How to separate from your radial Stage.

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

Hi Guys,

I have read somewhere in the Forum that there is a Bug in the Game that eliminates the ejection Force of your Radial Decouplers when using Struts on the outer Stage.

So i went on and used only the TT-70 decouplers which are standing extended on the "Main"-Stage to have enough Room if the outer Stage decides to crash into the Rocket when decoupled.

But, you know... I got sick of it so i tried to use Sepatron on the top and the sides of the Outer Stage to get rid of it.

But then I realised that Rocket-Exhaust is a pretty good pusher but it damages your Spacecraft,... so I made this.

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MY QUESTION IS:

How do you get rid of your used up Stages?

Which ways do work out the most for you?

I am pretty curious about this.

[Tiron]

Being 'damaged' by the sepatrons isn't a big deal, other than annoying log entries. Right now at least, 'damage' consists of 'got heated up a bit', and the part will only be destroyed if it fully overheats. Back when you could still see the fuel tanks listed in the staging interface it was easy to see.

The trick being, that as soon as the part isn't getting hit by the exhaust anymore(Actually even before that, just that more's being added still), it'll start losing the accumulated heat. There's no lasting 'damage' caused.

[Mode7]

I mount my sepratrons just below the radial decoupler and I point them upwards and slightly outwards. Rather than having the discarded tanks fly quickly away from me (and possibly flip over and collide with the main craft) they just move upwards and outwards. The thrust isn't enough for the discarded tanks to keep up with the main craft for long so they end up just drifting away and behind very slowly.

No "damaged by sepratrons" messages, no backflipping crazy fuel tanks, and only one seperatron per tank rather than the two I used to use when I was attaching them on the sides.

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

I know Tiron, but the thing is that I want to avoid too much Flight-Log entries because I experienced and reproduced a loading screen issue when the Log is getting so damn big that you have wait for an eternity to be getting back in the VAB.

This happened when an engine blasted its exhaust in a tank beneath and the log had tons of entries.

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

Mode, can I have a Screenshot of that?

[Stargate525]

I usually make my booster stages extend slightly below my main engine. They seem to want to rotate, for me, around their engine, so when I eject them they naturally fall back behind my ship. *shrugs*

[cantorobriar]

Using a decoupler with more decoupler force might help. If that doesn't help, I have a nooby solution. Try "stacking" your decouplers. It doesn't always work, but putting one decoupler on top of one another and putting them in the same stage might help them push a bit more, or at least be farther away from the main craft/engine.

[Galacticruler]

Stages?

On a more serious note, I just mount a wing to them, the lift forces them to roll away from my craft...however I've had them try to push inwards before.

[Mode7]

I don't think I did a very good job explaining so I fired up KSP and made a quick sample rocket.

Very basic, onion staging nothing amazing going on here.

Here you can see the sepratrons mounted just below the radial decouplers. I've used plenty of struts here so the decouplers won't be able to impart any separating force.

The sepratrons are pointed up and a little outwards. This will help them carry the discarded stage away smoothly.

Nice easy decoupling. The outer ring of tanks was mounted a little higher than the mainsail at the bottom there. If I had pushed them straight out they might have just done backflips and collided with my rocket motor. This way they clear the main vessel before dropping away.

[Capt'n Skunky]

Always eject stages down and away. The easiest way to avoid damaging you craft via exhaust or flipping booters is to place two Sepatrons at the top and bottom on the sides of the boosters. Angle the Sepatrons so the exhasut is pointed slightly up and outward. I usually use fine rotations and go 3 up and 5 out.

This minimizes the exhaust exposure on the center elements and pushes equally around the center of mass to prevent flipping. Also, since they ejected slightly downwards, your craft will clear them quicker as it's going in the other direction, up.

Cheers!

Capt'n Skunky

KSP Community Manager

[Traches]

I got tired of using radial decouplers, so I use I beams mounted radially, 1x1 structural panels on the ends, and regular stack decouplers on the bottom of the panels. As long as you're not turning when you stage, they drop straight back quite nicely. The panels also give you a good place to attach struts for awkward cargo, since they stick around till you ditch the center stage.

[SaturnVee]

Use seperatrons, put them facing downwards on the outside of your radial stage, and have them fire on the stage as your decouplers.

[Geschosskopf]

I usually only put 2 Sepratrons per booster. I put them at the height of the center of the decoupler and have them rotated exactly horizontal. But I drag them a couple of angle steps around towards the outer side of the booster so when you look down the length of the booster from the top, there's like a 90^ angle between the Sepratron axes instead of them being parallel. This is enough to have their exhausts pointing towards empty air instead of the center tank. Thus, no damage to the central tank although any tail feathers on it might get slightly scorched. The boosters go straight out from the central tank without any tumbling and are rapidly left behind.

[sgt_flyer]

i have a new technique i created for radial decoupling - i have explained it into the album, but basically, it allows to make boosters fits much more closely to their core stage than what is possible with radial decouplers, and the partially clipped M-beam (it's possible to use something else, as long as you don't clip it for more than it's half inside the core stage) allows me to mechanically eject the boosters (the same way the decouplers ejection force works) but this trick will not be canceled by struts the way decouplers does (basically, at the instant the decoupling occurs, the M-beam attached to the boosters is still partially clipped into the core stage, and they will be 'forced' outside the core stage because they became separate entities)

here's an album showing the construction technique.

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[Duxwing]

Orient your rocket so that the boosters don't hit it when they fall away: if you're vertical in the lower atmosphere or in any orientation while beyond the lower atmosphere, then hold your course while the boosters separate, and if you're anything but vertical while in the lower atmosphere, then roll your rocket so that your boosters don't fall down on top of it. Use the big radial decouplers instead of the little ones because the former are much more powerful; I've used them to separate asparagused 2xJumbo+Mainsail radial boosters while gravity turning below 24k without Sepratrons in FAR and in stock KSP.

Tangentially, Sepratrons are nevertheless very useful for deorbiting boosters. If you have extra fuel left over in your booster, then instead of burning its engine to lower your periapsis below the atmosphere, decoupling it, and then raising your periapsis with your orbital stage, attach a probe core to the side of your booster with a tiny strut, burn all of your booster fuel at periapsis with your most efficient engines, finish your burn with your orbital stage, and then deorbit the booster by burning retrograde with the sepratrons at booster apoapsis. You'll save the money that you spend on the probe core in decreased fuel requirements for the orbiter stage.

-Duxwing