Procedural Wings

[Infinite Aerospace]

So, there's a few things I'd love to see added and/or tweaked to how the procedural wings are generated, see below:

 

1) Wing fuel tanks, is there a method of adding an internal fuel volume which conforms to a given % of the wing volume. This would allow players to make much more realistic aircraft and allow the main fuselage to be much more payload-centric.

 

2) Angle 'snapping', what if someone wants to make a rectangular, or square wing? With the current system it's not the easiest thing to do, why not implement a drop down menu at the very top of the procedural wing system, with some basic geometry, allowing the user to adjust the scale rather than having to create the shape entirely.

 

3) Curve, the wings right now are entirely angular, based on straight lines and angles. I'd love to see a method to blend the wing shape a big more, give it curved edges, perhaps add a slight dihedral curve.

 

4) A potential 'compound' wing, where multiple procedural wings can be attached to one another. So instead of having to make two wings and then attach them together with the offset tool mainly.

 

5) An option for integrate airbrakes, or spoilers.

[shdwlrd]

8 hours ago, Infinite Aerospace said:

4) A potential 'compound' wing, where multiple procedural wings can be attached to one another. So instead of having to make two wings and then attach them together with the offset tool mainly.

Yeah, it's kind of a pain. I was hoping you could surface attach things to the wings. 

One thing I would like to add to this list is the ability to add multiple control surfaces to the wing. So you can have separate control surfaces for pitch and roll.

[Infinite Aerospace]

On 8/23/2023 at 7:05 PM, shdwlrd said:

Yeah, it's kind of a pain. I was hoping you could surface attach things to the wings. 

One thing I would like to add to this list is the ability to add multiple control surfaces to the wing. So you can have separate control surfaces for pitch and roll.

Agreed, that would be a nice addition.

[sgt_flyer]

it would be interesting if there were attachement node points at wing root / wingtip that could "merge" the sliders of the used node : (only for wings of the same type of course)

ex :

1) If a children wingroot node is connected to the wingtip root of it's parent, disable all of the parent's wing shape sliders. (that way, no need to have to recalculate the children wing's position if the parent wing sliders are changed)

2) the children wingroot node parameters (angle, length, thickness) are inherited from the parent's wingtip (so they seamlessly match) and are disabled.

3) Disable the wingtip trail on the parent wing. (currently on multisegmented wings, every wingtip generates a trail)

At the same time, using those wingtip nodes could also be used to disable the wing contrails at the node (if a wingtip node is connected to another wing segment of the same type, don't generate the trail there) - that way only the final wingtip would display the trail (instead of each segment)

If using nodes, having the ability to change the dihedral angle from sliders could also be useful (to keep the wing connection seamless) (would affect the lift vector of the wing piece)

Additionnal options (toggeable) that could be useful :

flaps (replaces standard control surfaces, not available if the control surfaces are disabled)  - increases lift & drag of the wing.
Possibly different type of flaps depending on the type of wing maybe  ? (plain flap, fowler flap, fowler flap + leading edge slats for example)

heat shield tiles for the underside

options as other proposed before :

spoilers (increases drag & reduce lift)
wet wings (size of the fuel tank of course dependant on wing shape, & control surfaces sizes)

With this, creating a compound wing could be really simple.
ex :
innermost segments : flaps instead of control surfaces, + spoilers.
main outermost segment, control surface (roll) + potentially a winglet

[Infinite Aerospace]

On 8/25/2023 at 5:24 PM, sgt_flyer said:

it would be interesting if there were attachement node points at wing root / wingtip that could "merge" the sliders of the used node : (only for wings of the same type of course)

ex :

1) If a children wingroot node is connected to the wingtip root of it's parent, disable all of the parent's wing shape sliders. (that way, no need to have to recalculate the children wing's position if the parent wing sliders are changed)

2) the children wingroot node parameters (angle, length, thickness) are inherited from the parent's wingtip (so they seamlessly match) and are disabled.

3) Disable the wingtip trail on the parent wing. (currently on multisegmented wings, every wingtip generates a trail)

At the same time, using those wingtip nodes could also be used to disable the wing contrails at the node (if a wingtip node is connected to another wing segment of the same type, don't generate the trail there) - that way only the final wingtip would display the trail (instead of each segment)

If using nodes, having the ability to change the dihedral angle from sliders could also be useful (to keep the wing connection seamless) (would affect the lift vector of the wing piece)

Additionnal options (toggeable) that could be useful :

flaps (replaces standard control surfaces, not available if the control surfaces are disabled)  - increases lift & drag of the wing.
Possibly different type of flaps depending on the type of wing maybe  ? (plain flap, fowler flap, fowler flap + leading edge slats for example)

heat shield tiles for the underside

options as other proposed before :

spoilers (increases drag & reduce lift)
wet wings (size of the fuel tank of course dependant on wing shape, & control surfaces sizes)

With this, creating a compound wing could be really simple.
ex :
innermost segments : flaps instead of control surfaces, + spoilers.
main outermost segment, control surface (roll) + potentially a winglet

A procedural heat shield system is sorely needed to be honest.

[betaking]

Procedural wings and Fuel tanks should both follow a system that has multiple "kinds" of procedural wings, analogous to different "parts" in ksp 1.

What I'm getting at is that the different "proc. wings" in the part-picker menu would each have different internal structures, that manifest in the form of different "sweet spots" and "diminishing returns" as far as flight-regime and their dimensions, or something else that would take into account/necessitate having/using/researching/unlocking different wing profiles and different wing "types" in the long scheme of things.

example: 

190X's-191X's frame-and-fabric wings are perfectly suitable for aircraft that are going to be used in lower-speed or 'bushplane'-type functions; using them on a spaceplane or high-performance jet would be a recipe for said wings disintigrating in the airstream however.

Some of these wing-types should be able to take additional modifications, fuel tanks for instance, or internal instrument, landing-gear, or other device bays. 

 

[Lowi_Sace]

A thing I would also like to be improved about the wings is the inconsistency in the sizes when designing your wing. For example you made a wing and wand a small vertical wing on the tip. Currently, while the sizes of big wing tip and small whing root are the same, the wings have different sizes. Just one universal size system would also make building rectangular wings way easier. Players should also be able to safe already designed wings as favourite. So when you made a good whing you could easy reuse it for other builds.

Totally agree with in wing fuel tanks, could improve plane designs by a lot. Fuel tanks should have impact on whing weight and strengt. Being able to add airbrakes, spoilers and flaps to wings would in my opinion also be something really cool and add a lot in terms of gameplay. Most colonies will probably not have a runway as big as the one of the KSC

[Infinite Aerospace]

On 8/30/2023 at 12:19 PM, betaking said:

Procedural wings and Fuel tanks should both follow a system that has multiple "kinds" of procedural wings, analogous to different "parts" in ksp 1.

What I'm getting at is that the different "proc. wings" in the part-picker menu would each have different internal structures, that manifest in the form of different "sweet spots" and "diminishing returns" as far as flight-regime and their dimensions, or something else that would take into account/necessitate having/using/researching/unlocking different wing profiles and different wing "types" in the long scheme of things.

example: 

190X's-191X's frame-and-fabric wings are perfectly suitable for aircraft that are going to be used in lower-speed or 'bushplane'-type functions; using them on a spaceplane or high-performance jet would be a recipe for said wings disintigrating in the airstream however.

Some of these wing-types should be able to take additional modifications, fuel tanks for instance, or internal instrument, landing-gear, or other device bays. 

 

Never thought of integrated landing gear. I'd 100% be for that too.

[almagnus1]

Aside from the wing fuel tanks (which tbh, should have been there a long time ago), here's other stuff that should be procedural on the wings:

• Flaps on the leading and trailing edges
• Air brakes
• Control surfaces for at least pitch and roll, but an arbitrary number of control surfaces that I can define however would be better.

Those (along with fuel tanks) would better mimic a lot of the wings we see on many a commercial jet.  

[Infinite Aerospace]

2 hours ago, almagnus1 said:

Aside from the wing fuel tanks (which tbh, should have been there a long time ago), here's other stuff that should be procedural on the wings:

• Flaps on the leading and trailing edges
• Air brakes
• Control surfaces for at least pitch and roll, but an arbitrary number of control surfaces that I can define however would be better.

Those (along with fuel tanks) would better mimic a lot of the wings we see on many a commercial jet.  

They'd have genuine game improving qualities too. Especially wing fuel tanks and integrated spoiler/brakes.

[NaughtyMonster]

Bearing in mind the demands being placed on the developers to fix bugs and implement a large number of features from KSP1 into KSP2, I limit my wish list to three of these items for now.

1) Add an option for a second control surface on a procedural wing that can be assigned independently. Currently, many players are finding it necessary to add a second wing on the tips of the first to provide this functionality.

2) Add internal fuel tanks to wings with a capacity equal to some percentage of the wing's volume.

3) Add an option for flaps on wings, to allow lower speeds during takeoff and landing.

 

[almagnus1]

Tbh, I'd rather not torpedo responses by trying to accommodate what we think the devs can do, but rather give it to them unfiltered and let the devs figure out what they can do.

[NaughtyMonster]

Quite right; torpedoes bad!

I was just surmising the dev team may have quite a long to-do list already and just wanted to try to add a clear concise shortlist - in order of preference, with an eye to my guess at the task's complexity - to this discussion.

In no way would I want to sink any of the suggestions in this thread.

Your suggestion of flaps is an excellent one that I'd not considered before. Tell me if I'm wrong but don't real-world flaps add drag and lift and so do function as airbrakes to some extent? My only reason for listing this last is that, in terms of complexity, adding flaps to the graphical representation of the wings seems at the trickier end of the coding challenge of my shortlist.

Similarly, the addition of in-wing fuel seems like a superb suggestion; a literal game-changer!

I only listed the second control surface first because this was the issue that I'd searched for in the hope of being able to add to an existing discussion and also because just duplicating the existing 'control surface' section in the 'wing shape' editor seemed - perhaps in a display of ignorance - to be a code-efficient path to restoring the KSP1 functionality of having separate pitch and roll controls on a wing.

[Periple]

I like 1 and 4. Adding more stuff to the wing parts (integrated landing gear, multiple control surfaces etc) goes against the lego ethos a bit too much IMO, I’d rather keep the parts simple and improve the way they can be connected up.

It should be easier to build wings out of multiple elements than it is now, that would address the multiple control surfaces request and make other things easier too. I don’t think flaps or spoilers have a place in KSP, the aerodynamics are too crude and it’s not like it’s hard to build planes that can fly very slowly as it is!

[Infinite Aerospace]

3 hours ago, Periple said:

I like 1 and 4. Adding more stuff to the wing parts (integrated landing gear, multiple control surfaces etc) goes against the lego ethos a bit too much IMO, I’d rather keep the parts simple and improve the way they can be connected up.

It should be easier to build wings out of multiple elements than it is now, that would address the multiple control surfaces request and make other things easier too. I don’t think flaps or spoilers have a place in KSP, the aerodynamics are too crude and it’s not like it’s hard to build planes that can fly very slowly as it is!

The question is, in the quest for minimising part count due to performance (and it never hurts to minimise part count) would you not want that option? Like I'd strongly support the idea that wings are a thing that evolve in the course of the tech tree, something like the following:

 

Node 1) Aerofoils I: Unlocks basic Procedural Wings, control surfaces and stabilisers.

 

Node 2) Aerofoils II: Unlocks 'Compound' option for procedural wings, unlocks 'Curve' option on Procedural Wings.

 

Node 3) Aerofoils III: Unlocks 'Internal Fuel Tanks' option for Procedural Wings.

 

Node 4) Aerofoils IV: Unlocks 'Integrated Airbrakes' and 'Integrated Landing Gear' to Procedural Wings.

 

Each node increasing other characteristics, such as maximum length, as materials advance it's easier to make more complex wings with greater span. Also, to further represent the advancing in materials through Science, have the wings weight decrease through the nodes.

 

Beginning with heavier, more crude wings at the start of the progression, ending up with lightweight 'composite' style wings you'll find on things like Global Flyer. With the added benefit of as craft size and complexity increases, several parts gradually start getting merged into a single part which is advantageous for performance.

[almagnus1]

11 hours ago, NaughtyMonster said:

Tell me if I'm wrong but don't real-world flaps add drag and lift and so do function as airbrakes to some extent?

From what I understand of them, they fundamentally change the cross section of the wing so that it performs better at lower speeds (like takeoff and landing).  Granted, I'm an armchair engineer so there's probably someone else here that can correct me if I'm wrong.

11 hours ago, NaughtyMonster said:

Similarly, the addition of in-wing fuel seems like a superb suggestion; a literal game-changer!

It's one of those things that you read and go "why hasn't this been modded into KSP1 and talked about since then?" because it's just such a fundamental concept that so perfectly mimics the real world that I'm surprised it hasn't been implemented long  before now.

11 hours ago, NaughtyMonster said:

I only listed the second control surface first because this was the issue that I'd searched for in the hope of being able to add to an existing discussion and also because just duplicating the existing 'control surface' section in the 'wing shape' editor seemed - perhaps in a display of ignorance - to be a code-efficient path to restoring the KSP1 functionality of having separate pitch and roll controls on a wing.

I do that with putting many procedural wings together - which also allows me to sort of mimic a bit of a curve to the wing which can help give it a more graceful dihedral to the wing because you're giving it a slight curve.  If we're going to go fully procedural on the wings, maybe it would make more sense to just have a bunch of segments for each wing, and then chain them (so the root of one wing is on the tip of the other and the connecting surfaces are always the same size).  That actually would be enough of a description to do a mod request actually....

[Periple]

7 hours ago, Infinite Aerospace said:

The question is, in the quest for minimising part count due to performance (and it never hurts to minimise part count) would you not want that option?

Unless you’re dealing with a really unusual design, that would only reduce the part count by 2 to 6 or so. That wouldn’t make any noticeable difference! So no, I wouldn’t want it.

[Alpha_star]

I entirely agree on the wing fuel tank part. It's just……weird to see the wing being nothing but a wing that provides nothing but lift. I used to build MK2 or MK3 sized SSTOs in KSP1, which meant big-s sized parts were a common sight. I often fill them with fuel, reducing  the need for dedicated liquid fuel tanks. After switching to KSP2, I couldn't help to notice the lack of fueled wing parts, having to manually place draggy and heavy LF tanks on my dear SSTO. Just feels so strange to me.

Still, all of the opinions above would likely need a stock part switch system, something the stock KSP2 does not have at this moment. I will wait for those in the future.