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

[Bombaatu]

On 1/26/2017 at 10:38 PM, Bombaatu said:

Don't know if this is a known issue or not, but the barometer from this set doesn't like having the science transferred. It's ok if you transmit it immediately, but if you transfer it (say, to the science container), it can get into a stuck state - it doesn't show any experiment data to review, but you cannot take any more readings. So far it's only been the barometer.

FYI, the single-use dust collector also has this problem

[akron]

19 hours ago, Bombaatu said:

FYI, the single-use dust collector also has this problem

It has to be something with DMagic science animate then. Maybe I did something in the config. Those use that module and it may be doing something quirky. I think the animation may get stuck, but it should still let you run the experiment. I noticed this with the barometer if I had a Kerbal pull the data, the animation would not reset.

[Bombaatu]

2 hours ago, akron said:

It has to be something with DMagic science animate then. Maybe I did something in the config. Those use that module and it may be doing something quirky. I think the animation may get stuck, but it should still let you run the experiment. I noticed this with the barometer if I had a Kerbal pull the data, the animation would not reset.

Ran into the issue with the ELIX probe as well - does that also use DMagic science animate?

[akron]

1 minute ago, Bombaatu said:

Ran into the issue with the ELIX probe as well - does that also use DMagic science animate?

Yes, it does

[akron]

Update

Github repo has been updated. Includes the new antenna above that can be toggled in the editor, a new 2-way RCS, and an updated Venera lander. I decided that the Fomalhaut/Venera lander camera will be far too niche even for this round of Venera parts, so it is now included in the lander and will not be available as a separate part. The same experiment can be found on the Surveyor camera, which is a separate part. If I see an opportunity for another version of the camera as a stand-alone part, I'll try and take it so you guys have more options. Maybe on Viking?

The changes to the lander include some UV and collider tweaks, but more may be needed. Other than the attached camera, I also changed the design of the thermal pipes to accommodate the future soil drill which kinda fits in-between:

No specular still because the texture is not yet done, more parts coming.

Thank you for all the recent feedback, I will keep looking for chances to do them in stages, first up were some missing physicSignificance tags and I think some of the DMagic animate issues will be next, although I may be unable to fix them. The alternative is to move many of those experiments to use the stock animation module but this will cause some of the animations to play in reverse when resetting the experiment so it will be its own problem. I'm open to suggestion for tackling this.

Keep feedback coming. I am trying my best to get a release out within a week which may necessitate more cuts to this release. I am thinking about releasing without the other science experiments and just patch those in later, we'll see.

 

~Cheers

[akron]

Holy triple post, Batman. Github updated again. More collider tweaks and a new solar panel part has been added to use with the lander (or anywhere you want). Not based on anything, just something to help refresh batteries on long descents. Leave it off if you want to run a realistic mission, but you may run out of batteries. Has anyone tested descents with the lander recently? The Heatshield decoupler is mostly fixed but it does still kinda hover near the lander until the chute deploys. It survived Eve entry to a 56km Pe, but every heat bar lit up like a Christmas tree on fire. May need some temperature tweaks.

 

~cheers

Edited February 6, 2017 by akron

[akron]

Got about half-way through a texture pass on the Vega camera. There's also some more tweaks in Github. Still pushing for a release, maybe this weekend so let me know if anything is broken.

~cheers

[akron]

свежие новости

A couple of hours of work every night is paying off. Trying to stay on this marathon modding run. Got the Vorona camera system done. It can now be found on Github. Since the way it mounts to Vega is so unique, I got the idea of using firespitter to let you guys toggle between mounting on Vega/Vorona and just any regular flat surface; the animations are adjusted for mounting at 60 and 90 degrees respectively:

Let me know if this works well. It allows you to use this with Vorona or toggle it to use on your general designs. Here is how it attaches on a folded Vega/Vorona:

And a space pic:

This will give you an IR spectrometer. UV spectrometer, and a DMagic Orbital telescope (if using DMagic Orbital Science, which you should ), similar to the Voyager Boom but with slightly different stats for variety.

Thoughts, suggestion and bug reports welcome. I guess I'll see how long you guys let me get away with these double posts .

~Cheers

[CobaltWolf]

It all looks very nice as always @akron. Hopefully soon I'll be able to actually play KSP again and then I'll be able to give you more feedback on all your parts.

[akron]

13 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

It all looks very nice as always @akron. Hopefully soon I'll be able to actually play KSP again and then I'll be able to give you more feedback on all your parts.

Thank you, sir! Please do

 

свежие новости

Github updated again with more tweaks, fixes, balancing changes, and some changed UV layouts. The big push tonight was getting the specular maps completed. Download and embrace the shiny!

At this point unless I find an unstoppable urge to add anything, all parts have been added. Some more will be patched in later, like the soil experiments for the Venera lander. I'll still do some balance changes, go though remaining issue reports, and update MM patches to include new parts. Last chance to have a request or major feedback!

Here, obligatory picture with the Vorona mission patch, based on a Soviet Venera 16 pennant.

Homestretch! Thank you all for your support.

 

~Cheers

[rasta013]

Just came back to KSP after a nearly 8 month long forced hiatus and I have to say that your work over that time has continued to maintain the highest quality and standards.  Really great work on this mod and congrats on getting to the end goal!

[komodo]

*also staggers in from the land of the dead*...

Wow!

[akron]

On 2/9/2017 at 2:53 AM, rasta013 said:

Just came back to KSP after a nearly 8 month long forced hiatus and I have to say that your work over that time has continued to maintain the highest quality and standards.  Really great work on this mod and congrats on getting to the end goal!

11 hours ago, komodo said:

*also staggers in from the land of the dead*...

Wow!

Thank you both! There is still a daunting amount of stuff to do. I hope I can keep at it.

 

[akron]

Update

Github has been updated. There are many texture and UV updates included for the old probes. I also started removing the foil texture from a lot of older science and utility parts to make them more universal to use with other mods/stock. More to come, but this last minute push to update the textures and remove the old foil has proven extremely time consuming and a little frustrating at times. This new pass did allow for a tweak to the original foil textures to try and make them better.

Here is a pass at the gold foil, which is technically a "new" material because I still left the old one in (Might be too bright still):

and the silver foil:

I completely remade the stock grey texture:

And added a new thermal blanket styled material:

The others got some updates too but I did want to post them all. Darn imgur albums not embedding.There's then technically 2 new materials to toggle from. And you can now texture-switch the magnetometer. Basically all Quetzal parts will eventually have texture switching, and maybe 1 or 2 science parts. Still doing other testing and still trying to get to some more of the issues logged on Github. If you've tested this latest release with Surveyor and Venera, I'd love to hear your feedback.

 

~cheers

 

EDIT: Forgot to post a screenshot of some of the new updated parts without foil:

 

Edited February 13, 2017 by akron

[rasta013]

I've been playing with this all week long and have been using the new Venera and Surveyor parts a lot.  It's running great and the balance seem really nicely even atm.  I've not really seen anything across the engines, tanks, RCS, science or probe cores that makes me go "Ooo that makes things easy."  Overall I think you've got this in a great spot.

As to the new textures...I love the new foil look far better than the old shiny gold which is still nice but this looks really good.  The rework of the stock grey looks really cool in the SS so can't wait to see it in game...so...off I go!

 

Edited February 13, 2017 by rasta013

[snekposter]

bug report for you, about the mg-100 magnetometer. the animation isnt working properly, it just rotates the boom 90 degrees instead of unfolding.

 

[akron]

1 hour ago, snekposter said:

bug report for you, about the mg-100 magnetometer. the animation isnt working properly, it just rotates the boom 90 degrees instead of unfolding.

LOL. I'll take a look. Thank you for letting me know

[rakol]

Had a nose around your latest changes and all look great

Wanted to ask if there is a chance of a fuel switch options?

currently looking at switching mono thrusters over to Ion but feel its a waste of parts if I do. Obviously your mod and your choice but wanted to ask  

[akron]

1 hour ago, rakol said:

Had a nose around your latest changes and all look great

Wanted to ask if there is a chance of a fuel switch options?

currently looking at switching mono thrusters over to Ion but feel its a waste of parts if I do. Obviously your mod and your choice but wanted to ask  

Well, fuel switch and engine switch are two different things. I did look at some ion-type technologies like the thrusters on Boeing 702SP satellites and the original thrusters for LISA Pathfinder. I would prefer to keep the two separate, because I don't think there is a way to have part switching still be restricted by unlocked tech tree nodes. At least not without a custom module, which I cannot do.

@snekposter I found the issue with the magnetometer animation but I didn't get a chance to fix it. I was working on RCSFX modules and hit a wall, I quit for the day to to take a break.

[rakol]

Just now, akron said:

Well, fuel switch and engine switch are two different things. I did look at some ion-type technologies like the thrusters on Boeing 702SP satellites and the original thrusters for LISA Pathfinder. I would prefer to keep the two separate, because I don't think there is a way to have part switching still be restricted by unlocked tech tree nodes. At least not without a custom module, which I cannot do.

@snekposter I found the issue with the magnetometer animation but I didn't get a chance to fix it. I was working on RCSFX modules and hit a wall, I quit for the day to to take a break.

Sorry. Tired english there. Was just the fuel switch on your tanks. Don't need engine switching at all as NF engines are fine to use and the like. 

[akron]

Just now, rakol said:

Sorry. Tired english there. Was just the fuel switch on your tanks. Don't need engine switching at all as NF engines are fine to use and the like. 

Ok, yes, that's fine. I can add this to the internal tanks once I have electric propulsion in. I will also take a look at probe-sized xenon tanks and have something that looks appropriate, rather than just adding xenon to something that is clearly not designed to hold it.

[Cetera]

Just wanted to let you know, Akron, that you and your mods do more for this game than just about anything else.  I love, and really appreciate, your work and attention to detail.  I've started getting back into KSP mostly because of this mod.  The updates getting emailed to me every so often really captured my interest again.

 

Thank you!

[akron]

4 minutes ago, Cetera said:

Just wanted to let you know, Akron, that you and your mods do more for this game than just about anything else.  I love, and really appreciate, your work and attention to detail.  I've started getting back into KSP mostly because of this mod.  The updates getting emailed to me every so often really captured my interest again.

 

Thank you!

Thank you for the compliment! It means a lot to hear that. Let me know if there's any way to make it better

[akron]

@snekposter The magnetometer has been fixed on the latest Github repo push just now. Again, thank you for letting me know.

Other than the mag fix, there is only a couple of tweaks for Barquetta, so nothing much. I spent a lot of time trying to convert everything to the new RCSFX module. Unfortunately, even after getting the correct cfg settings, only one rcs nozzle fires on any of the parts. The craft moves correctly, so the force is applied, but the effect is always incorrect. I also do not like the cone-like release of particle on the new rcs system, even after switching multi-particle references to the old particle system. The visual impairment sucks, so it does not seem to be worth the complication. Is there really any big advantage to the new system other than sound? I will at least probably use the new module on larger RCS systems whenever I get to them, but I gave up and reverted everything back.

The next item to test this weekend are those reports of issues with DMagic Animate. I am not sure if I can fix it though. I'll also tackle a couple more foil removals. Since the RCS thing bummed me and aggravated me, I took a break and ended up modeling some more, so here's a brief updated look to the Cassini WIP:

Huygens is just a placeholder

 

Let me know if the new textures are working ok on your probes.

~cheers

Edited February 18, 2017 by akron

[Phineas Freak]

3 hours ago, akron said:

Is there really any big advantage to the new system other than sound?

No, only the audio and visual stuff. The rest of the functionality (per-axis thrust, always full thrust, thrust by throttle) are all included in the base ModuleRCS (since the ModuleRCSFX inherits from it).

Edited February 18, 2017 by Phineas Freak
Wrong wording