, but I think I'll just finish the Solar panels and then move on to the engine.

Speaking of that, I thought of some changes to the Russian engine parts. I want to make Small-Med-Large service modules inspired by Russian bits. The small monoprop unit will be a mix of things, mostly old verniers. The medium will take place of the current Linkor/Fregat module and will be inspired by the 11D400-500 series KDU propulsion modules with an S5.461 engine. Linkor will get resized to the roughly 2.1m piece it should be and be the "large" unit. Vorona/Vega will get a KTDU-425A propulsion unit which can also be used stand-alone, of course, but will not be self-contained (No fuel). So... yay... craft breaking update coming! You've been warned.

Here, look at the thing:

 

Antenna dish also donated by Beale, but I modified the transmitter piece.

~Cheers

Wow!! This is awesome in a box with a side order of fries. I cannot wait to see this implemented, I also cannot wait to send this to Eve. 

[Mokmo]

I'm going to add one on the non-tracking panels CA-E100: They were pointing at the sun and were blocked by the cylindrical tank they were attached to. Very picky. Had to pitch the ship down 10-15 degrees to start having energy on one panel out of 4. It just taught me to test a part more thoroughly before sending it to Duna... (No worries i got a contigency plan, payload is providing power for now  )

[Jimbodiah]

Hey, do you know how many missions the russians lost to mars?

[komodo]

Im tempted to load up six of them in a revolver style booster aimed at Duna. At least one of them should survive, clearly  

[akron]

11 hours ago, Mokmo said:

I'm going to add one on the non-tracking panels CA-E100: They were pointing at the sun and were blocked by the cylindrical tank they were attached to. Very picky. Had to pitch the ship down 10-15 degrees to start having energy on one panel out of 4. It just taught me to test a part more thoroughly before sending it to Duna... (No worries i got a contigency plan, payload is providing power for now  )

Blasphemy! I will investigate. Maybe there is something I missed. These were one of my early parts anyway.

[CobaltWolf]

2 hours ago, akron said:

Blasphemy! I will investigate. Maybe there is something I missed. These were one of my early parts anyway.

Are we still talking about transforms for sunCatchers? I usually just make mine an empty gameObject with the Z+ pointing towards the sun, at the outer tip of my solar panels. Specifically for that reason; I'd rather err on the side of them working than make them break.

[akron]

3 minutes ago, CobaltWolf said:

Are we still talking about transforms for sunCatchers? I usually just make mine an empty gameObject with the Z+ pointing towards the sun, at the outer tip of my solar panels. Specifically for that reason; I'd rather err on the side of them working than make them break.

I don't understand why the surface area calculation is not processing. I have the suncatch actually be a target mesh because it only being a point sounds wrong 

Edited November 3, 2016 by akron

[CobaltWolf]

1 minute ago, akron said:

I don't understand why the surface area calculation is not processing. I have the suncatch actually be a target mesh because it only being a point sounds wrong 

But it doesn't calculate the area of a surface, does it? It's just the incidence angle. And IIRC using a mesh object can lead to it calculating for both sides.

[Deimos Rast]

3 minutes ago, CobaltWolf said:

Are we still talking about transforms for sunCatchers? I usually just make mine an empty gameObject with the Z+ pointing towards the sun, at the outer tip of my solar panels. Specifically for that reason; I'd rather err on the side of them working than make them break.

@akron doesn't believe in sunCatchers on solar panels. #RememberStayputnik468

In other news: I really like your radiator louvers. They are very unique among thermal doodads compared to how most mods depict such things.

[akron]

9 minutes ago, CobaltWolf said:

But it doesn't calculate the area of a surface, does it? It's just the incidence angle. And IIRC using a mesh object can lead to it calculating for both sides.

How else could it determine exposure but with an area? otherwise the panel could be 90% blocked and still receive full charge. This is why  I think this is a ksp issue

[CobaltWolf]

15 minutes ago, akron said:

How else could it determine exposure but with an area? otherwise the panel could be 90% blocked and still receive full charge. This is why  I think this is a ksp issue

Like I said, I err on the side of not causing issues where the panel should receive energy, but isn't. Rather than worrying too much about it receiving too much electricity. Players shouldn't be placing solar panels in a way that they'd be blocked most of the time, anyways. Most of your panels aren't tracking.

[Mokmo]

I don't know if it's a transform issue, here's the setup where it happened. I have these attached to a 2.5m stock tank and this shows the ship in solar orbit, pointing straight down gives no exposure blocked by the tank, as we change orientation at about 10 degrees one of the panels will start producing power with quite a good exposure percentage. 

On the image: Panel on top is almost making power and one on left is at 75% (ignore the tracking panels on the upper stage) 

 

Spoiler

http://imgur.com/2IrqnUg

EDIT: is embedding broken ?

Edited November 3, 2016 by Mokmo

[akron]

On 4/28/2016 at 0:39 PM, CobaltWolf said:

 

 

9 minutes ago, Mokmo said:

I don't know if it's a transform issue, here's the setup where it happened. I have these attached to a 2.5m stock tank and this shows the ship in solar orbit, pointing straight down gives no exposure blocked by the tank, as we change orientation at about 10 degrees one of the panels will start producing power with quite a good exposure percentage. 

On the image: Panel on top is almost making power and one on left is at 75% (ignore the tracking panels on the upper stage) 

 

  Reveal hidden contents

http://imgur.com/2IrqnUg

EDIT: is embedding broken ?

In this case, I would have rotated them so the cells on the panels are toward the bottom and attach them right at the bottom edge of the tank. Face the craft away from the sun to charge.

 

Can't get rid of the random CobaltWolf quote. Stupid mobile site

Edited November 3, 2016 by akron

[Mokmo]

Just now, akron said:

 

In this case, I would have rotated them so the cells on the panels are toward the bottom and attach them right at the bottom edge of the tank. Face the craft away from the sun to charge.

Yup, i changed it that way on another probe i was making. 

[akron]

1 minute ago, Mokmo said:

Yup, i changed it that way on another probe i was making. 

I may just leave it alone, as a challenge of using the lower tech solar panels. They're low tech and hard to work with. So, working as intended, just upgrade to our newer, more expensive series. See your authorized dealer for details.

[CobaltWolf]

59 minutes ago, akron said:

Can't get rid of the random CobaltWolf quote. Stupid mobile site

And I got all excited when I saw the notification...

[Drakenex]

On 10/29/2016 at 2:10 AM, akron said:

You're welcome. Let me know your thoughts and suggestions. I'll add the others that I used for screenshots later on.

Update

I'm slowly getting back in the swing of things for this next big update which will concentrate on Orbiter/lander missions. Vega/Venera and Cassini+Huygens. I am also considering bumping Juno/Kepler to a later update and doing Rosetta/Philae and/or ExoMars+Schiaparelli as they fit the theme. Thoughts?

 

 

But but but Juno . Nahh it's OK, keep them coming!

[DarthGav]

On 11/2/2016 at 10:19 PM, Jimbodiah said:

Hey, do you know how many missions the russians lost to mars?

15, although a few of those were launch failures. 

[Jimbodiah]

Haha, yeah, some of those mistakes were face palms and a testimony to the soviet way of doing things.

[akron]

Stream going on for a bit. I'll stop and hang out in the Dev Hole Discord if not many people show. Cheers!

[akron]

Stream over! Thank for stopping by, lady and gents!

update

I spent far too much time working on my version of the KTDU-425A engine that flew on several Russian missions. It's a 0.625m part but I probably gave it too much detail  2554 tris without fairings (Haven't made any yet)

Preview time:

 

And here is how it looks on ворона (Vorona), with folded panels and antennae

 

Slowly getting there!

Cheers

Edited November 5, 2016 by akron

[enlait]

I'm not sure if that has been asked before; but why do lahar and linkor LFO engines have such high ISP? 345 starting ISP is already enough to make all other small stock engines obsolete, and 355 after upgrades is higher than any LFO engine of any size. Other mods I have (eg SpaceY, RLA, MRS) also take those number as a baseline: 345 ISP is considered a "highly optimized" LFO engine, and 350 is a cap for LFO propulsion.

On a side note, I understand why monoprop engines (jib and trident) have low ISP realistically, but they are also heavier than their two-component fuel competitors, so they seem kinda useless...