[WIP] Nert's Dev Thread - Current: various updates

[RedParadize]

6 hours ago, Nertea said:

Sorry? I don't quite understand, the reaction products mode definitely has lower thrust.

Exactly! One mode is named reaction products and the other low trust.

6 hours ago, Nertea said:

You're saying that when you add a dual mode engine in the VAB it shows heat from both modes in the SystemHeat information?

Humm, I see two trust limiter bar when I add the engine or duplicate it... But you are right it doesn't seem to affect the heat generation. My bad, its just a display bug.

6 hours ago, Nertea said:

Added in NFP, I think.

Looking at config it is indeed in NFP... Seems like Kerbalism remove it. Gonna fix that on my end.
 

[Nertea]

17 hours ago, RedParadize said:

Exactly! One mode is named reaction products and the other low trust.

On 11/28/2020 at 10:21 PM, Nertea said:

Ah, maybe it's not clear to people who don't know the physics that 'reaction products' is always the lowest possible thrust. 

 

Anyways, new part mostly completedand coming in the next version...

Edited November 30, 2020 by Nertea

[Clamp-o-Tron]

Just now, Nertea said:

Ah, maybe it's not clear to people who don't know the physics that 'reaction products' is always the lowest possible thrust. 

 

Anyways, new part mostly completedand coming in the next version...

Helium-3 sifter?

[Terrestris]

47 minutes ago, Nertea said:

Brilliant!

[ra4nd0m]

6 hours ago, Nertea said:

Anyways, new part mostly completedand coming in the next version...

This thing really stands out from the rest of the lineup. It looks like it is from some kind of colonisation or factory mod.

[Starhelperdude]

6 hours ago, Nertea said:

Ah, maybe it's not clear to people who don't know the physics that 'reaction products' is always the lowest possible thrust. 

 

Anyways, new part mostly completedand coming in the next version...

amazing regolith shifter! will we need to drive around or does it work with full efficiency on stand still?

[Idleness]

Umm, wow.  If that's a Kerbal-sized catwalk in the lower right that is enormous!

[RedParadize]

Given the size and orientation of the ladder that seem to deploy a really huge mining rig. No idea what is its specific purpose but I like it. I like that it isn't cylindrical, I wish we had more part that. After all once in spaaaace most stuff don't need to be rocket shaped. Can we have more of cubic part?

[Nertea]

4 hours ago, ra4nd0m said:

This thing really stands out from the rest of the lineup. It looks like it is from some kind of colonisation or factory mod.

It is aligned with the color scheme of the (re)stock drills.

3 hours ago, Idleness said:

Umm, wow.  If that's a Kerbal-sized catwalk in the lower right that is enormous!

The 'box' on the right is about 3.75m long. So one kerbal can climb the catwalk but it's a little wide.

5 minutes ago, RedParadize said:

Given the size and orientation of the ladder that seem to deploy a really huge mining rig. No idea what is its specific purpose but I like it. I like that it isn't cylindrical, I wish we had more part that. After all once in spaaaace most stuff don't need to be rocket shaped. Can we have more of cubic part?

Lol, probably not from me, though I do try to make sure there are less cylindrical versions of most things I make these days (e.g the atmospheric harvesters).

[Nertea]

So, bit of an update on the thermal issues. I've decide to solve the problem with two changes

1. Rework engine heat output to be less physically based and more engine mass based, so required radiator mass is effectively some fraction of the propulsion system mass. This will be (relatively) consistent between classes of engines. Overall this doesn't change the total amount of radiator mass required that much for most engines, some win a little, some lose a little. 
   • Low mass flow engines will require 30-40% of their mass in radiators
   • High mass flow engines will require 20-25% of their mass in radiators
   • 'Thermal' fission engines will require 50-60% of their mass in radiators
2. Decrease radiator capabilities by 50%, but also cut mass by 50% - this will result in ships that look more what I want, but with pretty much the same vessel performance. This comes out of an error in the previous radiator power calculation, which assumed the radiator worked at maximum temperature along its whole length, which is very unrealistic. 

[Captain Sierra]

I was actually doing some spreadsheet math & testing out various propulsion combinations a few days ago (before finals decided to shut down my free time) and yeah, the radiator paneling required versus old-FFT is actually pretty low. 3-4 of the static graphene panels were enough in most cases.

46 minutes ago, Nertea said:

Decrease radiator capabilities by 50%, but also cut mass by 50%

Considering how surprisingly heavy those graphene panels are, I see nothing wrong with this. In terms of the engine heat output, it makes sense the magnetic confinement fusion engines need to lose. Those used to be very toasty in older versions and are surprisingly cold now for containing the power of a miniature sun! Unsure about the pulsed engines. I imagine they don't absorb much heat from the nuclear reaction and you're primarily cooling the lasers & capacitor arrays. I will eagerly await the new configs, and then proceed to comment excessively on them.  

[RedParadize]

@Nertea Do you plan on adding He3 production/extraction? I have read that there is low He3 concentration in moon regolith. Alternatively it could be produced trough fusion.

[Clamp-o-Tron]

20 minutes ago, RedParadize said:

@Nertea Do you plan on adding He3 production/extraction? I have read that there is low He3 concentration in moon regolith. Alternatively it could be produced trough fusion.

That's what I think the mystery part is for.

[RedParadize]

@Clamp-o-TronI trough about that too. Would be nice to have a alternative to Jool extraction.

In the main time, I changed my aproach about Jool extraction, (at 6.4x size its quite a challenge). Instead of slowing down by 8km/s to avoid burning I now dive into the atmosphere like a hammer. With the amount of trust that engine have the massive 50m/s of drag isn't really a problem. That heat shield is so OP...

Edited December 1, 2020 by RedParadize

[Nertea]

2 hours ago, RedParadize said:

@Nertea Do you plan on adding He3 production/extraction? I have read that there is low He3 concentration in moon regolith. Alternatively it could be produced trough fusion.

Yes, that's what ye enormous harvester is for.

1 hour ago, RedParadize said:

@Clamp-o-TronI trough about that too. Would be nice to have a alternative to Jool extraction.

In the main time, I changed my aproach about Jool extraction, (at 6.4x size its quite a challenge). Instead of slowing down by 8km/s to avoid burning I now dive into the atmosphere like a hammer. With the amount of trust that engine have the massive 50m/s of drag isn't really a problem. That heat shield is so OP...
 

I love it.

But it occurs to me that the harvester should check for air in front of it before working  

[RedParadize]

Just now, Nertea said:

Yes, that's what ye enormous harvester is for.

I love it.

But it occurs to me that the harvester should check for air in front of it before working  

I trough you would say that! I have another model where the intake is much more to the rear, If you gonna add occlusion it kind of need to take into account at what distance it would work.

@NerteaBtw, Falloff definitively do not work, I mean that line:

altFalloffType = Linear

Also Does the altitude have a hard cap ? it seem that not value above 200000 work:
altUpperBound = 280000

 

 

[Nertea]

24 minutes ago, RedParadize said:

I trough you would say that! I have another model where the intake is much more to the rear, If you gonna add occlusion it kind of need to take into account at what distance it would work.

@NerteaBtw, Falloff definitively do not work, I mean that line:

altFalloffType = Linear

Also Does the altitude have a hard cap ? it seem that not value above 200000 work:
altUpperBound = 280000

 

 

Can you provide a full example of the config you are testing so I can take a look? Also, better to put it in the SpaceDust thread. 

[Captain Sierra]

5 hours ago, RedParadize said:

@Clamp-o-TronI trough about that too. Would be nice to have a alternative to Jool extraction.

In the main time, I changed my aproach about Jool extraction, (at 6.4x size its quite a challenge). Instead of slowing down by 8km/s to avoid burning I now dive into the atmosphere like a hammer. With the amount of trust that engine have the massive 50m/s of drag isn't really a problem. That heat shield is so OP...

Ah yes ....  

This is perhaps the one case where the old radial mounting style was actually more useful. But I love the insanity of it.

[Nertea]

This one might be a bit buggy. 

There's a few known issues with the Regolith Processor:

• Bogey wheels don't spin. Might generally be too much effort. 
• KSP mirroring is poopy. Some things might go wrong with mirroring (effects and such). I may need to switch to a left/right variant version instead of the stock mirroring, my hacks are not totally working 
• The CRP LqdHe3 distributions are broken, which means the processor is currently useless. I'll try to get a fix into CRP, but if that takes too long I'll do something patchy here.

Other than that... 0.9.6:

• Updated SystemHeat to 0.2.0
• Updated SpaceDust to 0.2.1
• Updated Waterfall to 0.2.7
• Added PK-DUST Regolith Processing System: drilling system for collecting Helium 3
• Aligned some localization terminology with SystemHeat
• Renamed Fissionable Particles to Fission Fragments (Frag) to reduce confusion
• Renamed Low Thrust mode on Fresnel to Afterburner to reduce confusion
• Fixed Nova using obsolete FissionTargets insteat of FissionPellets
• Capped Shock Cone intake levels on Hoover at Mach 12
• Hoover can now be surface attached
• Adjusted Frisbee heat levels, now about 25% of previous and are completely eliminated with 15 radiator segments
• Added description notes to indicate radiator scaling to Frisbee
• Tuned heat on all engines: scaled in distinct bins to engine mass ratios depending on nature of the engine:
  • Most low mass flow engines require 40% of their mass in radiator capacity
  • Higher mass flow engines require 25% of their mass
  • 'Thermal' fission engines (FFRE/NSWR) require 60% of their mass
• Reduced Clarke thrust to 12 kN from 20 kN
• Reduced Asimov mass from 22 to 18 t
• Added Lithium refinement to ISRUs, disabled when NFP is installed

 

[Starhelperdude]

LOL I dreamed today of the regolith processor even before I read that it is already there, I swear 

Edited December 2, 2020 by Starhelperdude
tiping mistake

[RedParadize]

Truly awesome! Is He3 everywhere or it isn't placed yet?

 

[Nertea]

3 hours ago, RedParadize said:

Truly awesome! Is He3 everywhere or it isn't placed yet?

 

 

12 hours ago, Nertea said:

• The CRP LqdHe3 distributions are broken, which means the processor is currently useless. I'll try to get a fix into CRP, but if that takes too long I'll do something patchy here.

 

 

[CDSlice]

So here are my thoughts on some of the various engines in FFT. I am using a fairly simple 3.75m interplanetary ship as the payload and attaching various engines to the back to see how they perform. This is also from the perspective of a science mode player, as such cost of the engines or fuel won't really be a factor in my analysis.

The ship in question:

Spoiler

• The Hammertong seems rather pathetic, especially for a true endgame engine in a 10k science node in the CTT. Although it is easy to get over 1M dV with it, your TWR is going to be around 0.02. This seems unreasonably bad gameplay wise, even with persistent thrust or a higher physical time warp making interplanetary burns with this thing is going to take absolutely forever. The high thrust mode is even more useless since you lose a massive amount of dV and in return you get an amazing, game-changing 0.05 TWR. That TWR is pretty much just as bad as 0.02 is gameplay wise and you give up the one thing the Hammertong was good at by losing so much dV. The only things this engine has going for it is that it shouldn't be as hard to launch into space as some of the other engines since it isn't as long and that its fuel is really light and easy to ship from Kerbin to refill it. Other than that unless I needed something with a massive amount of dV to go intersteller and for some reason I didn't want to use my 10k in science to unlock the Frisbee I wouldn't ever use this engine, ain't nobody got time to mess around with a 0.02 TWR craft. 
• Spoiler

  

• The Fresnel is very interesting. Although it isn't as efficient as the Hammertong, it is still really easy to get 800k dV while still maintaining a 0.12 TWR at max engine length. Although this TWR isn't great, it is much more manageable than the Hammertong's 0.02-0.04 TWR and is comparable to some of the more insane NERVA setups in stock, just with way more dV. The Fresnel also is unlocked a node prior to the Hammertong in a 4k science node. The shorter engine lengths are kind of weird since you lose both dV and thrust which means that there is only one reason not to just extend the Fresnel to 22m and load up with fusion fuel. That reason is launching such a long engine is going to be an absolute pain, even with NFLV 7.5m parts. However I wouldn't bother going shorter than 18m or maybe 14m with this engine since you quickly start to approach Hammertong levels of terribly low TWR without the insane dV of the Hammertong. I would probably considerer building a large interplanetary vessel around this engine. 
  Spoiler

  

• The A-134NG "Casaba" could be a really good engine, alas at the moment it is limited by its limited supply of ablator to only around 36k dV with a TWR of 0.33 which makes it merely good. This engine could still find a niche in serving as say a transport between Kerbin and Jool or beyond depending on which planet packs you have, but the ablator is not replaceable so  this engine has a pretty limited lifetime.  This makes you have to replace the engines in your Casaba powered transports back home at Kerbin instead of being able to refine more fuel at your destination.  When compared to the Fresnel which is in a node that costs the same amount of science to unlock (4k), this engine has a better TWR but the Fresnel has much better dV and the ability to get more fuel via ISRU if you manage to run out.  Which one to pick probably depends on your mission profile, if you want to reuse your ship for future missions without returning to Kerbin for a new engine or need more dV than the Casaba can provide the Fresnel wins. If you are planning on a mission that fits in the dV budget that the Casaba is limited to, willing to spend the science costs on antimatter, and are returning to Kerbin at the end of your mission or want a one way trip without wanting to use the vessel later the Casaba is probably the better option since it will be smaller with less parts which makes it easier to launch into orbit and dock with your craft and it has a good bit higher TWR which will make maneuvers easier and more accurate. The only change I would like is to have the ability to replace the engine's ablator in the field so that it can be reused once the ablator runs out, other than that it is a fairly nice engine. 
  Spoiler

  

   

• The Frisbee is absolutely insane. This engine is able to get 1.2M+ dV with a 1.98 TWR!!! This is the endgame engine, with only two weaknesses. The first weakness is that this baby needs a ton of antimatter, and this much antimatter costs a ton of science. That means you either have to set up antimatter collection ships around Jool or wherever which can take awhile and is annoying to ship the antimatter back to Kerbin or you need to set up an antimatter factory which has its own issues. The second problem with this engine is that it is HUGE. Even at half the max length at 44m (which is the shortest length I can still get cooled properly with the graphene microchannel radiators, this thing is going to be horrible to lug into orbit. In fact I'm not sure if anyone here has done so, all of the screenshots I've seen were of ships cheated into orbit. This is where I think that the previous idea of splitting the engine and radiator segments up could help since then each piece would be manageable to stick on top of a 7.5m rocket and send to orbit. With the help of Konstruction these parts would be combined into one assembly as if they had been directly connected in the VAB. However, since Nertea does not want to do this I am unsure of how else to get one of these bad boys into orbit.
  Spoiler

  

• The JR-15 Discovery works pretty well as an early-ish fusion engine. It's unlocked in a 2.25k science node so it is pretty accessible and has pretty good performance compared to what you had before. It is pretty easy to get 100k dV with a 0.09 TWR which again isn't amazing but around the same or a little bit better than the best electrical engines like the VW-10k VASIMR with around 10x the dV. Not really much else to say about this engine, it seems like a pretty good upgrade once you unlock while not being so OP that the latter engines are garbage.  
  Spoiler

  

• The X-6 Clark has such low thrust it doesn't make sense to use on a big craft so I am not going to compare it to these engines.
• The X-7 Asimov in reaction products mode is also fairly useless for large crafts with a pitiful thrust and dV that looks more like one of the electric engines from NFP than a far future engine. However, in afterburning mode this engine transforms into a beast. This engine can give a very large amount of dV with useful thrust. I was able to get 180k dV with a 0.19 TWR which again isn't amazing thrust but isn't so low that you can't do Hohmann transfers. It also utterly destroys the JR-15 with both higher dV and a higher TWR while costing the same amount of science to unlock. This may actually be the most well rounded engine in the mod since it lets you get a very large amount of dV, have pretty good thrust, isn't super hard to refuel as long as you have an atmosphere with hydrogen available,  and won't be insane to launch.
  Spoiler

  

• The X-20 Verne is an OK engine in the 2.25k science tier for larger crafts, however the X-7 pretty much curbstomps it. I was only able to get around 50k dV before the TWR dropped below 0.2 which means that the X-7 lets you have over 3x as much dV for the same TWR. The one advantage the X-20 has is that its fuel can be completely refined from ore without needed a hydrogenated atmosphere to extract liquid hydrogen from, however this seems like a pretty niche use case. 
  Spoiler

  

• The X-2 Nuclear Saltwater Rocket is actually kind of bad when compared to the X-7 or even the X-20. I was only able to get around 34.7k dV before the TWR dropped to 0.20 which is way worse than the X-7 and not even as good as the X-20. I'm pretty surprised by this since everything I've read in this thread suggests that the X-2 should be massively OP which it just isn't, at least for 3.75m interplanetary crafts.
  Spoiler

  

 

So that's my thoughts on the engines in FFT. I think the balance could use a little work, the X-7 Asimov in afterburning mode seems to be pretty OP compared to the other engines in its tier and the Hammertong seems like a trash tier engine, at least for my play style. The X-2 NSWR also seems pretty weak which surprised me, I was expecting something much more powerful based off of the comments so far.

 

I do have a question though. How are we supposed to launch some of these engines into orbit? Especially the really long engines like the Hammertong, and the Frisbee and to a lesser extent the Fresnel seem to be far too large to launch with even the 7.5m parts in NFLV, especially in JNSQ. The antimatter factory shares this problem, weighing 96 tons and being incredibly long which makes it nearly impossible to launch on top of a rocket without the whole thing snapping apart even with struts and autostrut. None of my attempts have succeeded yet anyway, even with my more Kerbal designs to make it fit in the VAB and not collapse under its own weight.

(yes those are all vectors under 7.5m tanks)

[Terrestris]

6 minutes ago, CDSlice said:

In fact I'm not sure if anyone here has done so, all of the screenshots I've seen were of ships cheated into orbit. This is where I think that the previous idea of splitting the engine and radiator segments up could help since then each piece would be manageable to stick on top of a 7.5m rocket and send to orbit. With the help of Konstruction these parts would be combined into one assembly as if they had been directly connected in the VAB. However, since Nertea does not want to do this I am unsure of how else to get one of these bad boys into orbit.

Try EPL or Global Construction to build ships in orbit.

[WarriorSabe]

10 minutes ago, CDSlice said:

So here are my thoughts on some of the various engines in FFT. I am using a fairly simple 3.75m interplanetary ship as the payload and attaching various engines to the back to see how they perform. This is also from the perspective of a science mode player, as such cost of the engines or fuel won't really be a factor in my analysis.

The ship in question:

  Reveal hidden contents

• The Hammertong seems rather pathetic, especially for a true endgame engine in a 10k science node in the CTT. Although it is easy to get over 1M dV with it, your TWR is going to be around 0.02. This seems unreasonably bad gameplay wise, even with persistent thrust or a higher physical time warp making interplanetary burns with this thing is going to take absolutely forever. The high thrust mode is even more useless since you lose a massive amount of dV and in return you get an amazing, game-changing 0.05 TWR. That TWR is pretty much just as bad as 0.02 is gameplay wise and you give up the one thing the Hammertong was good at by losing so much dV. The only things this engine has going for it is that it shouldn't be as hard to launch into space as some of the other engines since it isn't as long and that its fuel is really light and easy to ship from Kerbin to refill it. Other than that unless I needed something with a massive amount of dV to go intersteller and for some reason I didn't want to use my 10k in science to unlock the Frisbee I wouldn't ever use this engine, ain't nobody got time to mess around with a 0.02 TWR craft. 
•   Reveal hidden contents

  

• The Fresnel is very interesting. Although it isn't as efficient as the Hammertong, it is still really easy to get 800k dV while still maintaining a 0.12 TWR at max engine length. Although this TWR isn't great, it is much more manageable than the Hammertong's 0.02-0.04 TWR and is comparable to some of the more insane NERVA setups in stock, just with way more dV. The Fresnel also is unlocked a node prior to the Hammertong in a 4k science node. The shorter engine lengths are kind of weird since you lose both dV and thrust which means that there is only one reason not to just extend the Fresnel to 22m and load up with fusion fuel. That reason is launching such a long engine is going to be an absolute pain, even with NFLV 7.5m parts. However I wouldn't bother going shorter than 18m or maybe 14m with this engine since you quickly start to approach Hammertong levels of terribly low TWR without the insane dV of the Hammertong. I would probably considerer building a large interplanetary vessel around this engine. 
    Reveal hidden contents

  

• The A-134NG "Casaba" could be a really good engine, alas at the moment it is limited by its limited supply of ablator to only around 36k dV with a TWR of 0.33 which makes it merely good. This engine could still find a niche in serving as say a transport between Kerbin and Jool or beyond depending on which planet packs you have, but the ablator is not replaceable so  this engine has a pretty limited lifetime.  This makes you have to replace the engines in your Casaba powered transports back home at Kerbin instead of being able to refine more fuel at your destination.  When compared to the Fresnel which is in a node that costs the same amount of science to unlock (4k), this engine has a better TWR but the Fresnel has much better dV and the ability to get more fuel via ISRU if you manage to run out.  Which one to pick probably depends on your mission profile, if you want to reuse your ship for future missions without returning to Kerbin for a new engine or need more dV than the Casaba can provide the Fresnel wins. If you are planning on a mission that fits in the dV budget that the Casaba is limited to, willing to spend the science costs on antimatter, and are returning to Kerbin at the end of your mission or want a one way trip without wanting to use the vessel later the Casaba is probably the better option since it will be smaller with less parts which makes it easier to launch into orbit and dock with your craft and it has a good bit higher TWR which will make maneuvers easier and more accurate. The only change I would like is to have the ability to replace the engine's ablator in the field so that it can be reused once the ablator runs out, other than that it is a fairly nice engine. 
    Reveal hidden contents

  

   

• The Frisbee is absolutely insane. This engine is able to get 1.2M+ dV with a 1.98 TWR!!! This is the endgame engine, with only two weaknesses. The first weakness is that this baby needs a ton of antimatter, and this much antimatter costs a ton of science. That means you either have to set up antimatter collection ships around Jool or wherever which can take awhile and is annoying to ship the antimatter back to Kerbin or you need to set up an antimatter factory which has its own issues. The second problem with this engine is that it is HUGE. Even at half the max length at 44m (which is the shortest length I can still get cooled properly with the graphene microchannel radiators, this thing is going to be horrible to lug into orbit. In fact I'm not sure if anyone here has done so, all of the screenshots I've seen were of ships cheated into orbit. This is where I think that the previous idea of splitting the engine and radiator segments up could help since then each piece would be manageable to stick on top of a 7.5m rocket and send to orbit. With the help of Konstruction these parts would be combined into one assembly as if they had been directly connected in the VAB. However, since Nertea does not want to do this I am unsure of how else to get one of these bad boys into orbit.
    Reveal hidden contents

  

• The JR-15 Discovery works pretty well as an early-ish fusion engine. It's unlocked in a 2.25k science node so it is pretty accessible and has pretty good performance compared to what you had before. It is pretty easy to get 100k dV with a 0.09 TWR which again isn't amazing but around the same or a little bit better than the best electrical engines like the VW-10k VASIMR with around 10x the dV. Not really much else to say about this engine, it seems like a pretty good upgrade once you unlock while not being so OP that the latter engines are garbage.  
    Reveal hidden contents

  

• The X-6 Clark has such low thrust it doesn't make sense to use on a big craft so I am not going to compare it to these engines.
• The X-7 Asimov in reaction products mode is also fairly useless for large crafts with a pitiful thrust and dV that looks more like one of the electric engines from NFP than a far future engine. However, in afterburning mode this engine transforms into a beast. This engine can give a very large amount of dV with useful thrust. I was able to get 180k dV with a 0.19 TWR which again isn't amazing thrust but isn't so low that you can't do Hohmann transfers. It also utterly destroys the JR-15 with both higher dV and a higher TWR while costing the same amount of science to unlock. This may actually be the most well rounded engine in the mod since it lets you get a very large amount of dV, have pretty good thrust, isn't super hard to refuel as long as you have an atmosphere with hydrogen available,  and won't be insane to launch.
    Reveal hidden contents

  

• The X-20 Verne is an OK engine in the 2.25k science tier for larger crafts, however the X-7 pretty much curbstomps it. I was only able to get around 50k dV before the TWR dropped below 0.2 which means that the X-7 lets you have over 3x as much dV for the same TWR. The one advantage the X-20 has is that its fuel can be completely refined from ore without needed a hydrogenated atmosphere to extract liquid hydrogen from, however this seems like a pretty niche use case. 
    Reveal hidden contents

  

• The X-2 Nuclear Saltwater Rocket is actually kind of bad when compared to the X-7 or even the X-20. I was only able to get around 34.7k dV before the TWR dropped to 0.20 which is way worse than the X-7 and not even as good as the X-20. I'm pretty surprised by this since everything I've read in this thread suggests that the X-2 should be massively OP which it just isn't, at least for 3.75m interplanetary crafts.
    Reveal hidden contents

  

 

So that's my thoughts on the engines in FFT. I think the balance could use a little work, the X-7 Asimov in afterburning mode seems to be pretty OP compared to the other engines in its tier and the Hammertong seems like a trash tier engine, at least for my play style. The X-2 NSWR also seems pretty weak which surprised me, I was expecting something much more powerful based off of the comments so far.

 

I do have a question though. How are we supposed to launch some of these engines into orbit? Especially the really long engines like the Hammertong, and the Frisbee and to a lesser extent the Fresnel seem to be far too large to launch with even the 7.5m parts in NFLV, especially in JNSQ. The antimatter factory shares this problem, weighing 96 tons and being incredibly long which makes it nearly impossible to launch on top of a rocket without the whole thing snapping apart even with struts and autostrut. None of my attempts have succeeded yet anyway, even with my more Kerbal designs to make it fit in the VAB and not collapse under its own weight.

(yes those are all vectors under 7.5m tanks)

I think your TWR expectations are pretty high. In stock parts, an average Nerv ship would be 0.1 to 0.15 TWR and an ion ship around 0.02-0.05, so considering that, rather than the crazy high 0.5 TWR that you seem to prefer, they're really pretty fine thrust-wise. You've just got to learn the way of the low TWR; even 0.01 is perfectly functional 

Just my two cents