Comnet support , loosing control over probe @ eve.

[bjerrang]

Hi , this is my first question here.

I have a m700 satellite with a ra-2 antenna on eve.

Now the signal is so weak i can barley control it. Fully upgraded on kerbin..

Tried to send up a RA-100 satellite in a geostationary position over kerbin. 

But the signal does not improve and goes directly to kerbin.

SUggestion and pictures appreciated.  

 

Tried to get some hint here: https://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Tutorial:Setting_up_a_CommNet_system

But the satellite build seems way overdone and like 40 satellites on kerbin ?? 

[ThreePounds]

At first, welcome to the Forum!

I assume you have the lvl2 tracking station (DSN). It has a signal strength of 50G. The RA-2 has a signal strength of 2G. With those numbers, we'll know that they'll communicate from up to 10Gm or 1e+7 km away. Now the RA-100 has, as the name suggests, 100G of signal strength, allowing it to connect with a RA-2 from 1.41e+7 km away (41% more). I have prepared a graph showing the distance from Eve to Kerbin as they revolve around the sun.

You'll notice that they are between about 4e+6 km and 2.35e+7 km apart at different times of the year. So neither antenna guarantees a connection to your eve probe. You either have to upgrade your tracking station or send a new relay satellite equipped with a RA-100 to Eve.

1 hour ago, bjerrang said:

But the signal does not improve and goes directly to kerbin.

Strangely enough, the game will prefer a direct connection over a routed connection even if the routed connection has better signal quality. At least that's what I have observed in my games as well. I am not sure what to do against it. However, the signal might not be that much better. Lets say you are 8e+6 km away from eve and your signal strength is thus 10% when connected directly to the DSN. If you'd somehow switch the connection to RA-2 to RA-100, you'll get a signal strength of about 40% - a little better I suppose. If are just 1e+7 km away, just as the signal from the DNS cuts out, you'll still get about 20% signal strength for your connection.

Hope that helps? Sort of?

Edited August 14, 2017 by Three_Pounds

[bjerrang]

1 minute ago, Three_Pounds said:

At first, welcome to the Forum!

I assume you have the lvl2 tracking station (DSN). It has a signal strength of 50G. The RA-2 has a signal strength of 2G. With those numbers, we'll know that they'll communicate from up to 10Gm or 1e+7 km away. Now the RA-100 has, as the name suggests, 100G of signal strength, allowing it to connect with a RA-2 from 1.41e+7 km away (41% more). I have prepared a graph showing the distance from Eve to Kerbin as they revolve around the sun.

You'll notice that they are between about 4e+6 km and 2.35e+7 km apart at different times of the year. So neither antenna guarantees a connection to your eve probe. You either have to upgrade your tracking station or send a new relay satellite with an RA-100 to Eve.

Strangely enough, the game will prefer a direct connection over a routed connection even if the routed connection has better signal quality. At least that's what I have observed in my games as well. I am not sure what to do against it. However, the signal might not be that much better. Lets say you are 8e+6 km away from eve and your signal strength is thus 10% when connected directly to the DSN. If you'd somehow switch the connection to RA-2 to RA-100, you'll get a signal strength of about 40% - a little better I suppose. If are just 1e+7 km away, just as the signal from the DNS cuts out, you'll still get about 20% signal strength for your connection.

Hope that helps? Sort of?

Tracking station is level 3. 

i even tried a RA-100 in a very high polar orbit , does not help.

I cant attach a .jpg screenshot to show you.

[bjerrang]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/eoxju1mcgmp5vkf/comnet-eve.jpg?dl=0

[bewing]

An RA100 antenna has a signal strength of 100G. A fully upgraded tracking station on Kerbin has a signal strength of 250G. So no, putting that extra 100G antenna in keostationary orbit will accomplish nothing because Kerbin already has a stronger antenna than that. You need to send an RA100 antenna toward eve. Once it gets halfway there, it will have a better relay signal strength than the tracking station.

[bjerrang]

4 minutes ago, bewing said:

An RA100 antenna has a signal strength of 100G. A fully upgraded tracking station on Kerbin has a signal strength of 250G. So no, putting that extra 100G antenna in keostationary orbit will accomplish nothing because Kerbin already has a stronger antenna than that. You need to send an RA100 antenna toward eve. Once it gets halfway there, it will have a better relay signal strength than the tracking station.

Ahh that seems logic. But why i am missing signal with level 3 and ra-2 on eve then?

After the first reply on this post it should be enough with lvl 3 trackingstation...

Can you post a picture of a good deep space comnet satellite. 

[ThreePounds]

40 minutes ago, bjerrang said:

Ahh that seems logic. But why i am missing signal with level 3 and ra-2 on eve then?

After the first reply on this post it should be enough with lvl 3 trackingstation...

Can you post a picture of a good deep space comnet satellite. 

Have you set a multiplier on your difficulty settings? iirc, there is a 0.6 DNS multiplier on the hard preset.

[bjerrang]

57 minutes ago, Three_Pounds said:

Have you set a multiplier on your difficulty settings? iirc, there is a 0.6 DNS multiplier on the hard preset.

No , its stock.

But with the tutorial i found in this forum (KSP CommNet Signal Strength Calculator & Antenna Selector)

The lvl 3 tracking vs RA-2 on eve its (longest - Shortest)

Eve

0%

93%

Its seems to match my gameplay.

Anyone have a good idea on a deep space comnet probe?

The build and number of satellites seem way overdone here:  https://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Tutorial:Setting_up_a_CommNet_system

Or maybe im just inexperienced

 

Edited August 14, 2017 by bjerrang

[bewing]

As Three_Pounds said in his first comment, and you said in your last -- the only time you will need a deep space commnet probe (and you are using a probe with an RA2 inside Kerbin's orbit) is when your probe and Kerbin are on opposite sides of the Sun. So all you need for a commnet relay is one 100G antenna in a low orbit around the Sun.

[Spricigo]

3 hours ago, bjerrang said:

No , its stock.

But with the tutorial i found in this forum (KSP CommNet Signal Strength Calculator & Antenna Selector)

The lvl 3 tracking vs RA-2 on eve its (longest - Shortest)

Eve

0%

93%

Its seems to match my gameplay.

Anyone have a good idea on a deep space comnet probe?

The build and number of satellites seem way overdone here:  https://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Tutorial:Setting_up_a_CommNet_system

Or maybe im just inexperienced

 

As Antenna Selector points out when Kerbin and Eve are in opposite sides of the sun your signal drop to 0. I guess that more than 90degrees apart the signal is considerably low.

A satellite just a bit more powerful  (2xRA-2 or a RA-15) should do the tricky.

My typical Network have around each  planet a pair of long range satellite s in high elliptical polar orbit (one north, other south. One at Ap, other at Pe) able to reach kerbin and four equally spaced small satellites (single HG-5) in equatorial orbit .  It give pretty good coverage with not much trouble or cost to setup.

 

[bjerrang]

8 hours ago, bewing said:

As Three_Pounds said in his first comment, and you said in your last -- the only time you will need a deep space commnet probe (and you are using a probe with an RA2 inside Kerbin's orbit) is when your probe and Kerbin are on opposite sides of the Sun. So all you need for a commnet relay is one 100G antenna in a low orbit around the Sun.

Thanks I will try this. Just circular orbit ? and altitude ?

And next question , how many solar panels and batteries on this probe with the RA-100 antenna. (cant find any good info on this , and since i guess transmitting/relay science from a another planet takes some power , i would like to have this correct the first time) 

5 hours ago, Spricigo said:

As Antenna Selector points out when Kerbin and Eve are in opposite sides of the sun your signal drop to 0. I guess that more than 90degrees apart the signal is considerably low.

A satellite just a bit more powerful  (2xRA-2 or a RA-15) should do the tricky.

My typical Network have around each  planet a pair of long range satellite s in high elliptical polar orbit (one north, other south. One at Ap, other at Pe) able to reach kerbin and four equally spaced small satellites (single HG-5) in equatorial orbit .  It give pretty good coverage with not much trouble or cost to setup.

 

Yeah better antennas should do the trick , but its to late now....

 6 satellites per planet quite expensive and a massive job. 

[bewing]

Relay takes no power at all. All you need is enough to power the probe core. So just a few OX-STATs on the relay is plenty.

The exploration ship transmitting the science often will need 600 to 1000 units of EC to transmit experiments as it is taking readings.

 

 

Edited August 15, 2017 by bewing

[bjerrang]

37 minutes ago, bewing said:

Relay takes no power at all. All you need is enough to power the probe core. So just a few OX-STATs on the relay is plenty.

The exploration ship transmitting the science often will need 600 to 1000 units of EC to transmit experiments as it is taking readings.

 

 

Kerbol orbit Altitude for probe

[ThreePounds]

1 hour ago, bjerrang said:

And next question , how many solar panels and batteries on this probe with the RA-100 antenna. (cant find any good info on this , and since i guess transmitting/relay science from a another planet takes some power , i would like to have this correct the first time)

The relay itself doesn't need any power besides what you need to run the probe core as they don't have an EC requirement by themselves. If you want to transmit, however, it depends on the kind of antenna you use. Lets assume a simple research probe with four science experiments on board and look at how different antennas effect the power requirement.

power requirements when transmitting science

Experiment	Data Size	DTS-M1	RA-2	RA-100
Material Study	25 Mits	156 EU	600 EU	168 EU
Mystery Goo	10 Mits	60 EU	240 EU	72 EU
Temperature Scan	8 Mits	48 EU	192 EU	48 EU
Atmospheric Scan	12 Mits	72 EU	288 EU	72 EU
all of the above	55 Mits	336 EU	1320 EU	336 EU

From this you see that the RA-2 is terrible in terms of energy cost. If you want to transmit all your science at once you'll need to bring some batteries. The DTS-M1 and RA-100 both only use 6 EU/Mits for transmission and are therefore economical.

In terms of energy usage, you can look at the tool tip of various solar panels to figure this out. Solar panels at eve produce about 90% more power then they do at Kerbin due to them being closer to the sun. Energy usage on probes comes from the probe core alone and the reaction wheels if you are using them. Both of these values are found in the tool tip of the probe cores in the editor and R&D centre. Make sure you convert them from EU/min to EU/s by dividing them by 60 s/min.

Edited August 15, 2017 by Three_Pounds

[Spricigo]

5 hours ago, bjerrang said:

6 satellites per planet quite expensive and a massive job. 

Not that much. The smaller satellites are ~2200funds and .5t each. The same basic design with a different antenna (the 'expensive' part) is used for the long range relays in polar orbit.  That gives excellent coverage (loss of signal at one pole when both long range relays are over the opposite pole, pretty much that's it. ) , is infrastructure that will be used for lots of future missions.

Of coarse you, concerned with more immediate needs, may be satisfied with less coverage( e.g  deploy  a pair of long range relays in Eve's polar orbit.) In any case you may consider how it can be expanded/improved later.