Jump to content

[WIP] R.E.L Skylon C2. Alpha Released. FAR config broken. (08 Dec 2014)

CaptainKipard

By CaptainKipard
in KSP1 Mod Development

 Share

Recommended Posts

CaptainKipard

CaptainKipard

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)

An alpha version for stock aerodynamics is now released

Download Skylon Alpha for Stock Aerodynamics

Lc6xZbd.png

Released under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license

Extract KipEng to GameData. If you have any of my other mods windows will ask you to merge the KipEng folder.

Dependencies:

If you don't want the parts from Firespitter, you can delete all the files from that folder but keep the plugin directory structure the same just in case.

Recommended

It flies well and can be used effectively, but is far from finished.

Usage:

Skylon Control Core 2 has an animation that allows you to change the "Control from here" vector between the Sabre engine thrust vector, and the orbital engine thrust vector. This will change where the navball is pointing to be in line with the corresponding engines. The Sabre vector is selected by default.

Skylon Control Core 1 is a regular part. Selecting "Control from here" on this part will let you control the craft easier with the RCS thrusters and reaction wheel since they are aligned with that part.

The included craft file has all the parts and action groups set up as follows:

  • The control surfaces are set to use specific user input
  • Main landing gear has the brakes on by default
  • Sabre engines are set to Manual Switching.
  • AG 1 set to change Sabre engine mode
  • AG 2 set to toggle Sabre engines
  • AG 3 set to toggle the Skylon Orbital Maneuvering Assembly

In order to perform a successful launch with the Skylon you need to do the following.

  1. Load the included craft file and launch
  2. Right-click on the Skylon Control Core 2 and click "Control from here".
  3. SAS on, Breaks off.
  4. Stage.
  5. Towards the end of the runway pitch up as far as you can without destroying the tail.
  6. As soon as you leave the runway, pitch up more to start gaining altitude and retract the landing gear to decrease drag.
  7. Fly in air-breathing mode to about 20km and accelerate to about 900-1000m/s. Watch your IntakeAir.
  8. Switch to rocket mode, and continue as you would with a rocket. The craft has enough resources to achieve an orbit of ~300km with a heavy payload.
  9. If you want to use the SOMA engine you must change the vector on the Skylon Control Core 2.
  10. If you have a dockable payload in the payload bay and you want to dock using RCS, you need to click "Control from here" on Skylon Control Core 1.
  11. Remember to switch back to the correct core and vector before returning to Kerbin.

Edited by Cpt. Kipard
Removed interstellar dependency, added links
Link to comment
Share on other sites
CaptainKipard

CaptainKipard

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)
congratulations on your alpha release :) i'm pleasantly surprised at how light the asset files are, i was expecting 60+mb, i'll be giving it a thorough session

Thanks. I was considering increasing the size of the textures (normal maps at least), and this makes me think it's a good idea.

Then again, the uncompressed files are 27Mb....

Edited by Cpt. Kipard
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Climberfx

Climberfx

Posted
Posted (edited)

Wow, gonna try in this moment. Great work Cpt.

Is there planning for FAR version?, i will try with it.

Why it have interstellar plugin?

I love the gears and their holes! Amazing Ship!

EDIT:

With FAR i could manage to take off on the end of runway, but since it take off, start to spinning up, losing control. with Sas on.

I believe it will need some FAR care too...

Edited by Climberfx
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Orange_Ignition

Orange_Ignition

Posted
Posted (edited)

I convert all of my textures to .dds and use ddsloader, it saves quite a bit of memory when running large amounts of parts simultaneously(the skylon works out to 9.6mb converted down from 27mb), personally i'd love to see an option for higher res textures, especially for something that is probably never going to leave my gamedata folder... :) also a quick comment; i love the little sliding doors on the side of the cargo bay.

@climberfx i tried it with FAR on for s&g but it can't fly without proper configs. it goes into an immediate flip or side slip a few seconds off the runway, we're testing it stock for a reason :)

Edited by Orange_Ignition
Link to comment
Share on other sites
CaptainKipard

CaptainKipard

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Is there planning for FAR version?, i will try with it.

Why it have interstellar plugin?

FAR configs are the next thing on my list. I already have some calculations done.

The interstellar is for the precooler to work, but I'll probably remove that dependency and just lower the heat generation of the engine.

p.s: A Tip for the stabiliser. If flips entirely, not only the back. You can see it on about 40 seconds of this video.

I never noticed that before. I guess I have to change it.

I convert all of my textures to .dds and use ddsloader, it saves quite a bit of memory when running large amounts of parts simultaneously(the skylon works out to 9.6mb converted down from 27mb), personally i'd love to see an option for higher res textures, especially for something that is probably never going to leave my gamedata folder... :)

Somehow I got the impression that there was some problem with that plugin, but I'll have another look at it.

Man how many BoxSat you think will fit in there lol they look so small in that cargo bay.

I dunno. The manual on RELs website has some info on it, but I haven't read it yet.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Climberfx

Climberfx

Posted
Posted

I like the idea off the pre cooler, but i see that the settings in the part.cfg are "commented" (disable). Imagine that is in the ways to implement.

To FAR work on it for know, i just pitch a degree down on the front stabilisers and it adjust the COL for control. Cold take off and go to a certain altitude, than, i lost control, and need to sleep, so gonna try some more early morning.

Cheers. I love it all. It is almost crashing my KSP, because this mod was the tip of iceberg, no more room for any other here. But i gonna force it to stay, because i love it. So you know, i share with you one of my most used and preferably vehicle today, pre Skylon, was a similar "space Jet" (not in appearance, but in concept).

Is Argo, that i create with most b9 parts. Is a Vtol SSTO with version to transport crew, other to cargo e another to both. Here i present to you the mix version. This vehicle get orbit with 2k dV, and return 100% of the investment when landed on the KSC (less fuel consumption, and cargo delivered). That way your gonna implement my fleet on the heavy cargo lift.

15613272532_3131290502_o.pngARGO by Climberfx, on Flickr

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Virtualgenius

Virtualgenius

Posted
Posted (edited)

I too would love to see the Pre cooler working, I am loving this mod managed to take off about 75% of the runway struck a problem with the engines not auto switching modes, solved it by using a smart part at a given altitude also struck another issue I am using Mechjeb it wouldn't maneuver properly under rcs so added some B9 rcs jets in strategic places and it went to 100km orbit without an issue for an Alpha release big thumbs up from me

Edited by Virtualgenius
Link to comment
Share on other sites
CaptainKipard

CaptainKipard

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)
I too would love to see the Pre cooler working,

Why.

I am loving this mod managed to take off about 75% of the runway struck a problem with the engines not auto switching modes, solved it by using a smart part at a given altitude also struck another issue I am using Mechjeb it wouldn't maneuver properly under rcs so added some B9 rcs jets in strategic places and it went to 100km orbit without an issue for an Alpha release big thumbs up from me

Another way to go about it would be to read the post where the link is.

FAO everyone. I anticipate a few unnecessary questions and issues with this craft. I'm absolutely not going to offer support if you ignore the readme and the OP and the release post, all of which have the same text explaining everything.

Edited by Cpt. Kipard
Link to comment
Share on other sites
MightyDarkStar

MightyDarkStar

Posted
Posted

Beautiful. First thing I've ever got into a proper orbit and that Jumbo tank in the pre-saved file was my first satellite. I have since re-saved it and um.... militarised it a bit? I think this is the perfect craft for beginners due to its easy fly-ability (made up a phrase). Also, it is very pretty.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Guest

Guest

Posted
Posted

Because you're only gonna use this engine and precooler together. Precooler is one of the things that you only affect you when they're missing. Combined, it'll seem just as if there was no precooler functionality, because with a precooler working correctly, Skylon would see no abnormal overheating. Those parts don't look suited for building anything but the Skylon, and only then precooler functionality would make sense.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
CaptainKipard

CaptainKipard

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)
and the pre cooler working why not make it work if there is a plugin that will allow it to work

I think I understand. You're not giving a reason for it, you're saying there's no reason not to do it, and providing the existence of the plugin to back it up.

What other plugins exist that there are no reasons to exclude? Presumably by this logic I could include a whole bunch of them. :)

Edited by Cpt. Kipard
Link to comment
Share on other sites
CaptainKipard

CaptainKipard

Posted
  • Author
Posted
I like how you did the rotate orientation for controls! ingenius!

artwhaley deserves some credit there. He made this discovery.

Optional plugins could always be managed via MM configs :D

On the subject of plugins, you could eliminate the need to have separate left/right parts by using this one.

Ah! This is going into the dev sticky.

It looks like it works with stackable parts too, so I'll consider it towards the end.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
CaptainKipard

CaptainKipard

Posted
  • Author
Posted

It turns out that the reason the textures were so small was because I didn't increase their max size in Unity. The MBM files were only exported at 10242px. After rectifying this, the entire Skylon mod folder is now 100 Mb. Everything looks as I intended now, at an obvious price. I'll need to give DDS textures a try.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
White Owl

White Owl

Posted
Posted

First impressions:

It looks fantastic, even with the low-res textures! Modeled perfectly.

That trick with changing the control vector is brilliant! Huge props to you and Artwhaley.

I had no problems taking off from the runway. Tried it with and without SAS; without gets kind of entertaining but is totally possible. Its flying manners when full of fuel are awkward and overly sensitive to pitch changes due to the CoL placed in front of the CoM, but it's still controllable. So it works, but can probably be improved.

Took the big orange tank payload into a 100km orbit with no difficulty... and still have over 11k hydrogen and 5k oxygen in the tanks. I honestly believe this is too efficient. It shouldn't have almost half the fuel remaining at this point. The orbital engine has the same Isp as the SABREs, so there doesn't appear to be any reason to use the little engine.

I haven't yet tried landing it when empty; that's the next test.

So overall first impressions are it's great looking and works very well! But could use some tweaking.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Climberfx

Climberfx

Posted
Posted (edited)

Hey dear Cpt. Kipard.

I didn't see any reaction wheels on it. Is possible to it to have some in the core 2? Would help for manoeuvres on space and stabilisation on atmosphere.

I would go with a valeu of 60 or 80. Or you will leave it with RCS for space only?

:D

I could manage to put into space with FAR (did some personal temporary tweaks), and i need to tell. It is gorgeous.

Will be my heavy cargo lifter number one.

Other thing i would consider, is to position the RCS truster in the extremes of the fuel tanks, if you wanna use then for rotational manoeuvres. But if not, letting the rotation for reaction wheels, just to strong on center of mass would do the job for translation.

Take my comments was humble personal opinion.

And do as you wish, i will love anyway.

Great ship Cpt.

:)

15764683417_7871ae50a0_o.pngSkylon FAR by Climberfx, on Flickr

15949754182_79acbfffa1_o.pngSkylon FAR by Climberfx, on Flickr

p.s.: Sorry, i forgot to put some flying light to improve beauty. Next pics...

Edited by Climberfx
Link to comment
Share on other sites
This thread is quite old. Please consider starting a new thread rather than reviving this one.

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
 Share
Go to topic listing
×
×
  • Create New...