KSP Interstellar Extended Support Thread

[Gildarrious]

So a glib reading of the above code would be the following, starting at the question mark:

     /* so if the above wasn't null. 50% of throttle * radius^.8 * .3 * ?? / fuelflow / ISP / partmass (error here with the whitespace?)
       Then take that portion, and min it against 9999. Using airflowheatmodifier which is calculted by coolers and atmosphere.

All of that leads to positive heat production under all circumstances, with greater or lessor dependant on fuels/atmospheric speed.

Would it be better to have a thermal nozzle at a given operational temperature, determined by connected heat, and then any usage reduces temperature? This would give you a balanced equation where more time thrusting reduces thrust. Effectively this would flip the equations on their head and work closer to real world mechanics? I know that isn't how it is modeled, but my question is, would that be an improvement albeit a difficult one to implement?

An illustrative example. Your thermal nozzle idles at 2600K when attached to sufficient power. This gives you an ISP of X and a thrust of Y. You takeoff from the runway, using that heat to generate thrust/lift As you are using the thermal resource, temperatures drop and reduce X and Y. Switching fuels from atmospheric to something that decomposes ie: methane, you generate some heat back and thus reduce temperature by a smaller amount than atmospheric air. X and Y would be higher. You stop thrusting upon reaching orbit, and your temperature recovers to 2600K. X and Y return to max amounts.

[FreeThinker]

10 minutes ago, Gildarrious said:

So a glib reading of the above code would be the following, starting at the question mark:

     /* so if the above wasn't null. 50% of throttle * radius^.8 * .3 * ?? / fuelflow / ISP / partmass (error here with the whitespace?)
       Then take that portion, and min it against 9999. Using airflowheatmodifier which is calculted by coolers and atmosphere.

All of that leads to positive heat production under all circumstances, with greater or lessor dependant on fuels/atmospheric speed.

Would it be better to have a thermal nozzle at a given operational temperature, determined by connected heat, and then any usage reduces temperature? This would give you a balanced equation where more time thrusting reduces thrust. Effectively this would flip the equations on their head and work closer to real world mechanics? I know that isn't how it is modeled, but my question is, would that be an improvement albeit a difficult one to implement?

Well that how more or less the kspie wasteheat meachanic works, the trouble is with the stock mechanic, which is incomprehensible or I simply used the wrong formula/variables

Btw, we are not the only one struggling with it

 

Edited September 22, 2018 by FreeThinker

[Apaseall]

Still not really sure where to post stuff like this so here goes:

Found a small typo. Yes I do seem to live in the log file. I must get out more. Anyways.

\GameData\WarpPlugin\Parts\Engines\HWRCS\RCS-perpindicular.cfg

Currently is:
scaleFactors = 0,5, 0.75, 1, 1.5, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 12, 16

Should be:
scaleFactors = 0.5, 0.75, 1, 1.5, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 12, 16

The typo is the use of a comma instead of a period to denote the first scaleFactors.

 

[garwel]

The Discovery engine has its description and manufacturer fields mixed up. Timberwind's description calls it Neptune (and is in fact the description of Kerbal Atomics Neptune engine).

[FreeThinker]

Download Version 1.20.0 for Kerbal Space Program 1.4.5 from here

Released on 2018-09-23

• Integrated Stock Ion Engine into KSPIE, including persistent thrust, exhaust and add power upgrades with electric tech nodes
• Added: "Discovery" Magnetic Confinement Fusion Rocket
• Added: Clover Graphene Radiator (texture by SilverSliver)
• Added Antiproton Storage Ring
• Added: display of exhaust during persistent thrust to Thermal and Plasma nozzle
• Added: Persistent thrust drop out of timewarp and cut engines after pressing X button
• Added: convection radiators to pre-coolers
• Added Graphene Radiators take dynamic pressure into account and are longer affected by atmosphere
• Added: Buckballs as an electric propellant
• Added: Radiators heat-color now range from Dark Red to Bright White
• Graphics: Switched colour scheme positron and antiproton on containers. Positron: red, Antiproton: blue
• Re-balanced thermal engines stock wastewheat
• Re-balanced: limited Ramjet/Turbojet to neutral and oxidizing propellant while Thermal Launch Nozzle is limited to neutral and reducing propellants
• Balance Fix: removed power requirement Kerbstein and reduced wasteheat by 50%
• Balance Fix: significantly increased core temperature Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactors
• Balance Fix: Doubled power output Quantum Singularity Reactor
• Balance Fix: unlock Molten Salt reactor upgrades with Thermal Management techs
• Balance Fix: Increased unlocking tech of VISTA, arcjets and resistojets
• Balance Fix: Changed tech requirement Thermal Receiver to Thermal management
• Balance Fix: Lowered unlocking tech of thermal power generator
• Bug Fix: Double charging of solar sells
• Bug Fix: issue with Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactors connected to only a thermal power generator not able to utilize all available power.
• Bug Fix: problem with haber proces
• Bug Fix: radiator slow updates
• Bug Fix: linear behaviour thermal and not geared electric engines
• Bug Fix: Crusader spool effect sound continuing after stopping engines

1 hour ago, garwel said:

The Discovery engine has its description and manufacturer fields mixed up. Timberwind's description calls it Neptune (and is in fact the description of Kerbal Atomics Neptune engine).

Thanks, have you played around with it yet? The engine is meant as the Fusion alternative to the Open Cycle Fission Reactor. By comparison, the Discovery is more bulky/less energy dense but offers better Isp. Since both tech branches (nuclear propulsion and fusion rocketry) lear to specialized propulsion, I think it should offer players more flexibility in the route they take.

Btw, I'm thinking about giving every engine and reactor a unique nickname should make it easier to refer to them. Any ideas are welcome.

Edited September 24, 2018 by FreeThinker

[FreeThinker]

double post

Edited September 24, 2018 by FreeThinker

[danshu15]

Output Log - Pastebin hated it, had to put it on WeTransfer

I've run into 2 issues that I was hoping you could help me with.

I'm playing GPP with many mods. The NERV engine plume is active even when the engine is not. I started by removing the config for RealPlume Stock, then removing the mod and Smokescreen completely but the bug persists on already created and newly created vessels whether the engine is activated yet or not. The only other config I can find for the NERV is in KSPIE. The output log is from a backup I reverted to that includes RealPlume and Smokescreen again after removing them didn't clear it up. I had the same issue in 1.4.3 and updated KSPIE this morning (in 1.4.5) with hopes it would clear that up.

The 2nd issue has occurred since updating to the most recent version with vessels using a dual technic magnetometer. I get a repeated scrolling error that magnetic field information cannot be found for the SOI the probe or vessel is in. That one I'm stumped on, but when I updated I only updated WarpPlugin and may just need to know what other files also need to be deleted and reinstalled alongside the current WarpPlugin. I'm streaming the playthrough, so if updating a current ongoing GPP play isn't an option I'll revert to a backup save and update to the current KSPIE next run  I never noticed the magnetic field issue previously, but the engine plume was still a problem.

Thank you for your time with my issues, as well as for your work with KSPIE  I love the mod collection <3

-Dan

edit- updated Output Log without RealPlume/RealPlume Stock/Smokescreen and an imgur link of a vessel on the launchpad with engine plume displaying before any staging

Imgur shot of the engine plume on a deactivated NERV

WeTransfer link to updated Output Log with RealPlume RealPlume Stock and Smokescreen removed from gamadata

update 2 -

Reloaded a backup installation of my GPP KSP and the 'cannot find magneticfield' issue was present even back then before updating to the newest KSPIE, may be an incompatibility with GPP unrelated to the most recent version

Update 3 -

I just avoided the builds with the NERV engine and dual techniques since they don't cause crashes and did some other little tests while I streamed today. I got some screenshots of the specific error spamming the log and noticed when I attach a NERV or switch to a vessel with one installed there is also a nullref Link to console screenshots

If it helps here is a VOD of the stream that's muted because of copyright (music playing while live) but shows me going for a little more info on different vessels. Today was a rough day lmfao ran into a few different issues with the channel and had a bunch of shorter restarts because of a problem with autohost for some viewers. Alot of what I did today is on there tho before I decided to stop and submit a bug report to you.

Thanks again!

Update 4 - I reinstalled GPP and the visual mods into a fresh 1.4.5 and tested KSPIE with all dependencies bundled in the folder - no problem

GPP/visuals/IE/Near future - no problem

GPP/visuals/IE/Atomics - ghost plumes! Log

Now I've just got to narrow down the dependency that I didn't install properly for the magnetometer. It works fine in GPP with a fresh full install, so it's gotta be something outside the WarpPlugin that I didn't want to overwrite. It's my day off so I'll fix the ghost plumes through Atomics and figure out a workaround. Since the bug can't be reproduced it's just my improper installation or a side effect of an improper upgrade, and the plume issue is just with an Atomics interaction that I can take care of through configs

---------------

Final Update - Situation resolved itself when the LiquidFuel patch is applied. I'd imagine Interstellar is doing a more broad addition of the hydrogen fuel, so when Atomics isn't trying to do the same thing as IE it all works together just fine. Error, Nullref, missingmagneticfuel log message, and ghost plume is gone.

I hope I didn't waste any of your time, I knew it was something that I didn't install properly. The Fuel config didn't make sense off the top of my head because I did indeed want it to use liquid hydrogen as intended, lucked out that it dawned on me that the incompatibility was probably related to something they both wanted to do to the same part.

Thank you for your time, and again I apologize!

Edited September 26, 2018 by danshu15
1-Added current Log and an Imgur Link to the plume 2- update 3-screenshots of console log 4-Atomics was the problem, no luck reproducing Magneticfield issue so neither problem is with KSPIE itself - Final Update - Situation Resolved via Atomics MM Patch

[garwel]

6 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

 

Thanks, have you played around with it yet? The engine is meant as the Fusion alternative to the Open Cycle Fission Reactor. By comparison, the Discovery is more bulky/less energy dense but offers better Isp. Since both tech branches (nuclear propulsion and fusion rocketry) lear to specialized propulsion, I think it should offer players more flexibility in the route they take.

Btw, I'm thinking about giving every engine and reactor a unique nickname should make it easier to refer to them. Any ideas are welcome.

TBH, I have only reached the very early engines in my career. I was looking at the config files to update Kerbal Health's patch and this is how I found these issues.

[Omeran]

7 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

Download Version 1.20.0 for Kerbal Space Program 1.4.5 from here

Released on 2018-09-23

[...]

• Balance Fix: Increased unlocking tech of VISTA, arcjets and resistojets

 

Oddly enough, after updating to 1.20.0 VISTA appears in both "Advanced Fusion Rockets" and "Specialized Fusion Rockets".

Or is this because I haven't done a full clean+reinstall?

[FreeThinker]

38 minutes ago, Omeran said:

Oddly enough, after updating to 1.20.0 VISTA appears in both "Advanced Fusion Rockets" and "Specialized Fusion Rockets".

Or is this because I haven't done a full clean+reinstall?

its is a memory effect of the campaign par unlocking mechanism, it does,'t old references when it changes. It is harmless except for some confused players

Edited September 24, 2018 by FreeThinker

[Omeran]

Also, after updating to 1.20.0, my (already installed) magentized target fusion reactor has lost its MK1 fusion modes (Deuterium-Tritium and Cold Deuterium-Tritium), and left only with MK3 modes (immediately after switching ships the mode got switched to Proton-Boron11 which couldn't work).

When constructing a new ship, the mode starts as Deuterium-Helium3, and when switching to "next" mode it becomes "He3 Catalyzed D-D Fusion" and is unable to switch anymore to anything else.

Is this by design?

Also - is this reactor affected by -

On 9/24/2018 at 11:54 AM, FreeThinker said:

Balance Fix: significantly increased core temperature Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactors 

(My Kerbals on Gilly would really like their reactor working again)

[FreeThinker]

14 hours ago, Omeran said:

Also, after updating to 1.20.0, my (already installed) magentized target fusion reactor has lost its MK1 fusion modes (Deuterium-Tritium and Cold Deuterium-Tritium), and left only with MK3 modes (immediately after switching ships the mode got switched to Proton-Boron11 which couldn't work).

When constructing a new ship, the mode starts as Deuterium-Helium3, and when switching to "next" mode it becomes "He3 Catalyzed D-D Fusion" and is unable to switch anymore to anything else.

Is this by design?

 

2

No, this was a bug introduced by 1.20.0, it will be fixed next release

Edited September 26, 2018 by FreeThinker

[FreeThinker]

Download Version 1.20.1 for Kerbal Space Program 1.4.5 from here

Released on 2018-09-26

• Compiled against KSP 1.4.5
• Added matched Temperature color with radiator color
• Linked maximum radiator temperature with maximum operational temperature
• Added 50% Reduction of Wasteheat and Engine heating when Cryogenic Fuels are used in Thermal Nozzles
• Added new LFO mode Liquid Hydrogen / Intake Air (unlocked with Specialized Fuel Storage)
• Added Liquid Carbon Monoxide, Liquid Neon, Liquid Krypton and Liquid Xenon as Thermal Propellants
• Added Apply Radiator wasteheat convection bonus to part stock convection bonus
• Balance: Removed or lowered tech requirement of many Thermal Fuel
• Balance: increased effect of atmosphere on graphene radiators
• Balance : Made Thermal LiquidFuel thrust equal to Hydrogen thrust (but with 80% lower isp)
• Balance : Made thrust LiquidFuel/Oxidizer mode equal to Hydrolox fuel mode (but with 80% lower isp)
• Balance: Prohibit thermal engine shutdown of engine while throttle isn't cut
• Fixed variable maximum temperature of Thermal Nozzle
• Fixed hidden parts filter
• Fixed ability to use D-T fusion mode
• Fixed negative cost Bosh Einstein antiproton containers
• Fixed description of some engines
• Fixed maximum efficiency on Tri Alpha

[ss8913]

so... @FreeThinker I started a new science-progression a while back... I haven't played KSP in a couple days and tonight I went back to a mission in progress coming back from Minmus; the craft in question is powered by a 3.75m lightbulb and 4 2.5m lightbulbs.. I've used this craft extensively before the recent updates.

Now, however, I throttle it up and it's about 50% less powerful and it overheats in seconds causing the engines to explode.  This is using LiquidFuel as a propellant (haven't unlocked everything yet).  Is this intentional or is this a bug?

[FreeThinker]

1 hour ago, ss8913 said:

so... @FreeThinker I started a new science-progression a while back... I haven't played KSP in a couple days and tonight I went back to a mission in progress coming back from Minmus; the craft in question is powered by a 3.75m lightbulb and 4 2.5m lightbulbs.. I've used this craft extensively before the recent updates.

Now, however, I throttle it up and it's about 50% less powerful and it overheats in seconds causing the engines to explode.  This is using LiquidFuel as a propellant (haven't unlocked everything yet).  Is this intentional or is this a bug?

Well it depends, does it have radiators?  You might want to use cryo genic propellant instead as they help keep the engine cool.

But we might have to custom tweak it. There is is hidden property called "heatProductionMultiplier" on the Thermal Nozzle, by default it is 1, try changing it to a lower number like 0.5 and see if it works

[AleXX]

Hello everybody!
@FreeThinker I have the same problem as @ss8913. I pIay career mode  in KSP 1.4.5.2243 and I have a craft with a 2.5m lightbulb engine, with hydrazine as fuel. It's on the way to the Jool system. For cooling, 4 Grafen Radiators Folding Large is used with maximum improvements (4400 K maximum temperature). This was more than enough earlier.
I updated from version 1.19.9 to 1.20. And now, if I give full thrust, the engine quickly overheats and begins to automatically reduce the thrust to about 20% to avoid an explosion. At the same time, the temperature of the radiator is about 800 K, the temperature of the part (fuel tank connected directly to the engine) is about 4000 K, which is strange, I think.
After returning to version 1.19.11, everything is working fine, as before.

So, is the waste heat system was some kind revised, or it is a bug?

English is not my native language, I use Google translator.

Edited September 27, 2018 by AleXX
grammatical mistakes

[FreeThinker]

1 hour ago, AleXX said:

Hello everybody!
@FreeThinker I have the same problem as @ss8913. I pIay career mode  in KSP 1.4.5.2243 and I have a craft with a 2.5m lightbulb engine, with hydrazine as fuel. It's on the way to the Jool system. For cooling, 4 Grafen Radiators Folding Large is used with maximum improvements (4400 K maximum temperature). This was more than enough earlier.
I updated from version 1.19.9 to 1.20. And now, if I give full thrust, the engine quickly overheats and begins to automatically reduce the thrust to about 20% to avoid an explosion. At the same time, the temperature of the radiator is about 800 K, the temperature of the part (fuel tank connected directly to the engine) is about 4000 K, which is strange, I think.
After returning to version 1.19.11, everything is working fine, as before.

So, is the waste heat system was some kind revised, or it is a bug?

3

Yes it was revised, but I think we need to add some tweaks for high isp engines like the nuclear lightbulb.

[ss8913]

1 hour ago, FreeThinker said:

Yes it was revised, but I think we need to add some tweaks for high isp engines like the nuclear lightbulb.

One thing to note here; I'm not seeing any more wasteheat in the radiators than I was before; it's the engines themselves overheating... like the stock "Overheat" alert bar next to the engines in the staging area in the lower left of the screen.. which I have rarely if ever seen on KSPIE engines.  Not sure if that makes a difference...?

[Gildarrious]

To add to what these guys were saying. Here is my Thermal Turbojet with 20 tons of additional radiators to what it originally had. You can see that at 1% thrust, 1% reception = 270MW it casually explodes on the runway. It is producing 1.2Kn of thrust while it explodes, which is pretty depressing. This same design last patch produced 2000Kn from 8GW of power, using only 4 normal sized radiators. Previously this craft went to Minimus and back with no heating trouble. One thing to note about the picture, is that there is no wasteheat at all. Turning down heatProductionMultiplier = .05 didn't even help at all. 1/20th the heating still explodes the craft engine in 1 second at full power.  https://www.dropbox.com/s/h88pn4vl9qfcj0n/KSP.png?dl=0. 

Additionally, as a test. I ran the engine full power full reception with cheats to not explode. This was the result after 1:25. Temperature gauges read 4.96 million degrees kelvin and climbing at 52,000 kelvin or so per second. This is gargantuanly hotter than the sun itself. Finally got my 4794.8 Kn though! https://www.dropbox.com/s/ka7ldijtlrhwvbh/KSP2.jpg?dl=0.

Running another test with 77 radiators, 162.9GW of radiation capability, 19,143 M^2 or radiator surface area. Here is the engine overheating and exploding at one notch of throttle. All the radiators on the middle are in atmosphere specialized, but I wanted to go all out and added the graphene as well. https://www.dropbox.com/s/sd0cnclm4rx3gem/KSP3.jpg?dl=0.

Edited September 28, 2018 by Gildarrious

[ss8913]

2 hours ago, Gildarrious said:

To add to what these guys were saying. Here is my Thermal Turbojet with 20 tons of additional radiators to what it originally had. You can see that at 1% thrust, 1% reception = 270MW it casually explodes on the runway. It is producing 1.2Kn of thrust while it explodes, which is pretty depressing. This same design last patch produced 2000Kn from 8GW of power, using only 4 normal sized radiators. Previously this craft went to Minimus and back with no heating trouble. One thing to note about the picture, is that there is no wasteheat at all. Turning down heatProductionMultiplier = .05 didn't even help at all. 1/20th the heating still explodes the craft engine in 1 second at full power.  https://www.dropbox.com/s/h88pn4vl9qfcj0n/KSP.png?dl=0. 

Additionally, as a test. I ran the engine full power full reception with cheats to not explode. This was the result after 1:25. Temperature gauges read 4.96 million degrees kelvin and climbing at 52,000 kelvin or so per second. This is gargantuanly hotter than the sun itself. Finally got my 4794.8 Kn though! https://www.dropbox.com/s/ka7ldijtlrhwvbh/KSP2.jpg?dl=0.

Running another test with 77 radiators, 162.9GW of radiation capability, 19,143 M^2 or radiator surface area. Here is the engine overheating and exploding at one notch of throttle. All the radiators on the middle are in atmosphere specialized, but I wanted to go all out and added the graphene as well. https://www.dropbox.com/s/sd0cnclm4rx3gem/KSP3.jpg?dl=0.

This seems to be an ongoing fight between KSP's stock heat management and KSPIE's heat management/production.. ask @FreeThinker, this kind of thing has been happening for years now, updates that address the interaction with KSP's stock heat will often cause similar issues to this.. so far they've always been addressed, and pretty quickly, and I'm sure this one will be no different.  Keep supplying as much detail as y'all can, if you're seeing the problem too, that helps in finding the issue.

[Gildarrious]

11 minutes ago, ss8913 said:

This seems to be an ongoing fight between KSP's stock heat management and KSPIE's heat management/production.. ask @FreeThinker, this kind of thing has been happening for years now, updates that address the interaction with KSP's stock heat will often cause similar issues to this.. so far they've always been addressed, and pretty quickly, and I'm sure this one will be no different.  Keep supplying as much detail as y'all can, if you're seeing the problem too, that helps in finding the issue.

For sure, he and I have been having discussions above about the last patched version and getting it working! I appreciate the willingness to listen @FreeThinker.

[von Fabricius]

Got the same problem as other people. Thermal turbojet +ramjet overheats in seconds even though theres plenty of wasteheat left.

Another thing is that I can't choose hydrogen as a fuel for the thermal turbojet anymore. Only atm and others like compressed air, helium, liquid xenon.

Happened when I upgraded from 1.19.11

[hotbigboy]

How do i activate the persistent thrust for the magnetic nozzle? 

[FreeThinker]

Version 1.20.2 for Kerbal Space Program 1.4.5 is available from here

Released on 2018-09-30

• Added Graphene Blanket Radiator
• Added Hydrogen/Fluorine LFO mode to thermal nozzle
• Added Intake Air + Hydrogen afterburner mode to Turbo/Ramjet Nozzle
• Balance: Limited Positron Antimatter Reactor , Gas Core Reactors and Lightbulb to Single Atomic propellants
• Balance increased overall maximum temperatures radiators
• Balance: increase none graphene radiator maximum temperature to 3200K
• Fixed excessive wasteheat production when Thermal nozzle is connected to Positron Antimatter reactor
• Fixes most of the excessive Thermal Nozzle/Turbojet/Ramjet Heat issues

[Omeran]

I've come upon a crash (in other occurrence, the ship vanishes), that happens when getting near a craft with multiple ISRUs working (possibly when one of the tanks is out of space).

It repeated several times, until I turned off all ISRUs, then everything was fine.

Is this worth a deeper investigation?