[CONCEPT] The Space Elevator

[Arran]

I've been intrigued a long time now by the concept of Space Elevators, and resently made it my goal to create this into KSP, as a platform to launch from, surpassing Kerbin Gravity.

Like here on Earth it seems, the idear is theoretically doable, it seems technically a huge challence and undertaking.

First basic Principels seems to work, but getting high up things start to get more complicated..

The Plan :

A working Space Elevator concept for KSP, where there will be a Link between KSC and a Geostableorbital station, on where a module can ride the Link delivering objects into GSO..

Basic Testing :

Created a 10km High railsystem,with a cart attached to it, powered by a Boosters who brought the platform all the way up, locked it in place, and launched the rocket from the platform at 10km Height.

This test allready brought up several problems to overcome, first getting a rocket placed on the Cart, attaching the Cart to the rails without destroying the cart or rails when it moved up.

But the concept gave me the idear that it should be possible to create, but needs alot of work to make it a workable and usable system.

First simple but futile Attempts :

• Placing a 2868 km Long structure made in 3DS on Kerbin that was functioning as "rails" on which a module could ride up.
  This didnt work as it was to large to handle by the engine.. It showed up in the parts list, but when trying to "place" it with HyperEdit on a location on kerbin it made the game crash.. As long the object was within the Atmosphere of Kerbin i worked, but as soon it was bigger as 33 KM, the game hung..
  
• Using a modified KAS winch that allowed a 2868km long wire link, launched this modified winch into a Geostable orbit and tried to lower this with a RCS trusting unit to the surface..
  This again same a first attempt, the game hung when the transition between "Orbit" and "Surface" came..
  
• created a Simple plugin that kept recreating Strut beams until it reached 2868 km height..
  Sadly i this costed so much resources the game started to become very laggy before even reaching space..
  

Conclusion

With exsiting parts/mods this idear is impossible to archieve, mostly due mod and gamemechanic limitations without a special plugin written for this purpose..

Therefore i started a colaberation with Nachtwind to see if we could create a completly new Mod for this

Although we are ATM yet in a planning stage for this..

Current Problems to be solved..

• Creating a Rideable link between KSC and the GSO station
  
• Creating a Module that attach itself to the Link
  
• Overcoming the Transition between "space" and "surface"
  
• Creating a perfect GSO station that stays in GSO regardless amount of time passed.
  

Where we are now

This seems to be a hard task to accomplish, but its going to be a challence we have picked up.

Once we have a rough working setup, more options could be added, but no need to go ahead of ourselfs, and first we need to create a working proof of concept on where we can build on further, but alot of hurdles need to be conqured before this..

If this idear has peeked you'r interrest and would like to join our endevours in creating a working space elevator, dont be shy and contact me or Nachtwind, to see how you could help out in realizing this.

Any idears and Tips are welcome as well, but keep in mind this is pretty much in planning stage, and currently we are mostly working on the idear and how to implement this into KSP.. There isnt yet any working model made thusfar, just the idear, and some basic testing setups.

I'll will keep this topics for updates on the Project. The Ups and Downs..

[EnhancedCookie]

You should look into kerbtown... It allows you to place static objects an lauchpads (maybe even in space?).

[Sapphire]

You should look into kerbtown... It allows you to place static objects an lauchpads (maybe even in space?).

Definitely check this out. There's lots of cool stuff made possible by the Kerbtown plugn. A past Kerbtown project that reminds me of yours is Skykooler's Mass Driver mod.

[HoY]

KerbTown can do this with what it has built in already. An elevator can be scripted into a unity scene that has a ribbon tethering the orbital station. a kerbal seat can even be added to the elevator

[Arran]

I'll defently will going to look into the kerbtown plugin then..

Thanks for the tip.

[skykooler]

Kerbtown is limited however, as objects can only go out to roughly 300km before they are clipped. So you can use a space elevator to get to space, but not to geosync orbit.

[Diazo]

Isn't the 33km limit where the co-ordinate system changes from surface to orbit?

I remember reading something somewhere that the ship will be in different co-ordinate systems depending on where it is to get around the precision limitations of the Unity engine.

Can't find where at the moment, but I think you would have to create a virtual 'elevator' that is present in the plugin code only and run the ships up and down the elevator purely on positioning vectors, not by attaching to an actual in game object.

The physics simulation range would also be another limitation to work around.

D.

[Awaras]

I really don't think that it is practical to have any kind of physical object stretching over almost 3000 kilometers...

And what are you gonna do even if you can make it work? Physically move things up and down the line? Over and over again? That would get boring fast.

Why not just make something similar to the extraplanetary launchpad mod - a 'launchpad' where you can spawn ships that is in a keostationary orbit, maybe with a line fading into the distance towards kerbin and abstract the process of getting stuff up there.

Edited October 2, 2013 by Awaras

[Albert VDS]

The only way I see a space elevator work is by faking it. Something like this:

Have a ribbon extended 10km (or anything that doesn't put an average pc to a grinding halt) on each side of the elevator craft and texture animate the ribbon up or down when your moving.

When your are near the anchor or end point the ribbon is just cutoff in those models.

The anchor and end point models need to be able to unload when your not in reach.

[Helix935]

how about changing the kas winch cfg to have a 100,000 m cable unrolled down or something as a start

[Nachtwind]

how about changing the kas winch cfg to have a 100,000 m cable unrolled down or something as a start

We tried that.. well, there was a babykraken to eat us

Anyhow.. just to give an idea of my (plugin) approach.

Since stretching any object to more than a few km is.. insane i have gone a different direction of "faking" the cable. We pretty much have a station on Ground and one, for simplicity, in a geostationary orbit (hovering more or less directly over the base). Both parts can be "connected" like, for example, done via remotetech. For the faked cable i am going to "draw" a sprite along the vector base/geostationary within the visible range of the currently active craft.

But i will be gone for a week so i dont think there is much development on this. One picture i got is this:

which is from a very early version. The red line is the normal vector that just sticks UP from the ground, the green one is the vector between the ground and satellite.

Cheers

[briansun1]

probably wont help but

you cauld use all the help you can get

[HoY]

Btw, you can still use kerbtown to do every part of your plan, except perhaps the faked in sprite cable. The orbiting satellite can be placed on the surface of kerbin at the exact same location as the base station, only offset the proper altitude. Kerbtown also let's you teleport kerbals, in case you wanted to just have them step into an elevator on the ground and step off of the elevator at the orbiting station instead.

[KhaosCorp]

Kerbtown is limited however, as objects can only go out to roughly 300km before they are clipped. So you can use a space elevator to get to space, but not to geosync orbit.

Um wrong....

There are ways around that, mostly to do with collider size..it theoreticaly possible to make a space elevator that reaches the very end of kerbins SoI with kerbtown if you do it right.

Also alot that can be done with rigid bodies to prevent clipping issues with craft/kerbals...

Best bet for space elevator is gonna be to use KerbTown and make the contraption in sections.

Edited October 5, 2013 by KhaosCorp

[Nachtwind]

Btw, you can still use kerbtown to do every part of your plan, except perhaps the faked in sprite cable. The orbiting satellite can be placed on the surface of kerbin at the exact same location as the base station, only offset the proper altitude. Kerbtown also let's you teleport kerbals, in case you wanted to just have them step into an elevator on the ground and step off of the elevator at the orbiting station instead.

Yesno.. thats some solution we thought about and while Arran is going that way, especially while creating a very very fine model for the base station we also approach this in two ways. His approach will be to use Kerbtown for a set System while mine will be to have parts available for using in "normal" rockets. That gives us the opportunety to have the simplicity of the Kerbtown method for those who want it and a way to create a space elevator the "oldfashioned" way by placing a geostationary satellite by hand. This also is a nice chance to build such elevates not only on kerbin but also Duna and every celestial body that a geostationary orbit within SOI.

The beauty is that those approaches seem compatible enough to follow them both so in the end we hope to achieve a mod that can be used by everyone who wants a space elevator.

[HoY]

Sounds good also, it may or may not be common knowledge, but you can place objects on any and every celestial body, not just Kerbin

[Nachtwind]

Sounds good also, it may or may not be common knowledge, but you can place objects on any and every celestial body, not just Kerbin

I didnt know that. But thats interestering.

[Nephf]

Well, this will only make sence for an elevator to a geo-syncronus orbit.

[sopwerdna]

So... if I'm understanding this right, the only barrier to making a working space elevator in KSP is the absence of something that can winch a vehicle up or down a rope (a minor problem), and more importantly, the practical problems with computers. In other words, the real barrier is just bugginess with objects that are both in space and in atmosphere at the same time. Is that correct?

[fafeman]

Actually, if you calculate the rate of geo-sync orbit to the height, you can, effectively, use Kerbtown to have a static object synced with the SOI by default, and have it be realistic. Now, I'm trying to get this done currently with KerbTown, but I'm having a bit of an issue with Unity. Either way, I was almost done by the time I encountered it. For a less visually appealing objective, you could have 2 models, one in orbit with the elevator going up and down to a point, and one on the ground, going up and down to a point. At each of the points, however, it cuts off to preserve computing power, space, and time(for me). I have it animated and all, I just need some help with the manual's instructions. Could anyone help? If so, please tell me so.

[The Destroyer]

Blast from the past- I remember this. Not sure if it's dead or not.

[Gryphorim]

What about making a part that forces ship it's attached to, to be over the KSC (or some other landmark, or a base-station part.) at all times, in effect dragging the ship into a perfect geosynch orbit. Perhaps using similar code to the old orbital construction or hyperedit code. This then becomes the "counterweight" or "space-station" part. One or both of these parts could be configured to procedurally produce the cable in a similar manner to a strut, but with ends at the limit of draw distance from each part. A "climber" part would then spawn at the base station, and ascend or descend by moving "on rails" using similar code as the spaceborne part uses for station-keeping.

[fafeman]

As mentioned before, it lags the game out when having an object actually go up and down a cable visually. Instead, I propose that we use KerbTown to just set an object in a geosync orbit with the space center, as a launch pad. I'm currently looking into this. I'm also currently having issues with Kerbtown not letting my game object show up in the 'Available Assets' list when I boot up the game.

Edited January 2, 2014 by fafeman