[0.25]KSP Interstellar (Magnetic Nozzles, ISRU Revamp) Version 0.13

[Lightwarrior]

I'm having problem with the heat radiator. No matter where I put them on, they seem to not reduce heat waste. Anyone know why this problem is persisting? Also any way to fix the issue where the solar panels? They generate heat waste too as is it by design, but it goes out of control when getting slightly closer orbit near the sun. Any way to fix that or remove it? I would love to edit the cfg file but have no idea.

You need more radiators than.

Also dont be afraid of WasteHeat buildup, as this will increase radiator temperature and they will radiate more heat. You only need to keep it below ~95%.

And yes, you can disable WasteHeat mechanic entirely in WarpPluginSettings.cfg.

Edited December 24, 2013 by Lightwarrior

[Donziboy2]

Hey Fractal. You have any tips on building a Fusion + Atmospheric turbojet space plane? I have tried just about every iteration I can imagine. Varying speed, adding engines, adding intakes, and it seems that irregardless of how many ram intakes I have on my twin engine/reactor craft I have the right most engine abruptly loses thrust at 14000M while going ~450m/s. It doesn't "flame out" with the usual pop and shower of sparks though, it just abruptly loses thrust from 150+kN down to 20kN or so, almost as if its throttle has been abruptly reduced. It's not just changing fuel modes either. I've tried a clean install already and the only mods I use are yours obviously, B9 Aerospace and KAS. I'm not even able to get high enough or fast enough to necessitate pre-coolers.

I get that the old Atmo intakes were hax and over powered but this is getting ridiculous.

Thanks for the help and the awesome mod! Even if I can't build a SSTO for s***.

Ya I have that problem alot also, I have been off from work for Vacation so I have logged alot of test flights and I have failed to make orbit on all but 1 and that failed due to my engines exploding after I did a quick save/load....

I have found that using 2 intakes per engine helps, FAR is far less forgiving now then before also, I have not tried it stock.

You have to keep an eye on the intakeATM and throttle back as it starts coming down, I really do miss the old system that Auto Throttled the engines based on the amount the intakes got...

You also have to keep the craft right on the edge or above flame effects, which is a bad thing if your using Deadly Reentry...

[Scamper1]

Where can I download the .22 version?

Edited December 24, 2013 by Scamper1

[Fractal_UK]

Ya I have that problem alot also, I have been off from work for Vacation so I have logged alot of test flights and I have failed to make orbit on all but 1 and that failed due to my engines exploding after I did a quick save/load....

I have found that using 2 intakes per engine helps, FAR is far less forgiving now then before also, I have not tried it stock.

You have to keep an eye on the intakeATM and throttle back as it starts coming down, I really do miss the old system that Auto Throttled the engines based on the amount the intakes got...

You also have to keep the craft right on the edge or above flame effects, which is a bad thing if your using Deadly Reentry...

The system still auto-throttles engines down to prevent flameout. I'm not entirely sure yet why the thrust asymmetry with multiple engines has returned though. I'm investigating though.

[kalizec]

Might I suggest the thrust levels of the Plasma thrusters is increased to some less realistic levels?

It's perfectly possibly to build a probe now great dV.

But the low thrust means that the acceleration will takes days in game time.

That's fine except we don't have a 1000x physics acceleration option.

And while that's realistic, it also makes them quite useless for a game over a simulation.

Just look at the Ion thrusters that Squad included. They too have unrealistic thrust values.

Why? Because it's not a game if you actually have to let the game run at 4x for the better

part of a day for your probe to reach anything beyond Kerbin orbit.

[biglightbt]

Sweet! And thanks. Just for fun I decided to build the smallest SSTO I could make, but instead swapped out the fusion reactor to a Kiwi reactor running on Thorium, which surprisingly has 5000*K more core temperature than the fusion reactor. Even with no ram air intakes and just some small supersonic inlets I managed to kiss the edge of space. 24000M at just under 1KM/s.

I was surprised to find that some of the stock radial intakes were only providing a mere fraction of their rated intake, just sitting on the runway, not moving. Picture for reference. WTF is going on here!?

[Lightwarrior]

Might I suggest the thrust levels of the Plasma thrusters is increased to some less realistic levels?

It's perfectly possibly to build a probe now great dV.

But the low thrust means that the acceleration will takes days in game time.

That's fine except we don't have a 1000x physics acceleration option.

And while that's realistic, it also makes them quite useless for a game over a simulation.

Just look at the Ion thrusters that Squad included. They too have unrealistic thrust values.

Why? Because it's not a game if you actually have to let the game run at 4x for the better

part of a day for your probe to reach anything beyond Kerbin orbit.

You need more power.

You can get very unrealistic ~1000+ KN from this thrusters...

[Fractal_UK]

Sweet! And thanks. Just for fun I decided to build the smallest SSTO I could make, but instead swapped out the fusion reactor to a Kiwi reactor running on Thorium, which surprisingly has 5000*K more core temperature than the fusion reactor. Even with no ram air intakes and just some small supersonic inlets I managed to kiss the edge of space. 24000M at just under 1KM/s.

Because you have the upgraded fission reactors and basic fusion reactors.

I was surprised to find that some of the stock radial intakes were only providing a mere fraction of their rated intake, just sitting on the runway, not moving. Picture for reference. WTF is going on here!?

Nothing is "going on," that is just what intakes do. No modifications are made to stock intakes.

[kalizec]

You need more power.

You can get very unrealistic ~1000+ KN from this thrusters...

I understand that. Nevertheless the point at which they are introduced in the game makes them useless until you upgrade them.

Imho they should be at least equally playable as the regular Ion engines before they're upgraded.

[CleverLikeMe]

A quick question about the ISRU and resource gathering...

I'm having a ton of issues designing anything with the ISRU attached. The attachment points are very difficult to get working, and even when I can get the things I want attached on both ends it seems like a very awkward thing to try and attach to a rover or lander. Is this working as intended?

Either way, if anyone has any tips or suggestions on how to build something usable with that part, I'd love to hear it. My original intent was to build an aluminum hybrid rocket based probe and have it tool around on the moon, but after an hour or so of trying to construct something feasible in the VAB I pretty much gave up.

[Lightwarrior]

Yes, they are mostly unusable with small unupgraded reactors.

But if you take 3.75m thorium reactor you may get something usable... but yes it is not a "small probe" at all.

Just use thermal nozzles, they are better at this "tech level". And it seems right.

BTW just tested it with 1.25m fusion Helium-3 reactor and xenon... interesting... ~45KN of thrust and TWR>1 on kerbin.

Edited December 24, 2013 by Lightwarrior

[Gibster]

I'm having trouble with the DT Vista engine, I've got fuel and power yet it keeps flaming out, some help and perhaps overall guide to the engine that I've heard much praise for?

[Fractal_UK]

I'm having trouble with the DT Vista engine, I've got fuel and power yet it keeps flaming out, some help and perhaps overall guide to the engine that I've heard much praise for?

Do you have enough power? It isn't like most engines in that it doesn't use less electricity when running at 10% throttle than 100%. Instead, the throttle changes the specific impulse so the engine is just as "good" at low throttle, it simply produces less thrust but more fuel efficiency. You need 2.5GW of power to run it, at any throttle setting.

[Fractal_UK]

Where can I download the .22 version?

The 0.22 version is here: https://bitbucket.org/FractalUK/kspinstellar/downloads/KSPInterstellar-v0.8.2.1.zip (Not compatible with KSP Version 0.23).

Ya I have that problem alot also, I have been off from work for Vacation so I have logged alot of test flights and I have failed to make orbit on all but 1 and that failed due to my engines exploding after I did a quick save/load....

I have found that using 2 intakes per engine helps, FAR is far less forgiving now then before also, I have not tried it stock.

You have to keep an eye on the intakeATM and throttle back as it starts coming down, I really do miss the old system that Auto Throttled the engines based on the amount the intakes got...

You also have to keep the craft right on the edge or above flame effects, which is a bad thing if your using Deadly Reentry...

I've found the problem, I'm really embarrassed, the atmospheric code in version 0.9 would've worked perfectly if it wasn't for a typo. I've since reverted to earlier code and been messing about with lots of wacky solutions when the original solution should have worked (and now does work) brilliantly.

It's christmas eve tomorrow so no promises but I'll try and put a new version with this fix included out tomorrow.

[Gibster]

Do you have enough power? It isn't like most engines in that it doesn't use less electricity when running at 10% throttle than 100%. Instead, the throttle changes the specific impulse so the engine is just as "good" at low throttle, it simply produces less thrust but more fuel efficiency. You need 2.5GW of power to run it, at any throttle setting.

Yeah I had a 1.5 meter fusion reactor with a 1.5 meter brayton cycle generator.

[Scamper1]

Thank you!

[Fractal_UK]

Yeah I had a 1.5 meter fusion reactor with a 1.5 meter brayton cycle generator.

That's not enough, not even close. 1.25m fusion reactor is 525MW thermal. There was someone building DT vista ships using fusion reactors and generators earlier in the thread, I believe you need 8 of each, assuming the fusion reactor and generators are both upgraded. You can also power it with one upgraded 3.75m nuclear reactor and 3.75m upgraded generator.

Reactors List

[Gibster]

That's not enough, not even close. 1.25m fusion reactor is 525MW thermal. There was someone building DT vista ships using fusion reactors and generators earlier in the thread, I believe you need 8 of each, assuming the fusion reactor and generators are both upgraded. You can also power it with one upgraded 3.75m nuclear reactor and 3.75m upgraded generator.

Reactors List

Oh, I thought fusion was better than that, ah well better redesign.

[Lightwarrior]

Actually 6 helium-3 powered reactors are needed now. 8 D/T will not be enough after those changes.

And yes, "brayton cycle generator" sounds really bad, the only way to power DT vista with this (unupgraded generator) is 3.75m thorium reactor. Also you will need 12+ huge radiators.

And this is one of those ships:

Works really good, has weight around 50-60T which gives insane efficiency. Also those thrust limiter added in 0.23 works good with DT vista, giving convinient way to get desired thrust/isp. And those LFO tanks are not really necessary here, they were added for lander refueling.

Edited December 24, 2013 by Lightwarrior

[Fractal_UK]

Actually 6 helium-3 powered reactors are needed now. 8 D/T will not be enough after those changes.

And yes, "brayton cycle generator" sounds really bad, the only way to power DT vista with this (unupgraded generator) is 3.75m thorium reactor. Also you will need 12+ huge radiators.

You can add both direct conversion *and* KTEC thermoelectric generators to a D/T reactor. You should then still have enough power to do it with 8 (in fact you get slightly more power than you used to). The major downside to using both types of generator is that there is no room for a thermal rocket/thermal turbojet but if you're using a DT vista, you won't need that anyway.

Main advantage of He-3 is that no thermoelectric generator is needed.

[Gibster]

Actually 6 helium-3 powered reactors are needed now. 8 D/T will not be enough after those changes.

And yes, "brayton cycle generator" sounds really bad, the only way to power DT vista with this (unupgraded generator) is 3.75m thorium reactor. Also you will need 12+ huge radiators.

I was wondering how many radiators I needed to slap on the ship so it wont overheat. I was looking at 80,000 m/s (WOW!) according to mechjeb but that'll probably drop like a rock now. I know the DT Vista gets more efficient the lower the engine power is, so is mechjeb calculating the engine on full power and least efficiency or most efficient thrust setting?

[Lightwarrior]

You can add both direct conversion *and* KTEC thermoelectric generators to a D/T reactor. You should then still have enough power to do it with 8 (in fact you get slightly more power than you used to). The major downside to using both types of generator is that there is no room for a thermal rocket/thermal turbojet but if you're using a DT vista, you won't need that anyway.

Main advantage of He-3 is that no thermoelectric generator is needed.

Yes, but it is also additional weight, and most important additional space (generators are large enough).

Anyway it is easy to get He-3 as only very tiny amounts are actually needed.

I was wondering how many radiators I needed to slap on the ship so it wont overheat. I was looking at 80,000 m/s (WOW!) according to mechjeb but that'll probably drop like a rock now. I know the DT Vista gets more efficient the lower the engine power is, so is mechjeb calculating the engine on full power and least efficiency or most efficient thrust setting?

I do not know how mechjeb works, but with isp of 15500 at 100% thrust, 31000 at 50% etc this engine wil really give insane amount of dV.

Single 2.5m tank is enough to travel to 3-4 different planets with 30T lander attached.

Also it does not need LV as it can easily reach kerbin orbit by itself. Even with fission reactor.

Edited December 24, 2013 by Lightwarrior

[Gibster]

Found a bug, assigned toggle radiators to an action group and tested it on the launch pad, none of them did anything.

Also, 50,000+ m/s according to MJ on what seems to be a fully functional Vista engine. I'm going places with this thing. Its getting late where I am, I'll strap a booster on to it tomorrow morning and see what happens.

[katalex-3]

I have stupid nub question about ISRU.

1. I set ISRU on ocean of Kerbin, near spaceport. ISRU water tank full, ok.

2. I can begin electrolysis of water, I see what quantity of water decrease. If i understand ISRU generate Oxidiser and LiquidFuel from water. But empty Oxidiser and LiquidFuel tanks stay empty. What kind of tanks should I use for store Oxidiser and LiquidFuel?

[Fractal_UK]

I have stupid nub question about ISRU.

1. I set ISRU on ocean of Kerbin, near spaceport. ISRU water tank full, ok.

2. I can begin electrolysis of water, I see what quantity of water decrease. If i understand ISRU generate Oxidiser and LiquidFuel from water. But empty Oxidiser and LiquidFuel tanks stay empty. What kind of tanks should I use for store Oxidiser and LiquidFuel?

You need fuel lines to transfer oxidiser and liquid fuel as you would between stacks on a rocket. The fuel line needs to go from the tank to the refinery (the opposite way to what you might expect).

Found a bug, assigned toggle radiators to an action group and tested it on the launch pad, none of them did anything.

Was it an inline or radial radiator? Only the deployable radiators that look a bit like solar panels actually deploy.