Kerbin Atmospheric Pressure

[AlamoVampire]

Okay, I decided in that since we have science coming out soon-ish to do a science experiment for all of us. We as players know that the end of Kerbins atmosphere is at 70,000 meters. BUT, did you know, that even though the atmosphere goes that far up, you actually hit the vacuum of space about 23,000 meters before that? Check this screen grab I got while launching a deep space communication satellite in preparations for .22 in the hopes that we keep our save files intact. Anyway, I turned on my pressure experiment prior to launch and watched the numbers. This was shocking:

as you can see, this thing is not even 47,000 meters up, and we are in a vacuum!

[Akinesis]

The sensor just isn't sensitive enough

[arq]

There is still atmosphere up there and there are still drag effects. It is just so thin that the instrument does not register it. The drag will only amount to a few kN at most, so it will take awhile to really notice it falling out of orbit.

[UmbralRaptor]

The stock barometer can't measure anything below ~10^-4 atmospheres. More sensitive instrumentation (eg: MechJeb) will show the actual pressure.

[AlamoVampire]

thing is, as soon as it said Vacuum I deployed my solar arrays and nothing broke off, so, while, yes, still in atmosphere, but 0 pressure, or rather, soo little pressure, it might as well be a vacuum. heck, even the ISS is IN atmosphere right now, its just soo slight as to have no real affect on the station.

either way, at 46km it is safe to deploy breakables

wow, ninja'd while getting this link XD

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Space_Station

[Crown]

In KSP there has to be a sharp edge to space (due to time warp). This is at about 69'000m meters. Anything else is calculated.

The pressure at 46'171m altitude at Kerbin ist:

.

This number is so tiny that the gauge can't display it. All scientific instruments have a 0.00 format to display their measurements. This pressure is just too tiny to display.

[AlamoVampire]

In KSP there has to be a sharp edge to space (due to time warp). This is at about 69'000m meters. Anything else is calculated.

The pressure at 46'171m altitude at Kerbin ist:

.

This number is so tiny that the gauge can't display it. All scientific instruments have a 0.00 format to display their measurements. This pressure is just too tiny to display.

you see, this is why you folks have me feeling soo much awe!

this is a game sure enough, but the fact that soo many players like you, have such a firm grasp and understanding of the math involved, it just makes me want to cry in pure awe. I truly bow to the genius level geniuses in this forum.

[Starglider]

Don't. They got that way either through book-research, training, or both. Classes in orbital mechanics and such are taught; there are textbooks available. Anybody with a large enough combination of intelligence and drive can learn it. I expect most that play KSP have enough intelligence; its only the drive that may be lacking.

[Crown]

Correct.

One can't know the background of the person posting something. Noone can see if he is a professor for aerospace engineering, has a degree in engineering or if he's just pupil. I remember players of X2 - The Threat who are 16 but so much into the whole economic thing in this game, which I have no idea of. Thankfully there are people that answer to a question with a simple "it's too small to display" and other serve more background to the problem. So one can pick the most suitable answer.

And I know that maths is a barrier too. It's like learning another language and, in fact, it is another language. It can express many things but you can't order a pizza with it (I'd love to see that pizzeria). It looks this complicated because it doesn't fit the language schemes we know and schools fail to teach us to love maths. Before I knew KSP I didn't like maths. Mainly because I saw no purpose in it. But now, with KSP, I know it's useful. I love KSP, I learned to love maths.

Don't let yourself down, just because other speak on what seems to be a higher level. Ask them for a more simple explanation. Tell them what you don't understand. If they care, they will take their time to explain. It takes time and a lot of reading. It's not easy to catch up. But it will be worth it.

“If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea†-Antoine de Saint-Exupery

[magnemoe]

The stock barometer can't measure anything below ~10^-4 atmospheres. More sensitive instrumentation (eg: MechJeb) will show the actual pressure.

Mechjeb will show how you deorbit because of drag, and as you say you get drag up to 68 km. If you are in 75 km orbit and reduce Pe slowly you first get an aerobrake node on 72 km or something, then you get reentry calculation timed out as you will do more than one orbit before landing.

This is pretty realistic, in real world this effect don't stop, even satellites 500 km up will deorbit after years.