Now This Is Pod Racing!

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

ok, finally got around to making a little video for you. nothing fancy in the deseart, but here you go!

I with the forums would support Twitch video.

with as many kerbalnaughts stream on twitch, they should add it.

http://www.twitch.tv/jasonlii/b/418946961

[Plur303]

Very nice. That seems really stable with the 3 airbrakes. It might not be as fast as some of the others but stability is probably more important that speed if more speed means crashing...

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

it is really stable. especially when you toggle the smooth controls. (like I forgot to do the first time). and really more agile than it would let on. But yes, not as fast.

[Plur303]

it is really stable. especially when you toggle the smooth controls. (like I forgot to do the first time). and really more agile than it would let on. But yes, not as fast.

I would still really like to set up a race course by dropping probe cores and naming them pylon 1, pylon 2 etc. and sharing the save file but there are a few issues I am predicting.

1. All of the terrain around Kerbal Space Center is flat and boring. The island airport is the closest thing of interest and it is a few minutes away. I don't think anybody wants to participate in a race that involves several minutes per lap of boring flat race course.

2. How to enforce the course and penalize cheaters. The only thing I can see is very carefully and slowly flying the course and mapping the distance very accurately. Anybody who posts a screenshot with a distance shorter than the minimum course length is disqualified.

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

That's a good start. you can pick anywhere. I know my racer, and I'm sure most others, can be modified to be launched into orbit and landed at any race site. Perhaps the race could be along the long windey river? Put a time pinalty on any time spent above a reasonable altitude. I like the river idea because you don't have to place any signifiers to lay out the track. it's already layed out.

[praise the suuun]

HI! im trying to build a pod for the race but quantum struts refuses to appear in my parts catalogue no matter how many updaes and hotfixes i tried. normal struts are too weak for this amount of strain. help?

[praise the suuun]

never mind, the strut looks exactly like an rcs port pics incoming

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

So I tested out the two more interesting Rivers and this is what I cam up with.

The yellow course could possibly be a long indurance challange. the river is wide and offers plenty of room to manuver withought being to challanging. the turns are easy, but with such a long run it could take some time.

The orange course is much more challanging with tighter turns and sections of land that make the river spotted. what I like about the rivers is it gives a clear reading on altitude with the water being at sea level. I was able to run both tracks at my max speed staying about 30m. the more challenging course took me to 60m with some of the raised land portions. I would recoment putting the altitude cap at about 50 or 60m with a time penalty above that or for any time spent above land and not water.

Let me know if anyone likes this idea.

[praise the suuun]

i need some guidance how to get this working with FAR. the vertical take off is just fine the problem is it starts spinning uncontrollably even with 14 sas modules. also i cant keep the nose up. thoughts?

ps kerbies thats a fantastic thermal map youve got there i cant wait ti race those 2

Edited June 29, 2013 by praise the suuun

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

thanks. I'm not sure if more sas means more stability. for me, it had to do alot with lift, and control surfaces. small racer noses down as well, I have to adjust the trim back to get it to fly level withought my finger on the button. If you're using kas, you'll want drag on the chariot to keep the tention on the cables. I used airbrakes from b9. withought testing your craft I don't know what else to tell you. good luck

[praise the suuun]

thanks to the advice from past pages i put air brakes as drag so that keeps tension, since i dont have any lift that may be the problem. am i supposed to have all my engines behind the COG? if so thats gonna be a problem >_<

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

They generally work best if the thrusters are behind the center of mass. Don't let it fool you, though. When the Kas extends, your center of mass gets split as if there are now two crafts. You deffinatly need the lift. everbody has been hiding wing sections inside of their fuel tanks. what I did to balance mine, was build the engines and tanks alone, and balanced them out, and then added the chariot with it's own lift surfaces. and then test test test.if you take your chariot off your racer, you'll see a shift in center of mass which will likely put it in front of your thrusters.

[praise the suuun]

Here's what I got so far, the wings helped me stay stable for longer but FAR is kicking my behind with this pod racer stuff haha. Ill figure out a comprise between aesthetics and mobility eventually.

[praise the suuun]

They generally work best if the thrusters are behind the center of mass. Don't let it fool you, though. When the Kas extends, your center of mass gets split as if there are now two crafts. You deffinatly need the lift. everbody has been hiding wing sections inside of their fuel tanks. what I did to balance mine, was build the engines and tanks alone, and balanced them out, and then added the chariot with it's own lift surfaces. and then test test test.if you take your chariot off your racer, you'll see a shift in center of mass which will likely put it in front of your thrusters.

thanks buddy this is a BIG help.

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

well, now that I get another view of your racer, you are carrying ALOT of weight on those engines. Those tanks are super heavy for our purpose, plus, they are oxidized which isn't nescisary. trying building with the mk space plane tanks. you'll get much more bang for less weight. You can also clip your wings inside of those tanks so they are not visible. ALWAYS MORE LIFT. lift is really important so if you're still having trouble, add more.

[praise the suuun]

if you can see from the screenie, the engine blocks have a tendency to roll to the left so the chariot is bending. the whole thing is doing big circles but i dont have enough control surfaces even if it didnt roll. l don't know if that is a symmetry issue or too much lift on one side. it should have enough power to stay up but very engine heavy. i dont know if engine weight decreases mobility but it would make sense if it did perhaps just need MORE surfaces. I just wanted to make the biggest engines I could lmao! . ps i have a suspicion that FAR will rightly disregard wings inside other parts. i can test that after i zzzzz.

Edited June 29, 2013 by praise the suuun

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

oh yeah, I think far doesn't like hidden wings. >.<

[praise the suuun]

the center of lift is off center with the chariot detached. there aint a single lifting surface on that thing, this is the source of the death spin for sure.... but why its off center i dont know; it should be perfectly symmetrical.

*edit* there was one wing left over inside but now the COL is even more off center. This proves FAR does not disregard wings inside other parts ( in the SPH at least) but im mystified by my COL. it must be unsymmetrical in some way. did any of you find just your engines by themselves to be off balance in some way that it spun uncontrollably?

Edited June 30, 2013 by praise the suuun

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

mine doesn't spin uncontrollably, but it does want to aileron roll slowly. all of my planes do it and the direction of the roll is determaned by which side I build from when useing symitry. double check and mike sure you find ALL hidden forms of lift though. there might be another hidden in there.

[praise the suuun]

no hidden wings, still unable to fly

[Kerbies_are_my_Minions]

does lift and mass show to be perfectly centered? slightly off can mean big trouble. could you possibly show a vid of you trying to fly this?

[frizzank]

Go big or go home

Titan Pod racer!

Controls really well for for her size.

[praise the suuun]

here it is bud, i managed to kill rotation by making perfect symmetry; thank god. I'm using this weird axial adapter thing from the B9 pack as my command pod; it might be doing something funky but so far all it needs is either more power or more lift or something else i didnt think of and it might just work! O_O

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddaipscdjnA&feature=youtu.be

Edited June 30, 2013 by praise the suuun

[praise the suuun]

Go big or go home

Titan Pod racer!

Controls really well for for her size.

how is your mobility? do you think you could get that thing around the river? chemical powered pod racer muhaha :evilface:

[frizzank]

how is your mobility? do you think you could get that thing around the river? chemical powered pod racer muhaha :evilface:

Lets just say it would need a really big river. But I can get to 2400m/s in 35 seconds