Modular Fuel System Continued v3.3 (OBSOLETE)

[Fractal_UK]

Fractal_UK, mind if I put that in the OP when I add the Mods Supported section?

Go right ahead.

[NathanKell]

Thanks!

EDIT: mods supported list in OP now.

Edited October 31, 2013 by NathanKell

[Farmer Bobathan]

Hey Nathan, I was thinking it would be cool if you could add space for kerbals to tanks to make a sort of wet lab like skylab.

[Frederf]

Thank you so much for separating these releases into Standard, RF, and RFRM versions. It makes it so much easier to understand.

[Silpion]

A thought I had while trying to make my very accurate Apollo modules: A fuel cell part that uses LH2 and LOX.

[SRFirefox]

Can a standard RCS thruster be made to use MMH and Nitrogen Tetraoxide? I'm mucking about with cBBp's Dragon Rider mod, and I'm seeing if I can get it to work on that combo rather than monoprop, but if I can't get the Dracos to run on the same fuel as the Super Dracos, I'd rather have one propellant supply instead of two.

[NathanKell]

Farmer Bobathan, there's actually a mod for that!

Frederf, you're very welcome!

SRFirefox: alas no. ModuleRCS will accept only one propellant, that's why I had to use MonoPropellant for all Real Gemini's OAMS thrusters. I was talking with ZRM, and when his exams are over maybe he could update his own RCS replacement module to allow bipropellant.

(I was also looking at doing it myself, but it looks like I'd have to rewrite things from near-scratch rather than overloading a few functions, since much fuel-handling is private).

[Starwaster]

A thought I had while trying to make my very accurate Apollo modules: A fuel cell part that uses LH2 and LOX.

Aside from the part about deciding how much ElectricCharge to output, that's not very hard to implement at all.

BTW did anyone notice that the R&D center makes an actual reference to a specific electrical unit of measurement? Under Advanced Electrics it says that they're fairly certain nobody will ever need more than 64kw. It's hard to know for sure if they're referring to the 400 EC battery or the 6 panel solar arrays. But if you divide the battery's 400 EC capacity by 64 you get.... 6.25.

[JoCRaM]

it says that they're fairly certain nobody will ever need more than 64kw. .

If only we knew what a kerbal-whisker was in Nm/s....

[NathanKell]

The Real-scale Gemini configs I released in the Realism Overhaul thread and frizzank's FASA thread has a LH2/LOX fuel cell, btw.

I believe I have the values correct for what Gemini used.

I don't think they were thinking more than just "let's make a Bill Gates joke." 1kW makes sense for one unit of EC in terms of both allowing low wattage devices (0.005EC/s as 5 watts is manageable) while still allowing reasonable battery capacity (Mercury would have 48600 EC, Apollo CM 270,000 [i think?] plus the SM's fuel cells).

[rhoark]

I'm working on a whole suite of resource-transforming parts, based on real-world values to ensure there's no perpetual cycle. 20 Watts per EC/s is also what I had picked out, from ballparking solar panels comparable to the OX-STAT.

(This is going to include the phase changes as well - fuel cells operate at room temperature + )

Edited November 1, 2013 by rhoark

[NathanKell]

Good gracious batteries are going to hold a lot of EC then.

Sounds pretty awesome though! (As I think I've said before re: that project. )

[rhoark]

Stock batteries are actually pretty puny by that conversion. The 2.5 meter one is worth about 16 alkaline AA's.

[NathanKell]

Yup. Why not just scale the SP chargeRate down?

At 1EC/s = 1kW, then batteries need to go up (~7x) and SPs way the heck down. For 20 watts...don't even want to think about it.

[firstpirlo]

What does the word "engine type" refer to in Engines.cfg?

[Chestburster]

The type of engine. Take a look at the spreadsheet

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AvHneDAy4k99dHlhdktvZW1NS1lndlhNNnRwd3FEblE&usp=sharing

L means lower stage

U means upper stage

O means orbital maneuvering engines

S means solid booster

+ means more vac isp but less surface isp

[firstpirlo]

What if I change the “type of engines†of one engine？

Edited November 3, 2013 by firstpirlo

[NathanKell]

Then your Isp will change, and the changes made when you increase or decrease tech level will also change.

[Starwaster]

The Real-scale Gemini configs I released in the Realism Overhaul thread and frizzank's FASA thread has a LH2/LOX fuel cell, btw.

I believe I have the values correct for what Gemini used.

I don't think they were thinking more than just "let's make a Bill Gates joke." 1kW makes sense for one unit of EC in terms of both allowing low wattage devices (0.005EC/s as 5 watts is manageable) while still allowing reasonable battery capacity (Mercury would have 48600 EC, Apollo CM 270,000 [i think?] plus the SM's fuel cells).

Sorry I'm only just now replying to this. If Mercury needs 48600EC then that's 48 of those 1K batts. And change. 12 if 4K

That's not an attractive number unless you're upgrading batt capacity.

On another note, with the tank mass further decreased in recent versions using the ultra realism option, the big orange tank configured for LH2 only has a dry mass of 31 kiloGRAMS.

[NathanKell]

Tank mass should have increased, unless I missed a zero somewhere. I'll check cryo.

For ~40 tons total mass, you should get a fuel fraction of 0.96

And yes, I do plan on upgrading battery capacity. Right now it's about 7x heavier than it should be for 1950s tech, at 1EC/s = 1kW.

[Starwaster]

Tank mass should have increased, unless I missed a zero somewhere. I'll check cryo.

For ~40 tons total mass, you should get a fuel fraction of 0.96

And yes, I do plan on upgrading battery capacity. Right now it's about 7x heavier than it should be for 1950s tech, at 1EC/s = 1kW.

Hydrogen specific tanks still have no mass at all. I always assumed the rationale to be that they were already massive enough to account for the necessary mass of a hydrogen tank. When cryo tank mass was decreased with the rest it introduced a discrepancy in hydrogen tank mass that's not been addressed.

[NathanKell]

You sure you have the latest? They sure do have mass in the cfg.

And I just checked in my game, and the mass is right in line with my calculations.

The Jumbo masses 0.345t dry.

Install MFS v3 Continued RFRM again.

[SanderB]

im a complete ogre on this mod. How do I use it? How do i change engine types, fuel types, etc in the VAB. Ive tried many keyboard things and I cant figure it out. The mod seems installed as a few new engine and tanks have appeared but I dont know how to change their properties or fuel types.

[NathanKell]

1. Which of the three available downloads did you install?

2. You do everything from the Action Group Editor mode in the VAB/SPH. Go to AG Mode, click on a tank. You can change what fuels it has. Click on an engine. You can change its mode and tech level.

[SanderB]

ah i had not looked in the action group editor. Thanks!