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

[NoPersona]

Have another "great work".

After playing around with FAR for a bit, it feels great having my planes doing interesting things again.

Enjoy your well deserved break. Even if you don't have one planned, you should have a break because you deserve it.

[eodh]

Hello. After instaling this new release I got a bug in the VAB were the fairings have this animation like a "pulse" followed by weird framerate "lags", I removed far and modular flight itnegrator and the problem went away...

[Voculus]

This is a glorious day! Thanks, Ferram!

[MarvinCZ]

The download link to GitHub in the first post is broken. It should be this: v0.15 Euler

Anyway, thanks for the work and persistence!

[Stratoroc]

YYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!

Thank you soo much Ferram. Time for to go and fly some planes

[Tarheel1999]

Hello. After instaling this new release I got a bug in the VAB were the fairings have this animation like a "pulse" followed by weird framerate "lags", I removed far and modular flight itnegrator and the problem went away...

Stock fairings are a little buggy right now. Are you it wasn't the restart of KSP that fixed the problem as opposed to the removal of FAR and its dependencies? I ask because I have had to restart KSP due to stock fairings being flaky without FAR installed.

[JohnTomato]

Can someone explain the difference between 1.0 stock aerodynamics and FAR? I already read the FAQ but I still have no clue and I can't figure out why is everyone so happy with the new release.

Thanks.

[jrandom]

An official release?? YAY!

Can someone explain the difference between 1.0 stock aerodynamics and FAR? I already read the FAQ but I still have no clue and I can't figure out why is everyone so happy with the new release.

Stock aero is a simplistic aerodynamics model. It works well enough if you want "the idea of air".

FAR is a super-realistic (for KSP) aero model written by an expert in the field. It models all sorts of stuff, including the different changes in aerodynamics you get at transonic, supersonic, and hypersonic speeds. If you're looking for realism in KSP, FAR is an absolute MUST. It also adds a lot of fine-tuning controls to control surfaces and wing weight/strength settings.

[Camacha]

Can someone explain the difference between 1.0 stock aerodynamics and FAR? I already read the FAQ but I still have no clue and I can't figure out why is everyone so happy with the new release.

Thanks.

The accurate description is in the first post, the short one would be: FAR is more accurate than stock and behaves more like real world aerodynamics than stock. This means that there are a couple of phenomena that you have to take into account that can be slightly complex, but also means things are more intuitive and that you have a whole internet full of resources on how things work and why. If you ever get stuck and do not know a solution, just look at how it is done in real life and you will have a couple of very valuable clues. If you ever need a formula, you can look on Wikipedia and have your answer, rather than deal with somewhat magical numbers that do not seem to come from anywhere.

In short; stock aerodynamics are meant to balance the game in a certain way, while FAR aerodynamics are meant to be as accurate as possible within the available processing power budget.

[JohnTomato]

Stock aero is a simplistic aerodynamics model. It works well enough if you want "the idea of air".

FAR is a super-realistic (for KSP) aero model written by an expert in the field. It models all sorts of stuff, including the different changes in aerodynamics you get at transonic, supersonic, and hypersonic speeds. If you're looking for realism in KSP, FAR is an absolute MUST. It also adds a lot of fine-tuning controls to control surfaces and wing weight/strength settings.

Oh I see, thank you very much! I'm not sure if I really want the game to be super-realistic, but I do want B9 so I guess this mod is a must (or WILL be once B9 is actually updated).

Anyway, thanks again!

Edit: Thank you too, Camacha!

Edit2: Thanks, NoPersona! (Didn't expect to get so many explanations, all of them helpful though)

Edited May 8, 2015 by JohnTomato

[NoPersona]

The FAQ on the front page doesn't seem like it has been updated to account for the changes added to version 1.0 of the game, which made the stock aerodynamics much better.

In general, FAR makes the aerodynamics more realistic. There are some things that the new stock system doesn't model, like accurate things happening as you are approaching and just passing the speed of sound. FAR also has nicer control over the control surfaces, allowing you to choose how much a surface takes part in pitch/yaw/roll, allows you to specify how much they actually deflect by, and more with angle of attack offsets, spoilers and flaps. While the stock game has some of this, it doesn't have it to the extent of FAR.

In short, it allows you to crash planes and rockets in much more interesting ways while you are inside an atmosphere.

[rriegner]

After 1.0.2, I changed my physics.cfg to the old 1.0 values. I'm assuming I need the 1.0.2 values instead?

[klgraham1013]

FAR updated. Thank science.

[ferram4]

@eodh: That's FAR re-voxelizing the vessel. It needs to send the fairings back to their original positions to voxelize properly (else they're floating off in space and the fairing basically doesn't exist). It only happens when an editor update event fires, so unless you've got something that's spamming editor updates it should only happen when you change the shape of the vessel.

Yes, I'm aware of the little hitches that can occur and I'm looking at ways to reduce it even in the worst cases. For the most part though, this only happens when the vessel needs to update, so it's not an utterly critical issue.

[Nothalogh]

Dear god, the hype is real

This was playing as I refreshed and saw the updated title:

[TangibleLight]

I obviously don't know how Euler goes about voxelizing the craft, but I assume part of your code analyzes the craft as a whole. Would it be possible to modify that part of the plugin to export the craft to a .obj file or some other 3D model format? If you can't or don't want to do this, but you think it is possible, where in your code does this process happen so someone else could have a go at such a plugin?

[Captain Planet]

Will this new parachute code automatically work for chutes added by mods, or will we need to do some config tweaking for non-stock chutes?

[eodh]

Well, I checked the debug logger and it seems that this "re-voxelization" is on some sort of loop (like here http://a.pomf.se/ngshfs.jpg) I believe this is some sort of conflict with this mod: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/92764-90-Stock-Part-Revamp-Update-1-7-2! Tested without it and apparently is all good. It alters the models so maybe it have some sort of incompatibility?

[PrometheanVR]

Hey all, I have no icon appearing for FAR in game. I used CKAN to install and everything appears to be working besides the FAR icon that gives me its menu options. I've got the the FAR installed crafts and flight definitely feels a lot more realist now. Any idea what could be causing the issue with the icon? I have a lot of mods running so should I just try reinstalling everything?

[yithpistol]

I hate to have to bring this up, and I can't find it elsewhere (besides which this never ocurred with 'old'FAR), but it seems that my FAR tool buttons are not showing up. I see screenshots of it being on people's regular tool bar, but I have no FAR tools (thus no way to tell why my planes are crashing). Blizzy's toolbar also seems to go missing in both VAB and SPH. This MAY be a toolbar issue, but before installing nuFAR her toolbar appeared in VAB/SPH.

Any ideas? Here is the xml in the plugs section which appear to show windows placement.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

<config>

<rect name="windowPos">

<xmin>410</xmin>

<xmax>1136</xmax>

<ymin>75</ymin>

<ymax>575</ymax>

</rect>

<bool name="EditorGUIBool">1</bool>

<rect name="FlightWindowPos">

<xmin>1086</xmin>

<xmax>1298</xmax>

<ymin>132</ymin>

<ymax>402</ymax>

</rect>

<rect name="AutopilotWinPos">

<xmin>0</xmin>

<xmax>0</xmax>

<ymin>0</ymin>

<ymax>0</ymax>

</rect>

<rect name="HelpWindowPos">

<xmin>0</xmin>

<xmax>0</xmax>

<ymin>0</ymin>

<ymax>0</ymax>

</rect>

<rect name="FlightDataPos">

<xmin>247</xmin>

<xmax>505</xmax>

<ymin>112</ymin>

<ymax>654</ymax>

</rect>

<rect name="FlightDataHelpPos">

<xmin>0</xmin>

<xmax>0</xmax>

<ymin>0</ymin>

<ymax>0</ymax>

</rect>

<rect name="AirSpeedPos">

<xmin>90</xmin>

<xmax>290</xmax>

<ymin>69</ymin>

<ymax>307</ymax>

</rect>

<rect name="AirSpeedHelpPos">

<xmin>399</xmin>

<xmax>913</xmax>

<ymin>53</ymin>

<ymax>531</ymax>

</rect>

<string name="k_wingleveler">0.1</string>

<string name="kd_wingleveler">0.002</string>

<string name="k_yawdamper">0.1</string>

<string name="k_pitchdamper">0.1</string>

<string name="scaleVelocity">100</string>

<string name="alt">0</string>

<string name="upperLim">25</string>

<string name="lowerLim">-25</string>

<string name="k_limiter">0.25</string>

<bool name="FlightGUIBool">0</bool>

<int name="SpacePortID">1113</int>

<string name="Name">Ferram Aerospace Research</string>

<string name="displayForces">False</string>

<string name="displayCoefficients">False</string>

<string name="displayShielding">False</string>

<string name="useSplinesForSupersonicMath">True</string>

<string name="allowStructuralFailures">True</string>

<string name="manualOverrideShielding">False</string>

<int name="unitMode">0</int>

<int name="velMode">0</int>

</config>

An older 'solution' showed the 'fix' being an antivirus thing. I'm just not sure about that.

I tried removing and reinstalling FAR via CKAN. I tried the same with blizzy's. No go. Also, turned off anti virus and that didn't help either.

OH, the center of lift bubble is ALWAYS in the floor. It starts in one place then drops to the floor and doesn't respond to any changes I make to the plane. Does this in VAB as well.

Edited May 9, 2015 by yithpistol
Tries that didn't work.

[Honeybadga]

Those aero-structural failures. Oh my!

Edited May 9, 2015 by Honeybadga

[yithpistol]

This is why I love the game, and FAR. Jeb was testing out a swept wing craft called Phantomas and he barely made it off the runway before the plane rolled right and tore off the right wing. He managed to get it into the air, though, and get enough altitude (barely 800m) and did an EVA. Frantically trying to tear at the ripcord device (Thanks EVA Parachutes) he was able to gently drift down into the water. he then got a 'surface sample'. Jeb. On the job. All the time.

[stupid_chris]

Will this new parachute code automatically work for chutes added by mods, or will we need to do some config tweaking for non-stock chutes?

It's all done procedurally, and it applies to all parts that implement ModuleParachute, as long as RealChute isn't present.

[yithpistol]

Is blizzy's toolbar missing in VAB and SPH for you, as well, Promethean?

[ferram4]

@eodh: Unless VSR is constantly animating something, there is no reason that should occur. That is very, very strange.

@PrometheanVR & yithpistol: If both of you were relying on CKAN, you made a bad decision. It isn't aware of the new ModularFlightIntegrator dependency, and so everything breaks. Install manually and everything will be fine.