KSP Interstellar Extended Continued Development Thread

[ss8913]

So far I haven't found a more efficient (in terms of ISP and thrust) combo for sub-light travel than the hybrid thermal ramjet/rocket engine with hydrazine and a plasma beam antimatter reactor.  Is there something else that might be better?  ie, something with the arcjet thrusters that would yield better performance?  I usually use the ATILLAs for VTOL thrust, although this generates a *lot* of wasteheat, especially using atmospheric ejection mass...

[Fairin]

plasma thruster scaled up, microwave reciever scaled up, 100gw of power in orbit gives about 300kn of thrust with unlimited isp using the same thruster with atmospheric scoops (i use 4 its overkill) for nitrogen lets it launch off kerbin without fuel loss, i feel a little bad i don't use anything but the damned plasma thruster all the other engines work in different ways however, the same scoops work on eve and duna for co2 (very VERY high thrust!), in my game i just unlocked the first fusion reactors, so i got quiet a few molten salts up in space for this purpose, taking mai time! trying hard not to abuse free science from labs =) or the reactor we don't talk about >:)

[_Virgil]

Got a problem. I play sandbox with cheats for creating ships etc. and I want to use the folding warp drive. I give myself the necessary resources with HyperEdit, and then try to use it. Turns out I can't, because there's simply no option to. Halp ( if you can't see the picture, open in another tab)

Edited August 7, 2016 by _Virgil

[FreeThinker]

14 hours ago, _Virgil said:

Got a problem. I play sandbox with cheats for creating ships etc. and I want to use the folding warp drive. I give myself the necessary resources with HyperEdit, and then try to use it. Turns out I can't, because there's simply no option to. Halp ( if you can't see the picture, open in another tab)

You wont even get the option to warp unless the vessel has the capacity to create and maintain high amounts of power.

Edited August 8, 2016 by FreeThinker

[Gman_builder]

SO

MUCH

STUUUUUUUUFFFFFFF

[FreeThinker]

1 hour ago, Gman_builder said:

SO

MUCH

STUUUUUUUUFFFFFFF

In what sence?

[Gman_builder]

33 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

In what sence?

This mod has a ton of content that the OP has so much information on every part I don't even know what to do with it

[FreeThinker]

56 minutes ago, Gman_builder said:

This mod has a ton of content that the OP has so much information on every part I don't even know what to do with it

Well you don't have to do everything at once, you can start by using either the Solid Core Reactor or Molten Salt Reactor with some radiator and Electric Engine

[hms_warrior]

Hey just a short question...the wiki says that the laboratory can generate antimatter...however, placing a lab on a rover and driving it out of KSP, i don't have any option in the right-click menu of the laboratory. Could it be you need to place it in orbit for the anti-matter production to be available?

[Nansuchao]

17 minutes ago, hms_warrior said:

Hey just a short question...the wiki says that the laboratory can generate antimatter...however, placing a lab on a rover and driving it out of KSP, i don't have any option in the right-click menu of the laboratory. Could it be you need to place it in orbit for the anti-matter production to be available?

You need the Advanced Lab unlocked in the tech tree and a good source of energy to create Antimatter.

[hms_warrior]

thank you.

[FreeThinker]

---

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Version 1.9.10 for Kerbal Space Program 1.1.3

Released on 2016-08-09

• Added Universal Nuclear Fuel Tank
• Added compatibility with Historical Progression Techtree
• Added compatibility with Sigma Dimensions
• Fixed Bug with Electric engines not correctly removing previous propellant when switching propellant
• Electric Engines Maximum output limited by engine efficiency
• VASIMR efficiency is negatively affected by efficiency
• VASIMR no longer receive propellant thrust bonus
• Increased Mass Electric Generators
• Increased Power Colliding Fusion Reactor by 33% and reduced cost
• Slightly Reduced power Close Cycle Gas Core Reactor and increased cost
• Fixed Cycle Gas Core Reactor hyper efficiency bug

 

Edited August 9, 2016 by FreeThinker

[Undecided]

Awwwww man, I just built a 2000-ton ship primarily powered by nuclear lightbulbs. How much of a decrease in power did it get? I may have to resort to flying it home before updating Interstellar Extended otherwise it may be stranded on an alien planet.

[Fairin]

argh my entire satalite network got removed cause i built it so long ago with those legacy transmitters *cry* oh well they were getting out of alignment anyway.

closed cycle gas core club is no more. only 1.15gw of power now (at first step of fusion power) MK3 I belive (2.5meter not 3.72)

its THRUST is still very nice, it was giving 141gw of power when combined with a thermal generator (again mk3) so it can no longer power a plamsa thruster to hell and back by itself

did a few vasmir testing (upscaled cause power reasons) , never really used this engine since plasma thrusters were so reliable compared...

using liquid nitrogen* found that i got 9600isp using 8500mw of power (via microwave network) gave about 150kn of thrust, thats just 1 tap of the shift button, 5% power? every press of the shift button decreased effeciency by 1.2% but thrust did not change (all that much) from 60%(no throttle) to 40%(2/3rds throttle) but 40% to 30%(full throttle) was an incredible difference hopping from 180 to 551!, the power useage also went down from 8500mw to 3500mw isp of course dropped to 960.

Edited August 9, 2016 by Fairin
clarification of gas core size + vasmir testing.

[Undecided]

Did you mean megajoules? These are the pre-patch nuclear lightbulb outputs.

[Fairin]

Edited August 9, 2016 by Fairin
i suck at this >< ha i found the button! removed otterbutt

[Undecided]

5 minutes ago, Fairin said:

http://imgur.com/d6NOVlX

So it's roughly a 15% decrease. Not great, but nothing devastating either.

Also, nice flag.  Even a few pixels further to the right and someone might have reported you.

[Fairin]

that's my tamest flag too  everyone that play'd on my multiplayer server had adult flags =P didn't even think about it when i cut/pasted a pic for you.

wait how do you know whats a few pixels to the right... =P

 

i fixed it so whiners wont whine about me having personal flags with revealing ottergirls on my ships

Edited August 9, 2016 by Fairin

[raxo2222]

It seems like Interstellar technologies are randomly placed at end of Historical Progression tech tree - it seems like you can unlock advanced fusion and fission reactors.

This mod should branch off with nuclear reactors/engines from main tree progression, and have costs 2x higher or something to represent, that while this tech is possible, its not used.

Fusion reactors seem to be about right.

Last fission technology should be unlocked before first fusion reactors, just like in stock tech tree, or at least be unlocked at same tier.

Antimatter techs should be at very end and need latest advancement from multiple branches, not just lwarp drive and QSR.

Edit: AI core core is missing in that tech tree.

Also graphite radiators should be placed in 2 groups: non movable, which unlock graphite MK1 tier and movable, that unlocks MK2 tier.

Edited August 9, 2016 by raxo2222

[FreeThinker]

23 minutes ago, raxo2222 said:

This mod should branch off with nuclear reactors/engines from main tree progression, and have costs 2x higher or something to represent, that while this tech is possible, its not used.

If you take a close look, you will notice the Research cost for reactor is significantly higher towards the end compaired to all other branches. I modified this intentional as this is the branch which unlocks the most powerfull reactors.

Edited August 9, 2016 by FreeThinker

[Fairin]

learning what i can about fusion reactors slowly unlocking all the tech (whee!) unlocked the exotic fusion tech tonight was wondering if someone could explain a few things for me...

molten salt is the only source of tritium off kerbin? 

does lithium mining just hate me? (and UF4/Th4 processing! - even the USI thing takes foooreevverrrrrr) approx 1/hr, trying to fill 96k

what is helium4 used for? , how do i aquire h3? (tritium decays? i.e. leave it in a storage bin till it becomes h3?)

the hell is lithium6?

and before i go crazy, i want to put a (few) fusion reactor in orbit for years (like molten salt) for microwave purposes, but none of the modes i have access too put out enough power (with the exception of deterium lithium6 and det+he3)'

10meter MCF : 14gw of power for a few days, or 40gw of power for a week

5m molten salt 4.5gw of power for 2 years 69days.

 

i currently build ships off minmus (usi+extraplanetary launchads of course) and its fueling the bloody reactors that's driving me nuts (still hasn't filled its mini molten salt reactor powering it!)

[FreeThinker]

2 hours ago, raxo2222 said:

It seems like Interstellar technologies are randomly placed at end of Historical Progression tech tree - it seems like you can unlock advanced fusion and fission reactors.

They are certainly not randomly placed, but the available realestate is limited. Instead of dumping everything into electrical system tree, I spread them over multiple trees  in a logical progressive order, creating intresting choices. For example, I put all nuclear propulsion tech in rocketry,  graphite radiators in engerering, all nuclear/thermer jet engines in Jet propulsion tree.

Edited August 9, 2016 by FreeThinker

[FreeThinker]

24 minutes ago, Fairin said:

molten salt is the only source of tritium off kerbin?

Tritium is a resource that is indeed hard to get resource. Currently in KSPI you can create significant amount by running any neutron producing fuel that won't require Tritium itself. Initialy includes Molten Salt, but only 2% of it's energy is in the form of neutrons, so it will not go very fast. Alternativly breed tritium durring Deteurium-Deteurium fusion, but this is currenlty still an advanced fusion. I plan to add a Cold Deteurium fusion mode, which also produces Excess Helium3, which will be very usefull for D-He3 fusion. A third method is converting Helium3 into Tritium by neutron bombardment, but this isn't implemented yet except implicitly when using the Daedalus Fusion engine where it is used to absorb most of the neutrons.

24 minutes ago, Fairin said:

what is helium4 used for? ,

Helium4 is the product of most fusion reactions, and therefore called nuclear ash. It's useless as a fusion fuel, but it is still usefull as a propellant  (or colling liquid) as iinert nature allows it to be used in any electrical engine. Do note that storing Helium4 liquid is even harder than Hydrogen, near the absolute lowest temperature and therefore will cost a lot of power to maintain.

Edited August 9, 2016 by FreeThinker

[FreeThinker]

43 minutes ago, Fairin said:

how do i aquire h3? (tritium decays? i.e. leave it in a storage bin till it becomes h3?)

There are several methods of collecting Helium3, 

1) mining of solar wind depostis on atmosphere less planets/moon, this can be done on the moon, gilly or moho, the closer to the sun and darker, the higher the possible concentrations

2) Scooping from Gas Planets (inside or just above the atmosphere)

3) Tritium Decay where the Helium3 is collected as a gas

4) Cold D-D fusion (not implmented)

Edited August 9, 2016 by FreeThinker

[FreeThinker]

57 minutes ago, Fairin said:

what hell is lithium6?

Lithium6 is an stable isotope of Lithium (similar to Helium3) which is initialised used for breeding Tritium (effectivly converting neutron energy into thermal energy), but later can be used as a Fusion Fuel (D-Li6 and p-Li6

57 minutes ago, Fairin said:

and before i go crazy, i want to put a (few) fusion reactor in orbit for years (like molten salt) for microwave purposes, but none of the modes i have access too put out enough power (with the exception of deterium lithium6 and det+he3)'

For efficient long term electric power production use either a MCF or an Colliding Beam Fusion Reactor. The MFC is more flexable in it fuels and application but bulkier, the Colliding Beam Fusion Reactor  is limited to less powerfull aneutronic fusion modes, but less wasteheat and lighter

Edited August 9, 2016 by FreeThinker