SpaceMouse Posted March 6, 2018 Share Posted March 6, 2018 This things gonna be colossal. lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 9, 2018 Author Share Posted March 9, 2018 (edited) 2.5 M expandable tank animation Edited March 11, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 10, 2018 Author Share Posted March 10, 2018 (edited) Edited March 10, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpaceMouse Posted March 10, 2018 Share Posted March 10, 2018 8 hours ago, Bonus Eventus said: Plasma engine? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 10, 2018 Author Share Posted March 10, 2018 Yeah, 5 nozzle vasimr. It will be operating at 100 MW. I plan to develope a MTF (Magnetized Targeted Fusion) reactor that can output 1 GW a second. The engine enclosure has a diameter of 1.25m. It’s designed to be attached to a thrust plate which will help order the engines into 5x2 array. The thrust plate will seamlessly integrate with the MTF, and provides a mount point for specialized radiators. Each array will output 500 KN of thrust at an isp of 3300 KM/S (subject to change, this is highly theoretical at the moment). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpaceMouse Posted March 10, 2018 Share Posted March 10, 2018 (edited) Looks awesome. Edited March 10, 2018 by SpaceMouse Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 10, 2018 Author Share Posted March 10, 2018 Front and back view of the VASIMR engine enclosure. The squareness of the sides implies modularity. Now to design the thrust frame (not plate after all) and add small details. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 12, 2018 Author Share Posted March 12, 2018 (edited) Optimized the geometry, added detail to the back coupler, and shortened the length some. Edited March 12, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeThinker Posted March 12, 2018 Share Posted March 12, 2018 (edited) On 3/10/2018 at 10:05 PM, Bonus Eventus said: Front and back view of the VASIMR engine enclosure. The squareness of the sides implies modularity. Now to design the thrust frame (not plate after all) and add small details. I don't want to sound as a party pooper but vasimir doesn't play well with modularity as the magnetic fields would interfere when too close together, making the above configuration not feasible. Instead I suggest you present them as Ion engines, in that case it does make sense to put them in modular arrays Edited March 12, 2018 by FreeThinker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 12, 2018 Author Share Posted March 12, 2018 (edited) 14 hours ago, FreeThinker said: I don't want to sound as a party pooper but vasimir doesn't play well with molecularity as the magnetic fields would interfere when too close together, making the above configuration not feasible. Instead I suggest you present them as Ion engines, in that case it does make sense to put them in modular arrays Hmmm... I assumed you could use some kind of shielding like a superconductor or solenoid to isolate the fields... So, what you're saying is that the fields of the magnetic nozzles would overlap? Yeah, I hadn't really thought of that, I was mostly thinking about the ICH. Edited March 12, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 13, 2018 Author Share Posted March 13, 2018 (edited) Doing some variations, considering what @FreeThinker was pointing out. EDIT: Another Variation Edit: Third variation Edit: Fourth variation I'm justifying the extra bulk as capacitor banks. Edit: Fifth variation So far I think I like the fourth one the most. Edited March 14, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 15, 2018 Author Share Posted March 15, 2018 (edited) Thrust frame attachment section Edit: Added protective doors. Still needs work Edit: Not sure about this, I may try a totally different approach next. Something with trusses. Edited March 17, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The-Doctor Posted March 17, 2018 Share Posted March 17, 2018 Holy Mother! WOW. Your motto should be ONE MOD TO RULE THEM ALL. Amazing work Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpaceMouse Posted March 18, 2018 Share Posted March 18, 2018 (edited) Perhaps a small number of vastly scaled up VASIMR engines? I always kinda felt Ion drives while crazy efficient are rather impractical for large ships. Xenon is crazy expensive and the quantity you'd need.... plasma rockets will run on nearly anything. Also, that big box they're going in looks like it might contain some shielding for each engine. Edited March 18, 2018 by SpaceMouse Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 18, 2018 Author Share Posted March 18, 2018 (edited) 3 hours ago, SpaceMouse said: Perhaps a small number of vastly scaled up VASIMR engines? I always kinda felt Ion drives while crazy efficient are rather impractical for large ships. Xenon is crazy expensive and the quantity you'd need.... plasma rockets will run on nearly anything. Also, that big box they're going in looks like it might contain some shielding for each engine. NASA demonstrated last year that ion drives can operate at 100KW of input power and generate 5.4N of thrust. At 84KW of power, VASIMR has produced 3.8N of thrust. So, they're actually pretty comparable. All ion engines are plasma engines since plasma consists of ions. Both the VASIMR and NASA's high power X series of thrusters are trying to get the engines to operate at much higher power (MW) which will equate to much higher thrust. Unfortunately the engines made so far can't operate at near MW power without their components melting XD https://futurism.com/nasas-new-ion-thruster-breaks-records-could-take-humans-to-mars/ P.S. I'm assuming that power to thrust will scale at a 1/1 ratio for now, so 100 MW would equal 5.4KN of thrust. I'm going to increase that thrust by 10x for better playability, even though it's stretching the realism a bit. Each ion engine will now output 50KN of thrust at 100 MW of input power. Edited March 18, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpaceMouse Posted March 18, 2018 Share Posted March 18, 2018 4 minutes ago, Bonus Eventus said: NASA demonstrated last year that ion drives can operate at 100KW of input power and generate 5.4N of thrust. At 84KW of power, VASIMR has produced 3.8N of thrust. So, they're actually pretty comparable. All ion engines are plasma engines since plasma consists of ions. Both the VASIMR and NASA's high power X series of thrusters are trying to get the engines to operate at much higher power (MW) which will equate to much higher thrust. Unfortunately the engines made so far can't operate at near MW power without their components melting XD https://futurism.com/nasas-new-ion-thruster-breaks-records-could-take-humans-to-mars/ I'm not saying they're not comparable, just with the cost and quantity of fuel required, also aren't ion drives known to erode the drive itself with long term usage? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 18, 2018 Author Share Posted March 18, 2018 (edited) 23 minutes ago, SpaceMouse said: I'm not saying they're not comparable, just with the cost and quantity of fuel required, also aren't ion drives known to erode the drive itself with long term usage? Yes, however there's a lot of different ways to create the plasma, like high powered lasers, or microwave emitter that would eliminate the electrode all together. The electrodes right now can't handle 1 MW let alone 100 so I'm assuming an electrodeless thruster. Edit: Some more info on hall effect thrusters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hall-effect_thruster They can run on Argon, Krypton, Bismuth and iodine as well. Edited March 18, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 19, 2018 Author Share Posted March 19, 2018 Finished modeling the docking bay adapter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpaceMouse Posted March 19, 2018 Share Posted March 19, 2018 I'm curious, have you done a mock-up for what your planning on the thing looking like? I kinda figured the big docking bay was gonna be what it parked in, not a integral part of the ship. With the engine pods it seems to be. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 19, 2018 Author Share Posted March 19, 2018 I used the docking bays to show the scale of the engine clusters. I plan to add a few adapters that will help the engine cluster and fusion reactor integrate with different bulkhead types. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 19, 2018 Author Share Posted March 19, 2018 (edited) Latest version of the engine cluster design. Still have to model the terminals for all those power lines, and also the liquid fuel lines. I may add gas tanks too. So far I'm really liking this iteration. P.S. I couldn't resist adding 2 more for 12 total, that way the electrical requirement to run all ion engines at full power will be 1.21 gigawatts. Edited March 19, 2018 by Bonus Eventus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpaceMouse Posted March 20, 2018 Share Posted March 20, 2018 10 hours ago, Bonus Eventus said: Latest version of the engine cluster design. Still have to model the terminals for all those power lines, and also the liquid fuel lines. I may add gas tanks too. So far I'm really liking this iteration. P.S. I couldn't resist adding 2 more for 12 total, that way the electrical requirement to run all ion engines at full power will be 1.21 gigawatts. Great scott!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 21, 2018 Author Share Posted March 21, 2018 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkyHook Posted March 24, 2018 Share Posted March 24, 2018 Have you give any thought to releasing a Version 1 of this pack? I love the parts, but I think working on this pack in phases would allow you to release something to us salivating users, while you work on different versions/iterations of the pack. For example, you could release the engines and trusses in version 1, but version 2 could incorporate the inflatable/rotating habitats, and version 3 could incorporate spaceport/shipyard parts. I only say this because I have been following development for 2 years, but I don't know that you have released anything. This makes me reluctant to support you on Patreon, etc simply because there is no plan to release the parts. Hope you take this suggestion into consideration. Sincerely, A long-time fan of the project. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonus Eventus Posted March 25, 2018 Author Share Posted March 25, 2018 Not a bad suggestion. I'll think about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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