[WIP] THSS - Tri-Hexagonal Structural Strut

[Bluegobln]

EDIT: Looking at the GE_THSS_Octo_250x2 part.cfg, I see the "breakingForce" and "breakingTorque" lines are missing. The defaults for these values are comically low. Stock 1.25m parts set them to 50, and 2.5m parts set them to 200. Parts this size should probably set them to 1000 or so...

Fantastic! That may just be the problem here, and also some other parts that have been driving me absolutely nuts in my own launches. Like, every time I launch a rocket SOME part is breaking off mid flight and I lose control (but of course the rocket keeps going).

[Scotius]

That would also explain why my space station lost one of docking arms during liftoff - despite struts.

[Catsceo]

I tried my rocket with the 2x 2.5 meter octo strut, same issue. Also, using those parts made KSP crash twice when trying to return to the assembly building after ending flight

[Semni]

I have been tweaking those values myself. Increasing the node size has a good effect on dampening the wobble as well. Currently I'm working at a 3 for the octostruts and may go up to a 4. Meanwhile though I have successfully relocated and continue work on the mod.

[Gaius]

That makes sense. If 1 is the 1.25m parts and 2 is the 2.5m parts, 3 should correspond to 3.75m parts and 4 to 5m parts, and the octostruts are over 5m wide (although not on both directions). I didn't realize those values had any effect on the stability, I always thought they just controlled the visual size of the little green node balls in the VAB during assembly. Good to know...

[Semni]

Aand the 0.2.0 version is up, with some new parts, some fixes and hopefully not too many bugs.

[PringleMan]

Aand the 0.2.0 version is up, with some new parts, some fixes and hopefully not too many bugs.

Could you please make a list of the new parts added?

[Semni]

Some 1/6th sized octo-pieces, a 1/3 size crew cabin, redone the geometry on the fullsize cargo container, added cubestruts in various kinds. Added in Goblin's parts he added since the last release with the exception of the LLL adaptors, I'm experiencing some problems with those. Otherwise that's about it unless I have forgotten something.

[King Jareth]

Just been building some station parts and the GE-08's surface attachment seems a bit funky (in that its partially inside the THSS-101 fuel tank I'm trying to put 3 of them around).

Seeing as I'm here... any chance you could colour the the GE-08-A fuel tank the same as the other tanks instead of grey? I've been mulling the idea of adding the KAS attach/detach code to them so in space EVA kerbals can swap them about for important science reasons*.

*-I understand there'd be nothing in the code to stop Kerbals wandering about with huge fuel tanks on the surface, I just wouldn't do it unless they were in space.

Edited June 4, 2013 by King Jareth

[Bluegobln]

Oy, sorry guys. That fuel tank was made as an example tank more than an actual part. I never put more than probably 5 minutes into it (literally, that's about how long it took to make a chamfered cylinder and create the cfg file and texture).

The THSS bay doesn't even HAVE a surface attach point (most of mine don't, which is silly, I should go through and update them to add it). This means the surface attach point is defaulting to the center point of the object. To change this you have to create:

node_attach = <coordinates>

inside the CFG file at the proper location. Then, when surface attached, it will correctly use that location as the point of attachment rather than the center.

You can swap the MBM texture in from another part, like one of the THSS parts, that has orange on it. The orange color is just a simple square texture that gets repeated. Since its hard to tell which texture is which, you may need to swap it more than once. Or you can export your own texture from Unity using the part tools. I *think* the orange is 255, 108, 0 RGB value.

LLL adaptors, I'm experiencing some problems with those.

Could you be more specific? What problems? Is it something you're trying to fix, or is it something that I need to fix?

I've made enough various parts now that I don't use them all on my own ships. Unless I spend a few hours testing everything (and even then) I am unlikely to spot every problem.

I do think we need to put breakingforce and breakingtorque into every part though. Those values def need to be higher for these.

[Moon Goddess]

I'll post my recolored replacement GE-08 tanks tonight.

Been playing rather than modeling.

[Frederoo]

First of all, thanks for a great parts pack! It looks so good and is so diverse that I rarely restrain myself from putting some of those parts on my ships. Great work Semni and Bluegobln! Anyway, I decided to finally write something because I think it might improve your great work.

1. adding breakingforce and breakingtorque greatly improves stability of connectors - the large octa/2,5m connector with two Skipper/Mainsail engines used in a horizontal configuration finally got usable after setting the values to 600 (it did tend to break away if a sudden force was applied vertically)

2. Is it possible to rename the textures to reflect their colour? Or maybe add a comment in the part file about which is which? I created a short octo Kethane tank (26000 capacity I think) and had a lot of trouble with swapping textures - all the files have the same size! Maybe it would even be possible to use PNG format for those? I could really use a green tank.

3. Tristrut parts should probably be "stackable" as primary attachment method, and only "allowsurfaceattach" - I sometimes can't place another segment if I don't change that in the part.cfg - it tends to stick to the tank another segment is connected to and completely ignores the attachment nodes. It is especially important for endcaps of all kinds and engines - I recently had three engines that required additional pipes to route fuel from the tank that was just behind it. Unfortunately it only became apparent in orbit... xD

4. I have little things (read part.cfg for your models) like a tristrut generator or different otostrut tanks that might be useful to somebody, let me know how I should make them available. Maybe an addon pack like Bluegobln initially did?

Thanks again, I hope my comments are useful.

PS I need to check out the latest release - you're so fast!

[Gaius]

Aand the 0.2.0 version is up, with some new parts, some fixes and hopefully not too many bugs.

Yay! The new THSS-001-C probe core now matches its description, requiring no external power or kerbals and providing decent gyros. Alas, the THSS-000-P still needs power, provides hardly any torque, and despite its incredibly thin size, it somehow manages to have room to squeeze three kerbals inside! (I see in the .cfg it specifies a minimum crew of zero, but it fails to specify CrewCapacity = 0, and apparently when unspecified, the default is 3.)

Edited June 5, 2013 by Gaius

[Tommygun]

More Mun trucking goods carriers.

This mod just gets more fun all the time, thank you.

[Moon Goddess]

2. Is it possible to rename the textures to reflect their colour? Or maybe add a comment in the part file about which is which? I created a short octo Kethane tank (26000 capacity I think) and had a lot of trouble with swapping textures - all the files have the same size! Maybe it would even be possible to use PNG format for those? I could really use a green tank.

This one I can help you with, on the short octo, the orange is model000.mbm Simply swap it for a green one labeled model000.mbm and it will be green, Warning the 3 orange fuel lines will turn green as well and will not match up.

[Frederoo]

Thanks, I managed to recolour that tank too, but after a lot of trial and error. What you wrote is unfortunately true only for that particular tank, as in one of the donor tristrut xenon tanks case the "tank proper" texture was was model001.mbm. My suggestion is to make those parts easier to modify, allowing anyone to make their own variations and enrich KSP.

[King Jareth]

The THSS bay doesn't even HAVE a surface attach point

It does, its the same values as the standard Tristrut part...you've been ninjad.

After a bit of "reload all"ing and changing the number I found

node_attach = 0.0, 0.0, -0.605, 0.0, 0.0, 0.1, 1

Works okay, -0.62 was a better number for the slightly wider 'ends' of the strut but I thought -0.605 looked better if they weren't flush with the end of another strut.

I also added a "scale = 1" line just because other parts seemed to have one, it made no difference.

I also coppied the model000.mbm from another tank so they're nice and orange now, feeling flushed with success I might even go crazy and make a xenon one.

Thanks for the help everyone.

[jfjohnny5]

Wow, these are some really cool parts!

Question - are there plans to create full UV texture maps for these? Right now they just appear to be tiled solid colors.

[mushroomman]

Despite my very best efforts, I can't get the docking ports to... dock.

They just seem to hang there just in front of each other. Mocking me.

Edited June 6, 2013 by mushroomman

[smunisto]

Would it be possible to officially add the LLL adapters to the future versions of the mod? I just broke my interplanetary missions using them and can't fix them :*(

[BioSehnsucht]

I've had a ton of trouble since .20.x came out docking the THSS docking ports, frequently they get their colliders stuck inside each other. However, I do eventually get them to dock, just have to get them lined up right and plow in full RCS power! and hope not to destroy the crafts...

[taniwha]

I played with the parts a little last night and three adapters came to mind, all for the tri-hex trusses: an inline tri-hex truss with three tri-hex connectors on the sides (ie, all five sides have triangular fittings); the same again but with round fittings on the sides; and thirdly: a tetrahedron, all four sides with triangular fittings.

[OrbitusII]

Despite my very best efforts, I can't get the docking ports to... dock.

They just seem to hang there just in front of each other. Mocking me.

-snip-

It looks like the docking port on the module you're attaching is colliding with the adapter/hub/thing, so maybe add some batteries or something as a spacer... move the docking port on the hub out away from the hub a little, to minimize/eliminate collisions while docking.

[Stim0r]

I've discovered a bug with the Half Meter Bay: If you place a clamp-o-tron Jr. on the upper internal node of the half meter bay, the entire half meter bay is suddenly not fuel cross-feed capable. Now I have found I can get around this by attaching a fuel line from the part attached to the Bay closest to the fuel tank to the Bay.

Example:

Tank->THSS-101->Bay->THSS-101->Engine (works)

Tank->THSS-101->Bay(clamp)->THSS-101->Engine (Liquid Fuel Starved)

Tank->THSS-101->FuelLine->Bay(clamp)->THSS-101->Engine (works)

[BioSehnsucht]

Any chance we can get fuel lines in the cubestruts? Also: Tri to cube strut and tri to octo strut adapters (The octo you can at least use tri to 2.5m and 2.5m to octo, there's not an equivalent for getting from tri to cube without going through the octos in the middle). Oh! and docking adapters for cubes and octos!