KSP Interstellar Extended Support Thread

[raxo2222]

11 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

where?

For refrigator - when I upscaled it to 5m it could convert only 20g/s of hydrogen

Did you saw my previous post?

Also likely for tank inbuilt converters too.

Edited March 11, 2018 by raxo2222

[FreeThinker]

38 minutes ago, raxo2222 said:

For refrigator - when I upscaled it to 5m it could convert only 20g/s of hydrogen

Also likely for tank inbuilt converters too.

Ah yes, I see now that the tweakscaleexponent for the InterstellarResourceConverter is completely missing

You should be able to realize the proper scaling by simply adding or editing any cfg file, and add the following text

TWEAKSCALEEXPONENTS
{
	name = InterstellarResourceConverter
	maxPowerPrimary = 3
	maxPowerSecondary = 3
}

please verify and I will add it to IFS in the next update

 

Edited March 11, 2018 by FreeThinker

[raxo2222]

37 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

Ah yes, I see now that the tweakscaleexponent for the InterstellarResourceConverter is completely missing

You should be able to realize the proper scaling by simply adding or editing any cfg file, and add the following text

TWEAKSCALEEXPONENTS
{
	name = InterstellarResourceConverter
	maxPowerPrimary = 3
	maxPowerSecondary = 3
}

please verify and I will add it to IFS in the next update

 

Now it works at few kg/s of Hydrogen.

5m was creating 31U/s of liquid hydrogen and 2.5m creates 20 U/s of liquid hydrogen.

10m creates 249 units of liquid hydrogen per second.

I guess increasing baseline 10x would be good enough.

Edited March 11, 2018 by raxo2222

[raxo2222]

I wonder if its possible to make multicomponent reactor that would use these processes at once:  CNO Cycle, Triple Alpha and proton cycle

H -> He4

He4 -> C12

And then circulate CNO when using He4.

[FreeThinker]

32 minutes ago, raxo2222 said:

I wonder if its possible to make multicomponent reactor that would use these processes at once:  CNO Cycle, Triple Alpha and proton cycle

H -> He4

He4 -> C12

And then circulate CNO when using He4.

Well, from my latest research, it appears NCO  Cycle has much higher reactivity than Triple Alplha, (which is extremely unlikely even under ideal circumstances),  NCO just a matter of High temperature and pressure. Of the record I already assumed this would be the ticket to achieve the Bussard Fusion engine. A nasty size effect is this type of fusion would create a lot of wasteheat because of all the Fusion reactions producing Gamma energy

Edited March 11, 2018 by FreeThinker

[rdahlin]

This is a questions for KSP interstellar extended with regards to power generators. My fusion generators are barely producing power. As I have been viewing tutorial videos it looks like charged particle and thermal electric generators are able to have their size changed. However, I cant seem to change mine. I am not sure if this is a bug, or if this is a change to an update. 

An example is my tokamak generator has a 5m radius and the thermal and electric generators are only 2.5m. I have tried this in sandbox as well and cant seem to change the sizes.

[raxo2222]

1 hour ago, FreeThinker said:

Well, from my latest research, it appears NCO  Cycle has much higher reactivity than Triple Alplha, (which is extremely unlikely even under ideal circumstances),  NCO just a matter of High temperature and pressure. Of the record I already assumed this would be the ticket to achieve the Bussard Fusion engine. A nasty size effect is this type of fusion would create a lot of wasteheat because of all the Fusion reactions producing Gamma energy

So TriAlpha can't even act as C12 breeder to replenish all lost carbon that managed to escape confinement?

 

Is there other way to get C12 ans final product?

 

Edited March 11, 2018 by raxo2222

[FreeThinker]

15 minutes ago, raxo2222 said:

So TriAlpha can't even act as C12 breeder to replenish all lost carbon that managed to escape confinement?

The main problem is that the amount of energy in the form charged particle is negligible. The Tri Alpha is a charged particles rich fusion specialist. A much better candidate would be the muon catalyzed fusion reactor, which is specialized in converting hard X-rays energy  into useful energy. The conceptual design is that the reactor core is surrounded by a meter thick photovoltalic X-ray  receiver, allowing a large part of it to be converted into electric energy

Edited March 11, 2018 by FreeThinker

[raxo2222]

7 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

The main problem is that the amount of energy in the form charged particle is negligible. A much better candidate would be the muon catalised fuen reactor, which is pecilized in converting hard X-rays energy  into useful energy. The general idea is that the reactor core is surrounded by a meter thick photovoltalic X-ray  receiver.

I meant using Tri Alpha not for energy production but as "renewable" source of C12, as tri-alpha is too useless for energy production.

It appears you don't even need p-p and He3-He3 reactors as well - I thought you need He4 for CNO cycle, while it actually uses hydrogen.

Trialpha would cover losses of C12 in CNO fusion mode, but since it is useless even for that...

Edited March 11, 2018 by raxo2222

[FreeThinker]

44 minutes ago, raxo2222 said:

I meant using Tri Alpha not for energy production but as "renewable" source of C12, as tri-alpha is too useless for energy production.

It appears you don't even need p-p and He3-He3 reactors as well - I thought you need He4 for CNO cycle, while it actually uses hydrogen.

Trialpha would cover losses of C12 in CNO fusion mode, but since it is useless even for that...

What you are proposing is factory which produces heavier molecules from fusing lighter molecules

Aren't Cyclotrons ment for this purpose?

What we could do is add a specialized part which uses the fusion interface to produce a collection of base resource and isotopes for other chemical processes or energy production

A Cyclotron part like this should do

[Arivald Ha'gel]

On 3/10/2018 at 3:02 PM, LightThrust said:

Hello, i have found a problem with radiators: as you can see in the image in the link in the interstellar thrmal helper the radiator area is only 0,01 m^2 while the piece description states that is 2,50 m^2. Do you have any suggestions?

https://ibb.co/b2vASn

(i have kerbal space program version 1.3.0 and kspi 1.7.0)

As for area - Thermal Helper lists Effective Radiator Area, not surface area. Changes to adapt Near Future Electrical to KSPI-E decreases effective area by 250 times. So it's about right.

As for Thermal Helper results. It seems that analytical solution gives different results than simulation. I'll try to understand those calculations, since they're incorrect.

[Nansuchao]

15 hours ago, rdahlin said:

This is a questions for KSP interstellar extended with regards to power generators. My fusion generators are barely producing power. As I have been viewing tutorial videos it looks like charged particle and thermal electric generators are able to have their size changed. However, I cant seem to change mine. I am not sure if this is a bug, or if this is a change to an update. 

An example is my tokamak generator has a 5m radius and the thermal and electric generators are only 2.5m. I have tried this in sandbox as well and cant seem to change the sizes.

Are you sure you have TweakScale installed?

[Ferrite]

I have set up beamed power network.

6 satelites in 800 km orbit around Kerbin spaced by 60 degrees each, I set up 2 transmiters to test the network, one using 700nm in 100 km orbit, the other using 11um on the ground.

As long as I have direct connection or network depth 1 everything works fine but when I'm in place that forces network to use 2 relay satellites (opposite side of planet), I get no power at all.

Am I doing something wrong or is it a bug?

Other problem I have with beamed power is wrong spotsize and network efficency calculation.

Here I'm traveling from Kerbin to Eve, notice how spotsize, avalible power and network effciency change depending on how it's relayed.

Relayed directly from trnasmiter, 1km spotsize, 510 MW

Reflected by my Mun network, 4 m spotsize, 810 MW

Relayed by Kerbin network 282 mm spotsize, 277 MW

As you can see the numbers are all over the place.

Can I fix this somehow?

[samooo2]

5 hours ago, Ferrite said:

Other problem I have with beamed power is wrong spotsize and network efficency calculation.

The spotsize shown is from transmitter to first hop (relay or receiver), and as such is not helpful if you are far from the relay.

Might be worth fixing.

[Sweetie bot]

Hello there, After some long time thinking and explosion , I have got some new ideas for Energy harvesting from Chemical Power.

First is about Oversize Fuel cell. That's very obvious，It can conversion  H2+O2 to water, Power and wasteheat. And it can also use Hydrazine as fuel too.Ex：Hydrazine Fuel cells

 

Second idear is about Chemical combustion reactor. You can think it as a close cycle rocket engine or reactor but power by chemical. When run it produce TP by combining chemical fuel and re-collection Combustion product（Like Water, CO2, etc） . Can link to TEG for cover to MJ, or link to Thermal nozzle. Core Temp Decide on combustion type, can have a cap on 3200K (Not on MHD)

If this Link to Thermal nozzle that can be a new evolution of chemical engines！You get the engine power by Chemical combustion but Isp and propellant same as Soild NTR! 

 

Ex：

Let burn H2 to get heat

H2+O2=H2O（recovery） + Heat（3200+K）

Recover water then heat propellant directly through heat exchanger ;

propellant+Heat(3200+K) = thrust with high Exhaust velocity

get thrust and isp same or even higher than NTR， and not lossing much propellant

ideal to handel some low △DV orbital transfer

 

 

If you like you can even burn a coal (Carbon) to power your Steam Rocket ！！

By burn some soild fuel and heat propellant directly through heat exchanger.

C + O2= CO2↑ + Heat 

it also recover that carbon to some product that is easy to handle.

 

 

More thing i will add after research

Purpose:

Fit the gap between Solar power, Low power reactor and Capacitance，New way to Handle Chemical fuel (like burn secend stage Hydron fuel to easy storage water), Give more Fun on low tech experience.

 

Tech tree:

Both Unlock at High power ec system same with TEG,  can be update by tech

Edited March 15, 2018 by Sweetie bot
make more clear

[Arivald Ha'gel]

11 hours ago, Sweetie bot said:

Hello there, After some long time thinking and explosion , I have got some new ideas for Energy harvesting from Chemical Power.

First is about Oversize Fuel cell. That's very obvious，It can conversion  H2+O2 to water, Power and wasteheat. And it can also use Hydrazine as fuel too.Ex：Hydrazine Fuel cells

 

Second idear is about Chemical combustion reactor. You can think it as a close cycle rocket engine or reactor but power by chemical. When run it produce TP by combining chemical fuel and re-collection Combustion product（Like Water, CO2, etc） . Can link to TEG for cover to MJ, or link to Thermal nozzle. Core Temp Decide on combustion type, can have a cap on 3200K (Not on MHD)

If this Link to Thermal nozzle that can be a new evolution of chemical engines！You get the engine power by Chemical combustion but Isp and propellant same as Soild NTR! 

 

Ex：

H2+O2=H2O（recovery） + Heat

H2+Heat = thrust about 1200s 

If you like you can even burn a coal (Carbon) to power your Steam Rocket ！！

C + O2= CO2↑ + Heat  /2 CO + O2= 2CO2↑ + Heat

 

More thing i will add after research

Purpose:

Fit the gap between Solar power, Low power reactor and Capacitance，New way to Handle Chemical fuel (like burn secend stage Hydron fuel to easy stonge water), Give more Fun on low tech experience.

 

Tech tree:

Both Unlock at High power ec system same with TEG,  can be update by tech

Once you'll do the research, you'll notice that energy density of chemical reaction is way to small for such an idea to be feasible. Even if you could transfer energy efficiently from combustion products - what you can't do efficiently, and using Termal Power Generator wouldn't be that great - we already done it - read "steam powered engines". Modern combustion engines convert chemical power into mechanical power at a a lower efficiency compared to Rocket Engines from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_combustion_engine#Energy_efficiency:

Quote

Most iron engines have a thermodynamic limit of 37%. Even when aided with turbochargers and stock efficiency aids, most engines retain an average efficiency of about 18%-20 %.^[32] The latest technologies in Formula One engines have seen a boost in thermal efficiency to almost 47%.^[33] Rocket engine efficiencies are much better, up to 70%, because they operate at very high temperatures and pressures and can have very high expansion ratios.^[34]

Fuel cells are more efficient (up to 80-90%) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell#Efficiency_of_leading_fuel_cell_types) , but practical efficiency in automotive sector is at 30-40%, while practical efficiency for diesel engines is at ~25%. While conversion of chemical energy into electricity in hybrid cars is essentially done in the similar manner as in coal/oil power plants, and it's efficiency is higher than practical efficiency for diesel engines, it's still not that great at around 40%.

We already have fuel cells in stock KSP - but RTGs are still more efficient.

Also this post should be posted in Development thread

 

[FreeThinker]

On 13-3-2018 at 11:22 AM, Arivald Ha'gel said:

Once you'll do the research, you'll notice that energy density of chemical reaction is way to small for such an idea to be feasible. Even if you could transfer energy efficiently from combustion products - what you can't do efficiently, and using Termal Power Generator wouldn't be that great - we already done it - read "steam powered engines". Modern combustion engines convert chemical power into mechanical power at a a lower efficiency compared to Rocket Engines from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_combustion_engine#Energy_efficiency:

6

 

Although is true that Chemical Fuel Cells power density is very limited (compared to fission/fusion), they could excel at is as a kind of auxiliary power backup system, (especially when you have plenty of fuel + oxygen), for short high power applications like starting up fusion reactors or for short mining and ISRU applications for resource collection on muns or asteroids. Therefore,  I think it would be a useful feature if we could create a Fuel Cell reactor which instead of running on fusion/fission, would use Hydrogen/Hydrazine + Oxygen. All we need is an accessible suitable model

Edited March 14, 2018 by FreeThinker

[Arivald Ha'gel]

8 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

 

Although is true that Chemical Fuel Cells power density is very limited (compared to fission/fusion), they could excel at is as a kind of auxiliary power backup system, (especially when you have plenty of fuel + oxygen), for short high power applications like starting up fusion reactors or for short mining and ISRU applications for resource collection on muns or asteroids. Therefore,  I think it would be a useful feature if we could create a Fuel Cell reactor which instead of running on fusion/fission, would use Hydrogen/Hydrazine + Oxygen. All we need is an accessible suitable model

As auxiliary energy source, sure, it can be a good idea to have a fuel cell using a different fuel than currently exists. Actually https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell does have a nice table. Although I'm still quite sceptically looking at crude combustion generator.

Diesel energy density 48 MJ/kg

Li-Po battery energy density 1.8MJ/kg

The question would be what efficiency is attainable (perhaps quoted above)... and mass...

I know I probably won't use such mass ineffective ideas

[Sweetie bot]

On 2018/3/13 at 6:22 AM, Arivald Ha'gel said:

Once you'll do the research, you'll notice that energy density of chemical reaction is way to small for such an idea to be feasible. Even if you could transfer energy efficiently from combustion products - what you can't do efficiently, and using Termal Power Generator wouldn't be that great

Well, I designed the main purpose of the device Not only for energy, but also recover that cryogenic fuel  back to Easy to store fuel （such as water）with higher density and boiling point, save on tank mass and Volume. In this case energy is a by-product. It can be electrolyzed againg by some low and stable power supply.( Like charging a giant battery/ Regenerative Fuel Cells)

And also, even that fuel combustion energy density are low, but the power ratio for combustion should way more higher then early reactor.  In futher, we can have MPD generator to deal with some high adiabatic flame temperature such as H2+F2 (8000+K).

 As alway. In space Energy are cheep, but Materials are expensive.

[Sweetie bot]

On 2018/3/13 at 6:22 AM, Arivald Ha'gel said:

We already have fuel cells in stock KSP - but RTGs are still more efficient.

Stock fuel cell are open cycle systeam, it mean it will loss mass when running.  And only work for stock fuel.

both are also running on low power (16KW or lower).

[Arivald Ha'gel]

35 minutes ago, Sweetie bot said:

Stock fuel cell are open cycle systeam, it mean it will loss mass when running.  And only work for stock fuel.

both are also running on low power (16KW or lower).

Then perhaps first we need 3/4 technologies that can be considered as Near Future technologies:

Flow Batteries (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_battery)

Regenerative Fuel Cells (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regenerative_fuel_cell) which are what you're talking about, those could be self-contained but lower peak power.

Non Stock Fuel Cells (those can even have power on the scale of 100MW, and there are already some mods with those).

Correctly implemented Super Capacitors/MJ Batteries (see MJ management below).

IMHO it would be quite difficult to "store" high temperature exhaust gas generated from combustion engine (since as you say temperatures can be as high as 8000K, and even MHD generator would need to expel that heat after converting heat to electric energy).

Also we would probably need to implement some EC/MJ management (like in Near Future Electrical, that limits EC/MJ discharge  per second, from such sources).

Edited March 15, 2018 by Arivald Ha'gel

[ss8913]

so.. it seems that KSPIE is updated for 1.4 but IFS isn't?  or am I missing something?

So far things seem to work correctly except for some visuals on the RCS blocks and the thermal turbojets... just minor visual problems with the plumes.  Functionally things seem solid, although I haven't tested everything yet.

[Infleto]

HELLO ALL!

I am setting up KSPIE for the first time with Near future mod pack.   What must I do to make the 2 mods play nicely?  Do I really gain any functionality by having the 2 mods that are not filled by one mod alone? There is a number of confusing threads bouncing around and I would like to hear it form the horses mouth! (your are the horse) (nay)

2nd question!,  I am using USI life support.  Is there any component in KSPIE that will not work with USI LS?

Note, I am still running 1.3.1 until all of the mods in my list are updated.

Edited March 16, 2018 by Infleto

[Arivald Ha'gel]

2 hours ago, Infleto said:

HELLO ALL!

I am setting up KSPIE for the first time with Near future mod pack.   What must I do to make the 2 mods play nicely?  Do I really gain any functionality by having the 2 mods that are not filled by one mod alone? There is a number of confusing threads bouncing around and I would like to hear it form the horses mouth! (your are the horse) (nay)

2nd question!,  I am using USI life support.  Is there any component in KSPIE that will not work with USI LS?

Note, I am still running 1.3.1 until all of the mods in my list are updated.

Near Future Electrical WILL finally play nicely with KSPI-E. But we need to wait for a new release

Overall NearFuture Electrical/Propulsion do work together to some extend, however I personally don't use NFE.

In the near future NearFutureElectrical parts will be used as a crude/low power/low tech Fission Generators, and  @FreeThinker is trying to make it happen (with some of my help).

[Infleto]

1 minute ago, Arivald Ha'gel said:

Near Future Electrical WILL finally play nicely with KSPI-E. But we need to wait for a new release

Overall NearFuture Electrical/Propulsion do work together to some extend, however I personally don't use NFE.

In the near future NearFutureElectrical parts will be used as a crude/low power/low tech Fission Generators, and  @FreeThinker is trying to make it happen (with some of my help).

What if I drunk a LOT for wine?  Would wine help?