Double-Sided Radial Decouplers.

[Stelith61]

Quite simple really.

You know the blue stack separators, that when decoupled, leave both sides of the rocket decoupler free?

I propose the same sort of thing, but radially.

To aid in things like this (These are from Brotoro's KSP missions)

without that pesky unbalancing and unsightly decoupler on the side.

[NovaSilisko]

You know, I think I'll make this as a mod right now... I will report back shortly.

[Stelith61]

Uh, wow, that was fast!

Thanks. I'll give it a shot once you put it up.

[Kegereneku]

Ah yes ! That's exactly what I would need for one of my probes-bus and the landing-stage of a big rover.

What would it be called ? "Radial separators" ?

[Stelith61]

Ah yes ! That's exactly what I would need for one of my probes-bus and the landing-stage of a big rover.

What would it be called ? "Radial separators" ?

'Horizontal Seperation Manifold 613-2J'

'The new Horizontal Seperation manifold combines two amazing things. The ability

to completely sever a ships connection radially without leaving anything on either

craft, and the word 'Manifold,' which is always a good thing to have.'

Edited July 31, 2013 by Stelith61
Formatting, so it looks all fancy-like.

[NovaSilisko]

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/43720-21-Radial-Stack-Separator

[Skorpychan]

I'd prefer decouplers that can be triggered twice; detach something from it, then drop it later after the other thing's gone. Save hauling bits of rover back to orbit.

[Themohawkninja]

Radial decoupler + Attachment node?

[vexx32]

Jeez, Nova... That was damned fast. Is this gonna end up stock in the future, or what? I get the sense that having a radial separator that detaches from both stages could be dangerous, as it could push the two sections away from each other, leaving the separator to potentially drift around dangerously close to the parent or child craft. I'm thinking perhaps the radial separator might need some new-fangled code, where it jettisons the section, then has a secondary jettison where it detaches itself from the parent ship. That way, both detached segments are free of the potential danger.

[Guard13007]

Oh my, I'd LOVE to see that!

[toric5]

finally!!! someone that doent prepose something that would make it necessary to rewrite the game!!

[YoshiFan501]

'Horizontal Seperation Manifold 613-2J'

'The new Horizontal Seperation manifold combines two amazing things. The ability

to completely sever a ships connection radially without leaving anything on either

craft, and the word 'Manifold,' which is always a good thing to have.'

Yes... Manifold

title = INB-4 Lateral Slicing Utility

manufacturer = Silisko Industries

description = The INB-4 was designed after a singular complaint was recieved by an extremely paranoid parts contractor regarding the lack of lateral stack separators. He quickly ordered his manufacturing devision to produce 15,000 of them.

Great as usual, Nova!

[SciMan]

Jeez, Nova... That was damned fast. Is this gonna end up stock in the future, or what? I get the sense that having a radial separator that detaches from both stages could be dangerous, as it could push the two sections away from each other, leaving the separator to potentially drift around dangerously close to the parent or child craft. I'm thinking perhaps the radial separator might need some new-fangled code, where it jettisons the section, then has a secondary jettison where it detaches itself from the parent ship. That way, both detached segments are free of the potential danger.

I think that might be doable in a single part without any new code, but I'm not certain. However, I AM certain that it can be done with that part Nova posted in combination with a stock radial decoupler. Attach them in this order: From the Main rocket, attach a radial stack separator, then a radial decoupler, then whatever you wanted to attach to the main rocket. Set the staging so the radial decoupler fires first, then the radial stack separator. This way you can use the radial decoupler to kick the radial stack separator away from the main rocket.

If there's a way to make it use a single part, that's much better. Here's my attempt.

Here's how I think a player would go about piloting a ship that uses one of these parts.

(It might not end up being the ONLY way to use it, but this is the "intended" usage)

1. The "parent" craft's staging sequence triggers the stack separator, decoupling it and the "child craft" from the main rocket. The child craft and stack separator remain connected.

2. The player switches focus to the child craft.

3. The player right clicks on the stack separator, and then clicks the GUI button labeled "decouple", which decouples the stack separator from the child craft.

Seems simple enough to me, but I'm not a coder or game designer or game programmer. I can usually follow what's happening in someone else' source code, and sometimes I can figure out how to make it work the way I want, but I don't consider that "coding" per se.

Anyways, here's an example part.cfg code fragment that does what I want, at least when I parse it out in my head. I have not tried it in game yet, but it should help you other humans out there to understand what I'm trying to make it do, even if it doesn't work right (or at all) in KSP.

MODULE
{
    name = ModuleDecouple
    ejectionForce = 80
    explosiveNodeID = srf
}

MODULE
{
    name = ModuleDecouple
    isOmniDecoupler = true
    ejectionForce = 80
    explosiveNodeID = srf
    staged = false
}

The first decoupler module handles the "decouple from parent craft" function. I know that this section will work as I intend it to, because I used similar code when making cfg edits to older parts for compatibility updates.

The second decoupler module is the section that might not work like I want it to. It's supposed to only trigger via action groups or right click, and it's supposed to decouple -both- sides of the radial stack separator (even thou one side was already decoupled, telling it to decouple when its not coupled in the first place should not cause problems)

Here's my issue: with only radially-attached parts, I don't know if there's a way to tell a decoupler to detach from the "parent" side surface node or the "child" side one.

I'm almost certain that this code would act as I intend it to if it was being used on a "regular" stack separator, because then you would be able to tell it to decouple from the "top" (node_stack_top) "bottom" (node_stack_bottom) etc. If there is a way to do something similar with surface attachment nodes, I don't yet know of it.

Edited July 31, 2013 by SciMan
fixed code tags

[Morden96]

I had an issue with this mod yesterday. It seems if you install it when you already have ship a space using stack separators attached attached radially (I used radial attachment nodes), the mod changes them to Horizontal Separation Manifolds. That would be fine, except the ship blows up if I engage them! I tried remove the mod, but it completely broke the ship (no parts function - the inline command module detached and floated away).

I did not try to build any new ships with the mod and test those. This was just on one existing ship. My other ships without stack separators were fine.

[Stelith61]

I had an issue with this mod yesterday. It seems if you install it when you already have ship a space using stack separators attached attached radially (I used radial attachment nodes), the mod changes them to Horizontal Separation Manifolds. That would be fine, except the ship blows up if I engage them! I tried remove the mod, but it completely broke the ship (no parts function - the inline command module detached and floated away).

I did not try to build any new ships with the mod and test those. This was just on one existing ship. My other ships without stack separators were fine.

Was a bug, now supposedly fixed.

[Morrigi]

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/43720-21-Radial-Stack-Separator

Well damn, thanks Nova. Now I'm going to have to get back into KSP and play with them