[0.23.5] Realism Overhaul: ROv5.2 + Modlist for RSS 6/30/14

[NathanKell]

The vacuum Isp is a little low given some recent info, but the air-breathing Isp may be a little high.

Skylon intends to transition at a bit over Mach 5 (1500-1700m/s TAS) and just under 30km, IIRC.

jrandom: dangit! Saw the -, thought you meant the Mk1-2. The 1m smallchute is upscaled the exact same amount as the pod; if it looks like a hat now, it always did.

[jrandom]

dangit! Saw the -, thought you meant the Mk1-2. The 1m smallchute is upscaled the exact same amount as the pod; if it looks like a hat now, it always did.

Aw heck, there it is! I had one of the non-upscaled RealChutes slapped on there (waaay too small). Speaking of which, we really need some .cfgs for RealChutes to scale them up. Seems a perfect fit for RO.

[jrandom]

I'm working on a .cfg file that sets up 0.5, 1, 2, 3, and 4-meter diameter fairing base ring for procedural fairings. I think I've got it all working now except I can't figure out how to change the joint connection size. Seems like the 4-meter ring should have a stronger connection, and that means a bigger joint size, right? Can't seem to figure out where in PART definition that gets set up.

Anyone know how this works?

[ferram4]

Attach node size doesn't change anything in terms of connection strength or stiffness, only the proximity needed to attach two parts to each other in the editor.

That said, the way to change the size is to look at the attach node definitions; there should be either 6 or 7 numbers there. The 7th number (which defaults to 1 if it is not listed) controls the size of the attach node.

[jrandom]

Huh. Well. Alrighty then. I could have sworn I read something about either KSP or Joint Reinforcement using the joint size for strength calculations. Must be going senile.

Who are you people? Where am I??

[jrandom]

If anyone wants to try it out, here's my preliminary .cfg files for adding even-number-diameter fairing base rings for Procedural Fairings.

Cost and masses may need to be tweaked should these ever get included in the official release.

[NathanKell]

jrandom: oh, you want the base rings rather than the custom fairing base? Sorry...I only rescaled the custom fairing base. I'll just include yours in the next RO then if you don't mind.

[jrandom]

jrandom: oh, you want the base rings rather than the custom fairing base? Sorry...I only rescaled the custom fairing base. I'll just include yours in the next RO then if you don't mind.

Yes, please! The ring bases support 4x symmetry and I find them to be more useful than the 3x symmetry of the old bases (which are, I believe, considered out of date). You can also use two, flipping the top one upside down, to make custom fuselages. Great for hiding away small things you'd normally have to glue on the outside of the rocket. Excellent for monopropellant and life support oxygen tanks.

I'm a bit leery of the masses of the larger fairing bases and rings. I'm roughly in-line with the original procedural fairing ring masses, but would a 4-meter fairing ring really weigh in the neighborhood of 1 ton? (I don't know enough about what kind of materials would go into building such a load-bearing structure that I have no frame of reference.)

[jrandom]

Also, it looks like maybe the radius adjustments could use a little work. I don't fully understand what exact values for things like extraRadius and whatnot I should have used:

[NathanKell]

You can see what I did for the masses of the fairing bases I added. Also, they now all have 2x symmetry (even the big ones) since that's most common in real life. (big exception being the S-IVB SLA.) It's probably still overestimating mass, but we'll see.

(the changes to existing bases are in RO/pFairings.cfg; the new even-meter fairings are in RO/Parts/ProcFairings/)

RO also adds a 2-sided interstage, btw.

[p3asant]

Is there any way in future releases to smallen the amount of resources by dividing by like 100 or so?

I think it's a big contributor to lag when at liftoff you have 500000 units of H2 and you're burning 10000 a second, for example.

Like this launcher has only 80 parts but lags like hell:

Notice the amount of resources.

Edited December 1, 2013 by p3asant

[Guest]

You seem to be using a large amount of high-quality engines (from BobCat, I presume), maybe that's the reason for the lag?

[Camacha]

Huh. Well. Alrighty then. I could have sworn I read something about either KSP or Joint Reinforcement using the joint size for strength calculations.

I believe FAR is using node sizes to work out some properties.

[jrandom]

I believe FAR is using node sizes to work out some properties.

Ah-hah! That's sounds suspiciously important. Would it happen to be the settings entry 'attachRules = 1,0,1,1,0'? Do I change that last '0' to a '1' or a '2'? Or do I add a number to the end of the list?

[NathanKell]

jrandom: attachRules determine how the part can attach, and what can attach to it. Right above attachRules is the comment describing them; they're bitmasks (1=true, 0=false) for allow stack attachment, allow surface attachment, allow stack to the part, allow surf attach to the part, allow collisions (I forget the exact order).

Node sizes are, as mentioned above, only used by FAR to determine the drag of unfaired parts (the detection is based on the node not having anything attached to it); this drag is scaled by node size. As ferram said, you determine node side by the last number of the node_xxxx_yyyy lines (if there are six numbers, add a seventh; if seven, edit the seventh).

You should also, if you have not already, make these changes to FAR/Plugins/PluginData/FAR/config.xml : change node size from 1.25 to 1.0, change incompressible drag to 0.01, change sonic drag to 0.2 (per ferram in the FAR thread for "made for RSS" settings).

[jrandom]

Quick question: If I want to add a .cfg to alter a part to rescale it (instead of copying the part.cfg for adding a new part), can I just use '@rescaleFactor = 0.8' to scale down from 1.25/2.5/3.75 to 1/2/3 meters? That would give me a lot of nice parts that currently don't quite fit in with the rescaled ones, and it would be simple enough to do that after a few passes I'd have most of my parts rescaled!

Edit: waaaait, I'd have to fix the all the node stack connects... Okay, so a bit more work that I first realized. It's early. I'm allowed to not think right.

Edited December 1, 2013 by jrandom

[NathanKell]

Check RftSEngines.cfg; that has mucho rescaling. Note that there are basically four cases, where the part.cfg:

Doesn't include rescaleFactor, doesn't use MODEL node. Use rescaleFactor = 1.0

Includes rescaleFactor, doesn't use MODEL node. Use @rescaleFactor = 0.8 * old_resacle_factor

Uses MODEL node: add or change the scale = line in the MODEL node to be scale = 1/rF, 1/rF, 1/rF, and (3) change/ (4) set rescaleFactor as desired.

Then you need to copy/paste the two attach node lines and add @ in front, and change (or add if missing) the seventh number [node size] as appropriate. Note that rescaleFactor does change the position already, so all you have to edit is the size.

[p3asant]

You seem to be using a large amount of high-quality engines (from BobCat, I presume), maybe that's the reason for the lag?

How does the size of the part's textures/ amount of polygons affects the physics load?

[Camacha]

How does the size of the part's textures/ amount of polygons affects the physics load?

How are you so sure that the lag is a result of the physics load?

[Guest]

Not physics, but it does do a number on the graphics card and (to a lesser extent) CPU. Perhaps this time, this isn't physics engine that's causing the lag, but the graphics.

[NathanKell]

Amount of resources in a part has diddly to do with physics lag: 10000 * 0.0043 isn't really faster than 100000 * 0.0043 (which is what happens: physics mass = part.mass + sum(resoucce_qty * resource_density) )

[TeeGee]

I dont see how the engines have been restated... They seem the same to me.

I followed the installation directions of using modular fuels and deleting realistic fuel /engine cfg. I want PROPER/REALISTIC engine stats for everything, what am I doing wrong?

[Jobin]

TeeGee I'd recommend just starting your mod install from scratch and making sure you're starting from a clean install. There's a lot of mods here and it could be easy to miss something. I installed remotetech improperly the first time. The engine stats are definitely scaled up in my version so it's probably an install error somewhere.

[Scripto23]

Alright finally got a working SSTO. Has about 6900 deltaV, TWR 2.21 and will get into orbit with a few hundred to spare. You can see the dry mass is incredibly small at a measly 12 tons. The big downside is the H2/LOX tank isn't heatshielded and so the craft can't actually reenter the atmosphere without eventually burning up. As far as I know there aren't any insulated tanks that are also heat shielded so I'm not entirely sure how to fix this problem. Any suggestions are welcome.

Edited December 2, 2013 by Scripto23

[jrandom]

Are there any adapters in any parts mods that let us connect the 1.25/2.5/3.25-meter parts to the 1/2/3/4-meter parts smoothly?