Parachute Height Deploy

[therealcrow999]

Has anyone tweak the deploy height for KSP? I feel like for the single, large and radial the 500m height is too low. I remember in early days of KSP it was around 800m.

I was thinking about setting the chutes to 800m or 1000m. I might leave the drogue height at 2500m. Has anyone tweaked the drouge height? If so what height did you set it at?

With the tweaks you did, was there any problems in Kerbin atomsphere or any other planet?

[boomerdog2000]

Out of curiosity why do you want to change it? Your ship would just be floating down for longer. After the parachutes are fully deployed there's not any more deceleration that can occur.

[FITorion]

As I remember it... it was always 500m above sea level and it didn't matter if the ground rushing up toward you was at 1Km... and you'd smash right into it.

Now it detects when you're 500m over a surface and deploys. It slows you down almost instantly and there's not much difference if any in velocity between when you land and say 400m just after opening.

Why would you want it to fully open higher? It won't slow you down more. It would just make the wait to get to the surface longer. If you're having problems with velocity... I suggest adding more chutes...

[Aragosnat]

Out of curiosity why do you want to change it? Your ship would just be floating down for longer. After the parachutes are fully deployed there's not any more deceleration that can occur.

Not true. It just happens that you lose speed very very slowly. Most of the time not making much of a difference unless it is a large fat craft. But, it makes sense on certain worlds say like Duna where it would be nice if they deployed sooner.

[boomerdog2000]

Not true. It just happens that you lose speed very very slowly. Most of the time not making much of a difference unless it is a large fat craft.

Alright, there's very little deceleration that can occur.

But, it makes sense on certain worlds say like Duna where it would be nice if they deployed sooner.

Given the atmosphere density of Duna deploying the chutes earlier wouldn't help since there's not enough atmosphere to fill them, to significantly slow you down.

[therealcrow999]

As I remember it... it was always 500m above sea level and it didn't matter if the ground rushing up toward you was at 1Km... and you'd smash right into it.

Now it detects when you're 500m over a surface and deploys. It slows you down almost instantly and there's not much difference if any in velocity between when you land and say 400m just after opening.

Why would you want it to fully open higher? It won't slow you down more. It would just make the wait to get to the surface longer. If you're having problems with velocity... I suggest adding more chutes...

I think the reason why they changed it from 800m to 500m, is that your capsule would splash down sooner and not have to wait too long for it.

If I remember it was 800m in like the 0.7 version, and maybe a few editions after. It wasn't around long.

I'm not doing it to slow down or anything, just want it to open higher. It seems like I am close to ground when it finally open, there is this OH S!#T moment just before it opens. It's more for immersion.

I do remember when they had it higher it too a long while for the capsule to get to surface, lol.

[boomerdog2000]

I'm not doing it to slow down or anything, just want it to open higher. It seems like I am close to ground when it finally open, there is this OH S!#T moment just before it opens. It's more for immersion.

Then there's the OH S!#T moment when half of your craft, including the hitchhiker with poor innocent passenger kerbals, rips off because you didn't secure it well enough.

[Dasemay]

i feel like this isn't a issue. if you don't slow down fast enough add more chutes.

[annallia]

I could see drogue chutes fully deploying earlier as being useful as there is quite a bit of deceleration involved in that and in turn would help with the shock when your chutes fully open.

I do not however see the point in regular chutes opening any higher than 500m above ground. Lets say your craft is so fat that it is falling at 15m/s even with the chutes fully deployed. The deceleration at this point is so slow that even if you doubled the deploy height to 1km you would still hit the ground at over 10m/s making the adjustment pointless.

Better to just slap a few more chutes on your craft.

Edit- I would also think that since you would be moving faster when they fully deployed the shock would increase as well making more more spectacular failed landings.

Edited November 1, 2013 by annallia

[Activity]

I'd like it if the chutes don't open instantly, but over a short period (maybe 2-4s), so avoid those neck breaking g-forces, and spontaneous unplanned vessel disassembly

[Don Quixote]

I'd like it if the chutes don't open instantly, but over a short period [...]

Yes that would be great. If we take the idea even further, it would be great if there were "multi-stage" parachutes in the future, such as those used on actual spacecraft (i.e. first a small "pilot" chute deploys, then the drogue, and lastly the main chutes).

[SpaceSphereOfDeath]

The reason when your parachutes are open but you still fall slower the lower down you go is because the atmosphere is thicker, thus more drag.

So if you open your chutes at 1000m AGL, you would get more of this tiny force, but your initial deployment velocity would be much higher, thus cancelling out this extra tiny force.

QED

[Geoff-AU]

http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Parts#Parachutes

Try the MK25. I noticed this yesterday, it has 4 times the semi-deployed drag and fully deployed it opens much earlier (2500m). The final drag is not enough but if you follow it up with one of the other chutes you will get a staged deceleration and less of a jolt at 500m.

[MatzahMan]

Thank you for mentioning that parachute, I always looked at the stats and it looked like it had less drag so I never used it. But now you mentioned this I am going to be using these a lot.

[polimerjones]

Not true. It just happens that you lose speed very very slowly. Most of the time not making much of a difference unless it is a large fat craft. But, it makes sense on certain worlds say like Duna where it would be nice if they deployed sooner.

Actually is it true. You sir are the one who is wrong. I isnt the same on other planets but as for kerbin its 500

[Landge]

Landing large craft on Duna I find is not worth the effort to use chutes. What I'd also love to see is a drogue chute version of the Mk2-R radial.

[Merinsan]

Landing large craft on Duna I find is not worth the effort to use chutes. What I'd also love to see is a drogue chute version of the Mk2-R radial.

I disagree. They're quite useful for keeping the craft upright.

Also, the initial drag before the chutes fully deploy is useful, but no matter what you still need some engines to land in the end.

[annallia]

Actually is it true. You sir are the one who is wrong. I isnt the same on other planets but as for kerbin its 500

Pretty sure it is 500 on any planet/moon that you use them on. I could be wrong but I think the game just looks at your altitude as to when to deploy, not your actual atmosphere.

I disagree. They're quite useful for keeping the craft upright.

Also, the initial drag before the chutes fully deploy is useful, but no matter what you still need some engines to land in the end.

You can land chute only on Duna, but you have to really pack em in there to pull it off. I built a rover with the intent of doing just that, in total it had 16 radial chutes and 4 drogue chutes. Set down a little harder than I would have liked but it made it down in one piece all the same.

[magnemoe]

Pretty sure it is 500 on any planet/moon that you use them on. I could be wrong but I think the game just looks at your altitude as to when to deploy, not your actual atmosphere.

You can land chute only on Duna, but you have to really pack em in there to pull it off. I built a rover with the intent of doing just that, in total it had 16 radial chutes and 4 drogue chutes. Set down a little harder than I would have liked but it made it down in one piece all the same.

its 500 all places even Jool.

Now the only reason for opening parachutes higher is that you would get less of an opening shock as the air is thinner.

This is even more true on Eve than Kerbin. Could also be reduced by redesigning the parachutes.

For large landers parachutes is only helpers they keep the lander stable and reducing speed. Easy to just use the engines to reduce speed from 15 to 3 m/s.

However this don't work if half of the parachutes rip then opening.

[Sof]

All they need is radial drogue chutes.

[magnemoe]

All they need is radial drogue chutes.

One octagonal strut on the side and a drogue chutes on it works well enough.

[Wallace]

there is a mod for a radial drogue chute if you search the forum, however if you check the config it's not the same, it opens earlier and has higher drag so i modded the cfg to match the stock drogue chute.