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

[CDSlice]

15 minutes ago, WarriorSabe said:

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

I've flown my fair share of 0.1 TWR Nerv ships which is why I said that the Fresnel and Discovery were pretty good engines, flying them is like flying a Nerv ship except with way more dV. I have not and will not use ion engines for anything other than probes, once you get to that low TWR everything takes absolutely forever and you can't do things like Hohmann transfers. Stratzenblitz may be OK with spending 2 hours doing 43 periapsis kicks to do a planetary transfer but there is no way I'm doing that. I also never said that I needed the engines to have like 0.5 TWR, in fact I complemented the X-7 Asimov and the Casaba for how good their TWR was at 0.19 and 0.33 respectively. Really the Hammertong is the only engine I think has TWR issues and that is mostly because it is supposed to be an endgame engine that takes 10k science to unlock while having a pathetic TWR that is unplayable for me while at the same time the Fresnel has a much better TWR along with a massive amount of dV in the previous tech tree node.

[WarriorSabe]

1 minute ago, CDSlice said:

I've flown my fair share of 0.1 TWR Nerv ships which is why I said that the Fresnel and Discovery were pretty good engines, flying them is like flying a Nerv ship except with way more dV. I have not and will not use ion engines for anything other than probes, once you get to that low TWR everything takes absolutely forever and you can't do things like Hohmann transfers. Stratzenblitz may be OK with spending 2 hours doing 43 periapsis kicks to do a planetary transfer but there is no way I'm doing that. I also never said that I needed the engines to have like 0.5 TWR, in fact I complemented the X-7 Asimov and the Casaba for how good their TWR was at 0.19 and 0.33 respectively. Really the Hammertong is the only engine I think has TWR issues and that is mostly because it is supposed to be an endgame engine that takes 10k science to unlock while having a pathetic TWR that is unplayable for me while at the same time the Fresnel has a much better TWR along with a massive amount of dV in the previous tech tree node.

Oh, alright, I had gotten the impression that you found even the 0.33 low but the dV worth it. Still, 0.02 isn't *that* bad; I only usually need maybe a half-dozen kicks or just over and (interplanetary) hohmann transfers work fine down to much lower TWR's than that. I don't have too much trouble with it.

[CDSlice]

1 minute ago, WarriorSabe said:

Oh, alright, I had gotten the impression that you found even the 0.33 low but the dV worth it. Still, 0.02 isn't *that* bad; I only usually need maybe a half-dozen kicks or just over and (interplanetary) hohmann transfers work fine down to much lower TWR's than that. I don't have too much trouble with it.

Yeah what I was criticizing the Casaba for was having only around 30k-40k dV before the whole engine needs to be replaced which when compared to the rest of the engines in this mod isn't that much. I didn't mean to imply that the TWR was bad. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on the Hammertong.

[WarriorSabe]

6 minutes ago, CDSlice said:

Yeah what I was criticizing the Casaba for was having only around 30k-40k dV before the whole engine needs to be replaced which when compared to the rest of the engines in this mod isn't that much. I didn't mean to imply that the TWR was bad. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on the Hammertong.

Well, on the Casaba thing, I want to say it's supposed to be refurbishable in-flight with the atomic smelter or something and that just doesn't work/isn't implemented yet. Unless plans changed and I didn't notice

[NHunter]

1 hour ago, CDSlice said:

I am unsure of how else to get one of these bad boys into orbit.

While still not a stock solution, you can use Extraplanetary Launchpad or a similar mod to build the ship in space (bleh, you'll need to ship 300+ tons of rocket parts up there) or on a low-gravity moon and then launch it into orbit with decouple-able engines. Just like Dr.Lxweei suggested.

With NFLV, you might be able to launch it by sticking it between 2-3-however-many stacks of rockets with mounting point being up and between stacks with Frisbee hanging down from there (with lots of struts to keep it in place until released in orbit). Yes, this is something that will not work in real life, but meh.

1 hour ago, CDSlice said:

The X-7 Asimov in reaction products mode is also fairly useless for large crafts with a pitiful thrust

I've actually come to love stacking three of those together using one of NFLV engine mounts and some offset tooling. Can get 0.1 TWR - yeah, not something to write home about, but you can play with that even without persistent thrust - for a 160 ton ship in reaction products like that with some quite good dV to boot. The only real issue with such a configuration is that it is somewhat attractive to kraken and depending on its mood might just shake itself apart as soon as you try to change ship's orientation in space.

1 hour ago, CDSlice said:

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

Nuclear smelter part allows you to rebuild ablator on the engine. Yeah, you'll have to lug around that big heavy part - and maybe some ore tanks as well - but it will let you refuel the engine.

1 hour ago, CDSlice said:

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.

It works well in atmosphere, though, unlike most of the other engines offered by FFT. So, assuming you're okay with causing an ecological disaster (in roleplay, at least), you can make a single-stage-surface-to-anywhere NSWR-powered ship.

[RedParadize]

Regarding Trust, I can live with a acceleration of 2ms. Under that planetary orbital maneuver start to be really messy, you can't just go higher before doing interplanetary transfer, you have to do it in multiple pass. I play with kerbalism and scale at 6.4x. That mean crewed transit time is really important. But anything above 200k dV is excessive (unless you have other stars to go to).

What I usually do is send material, supply and fuel separately at lower speed, sometimes with chemical or nuclear booster. Then send the crew at dash speed with dedicated fast taxi. That image predate X-6 Clark trust nerf but it still can fulfill that role. It's hard to see, but the engine can be disconnected and changed for a new one on destination:



Atm, I do not play a real campaign, I am just exploring option. From experience, multi millions spacecraft don't cut it. This is one of the major drawback of everything that use He3 atm as the fuel alone can cost a fortune. Until we get that beautiful regolith miner to work the only other option is Jool atmosphere. That cost also a millions to start extracting. Having Kerbalism installed mean that I can't expect a atmospheric scooping pipeline over Jool to work forever. Its fun to figure out how break even expense wise, its another kind of optimisation. I hope we get a bit more of that in KSP 2.

Edited December 3, 2020 by RedParadize

[Terrestris]

@Nertea

It seems that nuclear smelter are not willing to cooperate with System heat. Smelter can still function but not generating heat (5% efficiency forever).

Spam in console:

In editor:

NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
  at SystemHeat.ModuleSystemHeatConverter.GenerateHeatEditor () [0x00036] in <4f94d6b1a43b4b729dbcd659b6fe77c5>:0 
  at SystemHeat.ModuleSystemHeatConverter.FixedUpdate () [0x00047] in <4f94d6b1a43b4b729dbcd659b6fe77c5>:0 
UnityEngine.DebugLogHandler:Internal_LogException(Exception, Object)
UnityEngine.DebugLogHandler:LogException(Exception, Object)
ModuleManager.UnityLogHandle.InterceptLogHandler:LogException(Exception, Object)
UnityEngine.Logger:LogException(Exception, Object)
UnityEngine.Debug:CallOverridenDebugHandler(Exception, Object)

In flight:

NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
  at SystemHeat.ModuleSystemHeatConverter.GenerateHeatFlight () [0x00039] in <4f94d6b1a43b4b729dbcd659b6fe77c5>:0 
  at SystemHeat.ModuleSystemHeatConverter.FixedUpdate () [0x00012] in <4f94d6b1a43b4b729dbcd659b6fe77c5>:0 
UnityEngine.DebugLogHandler:Internal_LogException(Exception, Object)
UnityEngine.DebugLogHandler:LogException(Exception, Object)
ModuleManager.UnityLogHandle.InterceptLogHandler:LogException(Exception, Object)
UnityEngine.Logger:LogException(Exception, Object)
UnityEngine.Debug:CallOverridenDebugHandler(Exception, Object)

Same issuse when I trying to modify PlanetaryBaseInc's OSE ISRU to use SystemHeat module (Maybe I config it wrongly).

Log and Cache: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1MYr-hCbM_Fwext7w2NgZzfeAjTngpVm-?usp=sharing

[Starhelperdude]

12 hours ago, WarriorSabe said:

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

also Isn't the ''Hammertong'' more like an Interstellar Engine with really low thrust but in an interstellar matter it doesn't matter that much IMO

[Captain Sierra]

When you have hundreds of thousands of meters/second delta-V, you don't really do hohmann transfer orbits anymore. You set your target, position yourself in a higher kerbin orbit, and then burn towards target for 20k dV and fly brachistochrone to destination. Flip'n'burn welwala.

As for how to get a full-length antimatter torch to orbit in 2.5x/JNSQ, the solution involves a 7.5 meter cryogenic booster core with 7 hydrolox-patched Rhinos, four Clydesdales, and a truly absurd fairing.

full album here: https://imgur.com/a/Z7S4mCo

EDIT: I have an exam in 10 minutes but I do see the rest of the balance conversation and will get back to it.

EDIT 2:

Read up on most of the balancing discussion. The one thing I agree with out of all of it is that the X-20 Verne is on the weak side. I had a soft spot for fission zeta-pinch in old-FFT but in new-FFT it just can't compete at all with afterburning FFREs or thermal fusion engines. For crying out loud, the Casaba has better thermal properties than it does! Back in old-FFT it was good because it was very cheap electrically (lowish charge-up, no active power draw), used a stable fuel, and had low heat output. Currently Casaba has better heat output, cheaper electrical needs, and only a small amount of fuel instability for a markedly better performance envelope.  My balancing recommendations would be to either pull the mass down, or bring the thrust up (or both) to give it some kind of a niche (either that or the Casaba needs a nerf but I love that engine to so no plz).

Now with regard to balance, I know Nertea's mods are generally balanced against stock game, as best as you can balance against stock which is sometimes nonsensical. But if there was ever a mod that should be balanced for rescale/JNSQ/RSS and not stock, this is it. These aren't engines I foresee people using to get to stock Eeloo. These are engines for flying out to the moons of Nero in GPP 3.2x.

And regarding the whole orbital construction thing, there's EPL parts for SSPXr on Nertea's roadmap but they haven't been touched in three years (partly because IVAs are involved and I know how much he hates IVAs) and aren't exceptionally prioritized. This mod being the bringer of oversized drives, it would be nice if those came sometime soon but I'm not the one doing the work on it so they get done whenever they get done.

Edited December 3, 2020 by Captain Sierra

[Nertea]

 @CDSlice Thank you for the detailed analysis, regardless of how I proceed it is really great to get people's thoughts. Much appreciated.

I will try to add some comments to get into the specifics. 

19 hours ago, CDSlice said:

• 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. 

I agree it's not the most useful thing to use the higher thrust mode. Someone made a point that in career though, it massively decreases the operating cost of the engine as the He3 consumption goes down by 3/4. Overall, the way you're describing this engine is effectively how I intended it to be. Of course, that doesn't mean it's good gameplay so I'll take it under advisement. 

Side note: any statements comparing any of the regular engines to one of the three torches aren't very useful. The power levels can't really be reconciled. 

19 hours ago, CDSlice said:

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. 

This is getting to where I want it to be, after the few iterations we've had. 

19 hours ago, CDSlice said:

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.

This smells a little too good to me! I'll take a look.  The thrust might be too high. 

19 hours ago, CDSlice said:

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

I'll take a look at this one. 

19 hours ago, CDSlice said:

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

I don't think it's intended for 3.75m interplanetary crafts, it's more like lifting off from Tylo or similar. I believe comments about it center on the combination of small footprint and high TWR. 

19 hours ago, CDSlice said:

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.

I might end up decreasing the mass a bit. The goal is to make it fairly hard to accomplish 'guaranteed' production, and make it functionally very difficult to say, stick it on an actual ship and use during transit. 

19 hours ago, CDSlice said:

I've flown my fair share of 0.1 TWR Nerv ships which is why I said that the Fresnel and Discovery were pretty good engines, flying them is like flying a Nerv ship except with way more dV. I have not and will not use ion engines for anything other than probes, once you get to that low TWR everything takes absolutely forever and you can't do things like Hohmann transfers. 

Heh you might not totally align with me then :P. 

5 hours ago, Captain Sierra said:

Read up on most of the balancing discussion. The one thing I agree with out of all of it is that the X-20 Verne is on the weak side. I had a soft spot for fission zeta-pinch in old-FFT but in new-FFT it just can't compete at all with afterburning FFREs or thermal fusion engines. For crying out loud, the Casaba has better thermal properties than it does! Back in old-FFT it was good because it was very cheap electrically (lowish charge-up, no active power draw), used a stable fuel, and had low heat output. Currently Casaba has better heat output, cheaper electrical needs, and only a small amount of fuel instability for a markedly better performance envelope.  My balancing recommendations would be to either pull the mass down, or bring the thrust up (or both) to give it some kind of a niche (either that or the Casaba needs a nerf but I love that engine to so no plz).

 

Casaba should be the same as Verne but trades some mass for antimatter driving. 

16 hours ago, Dr.Lxweei said:

It seems that nuclear smelter are not willing to cooperate with System heat. Smelter can still function but not generating heat (5% efficiency forever).

 

Thanks I'll take a look. 

 

 

[CDSlice]

2 hours ago, Nertea said:

 @CDSlice Thank you for the detailed analysis, regardless of how I proceed it is really great to get people's thoughts. Much appreciated.

Thank you for responding to my feedback. I do think I was a bit too harsh on the Hammertong. I probably won't use it very much but it does seem to have its niche.

Also, I forgot to mention it in my previous post, but your models and textures are just gorgeous, thank you so much for doing all of this incredible work and giving it away to the community! Between you, CobaltWolf, and Beale, y'all have pretty much transformed KSP with your amazing parts. 

[Captain Sierra]

3 hours ago, Nertea said:

Casaba should be the same as Verne but trades some mass for antimatter driving. 

Casaba technically generates less heat but in practice both engines end up needing two of the large-size YF-8K deployable panels. As for the rest of the numbers, I slapped together an on-paper best case scenario for this. These values don't include electrical generation or battery storage, control cores or antennae, mission payload of any kind, or even structural frills to mount the radiators. This is engine, tank, radiator: the absolute best-case scenario. In real-game situations it can only get worse from here.

Casaba	Verne (1 tank)	Verne (14 tanks)
101k dV	28k dV	101k dV
59 tons	55 tons	304 tons
0.73-1.76 TWR	0.97-1.31 TWR	0.13-0.51 TWR
984k funds	967k funds	3,587k funds

So in that case, mission accomplished in all aspects except delta-V (which I suppose is to be expected). I also threw on enough tanks to get comparable delta-V, which involved fighting diminishing returns which get pretty nasty past 6-8 tanks and included those numbers. The moral of this is that the Verne is rather weak on the dV compared to most alternatives and once a relatively modest amount of antimatter is available, the Casaba just takes over in terms of performance (which is hardly surprising). Its TWR is more consistent but not stand-out in any way. That I think is the crux of its issue: it has nothing it can really do that something else can't do as well or better and without any huge trade-offs. Its not my balancing paradigm so I'm not 100% sure what it's niche should be here. My first thought was to cut the mass & the heat but I'm not sure where it needs to go and can't speculate on how to get it there.

Also I agree, Asimov afterburning is really strong, to the point there's no reason to ever use the reaction products mode. Fresnel and Discovery I think kinda suffer from this same problem of one mode being better than the other but the issue is far less pronounced than it is with X-7.

3 hours ago, Nertea said:

comparing any of the regular engines to one of the three torches aren't very useful.

Three torches? Antimatter torch ... linear fusion torch ... which one am I missing as being classified as a torch? FFRE afterburning?

EDIT: What about tech-bumping it down and maybe playing with the costs of both engine and the fission pellets? If it's doomed to being superseded by better fusion engines in a sandbox environment, perhaps its role as an early-availability endurance drive could be an option. Progression-wise we introduce the small magneto-inertial confinement fusion first which is barely better than electric plasma engines, then we introduce z-pinch as the first main long-haul drive, and then you start getting into the power of fusion tech.

Edited December 4, 2020 by Captain Sierra

[Nertea]

Coming soon to a release near you!

Axial-flow z-pinch fusion engine, get Fresnel reaction products mode-like impulse at much higher thrusts. Probably have an extra-high thrust mode too using LH2. Eats a lot of He3!

[CDSlice]

Pretty! Does it come with built in radiators like the Frisbee?

[Nertea]

34 minutes ago, CDSlice said:

Pretty! Does it come with built in radiators like the Frisbee?

Nah, these are like the builtin radiators on the Hammertong. Yes, they're there, they don't participate in the heat simulation because they operate at super high temperatures to keep the local shields from melting (typically they will dump some heat, but still need to shunt the bulk into the main radiators. 

[Captain Sierra]

3 hours ago, Nertea said:

Eats a lot of He3!

Does this mean it's going to have a different ratio of D-He3? Much like how the Hammertong has the deuterium-rich mode, this is going to have a similar ratio but guzzling helium?

 

On a semi-related note to this mod, PersistentThrust has been giving me no shortage of issues largely as a result of patching itself to engines that it has no right to be patching itself to, like jet engines. Most of this went away when I disabled its automatic universal patch and manually patched only the relevant engines. In my case, this includes the stock ion, all of NFP, the stock/ReStock+ NTRs, Kerbal Atomics NTRs (excluding the aerospikes), and every engine in this pack excluding the tokamak aerospike and the NSWR. If anyone wants this patch, or any mod's section thereof, I'm pasting it below. I don't know if its wise to bundle this as an extra with these mods as you have to first disable PersistentThrust's default patch. In any case, hope someone finds this useful:

// Stock parts (assumes RESTOCK is present for ion engine)
@PART[ionEngine]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = colorAnimation
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[nuclearEngine]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}

// RESTOCK+
@PART[restock-engine-cherenkov]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}

// Kerbal Atomics
@PART[ntr-sc-0625-1]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[ntr-sc-125-1]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[ntr-sc-125-2]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[ntr-sc-25-1]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[ntr-gc-25-1]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[ntr-gc-25-2]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}

// NF Propulsion
@PART[ionArgon-0625]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = ionArgon-0625-1-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[ionArgon-0625-2]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = ionArgon-0625-2-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[ionArgon-0625-3]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = ionArgon-0625-3-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[ionXenon-0625]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = ionXenon-0625-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[ionXenon-0625-2]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = ionXenon-0625-2-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[ionXenon-0625-3]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = ionXenon-0625-3-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[mpdt-0625]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = MPDT-0625-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[mpdt-125]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = MPDT-125-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[mpdt-25]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = MPDT-25-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[pit-0625]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = pit-0625-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[pit-125]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = pit-125-Throttle
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[pit-25]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = PIT-25-ThrottleA
        }
//	-MODULE[FXModuleAnimateThrottle] {}
}
@PART[vasimr-0625]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[vasimr-125]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[vasimr-25]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}

// FFT
@PART[fft-antimatter-*]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[fft-fission-zpinch-1]
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[fft-ffre-plasma-1]
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}@PART[fft-ffre-solid-1]
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
				throttleAnimationName = DrumSpin
        }
}
@PART[fft-fusion-inertial-*]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[fft-fusion-magnetic-mirror-1]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}
@PART[fft-fusion-magnetic-tokamak-1]
{
        MODULE
        {
                name = PersistentEngine
        }
}

 

EDIT: After reading a bit of Atomic Rockets, the axial-flow is the mythical third torch I couldn't figure out a few days ago isn't it... Goodie.  

Edited December 8, 2020 by Captain Sierra

[Terrestris]

12 hours ago, Nertea said:

Coming soon to a release near you!

Axial-flow z-pinch fusion engine, get Fresnel reaction products mode-like impulse at much higher thrusts. Probably have an extra-high thrust mode too using LH2. Eats a lot of He3!

I am interesting in stuff at the top left coner hahah 

[Nertea]

14 hours ago, Captain Sierra said:

Does this mean it's going to have a different ratio of D-He3? Much like how the Hammertong has the deuterium-rich mode, this is going to have a similar ratio but guzzling helium?

 

Nah, just that if your only exhaust products are D and He3, a high thrust will result in a high flow rate of expensive isotopes. 

4 hours ago, Dr.Lxweei said:

I am interesting in stuff at the top left coner hahah 

That's just the Fresnel hanging out

[Nertea]

We're on the home stretch. I want official release by christmas!

FFT 0.9.7

•  Updated SystemHeat to 0.2.2
•  Updated Waterfall to 0.2.8
•  Added JX-200 'Cascade' Axial Flow Z-Pinch Fusion Engine: endgame fusion engine with low and high thrust modes
•  Added an override to He3 concentrations from CRP
•  PK-DUST Regolith Processing System has been changed to use B9PS-based mirroring rather than stock, which should fix many issues
•  Fixed configurations of the Nuclear Smelter converter modules
•  Fixed missing ablator refurbish module on Nuclear Smelter
•  Fixed Discovery heat engine module duplication
•  Adjusted NSWR flare to use new Waterfall features and clip less
•  Added SystemHeat configs to the PK-ATMO and PK-EXO
•  Fixed some effects on the Frisbee
•  Increased Frisbee Antimatter:LH2 ratio from 1:1 to 2:1
•  Increased heat production of Asimov Afterbuner mode to 12.5 MW from 8 MW
•  Decreased thrust of Asimov Afterbuner mode to 250 kW from 300 kN
•  Moved Verne from Exotic Nuclear Propulsion to Experimental Nuclear Propulsion
•  Increased Verne thrust to 640 from 520 kN
•  Decreased Verne mass to 28 from 30t
   

This marks the end of what I had planned for features, so I would like to concentrate on bugfixing and won't be adding anything elsemajor. Two things I had considered adding in the last few days:

• Bringing back the AIM drive as a smaller form factor (2.5m) antimatter drive. I have an interesting concept for this in my head, which is why it's on the table. 
• Adding a smaller bulldozer form factor He3 harvester (one harverster 'box'). This depends on how well you people like He3 harvesting in general. 

Edited December 16, 2020 by Nertea

[toric5]

1 hour ago, Nertea said:

•  Increased Frisbee Antimatter:LH2 ratio from 1:1 to 2:1

This marks the end of what I had planned for features, so I would like to concentrate on bugfixing. Two things I had considered adding in the last few days:

• Bringing back the AIM drive as a smaller form factor (2.5m) antimatter drive. I have an interesting concept for this in my head, which is why it's on the table.

Is the AM ratio a typo? is the AM monoatomic antihydrogen, or are we expelling unreacted antimatter out of our engine. (or is it 1:2 and we are running a bit hydrogen-rich for thrust and cost reasons?)

 

Also, I completely forget what the AIM drive was. Antimatter Induced something?

[Nertea]

53 minutes ago, toric5 said:

Is the AM ratio a typo? is the AM monoatomic antihydrogen, or are we expelling unreacted antimatter out of our engine. (or is it 1:2 and we are running a bit hydrogen-rich for thrust and cost reasons?)

Antimatter density in CRP is not equivalent to LH2. It is much higher, so if you do a 1:1 ratio you are using tons more LH2 per antimatter by mass. A real 1:1 would be something like 10000:1.

edit: to clarify, Antimatter is 1 micrograms/unit. LH2 is 0.00007085 t/unit, or 70850000 micrograms per unit. So a 1:1 mass ratio would technically be 70850000 units of antimatter to 1 unit LH2. Obviously I don't want to go that far but hopefully this makes sense to you. 

  

53 minutes ago, toric5 said:

Also, I completely forget what the AIM drive was. Antimatter Induced something?

Antimatter initiated microfusion

 

 

Edited December 10, 2020 by Nertea

[Nertea]

I just pushed a small update as 0.9.8 to fix an utterly broken thing about the Cascade's heat generation.

[lemon cup]

On 12/10/2020 at 1:59 AM, Nertea said:

This depends on how well you people like He3 harvesting in general

Since CRP still isn't tracking He3 I haven't been able to do a lot of testing but the concept intrigues me. I think more than any other resource, it makes the most sense to set up Mun infrastructure for production and shipment of He3, on account of how costly a full tank of the stuff is when buying from KSC.

What remains to be seen is how resource distribution will go regarding ISRU. I've read that the two main sources of real-world He3 will be imbedded in Lunar regolith and in the atmospheres of gas giants. What I have not seen much talk of (probably since it's irrelevant to our current interests) is the presence of He3 on other airless bodies in the solar system. If planets such as Moho and Gilly have high concentrations of He3, which I believe they would, then a smaller regolith harvester would definitely come in handy for ISRU. Though I imagine  gas giant scooping would be the preferred method in the outer solar system. 
 

EDIT: After more research, it looks like Moho would be too hot to hold He3, but Gilly and Ike would probably be good candidates. 

Edited December 11, 2020 by lemon cup

[ra4nd0m]

This new engine is awesome! But I think that new tech tree node for fusion drives should be added.  Right now the Cascade is on the same node as the Ouroboros and Hammertong, and this totaly breaks balance, at least in science mode.

On 12/10/2020 at 12:29 AM, Nertea said:

Bringing back the AIM drive

Is this engine going to be smaller, more powerful Casaba? What science node is it going to occupy?

I think that I've found localization strings for Highly-Enriched NSWR in the file. Was it the original plan to add it insted of something else?

Edited December 11, 2020 by ra4nd0m

[Nertea]

20 hours ago, ra4nd0m said:

This new engine is awesome! But I think that new tech tree node for fusion drives should be added.  Right now the Cascade is on the same node as the Ouroboros and Hammertong, and this totaly breaks balance, at least in science mode.

On 12/9/2020 at 1:29 PM, Nertea said:

Yeah I meant to put it in Unified Field Theory. 

20 hours ago, ra4nd0m said:

Is this engine going to be smaller, more powerful Casaba? What science node is it going to occupy?

IRL it is a lower-thrust higher-impulse (60,000-90,000s) engine than a fission catalyzed. It would probably go in the Antimatter Power node too. 

20 hours ago, ra4nd0m said:

I think that I've found localization strings for Highly-Enriched NSWR in the file. Was it the original plan to add it insted of something else?

Sometimes I add unused localization strings as treats for observant viewers :). 

 

On 12/10/2020 at 7:55 PM, lemon cup said:

What remains to be seen is how resource distribution will go regarding ISRU. I've read that the two main sources of real-world He3 will be imbedded in Lunar regolith and in the atmospheres of gas giants. What I have not seen much talk of (probably since it's irrelevant to our current interests) is the presence of He3 on other airless bodies in the solar system. If planets such as Moho and Gilly have high concentrations of He3, which I believe they would, then a smaller regolith harvester would definitely come in handy for ISRU. Though I imagine  gas giant scooping would be the preferred method in the outer solar system. 

Hmm, did my override patch from the last version not work? I did test it for Kerbin and it seemed fine.