[0.23.5] Spherical and Toroidal Tank Pack (Updated 05/02/14) (New download link)

[Redchrome]

I just got around to trying this mod as it stands, and if just using the LFO tanks (which is all I wanted anyway) Modular Fuels isn't needed. Maybe I'll install it when I decide I need a giant xenon tank or something.

I did note that the girder sections included in the pack still have the bug wherein they don't actually touch each other, but seem to float in space with a gap between them.

Far be it from me to tell anyone how to organize their mod, but it would seem to make sense to me to break the girders out into a separate mod pack since they really don't have any relation to the tanks.

[girka2k]

I did note that the girder sections included in the pack still have the bug wherein they don't actually touch each other, but seem to float in space with a gap between them.

Some time ago I wrote a very simple config for Module Manager which fixes this bug.

Place it somewhere in GameData.

Also it fixes unbelievable high breakingForce and breakingTorque of trusses. If you don't like it you should delete lines

@breakingForce = 200
@breakingTorque = 200
[I]and[/I]
@breakingForce = 140
@breakingTorque = 140

I don't mind using this config in any way, including to redistribute, modify, include in any packages - in one word, do with it what you want.

[taniwha]

I've got a pile of fixes I'm sitting on for testing. When I'm happy with everything, I'll do something about getting them out.

[Grease1991]

I did note that the girder sections included in the pack still have the bug wherein they don't actually touch each other, but seem to float in space with a gap between them.

That is actually really easy to fix, just go into the parts CFG and change the scale on the mini's to .5 (they are at .4 which is causing the gap) and the standard to 1 (they are set to .8) it solved the issue for me.

[Redchrome]

That is actually really easy to fix, just go into the parts CFG and change the scale on the mini's to .5 (they are at .4 which is causing the gap) and the standard to 1 (they are set to .8) it solved the issue for me.

Thanks! I may give that a try if I feel a need for those girder segments.

[Redchrome]

I don't have hard numbers to back this up yet, but it seems like when I use the spherical tanks vs. cylindrical tanks the game becomes slower to render. The frame rate doesn't seem to change meaningfully, but the game feels choppier. Maybe there's more triangles and angles of the triangles relative to the light, for the game engine to calculate compared to a cylinder?

[taniwha]

Simple cylinders with 24 sides (usual for KSP) have 96 triangles. Even doubling that will make for a pretty ugly sphere. To get a good sphere, take a cylinder and slice its sides 9 times, then inflate it such that it's spherical. This will give 24 sides going around the equator, and 12 sides going from pole to pole, thus keeping things fairly evenly distributed, along with a total of 528 triangles

[Redchrome]

Simple cylinders with 24 sides (usual for KSP) have 96 triangles. Even doubling that will make for a pretty ugly sphere. To get a good sphere, take a cylinder and slice its sides 9 times, then inflate it such that it's spherical. This will give 24 sides going around the equator, and 12 sides going from pole to pole, thus keeping things fairly evenly distributed, along with a total of 528 triangles

Ok. Thanks for the information!

This also makes me think why the VAB is so slow to render my models sometimes -- there's kerbals walking around in it, and they need to be rendered as well.

[UnanimousCoward]

Ok. Thanks for the information!

This also makes me think why the VAB is so slow to render my models sometimes -- there's kerbals walking around in it, and they need to be rendered as well.

Pretty sure you can turn off those meandering kerbals in the game settings if you want to. It's called something like "Space Center Crew".

[Redchrome]

Pretty sure you can turn off those meandering kerbals in the game settings if you want to. It's called something like "Space Center Crew".

I'll need to look for that. Thanks!

[Mapoko]

What are the storage tanks for ? I do not seem to find any use of them.

They are in utility, but I can not use them as hangars or to put any stuff inside.

Edit : If they are only for visual/aesthetics then shouldn't they be listed in structural and not utility?

Some day when I find myself making a station with this kind of look I will find em useful and light weight, but now they are clogging up my utility tab even more than it is now.

Edited April 4, 2015 by Mapoko

[Mecripp]

Did you install MODULAR FUEL TANKS ?

[Mapoko]

My bad. I did not install it, but I already have mod that lets me change the fuel from FL/O to LF only. It came with another mod. Won't that conflict with it ?

And I am sorry for my negligence of not reading carefully. I was reviewing the mods I have installed and I moved my saves and moved mods 1 by 1 in a fresh copy, eliminating few, adding few, so that one slipped and I did not read it.

[Mecripp]

Also see it says you need Firespitter plugin and no problem we all do it.

[Mapoko]

OK, everything works now. It does not interfere with the other mod and the tanks make good food/water containers for my space program!

[Dazpoet]

Seems the hosting on Nabaal.net is experiencing problems, certificate errors popping up

[taniwha]

Ok, I have updated Spherical Tanks for 1.0 (including cost rebalancing using my own system). As this is not my thread, I cannot update the version and I'd really like to talk to Talisar before doing a takeover, despite the license.

Note that neither FireSpitter nor MFT are included in the zip, so such functionality will have to wait.

I did go through and fix the nodes, but I may have missed some as I didn't test them all.

Download: Talisar's Spherical Tanks updated for 1.0. Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (in Readme.txt).

[ExavierMacbeth]

I tried your files taniwha and it it doesn't look like its fully working

The Toroidal hubs seem to be missing the center node. Doesn't look like "node_stack_center" is valid anymore after whatever 1.0 did to the nodes.

Modifying the Hub nodes to the following works.

node_stack_top =     0.00,  0.10,  0.00, 0.0,  1.0,  0.0, 2
node_stack_bottom01 =  0.00,  0.00,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 2
node_stack_bottom02 =  0.00, -0.10,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 2

However connecting to the correct bottom node can be a bit tricky because of how close they are together. You can adjust the -0.10 value on bottom02 to -0.125 and it makes it alot easier. You do end up with a small gab between the hub & whatever is connected under it but you'd have to be looking straight at it to see it, and with the tank in place its pretty much impossible to see if your not looking at it.

Edit: Just make sure the last digit in each node row is unchanged from the defaults (1 for the small & medium, 2 for large, 3 for very large)

Edited April 30, 2015 by ExavierMacbeth

[taniwha]

ExavierMacbeth: they work: you have to flip either the hub or the tank upside down. I haven't decided how to fix that yet.

[ExavierMacbeth]

ExavierMacbeth: they work: you have to flip either the hub or the tank upside down. I haven't decided how to fix that yet.

Lmao. Thats because they added direction to the nodes in 1.0, and the reason I specified the center as a new bottom node. The center node wasn't attaching properly because it was being considered another top node & being blocked by the part you attached the hub to. I flipped it upside down and realized I could attach so thats why I change the nodes to what I posted

[Gfurst]

These models seems pretty awesome, let me know when the update comes out. And with MFT too, greatness.

[ExavierMacbeth]

You can use the download provided by taniwa in post #1042 above will load into the game. He fixed most of the nodes throughout the mod though the Toridial Hubs still have some minor issues.

Throw this code into a MM cfg file somewhere in gamedata will apply my fix to the Toridial Hub nodes so they work a bit better.

@PART[TAL_Toroidal_Tank_Hub_Small]:FINAL
{
    !node_stack_center
    !node_stack_top
    !node_stack_bottom
    node_stack_top =     0.00,  0.10,  0.00, 0.0,  1.0,  0.0, 1
    node_stack_bottom01 =  0.00,  0.00,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 1
    node_stack_bottom02 =  0.00, -0.125,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 1
}
@PART[TAL_Toroidal_Tank_Hub_Medium]:FINAL
{
    !node_stack_center
    !node_stack_top
    !node_stack_bottom
    node_stack_top =     0.00,  0.10,  0.00, 0.0,  1.0,  0.0, 1
    node_stack_bottom01 =  0.00,  0.00,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 1
    node_stack_bottom02 =  0.00, -0.125,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 1
}
@PART[TAL_Toroidal_Tank_Hub_Large]:FINAL
{
    !node_stack_center
    !node_stack_top
    !node_stack_bottom
    node_stack_top =     0.00,  0.10,  0.00, 0.0,  1.0,  0.0, 2
    node_stack_bottom01 =  0.00,  0.00,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 2
    node_stack_bottom02 =  0.00, -0.125,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 2
}
@PART[TAL_Toroidal_Tank_Hub_XLarge]:FINAL
{
    !node_stack_center
    !node_stack_top
    !node_stack_bottom
    node_stack_top =     0.00,  0.10,  0.00, 0.0,  1.0,  0.0, 3
    node_stack_bottom01 =  0.00,  0.00,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 3
    node_stack_bottom02 =  0.00, -0.125,  0.00, 0.0, -1.0,  0.0, 3
}

Those two combined do work with KSP 1.0.2.

Edited May 5, 2015 by ExavierMacbeth

[taniwha]

ExavierMacbeth: A touch excessive: just negating the center node is sufficient (which I have done).

Another thing I have done is create a github repository with the fix (and changing the GameData directory from ModsByTal to TalisarParts). (License in the readme (CC BY-SA 3.0)

[ExavierMacbeth]

Shrug. I guess I could have saved 8 lines of code by leaving the top node alone lol.

For the bottom nodes I just did it that way because it seemed logical to me to make the center node be bottom01 while the actual bottom node be bottom02. By the time I posted it for Gfurst I was already working on fixing a different set of my personal MM configs and hadn't seen a need to revisit the brute force method.

EDIT: That and I pull the patch out of a much larger config since I also converted all the tanks to using Interstellar Fuel Switch with a larger selection of resources and such. Since I really like using these things for my life support storage and a few other mod resources. They make great center pieces to strut everything to for stability

Edited May 8, 2015 by ExavierMacbeth

[taniwha]

It's more "why these changes?" that's the issue than the size of the patch.

Yeah, these tanks do work very well as the core to large vessels. One reason I love them so much.