Building for testing ships in different gravity and/or atmosphere.

[JiWint]

It's hard to make sure 'will your lander be able to land and take off a planet'.You can calculate delta V,but some people (like me) are just too lazy to do it.

So what about a building that will simulate some planet gravity and atmosphere,so you can test ships in different planet enviroment?

sorry for bad English

[FenrirWolf]

Having some kind of massive building that magics in another world's atmosphere and gravity seems... well, it seems a lot more Star Trek than KSP. I don't think that would make a lot of sense for this game. I guess you could write it off as a "simulation" or whatever, but that still seems like a stretch.

What I do is test my landers on Kerbin. Like a Duna lander needs somewhere in the neighborhood of 1500 delta-v to take off and reach orbit (maybe more or less, i don't recall the specifics). Knowing that it takes around 4500 delta-v to reach Kerbin orbit, I launch the lander and see how far it will go. Does it barely break 10km? does it get to a suborbital trajectory with the apoapsis out of the atmosphere? Does it nearly reach orbit? Does it reach orbit, successfully land, then get back into orbit again? Benchmarks like that should give you a general idea of how far your lander can take you on other worlds.

[thereaverofdarkness]

Kerbal engineer is a useful mod for this. It would be nice to have a test facility though. It could be a giant centrifuge in which you could do controlled rocket thrust tests: the rocket would be held in place against the wall and you'd have a scale which would tell you your net upward thrust and a calculation for your net TWR. You would, of course, have to input your own gravity values, thus you'd need to go explore those worlds to find out their gravity (or check the wiki, which is cheating).

Of course, real rocket scientists don't need a centrifuge to test lift. They can simply estimate it from the mass of the rocket, it's thrust, and the gravity it'll be launched from. But putting rockets in a test centrifuge would be rather comical, especially if it was possible to break them free from the restraints and have them explode hilariously against the other side of the centrifuge.

[Man in the Funny Hat]

I'll sign this. Or it doesn't necessarily have to mean adding a "Test Lab" building to KSC; just provide pulldown options for setting the gravity hack to a given planet/atmosphere to be able to test how, say, a lander will handle without having to run a full "dry run" mission.

[Dwight_js]

I've found myself wishing that I could test the fuel flow of my rockets without having to send them to the launch pad. I tend to build multistage landers that require fuel lines, and I need to verify that different tanks are draining in the correct order. Going to the launch pad is a pain especially because you have to sit and wait for the tanks to actually empty and watch which tank is tapped next.

Would be nice to have a visual representation of the fuel-flow logic in the VAB so you can get everything sorted as you build.

[404james]

You could simulate other levels of gravity in a building. Just hang the rocket from a crane on the ceiling, pulling upwards at a calculated rate. Not in the least bit accurate, and terribly unsafe to have rockets firing uncontrolled indoors, but since when have we cared about either of those?

it is a bit of an oddly specific thing to have built from the start, so perhaps it could wait until we can build buildings for ourselves.

[Vostok]

A building doesn't have to 'magic in' gravity. You could just suspend the craft from a bungee cord that would make up the force difference, and have a reasonable approximation of gravity. Or have the whole thing at an angle, against an inclined slope, similar to the apollo lander tests.

Maybe even a part that you can add to the nose of your rocket, that is a big elastic bungee (tweakable in the VAB to simulate different planets gravity) and the game calculates the force required to simulate based upon the mass of the whole craft. Then you just launch the craft and, similar to the launch stabilisers currently in game, the bungee cords extend from above the ship and simulate the gravity as you specified in the vab.

[ravener]

i imagine they would cancel out gravity by harnessing the vehicle up with strings like they did when they tested space suits for apollo and during the testing of the moon rover. some of the testing was done sideways, but we can do it horizontally and with rockets allowed.

[Kasuha]

There's a tool that allows you to test your ship in any environment. It's called Hyperedit.

[innovine]

There's a tool that allows you to test your ship in any environment. It's called Hyperedit.

I think indoor testing of rocket motors tied to bungy cords sounds like a lot more fun.

[jordanjay29]

Of course, real rocket scientists don't need a centrifuge to test lift. They can simply estimate it from the mass of the rocket, it's thrust, and the gravity it'll be launched from. But putting rockets in a test centrifuge would be rather comical, especially if it was possible to break them free from the restraints and have them explode hilariously against the other side of the centrifuge.

Once they know the power of the engine, yes. But real rocket scientists do plenty of test firing before fitting an engine on a rocket. Like so:

[KvickFlygarn87]

Maybe a "simulator" that works like launching, except you are on the only planet in the universe, it's all grey flatness, and before starting you can choose atmo stats (thickness at sea level, thickness curve, and atmo height), planet stats (gravity, radius, etc), starting point (ground/orbit), and more?

[Kasuha]

I think indoor testing of rocket motors tied to bungy cords sounds like a lot more fun.

It doesn't sound like a lot of fun for developers and I am afraid it would be seldom used.

If developers integrate HyperEdit to the core game in a way that makes sure nothing done with it is recorded in the permanent state, that would be the ultimate testing facility for an order of magnitude less work.

[JimmyAgent007]

Id say a simulator can work. You select the rocket design you want to test and the body you want to test it on, or simply deep space. However, you can only simulate qualities you have sampled. For example you cant have Duna gravity until you have sent a probe to measure its gravity before hand.

[Dun Kirk]

hypertext edit gives the ability to test. I hope they have some kind of guide in game, currently its entirely the wiki...

most things are the mun or less, a couple are x2 the mun, the others aren't viable economically bar probes.

[leax256]

is it really that hard for you people to understand, the people who request stuff like this don't want something that transport's them to where they wan't to go(like hyperedit) but instead just want to test their rocket's under the same conditions found at the location. what's the fun of sending a lander to the location to test it only to travel there again just to see the same stuff again and ruin the suprise?

guess what I'm saying is please stop telling people to go get hyperedit everytime this is suggested, it's starting to be like discussions about female kerbals and mechjeb.

ok I'm done.

[Atoning Unifex]

Hypertext sounds like a good interin work around for texting but leax256 is right, I want to just proof-of-concept by design without actually having to spoil the surprise and achievement of making a landing there.

What would be good is some sort of computer simulation that would allow the creation of a generic smooth body that approximates a target planet and then allowing a craft to be testing from orbit or surface. I think that would be really useful, even allowing the creation of alternative planets to really challenge your design skills.

I love the irony of asking for a computer imulation to be implemented inside a computer simulation though!

[Moonfrog]

Its unrealistic in my opinion, in real life you would send probes and collect data, and then use that data to build your other craft, or improve the last one.

Then again, most people just look on wiki it will tell you anyway.

Also feels a bit pointless, but your basically saying I don't want to calculate the maths, I want a graphical representation that can show me the maths visually.

I suppose that would be feasible, put it in terms of gameplay so it makes sense and doesn't detract from challenge of building something.

You could have kerbalesque wind tunnels, to show drag like in real life or for testing paracutes for different atmospheres.

Someone suggested adding weights to simulate different gravity levels or something.

All of this could be done with a scale model of the rocket.

You could change the supposed gravity or environment conditions in this environment simulator for the model, so u wouldn't simply select Duna, u would have to know Duna's gravity before hand, but ucould figure out that if the gravity was at 3.5 m/s the ship would take off.

I think this could work, and add some fun, espically if the models had tiny kerbals inside that catch on fire if the model ship breaks apart under testing.

[Kasuha]

Come on people, it's a game. In real life you have way less information and way less ways how to test the craft, but on the other hand you have way more computing capacity to run simulations and way more expertise in people who spent their life doing such projects and which know what they are doing and how to do stuff. There's no way to put all this to the game.

The game itself is a cheap simulation of a space program, putting another cheap simulation of game physics into it makes no sense.

I suggest to concentrate on easy solutions as these are more likely to find their way into the game than complex and complicated ones.

[Atoning Unifex]

Its unrealistic in my opinion, in real life you would send probes and collect data, and then use that data to build your other craft, or improve the last one.

Then again, most people just look on wiki it will tell you anyway.

Also feels a bit pointless, but your basically saying I don't want to calculate the maths, I want a graphical representation that can show me the maths visually.

I suppose that would be feasible, put it in terms of gameplay so it makes sense and doesn't detract from challenge of building something.

You could have kerbalesque wind tunnels, to show drag like in real life or for testing paracutes for different atmospheres.

Someone suggested adding weights to simulate different gravity levels or something.

All of this could be done with a scale model of the rocket.

You could change the supposed gravity or environment conditions in this environment simulator for the model, so u wouldn't simply select Duna, u would have to know Duna's gravity before hand, but ucould figure out that if the gravity was at 3.5 m/s the ship would take off.

I think this could work, and add some fun, espically if the models had tiny kerbals inside that catch on fire if the model ship breaks apart under testing.

Ok but in real life we don't spend billions to send a probe just to see if it works, we simulate first. Also I'm no mathematician, and I don't want to be! I want to have fun trying out various designs to see if they will work, rather than calculating things that are unimportant. Yes, I can do this now as things stand, however the game does punish me by killing kerbals that die during the course of my experiments... Although I guess I could create a new game specifically for testing... Oh... Maybe I've just had an epihpany...

Come on people, it's a game. In real life you have way less information and way less ways how to test the craft, but on the other hand you have way more computing capacity to run simulations and way more expertise in people who spent their life doing such projects and which know what they are doing and how to do stuff. There's no way to put all this to the game.

The game itself is a cheap simulation of a space program, putting another cheap simulation of game physics into it makes no sense.

I suggest to concentrate on easy solutions as these are more likely to find their way into the game than complex and complicated ones.

You are correct. My only point here would be that as it's a 'cheap' simulation, the physics is dubious and temperamental (purely on the basis of making it enjoyable rather than accurate), so one would need to test designs based upon this simulations parameters rather than what reality would present. Anyway, I've realised I can use 'throw away' non-career games as testing so I think it's a bit of a moot point!

[Koltronn]

I personally love the idea of the flat grey simulation land where you can set the atmosphere and gravity data; my missions would be a lot more efficient if I didn't feel like I had to overbuild everything just in case. I know that I could do the math myself but frankly, it's a game and I think that it should feel like one all the time and extended periods on a calculator doesn't fit the "struts and boosters" feel that the rest of the game has.

[vetrox]

Kerbal Engineer is such a god send

[KvickFlygarn87]

I personally love the idea of the flat grey simulation land where you can set the atmosphere and gravity data; my missions would be a lot more efficient if I didn't feel like I had to overbuild everything just in case. I know that I could do the math myself but frankly, it's a game and I think that it should feel like one all the time and extended periods on a calculator doesn't fit the "struts and boosters" feel that the rest of the game has.

Yaay, my mind spawned a like-able thought!

[chaos_forge]

Maybe a "simulator" that works like launching, except you are on the only planet in the universe, it's all grey flatness, and before starting you can choose atmo stats (thickness at sea level, thickness curve, and atmo height), planet stats (gravity, radius, etc), starting point (ground/orbit), and more?

I think this is the best approach. For example, if I want to test how a plane flies on Duna, my only option is to haul a plane all the way to Duna only to have it fail. The problem with using hyperedit is that it detracts from the sense of achievement. What's the point of landing on Duna "for real this time" when you've already seen that red surface so many times already?

EDIT: also I wonder how difficult this would be to do, given we already have scenarios separate from the game instances. All KSP would have to do would be create a temporary scenario specific to the parameters you gave it. Unless I'm missing something.

Edited February 19, 2014 by chaos_forge

[Greenspan]

Alt-F12? Doesn't the Debug Toolbar let you change the gravity to match other celestial bodies?

So, if I understand this thread correctly, you want something exactly like Hyperedit because your too lazy to have MechJeb/Kerbal Engineer calculate your Delta-V/TWR/etc, but you don't want the enviroment to look like the planet because that would ruin the feeling of accomplishment? Hate to break it to you but there's not a lot of accomplishment in there to begin with.