KSP Interstellar Extended Support Thread

[DrScarlett]

Thank you both, @BlackMoonsand @FreeThinker,

So orbital velocities are easy, but what I need to know in order to estimate the right starting point is the relative vector of my target body with the current body I am orbiting. If for instance my target is moving more or less towards my current body, I better start on the part of my orbit that moves away from the target, in order to decrease my relative velocity - am I getting this right?

12 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

...and drop out of warp at the right moment, which becomes easier the slower you go. Your exit speed is visible in the Aclubier Warp control window, use it wisely...

This is the part that still confuses me. I am sensing it is also important where  I drop out of warp, because my original (and now retained) vector will the basis of my new trajectory in the gravitational influence of the new body. Depending on my starting vector I will want to pick whether I want to drop out of warp to the left side or the right side or straight in front of the new body. Damn this is not easy. Does the Warp control window give me a direction as well, i.e. tell me the whole vector?

When i start traveling to a new star, which is my goal, I am going to have to worry about the relative velocity between Kerbol and that star. That is gong to be fun...

Also i don't understand how multiple warp hops can help brake my original vector. Dang...

Let me experiment and see if I can get a better grip on this. That usually helps  Any additional instructions are very welcome.

[BlackMoons]

Simple. Warp to the escape side of the planet

gravity pulls you down when you go back into normal space, when nearly escaped the planets gravity, warp back closer to it and let gravity slow you down again.

[FreeThinker]

@DrScarlett If you're not sure, a neat trick is to drop out of warp above the north pole or below the south pole. Because movement is usually inside the plane of the solar system, at worst you exit velocity is too little at you drop into the atmosphere, but your orbital path will not go directly at high speed into a celestial body, which will usually kill you when too close because it takes a time to recharge the warp drive. Of course this will result in a polar orbit, which might not what you want

Edited July 24, 2017 by FreeThinker

[DrScarlett]

10 minutes ago, BlackMoons said:

Simple. Warp to the escape side of the planet

gravity pulls you down when you go back into normal space, when nearly escaped the planets gravity, warp back closer to it and let gravity slow you down again.

Thank you!!

8 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

@DrScarlett If you're not sure, a neat trick is to drop out of warp above the north pole or below the south pole. Because movement is usually inside the plane of the solar system, at worst you exit velocity is too little, but your orbital path will not go directly into a celestial body, which will usually kill you when too close because it takes a time to recharge the warp drive.

And thank you!!

These two tricks together will probably be all I need!

Edited July 24, 2017 by DrScarlett

[BlackMoons]

Another good trick iv heard is using the sun itself to change your velocity (or jool) since it has a MUCH bigger gravity well to do deacceleration in. Plus less issue with having to get so close you might hit the thing!

Ie: warp to sun, do your gravity maneuvers to change speed to match target planet, then warp to planet

It would be a weird future for the human race if we ever get there. Warp from star to star in a few minutes/hours/years, then spend decades repeatedly warping towards the star/planet/whatever to bleed off velocity so you can actually land

"Yay we made it to our destination.. And its going away.. *warp* yay we made it.. and its going away.. *warp* (20 years later) YAY WE ACTUALLY ARRIVED AND IT STOPPED GOING AWAY"

Edited July 24, 2017 by BlackMoons

[DrScarlett]

6 minutes ago, BlackMoons said:

Another good trick iv heard is using the sun itself to change your velocity (or jool) since it has a MUCH bigger gravity well to do deacceleration in. Plus less issue with having to get so close you might hit the thing!

Ie: warp to sun, do your gravity maneuvers to change speed to match target planet, then warp to planet

Hehe that's some advanced warping chicanery!

1 hour ago, Ciro1983811 said:

...ammonia/methane (isru dependant) for higher atmo in closed cicle mode. Then over 40Km high, fire kerbstein/trialpha and go (antimatter off). ...

Hi @Ciro1983811,

You are talking about a SSTW plane right? A few questions on that.

• What engine is this ammonia/methane thing?
• What does isru dependant mean?
• Why turn off the antimatter reactors in the upper atmo?

Thanks in advance,

Dr. Scarlett

Edited July 24, 2017 by DrScarlett

[BlackMoons]

Well I know the thermal launch nozzle and ramjet can use other propellants (Read as: just about any gas/liquid), but wouldn't that be open cycle since your expelling them?

Im always amused when I accidentally switch to 'water' mode. My kerbals who need it for life support, less so.

[Ciro1983811]

30 minutes ago, DrScarlett said:

Hehe that's some advanced warping chicanery!

Hi @Ciro1983811,

You are talking about a SSTW plane right? A few questions on that.

• What engine is this ammonia/methane thing?
• What does isru dependant mean?
• Why turn off the antimatter reactors in the upper atmo?

Thanks in advance,

Dr. Scarlett

SSTW rocket (vertical takeoff vertical landing). I mean ammonia or methane propellant (based on availability of ISRU of nitrogen/hidrogen to make ammonia or methane from upper atmosphere of gas giants  at the destination) to fuel thermal turbojet when intakeatm fade out.

Antimatter reactors when coupled with thermal nozzles don't need much radiators. Instead as you know, they need a LOT of dissipation when producing electricity. I use the electric priority sliders on reactors/generators to prioritize the use of trialpha. That way, antimatter reactors function only for thermal propulsion (low and high atmo) and when charging/warping the alcubierre drive. When doing orbital maneuver with kerbstein they are idle.

that is a big try i made a while ago...

 

Edited July 24, 2017 by Ciro1983811

[DrScarlett]

Thank you very much, @Ciro1983811, very helpful!!

[BlackMoons]

Hmm, Depleted fuel seems kinda pointless in the Timberwind engine. Does not seem to degrade its performance when full, the timberwind will gladly suck UN outta any other onboard ship containers, and the IRSU's won't do anything about 'depleted fuel' AFAIK. (Nuclear reprocessing is not available)

[Nansuchao]

@FreeThinker I'm sprry to bother you, but every time a decouple a part from my ship, by staging OR undocking, the generator attached to a reactor, or inside an engine stop to produce energy. This is usually not a big issue when you're in orbit, cause a F5/F9 will solve the problem, but it becomes dangerous when you have to reload several times entering the atmosphere of Eve at orbital speed.

Is there a way to fix it? I'm still on 1.2.2, but I saw the same issue in 1.3.

[BlackMoons]

Timberwind overheat/cooling mechanic does not respond to timewarp (Falls at same rate in real time at any timewarp speed)

Does not seem to respond to radiators either. (Although maybe you just can't cool a timberwind core like that)

Also seems overheat increases quickly if you just leave the generator on after a burn that has started to overheat the core a little.

Mainly I would just like the core temp to fall faster in real time during timewarp.

[FreeThinker]

5 hours ago, Nansuchao said:

@FreeThinker I'm sprry to bother you, but every time a decouple a part from my ship, by staging OR undocking, the generator attached to a reactor, or inside an engine stop to produce energy. This is usually not a big issue when you're in orbit, cause a F5/F9 will solve the problem, but it becomes dangerous when you have to reload several times entering the atmosphere of Eve at orbital speed.

Is there a way to fix it? I'm still on 1.2.2, but I saw the same issue in 1.3.

Is there a way to consistently  reproduce it?

[danielboro]

did the Solid Core Nuclear Reactor lose trust in the version for 1.3?
i  had 73 KN but now i see i have 47 KN
edit: after looking at the vids i made wen i moved to 1.3 i see it was 73 KN
did an upgrade thec move? was the trust lowered?
i didnt see specific mention of this in the change logs i found

@FreeThinker

Edited July 25, 2017 by danielboro

[BlackMoons]

1 hour ago, FreeThinker said:

Is there a way to consistently  reproduce it?

Iv had it happen undocking from my space station rather consistently with a salt reactor and thermal generator on the ship that was doing the docking.

I would say just try docking with something in orbit, saving, loading and then undocking. Pretty sure I left/came back to the ship after it was docked.

I found there does not need to be a second reactor. There was a number of beamed power transeivers onboard the station but none where active, not sure if that matters. There was also a 2nd ship docked to the station IIRC although it was mainly stock parts.

 

[Nansuchao]

4 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

Is there a way to consistently  reproduce it?

I have this issue with every spaceplane that dock and undock with a space station, with 2 TORY and 2 DCNTJ and with a EVE rover that was nuclear powered. 

My install is heavily modded, if you want I can share a short video about that.

[FreeThinker]

3 hours ago, Nansuchao said:

I have this issue with every spaceplane that dock and undock with a space station, with 2 TORY and 2 DCNTJ and with a EVE rover that was nuclear powered. 

My install is heavily modded, if you want I can share a short video about that.

So just undocking/undocking in orbit will trigger it?

Edited July 25, 2017 by FreeThinker

[DrScarlett]

18 hours ago, BlackMoons said:

Another good trick iv heard is using the sun itself to change your velocity (or jool) since it has a MUCH bigger gravity well to do deacceleration in. Plus less issue with having to get so close you might hit the thing!

Ie: warp to sun, do your gravity maneuvers to change speed to match target planet, then warp to planet

It would be a weird future for the human race if we ever get there. Warp from star to star in a few minutes/hours/years, then spend decades repeatedly warping towards the star/planet/whatever to bleed off velocity so you can actually land

"Yay we made it to our destination.. And its going away.. *warp* yay we made it.. and its going away.. *warp* (20 years later) YAY WE ACTUALLY ARRIVED AND IT STOPPED GOING AWAY"

I have been experiencing the above yesterday in my tests, hehe, very funny. Now that I have played around with gravity breaking, first: thanks again to y'all who pointed this out to me. Second: it's quite freaky, and quite fun, and it clearly points out to me the Alcubierre is NOT OP. Third: try bleeding off 15K dV when returning to Kerbin, or using some other relatively small body for gravity breaking, you will be using many hops to do it. It is very much like aerobreaking, it can take quite a while. Also it is quite possible to use a sh!tton of antimatter while doing this, at some point you really have to consider designing for a different method...

In short, I LIKE IT. Whooohoooo!

Edited July 25, 2017 by DrScarlett

[Nansuchao]

3 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

So just undocking/undocking in orbit will trigger it?

Yes, undocking or just decouple a part from your main ship nuclear powered. The reactor remains active, but the generator stop to provide energy.

[FreeThinker]

9 hours ago, Nansuchao said:

Yes, undocking or just decouple a part from your main ship nuclear powered. The reactor remains active, but the generator stop to provide energy.

Well I could not reproduce with this ship, docking/undocking

Perhaps you can send me a  simple vessel where the problem occurs:

I do have an idea why it might occur, could you test if the problem also occurs with this alpha of KSPIE 1.15

Edited July 25, 2017 by FreeThinker

[danielboro]

@FreeThinker

hello
i have a strange problem

this SSTO is brand new on its first flyet to minmus
after the problem i seen in my TTNL i had a look at this ship nuks to discover that 3 has in the old trust  value of 73 but 1 has a max trust of 46
i looked in the saave file but as far as i can see thay are all the same
way is one of identical 4 downgraded?
i have saved the ksp.log and out-put.txt if you need them
thanks

[FreeThinker]

31 minutes ago, danielboro said:

@FreeThinker

hello
i have a strange problem

this SSTO is brand new on its first flyet to minmus
after the problem i seen in my TTNL i had a look at this ship nuks to discover that 3 has in the old trust  value of 73 but 1 has a max trust of 46
i looked in the saave file but as far as i can see thay are all the same
way is one of identical 4 downgraded?
i have saved the ksp.log and out-put.txt if you need them
thanks

Notice the right reactor is 7 times more the amount of actinides than the left, and since the anticides act as neutron absorber it will result in a significantly reduction power output.  This could be the result of an uneven power usage. In this case that would need to set the left reactor output at 62%

Edited July 25, 2017 by FreeThinker

[Nansuchao]

27 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

Well I could not reproduce with this ship, docking/undocking

Perhaps you can send me a  simple vessel where the problem occurs:

I do have an idea why it might occur, could you test if the problem also occurs with this alpha of KSPIE 1.15

Sure I will. Is that version for 1.2.2 or 1.3?

[FreeThinker]

Just now, Nansuchao said:

Sure I will. Is that version for 1.2.2 or 1.3?

1.3

[danielboro]

15 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

Notice the right reactor is 7 times more the amount of actinides than the left, and since the anticides act as neutron absorber it will result in a significantly reduction power output.  This could be the result of an uneven power usage.

way wold the power be used un even?