[0.20] Modular Fuel System 1.3/realistic fuels, reconfigurable fuel tanks and engines

[MDBenson]

Thanks for fixing that ISP glitch, ialdabaoth, it's made my experiments come to fruition *evil laugh*

[camlost]

Hi beloved people who made this mod:

There's an error in the B9 SABRE M config:

@secondaryEngine[ModuleEngines]

{

@heatProduction 275

@PROPELLANT[LiquidFuel]

{

@name = LiquidH2

@ratio = 0.73

DrawGauge = true

}

@PROPELLANT[Oxidizer]

{

@name = LiquidOxygen

ratio = 0.27

}

@useEngineResponseTime = false

@atmosphereCurve

{

@key,0 = 0 420

@key,1 = 0 455

}

}

There a "@" was missing.

This bug caused the SABRE to consume huge amount of LO2 in rocket mode.

[Wert]

Great mod! However, the 2 B9 aerospace jet engines your mod modifies don't do anything with your mod installed. When you look at there stats in the VAB/SPH, all you see is how much electric charge they produce. In flight, they do nothing, and the only thing in the right-click menu is 0.0/0.0 electric charge. They also don't show up in the staging sequence. I tried removing the "!MODULE[ModuleEngines] {}" line, and that made them act as if your mod was doing nothing to them at all, meaning there was no afterburner option. Any ideas how to fix it?

[Chestburster]

Hi beloved people who made this mod:

There's an error in the B9 SABRE M config:

@secondaryEngine[ModuleEngines]

{

@heatProduction 275

@PROPELLANT[LiquidFuel]

{

@name = LiquidH2

@ratio = 0.73

DrawGauge = true

}

@PROPELLANT[Oxidizer]

{

@name = LiquidOxygen

ratio = 0.27

}

@useEngineResponseTime = false

@atmosphereCurve

{

@key,0 = 0 420

@key,1 = 0 455

}

}

There a "@" was missing.

This bug caused the SABRE to consume huge amount of LO2 in rocket mode.

Strange. Can't find that error in my configs but i will upload a fixed file with my config collection.

Great mod! However, the 2 B9 aerospace jet engines your mod modifies don't do anything with your mod installed. When you look at there stats in the VAB/SPH, all you see is how much electric charge they produce. In flight, they do nothing, and the only thing in the right-click menu is 0.0/0.0 electric charge. They also don't show up in the staging sequence. I tried removing the "!MODULE[ModuleEngines] {}" line, and that made them act as if your mod was doing nothing to them at all, meaning there was no afterburner option. Any ideas how to fix it?

Looks like you are missing the ExsurgentEngineering.dll. I will update the engines to work with the new ModuleHybridEngines provided by MFS.

[The Lone Wolfling]

You've said you've given up on using other fuels with RCS thrusters.

Could you instead have the plugin convert other fuels to monoprop each frame?

(Actually, it would have to be more along the lines of this:

1. Drain all current monoprop; keep track of amount.
   
2. Convert other fuel to monoprop.
   
3. Fire RCS thruster(s).
   
4. Restore monoprop fuel.
   

)

[SchroedingersHat]

Could you instead have the plugin convert other fuels to monoprop each frame?

Sounds complicated and like it would make the UI a bit counterintuitive. Maybe talk to the person rewriting the whole RCS system? S/He might have already changed the thing that prevents switching fuel.

[intidragon]

Hey guys I got a question. . . the atomic thruster isn't that efficient anymore, it guzzles Hydrogen furiously. Can anyone help me claify as to why it's such a hungry beast at the moment?

[CaptainArbitrary]

Hey guys I got a question. . . the atomic thruster isn't that efficient anymore, it guzzles Hydrogen furiously. Can anyone help me claify as to why it's such a hungry beast at the moment?

Not that I think this is necessarily your answer, but just in case … remember that due to the specific-impulse bug in the current version of the game, lighting up an engine with a low sea-level Isp while you've still got air around you will cause it to suck down propellant at an insane rate. The stock nuclear thermal rocket has a vacuum Isp of 800-something, but it has a sea-level Isp of only 200-something. What should happen (and one of the devs agreed that this is a bug in some other thread, but it hasn't been fixed yet) is that the engine should put out lower thrust if there's air around it. What does happen is that it puts out the maximum rated thrust, but goes bananas on your propellant tanks to make that happen.

I've thought about trying to create a simple ModuleEngines subclass addon that would change this behavior, but a glance at the API suggests it wouldn't be super-trivial to do. All the fuel-consuming code is in one method that'd have to be overridden, and that's just more work than I've wanted to put into it.

So maybe that's related to what you're seeing. Don't light up low-sea-level-impulse motors in the atmosphere, is the workaround right now, really.

[The Lone Wolfling]

I've thought about trying to create a simple ModuleEngines subclass addon that would change this behavior, but a glance at the API suggests it wouldn't be super-trivial to do. All the fuel-consuming code is in one method that'd have to be overridden, and that's just more work than I've wanted to put into it.

Hmm...

Instead of overriding the fuel consumption method, could you instead change the thrust level according to the ratio between the vacuum Isp and the current Isp?

[CaptainArbitrary]

Instead of overriding the fuel consumption method, could you instead change the thrust level according to the ratio between the vacuum Isp and the current Isp?

Actually? Um … yes! I can, and did, do that thing.

EDIT: I've removed the source code and download link to the little plugin I wrote, because I decided I'd done it wrong. I implemented it originally as a PartModule you had to apply through config-file editing to every engine, but it really works a lot better as an AddOn instead.

Edited July 1, 2013 by CaptainArbitrary

[intidragon]

Not that I think this is necessarily your answer, but just in case … remember that due to the specific-impulse bug in the current version of the game, lighting up an engine with a low sea-level Isp while you've still got air around you will cause it to suck down propellant at an insane rate. The stock nuclear thermal rocket has a vacuum Isp of 800-something, but it has a sea-level Isp of only 200-something. What should happen (and one of the devs agreed that this is a bug in some other thread, but it hasn't been fixed yet) is that the engine should put out lower thrust if there's air around it. What does happen is that it puts out the maximum rated thrust, but goes bananas on your propellant tanks to make that happen.

I've thought about trying to create a simple ModuleEngines subclass addon that would change this behavior, but a glance at the API suggests it wouldn't be super-trivial to do. All the fuel-consuming code is in one method that'd have to be overridden, and that's just more work than I've wanted to put into it.

So maybe that's related to what you're seeing. Don't light up low-sea-level-impulse motors in the atmosphere, is the workaround right now, really.

Alright. . . I'll try to bring a nuclear engine to orbit instead then try it there. I was just curious 'cause when I didn't have the mod installed before, the nuclear engines worked fine in atmosphere.

[MR4Y]

Can you add the ability to add SolidFuel to tanks and engines to work with it, so we can have(or make) solid boosters that can gimbal?

EDIT- Also, it's not possible to change B9's SABRE engine fuel type.

Edited July 1, 2013 by MR4Y

[cardajowol]

I'm wondering whether someone can walk me through how you got the figures for the fuels, like the density and utilization etc. I'm not sure how you worked out the density in Kg/K (Per Kerbo) from the Kg/m3 (cubic Metres)

edit: KP-1 was it 0.81 g/ml changed to m3 which is 0.00081 m6 / kg then * by 6.25 (1 Kerbo) = 0.0050625 ?

Edited July 1, 2013 by cardajowol

[MR4Y]

It's not possible to alter the fuel type of some KW Rocketry Fuel Tanks.

[cardajowol]

dunno about normal Fuel and Oxidizers as they are basic game stuff, but I did add in 2 new fuel types and 1 oxidizer - Aerozine 50, UH25 and N2O4 (Di-nitrogen tetroxide)

[ialdabaoth]

I'm wondering whether someone can walk me through how you got the figures for the fuels, like the density and utilization etc. I'm not sure how you worked out the density in Kg/K (Per Kerbo) from the Kg/m3 (cubic Metres)

edit: KP-1 was it 0.81 g/ml changed to m3 which is 0.00081 m6 / kg then * by 6.25 (1 Kerbo) = 0.0050625 ?

Exactly, which I then round to 0.005 because we can afford to be a little imprecise in a game about little green dudes.

[plausse]

Great mod..! I'm not trying to be lazy and not do it myself (or am I?) - but have you considered adding NovaPunch2 support in the future? cheers

[cardajowol]

Exactly, which I then round to 0.005 because we can afford to be a little imprecise in a game about little green dudes.

Sweet hehe, I was little confused on the percentages you got for mixes, I was trying to do Dinitrogen Tetroxide + Aerozine 50/UH25 (Different Mixtures of UMDH + Hydrazine) Density I think I got down now, the mix I got different types of mixtures from my research but I got (Oxidizer to Fuel Ratio) 1:93:1 on N2O4 + Aerozine and 1:71:1 on N2O4 + UH25. To which I sort of rounded them down to .64 N204 to .33 of Aerozine and then .57 N204 to .43 UH25.. not sure if thats correct or not...

[Chestburster]

It's not possible to alter the fuel type of some KW Rocketry Fuel Tanks.

They are all working on my install. Could you be more precise? What tanks arent working?

Great mod..! I'm not trying to be lazy and not do it myself (or am I?) - but have you considered adding NovaPunch2 support in the future? cheers

Will work on NP2 support after that weekend.

Also, it's not possible to change B9's SABRE engine fuel type.

Its not supposed to be changed. I could switch the default mode to LH2+LOX if you want to calculate dV in the SPH/VAB.

@ialdabaoth

i want to add support for the CORE mod but theres one small problem. CORE is using fueltanks with build-in engines. the current GUI cant handle both at the same time. could you add support for those hybrid parts?

[ialdabaoth]

@ialdabaoth

i want to add support for the CORE mod but theres one small problem. CORE is using fueltanks with build-in engines. the current GUI cant handle both at the same time. could you add support for those hybrid parts?

Ugh... I've actually been working on this for awhile now. The Right Way to do this is some kind of tabbed browsing system, but I've been having a hell of a time getting it to look good and work bug-free.

[SchroedingersHat]

@ialdabaoth I have a few questions/notes.

What's up with Xenon? I notice your density for it is vastly different to Squad's and you have a couple of different values (0.0005 and 0.000625). Does lowering the capacity of any extra Xenon tanks we get fix this correctly?

The mass ratios of Hydrogen tanks seem to make doing things with Nuclear rockets rather tricky. Your figures are fairly close to right (about 10:1, although real tanks get up closer to 20 or 30 to 1) but the base mass of the tank makes getting anything over 4 almost impossible. Can't think of how you'd fix this within your mod, maybe a button that allows us to reduce a tank's base mass and various strength stats by an order of magnitude? Maybe I should put together a pack of light weight tanks.

Edit: Played around with it a bit more and it is the dry mass that your mod sets. Perhaps a special category for Space-going H2 tanks (or low strength tanks in general) that weighs a lot less?

Also does anyone know what breakingForce and breakingTorque do exactly? It doesn't seem to be giving up under static weight even when they're at very low values.

Edited July 5, 2013 by SchroedingersHat

[RuBisCO]

KSP kept failing to boot when ever I unpacked the RealFuels module, I had to unpack it into the GameData Folder and remove "_MASCOSX" I have no clue what that folder is, perhaps its a problem with my unzip software.

[RuBisCO]

Is there a cryogentic plant mod/part to prevent LO2 and LH2 boil off?

[somnambulist]

@ialdabaoth, @chestburster -- check your RealFule cfgs for typos on "exhaustDamage". In multiple cfgs you have "ehxaustDamage" instead (which is what happens in Canada, apparently).

Also, for the "B9_Engine_L2_Atlas", change all instances of "thrustTransform" to "thrust_transform" or the engine doesn't actually produce thrust.

[somnambulist]

Is there a cryogentic plant mod/part to prevent LO2 and LH2 boil off?

See this post

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/31706-0-20-Modular-Fuel-System-1-3-realistic-fuels-reconfigurable-fuel-tanks-and-engines?p=416088&viewfull=1#post416088