Buffalo 2 Modular Space Exploration Vehicle

[Angelo Kerman]

Today I powered through the Pilot House variant of the command pod:

The end of Phase 1 is in sight at last.

[Angelo Kerman]

Yesterday I worked on the last variant for the Buffalo 2 Command Pod that is slated for Phase 1: the Chopper! Here's where it's at:

The Chopper variant is something that I wanted to do for the OG Buffalo, but never got around to. As you can see, it works with the V-22 engines from the original mod- I've decided to revise them a bit, but not in Phase 1.

[chaos113]

On 8/20/2022 at 11:56 PM, Caerfinon said:

Method one: Load them into an airplane/rocket and fly them at maximum speed into a nearby mountain/planet. 

Method two: Edit the persistent.sfs file of your game (while your game is not running). Find the roster section, delete at the lines that define each tourist.  Start your game. 

 

method three use method 2 to make them into astronauts 

[Ooglak Kerman]

2 hours ago, Angel-125 said:

Yesterday I worked on the last variant for the Buffalo 2 Command Pod that is slated for Phase 1: the Chopper! Here's where it's at:

The Chopper variant is something that I wanted to do for the OG Buffalo, but never got around to. As you can see, it works with the V-22 engines from the original mod- I've decided to revise them a bit, but not in Phase 1.

That is right pretty!  Makes me want to start playing with aircraft.  That would be super cool for exploring Laythe.

An idle question, please.  Are the DSEV cryo-module chambers suppose to close?

[Angelo Kerman]

2 hours ago, Ooglak Kerman said:

That is right pretty!  Makes me want to start playing with aircraft.  That would be super cool for exploring Laythe.

An idle question, please.  Are the DSEV cryo-module chambers suppose to close?

They're designed to work with DeepFreeze:

And an updated aircraft nose:

[Ooglak Kerman]

33 minutes ago, Angel-125 said:

They're designed to work with DeepFreeze:

And an updated aircraft nose:

.

Personally, I like the snub nose, but both are cool as can be.  Since I'm messing with medical ships now, one of those Kospreys with a B2 Sickbay module would make a great air ambulance.

If you feel the need to modify the D2 Sickbay, I'd like to request a built in airlock.

[Rutabaga22]

On 8/13/2022 at 5:18 PM, Angel-125 said:

And yes, a few of the Buffalo 2 IVAs have ice cream cartons in them too. I had to redo them due to some issues with the props.

Heck yeah! Now my kerbals have something to eat while I drive 'em up to vermont

Edited August 28, 2022 by Rutabaga22

[Angelo Kerman]

It's my day off from modding, but while I waited for my KSP game save to load, I fiddled with the nose a bit more. I'm settled on this, I think:

Not as long as before, but still longer than the stub nose. Next week I'll flesh this out.

The other thing I looked at is how to revise the tilt-rotors and wings from OG Buffalo. The new wing root will cater to the new body's topside width, and given the problems I've had, the tilt-rotors will get integrated engines instead of running on electric charge (though they may end up dual-mode). I might cram some liquid fuel into the wing-boards as well. I know that I don't want to require Kerbal Actuators to be downloaded with Buffalo 2, so these parts won't be available unless you download the Kerbal Actuators mod. I might even include the revised tilt-rotors as part  of Kerbal Actuators...

[Rutabaga22]

I thought you weren't going to do aircraft with B2. But if you are, I hope they work really well!

[Angelo Kerman]

7 minutes ago, Rutabaga22 said:

I thought you weren't going to do aircraft with B2. But if you are, I hope they work really well!

Yeah, that was the original plan, but looking at the textures, they're not far off from Restock. Plus, when Buffalo 2 is ready, the original Buffalo will be retired. And I figured that since I'm making the aircraft nose variant, I might as well port over the aircraft components as well.

[Blufor878]

1 hour ago, Angel-125 said:

Yeah, that was the original plan, but looking at the textures, they're not far off from Restock. Plus, when Buffalo 2 is ready, the original Buffalo will be retired. And I figured that since I'm making the aircraft nose variant, I might as well port over the aircraft components as well.

So is Buffalo 2 replacing original Buffalo completely, or will the original still be available, just finished with work switched to Buffalo 2? (I hope I worded that correctly).

[Angelo Kerman]

9 minutes ago, Blufor878 said:

So is Buffalo 2 replacing original Buffalo completely, or will the original still be available, just finished with work switched to Buffalo 2? (I hope I worded that correctly).

Buffalo 2 replaces the original Buffalo completely. While you'll still be able to download and use it, I won't do anything more with it and instead am focusing on Buffalo 2. Buffalo 2 is a separate mod from Buffalo 1 to avoid any issues.

[Blufor878]

10 minutes ago, Angel-125 said:

Buffalo 2 replaces the original Buffalo completely. While you'll still be able to download and use it, I won't do anything more with it and instead am focusing on Buffalo 2. Buffalo 2 is a separate mod from Buffalo 1 to avoid any issues.

So I don't have to uninstall Buffalo I?

[Angelo Kerman]

32 minutes ago, Blufor878 said:

So I don't have to uninstall Buffalo I?

You won't have to uninstall Buffalo 1, but once Buffalo 2 is done, I won't provide any further support for the original.

[Rutabaga22]

Will you retool the tiltrotors? Those thing suck up EC like it's lemonade

 

[Angelo Kerman]

17 hours ago, Rutabaga22 said:

Will you retool the tiltrotors? Those thing suck up EC like it's lemonade

 

Yeah, as I mentioned, they'll have integrated gas turbines. They'll run on liquid fuel and intake air.

[Angelo Kerman]

Today I got the exterior of the Chopper part variant done:

I also started on the IVA variant, but it'll be done tomorrow. After that, Buffalo 2 Phase 1 is done! At that point, I'll put Buffalo 2 and its dependencies onto CKAN. The mod won't be done, but it'll be in a minimum playable state.

[Naeth Kerman]

On 8/22/2022 at 8:34 PM, Angel-125 said:

Bit late, but I think that mouse is backwards

[Ooglak Kerman]

4 hours ago, Angel-125 said:

Today I got the exterior of the Chopper part variant done:

.

I also started on the IVA variant, but it'll be done tomorrow. After that, Buffalo 2 Phase 1 is done! At that point, I'll put Buffalo 2 and its dependencies onto CKAN. The mod won't be done, but it'll be in a minimum playable state.

DSEV also?

[Angelo Kerman]

1 hour ago, Ooglak Kerman said:

DSEV also?

DSEV is already on CKAN.

[Rutabaga22]

13 hours ago, Angel-125 said:

I also started on the IVA variant, but it'll be done tomorrow. After that, Buffalo 2 Phase 1 is done! At that point, I'll put Buffalo 2 and its dependencies onto CKAN. The mod won't be done, but it'll be in a minimum playable state.

Heck yea! I can finally get rid of the old, ugly buffalo!

[Ooglak Kerman]

8 hours ago, Angel-125 said:

DSEV is already on CKAN.

How about github though?  I don't use CKAN.   Is 3.12.0 all up to date?  And it looks like Buffalo 2 is still on pre-release 0.1

Edited August 30, 2022 by Ooglak Kerman

[Angelo Kerman]

3 hours ago, Rutabaga22 said:

Heck yea! I can finally get rid of the old, ugly buffalo!

Well, bear in mind that Phase 1 is just the chassis and crewed rover body parts. Other parts are slated for Phase 2, Phase 3, and Phase 4.

2 hours ago, Ooglak Kerman said:

How about github though?  I don't use CKAN.   Is 3.12.0 all up to date?  And it looks like Buffalo 2 is still on pre-release 0.1

CKAN pulls all my mods from my Githup Repositories. All my threads  have github links in the first post of the thread. You can also find them here.

[TheSaint]

29 minutes ago, Angel-125 said:

Well, bear in mind that Phase 1 is just the chassis and crewed rover body parts. Other parts are slated for Phase 2, Phase 3, and Phase 4.

CKAN pulls all my mods from my Githup Repositories. All my threads  have github links in the first post of the thread. You can also find them here.

I was playing around with the pre-release last night, it looks great. Although I did find that if you make a short chassis rover with the robotic wheels, start from a dead stop and accelerate as fast as you can, when you get somewhere over 22 m/s it suddenly pulls to the left and flips without any user input. If you accelerate to, say, 20 m/s, then start gradually edging your way up, it goes great all the way over 30 m/s, you can merge onto the freeway without any problems. And if you make the chassis long, like the longest chassis segment or longer, it doesn't seem to be an issue. It's kind of an edge case, but I don't know if it points to anything deeper.

Speaking of Buffalo 1, I did see some parts that are in Buffalo 1 that aren't listed in the various phases, was wondering if they are going to make their way over:

• The decoupler. I use that a lot for getting rovers to where they need to rove.
• The chassis end cap. Yeah, it's cosmetic, I know.
• The Mineshaft. Buffalo always seemed a weird place for it anyway, seemed to me like it should have been in Pathfinder. But, wherever it is, I need it. It solved all my base-building headaches.

I would totally just keep Buffalo 1 installed for this stuff, but it would be nice not to have to.

[Angelo Kerman]

1 hour ago, TheSaint said:

I was playing around with the pre-release last night, it looks great. Although I did find that if you make a short chassis rover with the robotic wheels, start from a dead stop and accelerate as fast as you can, when you get somewhere over 22 m/s it suddenly pulls to the left and flips without any user input. If you accelerate to, say, 20 m/s, then start gradually edging your way up, it goes great all the way over 30 m/s, you can merge onto the freeway without any problems. And if you make the chassis long, like the longest chassis segment or longer, it doesn't seem to be an issue. It's kind of an edge case, but I don't know if it points to anything deeper.

Speaking of Buffalo 1, I did see some parts that are in Buffalo 1 that aren't listed in the various phases, was wondering if they are going to make their way over:

• The decoupler. I use that a lot for getting rovers to where they need to rove.
• The chassis end cap. Yeah, it's cosmetic, I know.
• The Mineshaft. Buffalo always seemed a weird place for it anyway, seemed to me like it should have been in Pathfinder. But, wherever it is, I need it. It solved all my base-building headaches.

I would totally just keep Buffalo 1 installed for this stuff, but it would be nice not to have to.

The Mineshaft will have a Buffalo 2 equivalent for sure. It's slated for Phase 2.

I do have some additional chassis components in Phase 2, the end cap can be one of them.

I'll look at adding the decoupler as well.