[1.3.1] Ferram Aerospace Research: v0.15.9.1 "Liepmann" 4/2/18

[Hodo]

Farram4 do I need to get the KIDS plugin to adjust my engine settings if I am running the AJY plugin and RSS?

[ferram4]

No, you don't need to. Besides, you should be running RealFuels if you're messing with RSS, which KIDS currently doesn't support.

[Hodo]

No, you don't need to. Besides, you should be running RealFuels if you're messing with RSS, which KIDS currently doesn't support.

I have real fuels, just making sure.

Finding it a bit more challenging with the RSS... and I like it.

Haven't made a SSTO plane yet, but made a SSTO rocket by accident.... Didn't realize that 10km/s d/v is a bit more than needed when sitting on the launch pad. Didn't need the second stage to do anything other than de-orbit the craft, and I could have done that in the first stage had I put more RCS thrusters on it.

[Motokid600]

How would/can I configure a FASA nosecone to be FAR compatible?

[ferram4]

If it's hollow and stuff is supposed to go inside it, make sure that it has "fairing" or "shroud" somewhere in its title.

Make sure there is only one attach node at the center of the base, and make sure that the part's radius / 1.25 is the same as the size of that attach node.

It should work fine to start with; FAR automatically detects the shape and applies the proper drag to parts unless a modder tries something clever, i.e. their parts are set up distinctly differently than the stock parts in terms of where the origin is relative to the model, where attach nodes are placed, what sizes the attach nodes have, etc.

[SkyRender]

So I decided to see just how much more flexible FAR makes the atmosphere when it comes to spaceplanes. I... may have overdone it just a wee bit.

Yeah. I landed that puny little 360/440 fuel capacity thing on the Mun. With a suboptimal transfer to the Mun about 3 million KM out from Kerbin. Which was where my initial burn while still in the atmosphere took my spaceplane. Did I mention that it had enough fuel to get back into Munar orbit, too? I think I understand now why people tend to pair Deadly Re-entry and/or an engine nerf with FAR...

[ferram4]

Well, there's also a well-known and well-publicized typo in the FAR config that prevents the turbojet from ever running out of thrust. So basically until you adjust that (the fix is fairly easy to search for) you're working with utterly broken and cheaty turbojets.

This sort of thing has come up enough that I'm tempted to push the not-ready FAR v0.13 out the door just to get the fix out there so I can stop hearing about how FAR lets people do such crazy things with their jets and spaceplanes.

[SkyRender]

Well, there's also a well-known and well-publicized typo in the FAR config that prevents the turbojet from ever running out of thrust. So basically until you adjust that (the fix is fairly easy to search for) you're working with utterly broken and cheaty turbojets.

This sort of thing has come up enough that I'm tempted to push the not-ready FAR v0.13 out the door just to get the fix out there so I can stop hearing about how FAR lets people do such crazy things with their jets and spaceplanes.

Heh, sorry I didn't notice that! But it does explain a lot of strange anomalies surrounding the turbojet engine I noticed. I figured it wasn't intentional.

[ngianoplus]

I want to use FAR with out being cheaty due to the reduced delta-v required for Kerbin orbit.

Using just FAR and KIDS, what setting should I use to achieve stocklike delta-v requirments with FAR installed? (No RSS)

Also, thanks for being such a cool modder. You always respond to peoples' questions.

[ferram4]

There's two presets there that will do what you want, you just have to decide if you want a crazy nerf to efficiency in atmo only or if you want a more modest nerf everywhere.

I think you might change your mind on it being cheaty once you try to launch something larger though. The difficulty curve scales up a lot more harshly with FAR aerodynamics than in stock.

[Motokid600]

I planned on installing the Alternis planet pack, but I read FAR isn't compatible with custom planets?

[AbeS]

Of course it is compatible! FAR is a must have for RealSolarSystem for example!

[ferram4]

FAR is not compatible with PlanetFactory CE packs if and only if the pack maker is lazy and doesn't bother to set the flightGlobalsIndex (which is supposed to be a unique value) to a unique value for each planet. In that case, FAR isn't able to specify unique atmospheric properties for each planet and breaks. There is simply nothing that I can do to add compatibility in that situation short of removing unique atmospheric properties for each planet, and I'm unwilling to scrap an entire feature because a few modders are unwilling to do things the correct way. Simply put, the incompatibility is on the planet pack maker's side, not mine.

That said, Alternis doesn't function the way PlanetFactory CE does, and so there is no way for FAR to conflict with that.

[curiousepic]

Ferram, do the fairings on this amazing contraption actually shield the interior?

[ferram4]

Because of the way the code is set up, either it's going to always shield the payload, regardless of whether it's open or closed or it's going to never shield the payload regardless of whether it's open or closed. There's no easy way for me to detect whether the fairing / cargo bay is open or closed with that system, so if I did attempt to make it work everyone would complain about how much it would make the game lag.

So basically, if it does or doesn't, it's still going to not work correctly.

[curiousepic]

Is it that the Procedural Fairing base dictates that anything attached above it is considered shielded, and ignores the presence of fairings?

[ferram4]

No. It looks at the boundaries of the fairing parts and determines what is "inside" them once, and then waits until the vessel part list changes (indicating staging or breaking, which could cause the payload fairing to come off) for fairing parts. The issue is that the particular code module that runs in this case only updates whenever the vessel part list changes, which doesn't happen with this weird fairing opening and closing thing.

[Read have Read]

Sage Sagan is making a small Dreamchaser style lifting body craft with small wiglets, FAR will handle the body lift fine, but he was wondering how the wings should be set up. Would integrated horizontal wings with attachable vertical wing tips be worse than having either separate vertical and horizontal pieces or a compound curve wing that goes horizontal to vertical in one piece?

The winglets will attach separately from the main lifting-body,I think it will be necessary for control and aerodynamic config to have winglets for yaw control and stability.

The question is, do we separate the wings from the body at line "A" in which case they will have to have lift/stability working in two planes? Or at line "B"? meaning the fuselage and the horizontal wing surfaces are one part and the vertical sections of the wings are 2 attached parts. i think the second approach will be more straightforward.

[ferram4]

The best would be cuts at both points, since FAR is only able to simulate a wing for a part that is a flat plane; any other set up will have either the vertical fins doing nothing or the regular wings doing nothing.

However he decides to do it, make sure that the part-forward vector is oriented perpendicular to the wing and that the part origin is at the center of the wing root, or FAR won't handle the aerodynamics correctly at all.

[Read have Read]

The best would be cuts at both points, since FAR is only able to simulate a wing for a part that is a flat plane; any other set up will have either the vertical fins doing nothing or the regular wings doing nothing.

However he decides to do it, make sure that the part-forward vector is oriented perpendicular to the wing and that the part origin is at the center of the wing root, or FAR won't handle the aerodynamics correctly at all.

That is what I thought, but as a thought experiment, is it possible to have the wing behave like a strong dihedral if the part centre was at the hypotenuse of the triangle between the vertical and the horizontal parts?

[ferram4]

That would cause really, really funky things to happen in flight. With separate horizontal and vertical sections 2 degrees of sideslip at low speeds won't cause a lot of rolling; using a single angled section will cause lots of rolling. And that's with 5 seconds of thinking about it; there will be more issues, especially once you get into the supersonic stuff. Aerodynamics can't be added together like that, and there are a lot more complications than you think from doing things that way. This is a bad idea.

[Read have Read]

More along the lines of appearing like a curved wing, but faking it for appearances and having it behaving just just a simple dihedral wing set up for all aerodynamic purposes. I do realize that much like the the Apollo program, this would be harder to fake than to do it right.

Perhaps my understanding of dihedrals is lacking, how much is too much for a low slung dihedral wing, or a high mounted anhedral on a medium sized plane like a DC-3? Would say 10 degrees or 15 degrees cause all sorts of funky rolling motions at trans-mach?

[ferram4]

10 or 15 degrees would cause lots of funky rolling motion at any speed; dihedral or anhedral is rarely more than 3-4 degrees in real life. Seriously, just put together a plane in KSP using wing parts in the configuration you're talking about and see how badly it flies. This hacky approach you're insisting on doing is not going to result in anything fun to fly. That said, if you are going to just do a curved wing like you're talking about the poor qualities you'll get out of it will be realistic, and FAR (and actually, the stock "aerodynamics" as well) will prove why curved wings like that aren't done in real life.

[StevenRS11]

Ferram4, I was doing a physics lab at college the other day, and my group and I started talking about KSP. My professor (who was already amazing) overheard and joined in; apparently a group of the physics professors share a KSP save between themselves. When stock aerodynamics came up, he said "Have you heard of Ferram Aerospace Research? Its honestly pointless trying to build planes without it." and I just smiled. Yes, I have.

[ferram4]

See, it's things like that that make actually publishing and supporting something like this worthwhile. I'm curious, what school is it that has professors that think that my mod is actually decent? Also, this is probably asking too much, but do any of them happen to have any connections in the aerospace industry? I've been trying to get an aero engineer job and haven't had much luck due to a lack of connections and networking; I figure them having some experience with my little project can't hurt, right?