New SLS vs Asparagus

[NecroBones]

The only ironic part of his post is the ending ";)", so i was asking, just a question, nothing else... The only one who want to start a fight seems to be you...

Yes, I was making a joke.

No worries.

EDIT: Note what I said originally. I described the Saturn-V stats.

Edited March 24, 2014 by NecroBones

[khearn]

Vladimir Chelomei's UR-700 design would have used a partial asparagus staging method. It would have 6 outer tubes (1st stage) and 3 inner tubes (second stage). All 9 engines would burn from the start, but each outer tube would have fuel and oxidizer tanks for its engine, plus either a fuel or oxidizer tank that would feed into one of the inner three tubes. Three 1st stage tubes had fuel tanks, and three had oxidizer tanks. All six 1st stage tubes would jettison at the same time, leaving the second stage with full tanks. Then stages 3, 4, and 5 were stacked on top of the inner 2nd stage in standard serial staging fashion.

We'll never know if it would have worked, though. It was cancelled in favor of the N-1 booster, which we know didn't work (but for entirely different reasons).

[Spartwo]

TSTO is the way to go(The first T stands for three)I never used any more stages than that,even for lifting craft in excess of 200 tons into orbit.

[The Jedi Master]

The only ironic part of his post is the ending ";)", so i was asking, just a question, nothing else... The only one who want to start a fight seems to be you...

Yeah, I panic sometimes.

[JedTech]

Oh, well now Asparagus staging doesn't feel so unique to KSP. I guess I shouldn't be sentimental about Asparagus staging.

[mellojoe]

The Falcon Heavy does not use fuel crossfeeding, I don't believe. Going from memory here, so don't flay me, but I think it simply uses independent throttle control reducing thrust in the central stalk to 50% or less during ascent. It lifts off initially using 100% thrust from all 3 engines. Then part-way it reduces the central engine to 50% thrust, conserving fuel in the central stalk. The outer two engines/boosters run at full throttle until fuel is spent in those stages. They are dropped off, and then the central stalk is fired back up to 100% for the rest of the ascent. This is a fuel-saving measure for the central booster / main engine, but it is not fuel crossfeeding as we would call it.

There may be plans to work out fuel crossfeeding, but I don't think they are working at this time, or are even intended to be working by the full scale tests later this year.

((edit))

or wait ... is that the Delta V Heavy? I've confused myself. I might have to go look it up again.

[SargeRho]

No, the Falcon Heavy uses fuel crossfeeding. When the boosters are jettisoned, the core stage is still almost full.

The Delta 4 Heavy in turn doesn't use crossfeeding.

[merendel]

Personaly I dont see any reason asparagus would be any more difficult with the SLS parts than now. I play with KW rocketry and reguarly use 3.75m parts already and have even asparagus'd them. I know folks have done it with 5m parts as well (think nova punch has them) Its not significantly harder than doing it with the standard 2.5 parts in the stock game. In fact as long as the core is the same diameter as the boosters you end up with the same relative separation between the boosters. At most you need to be a bit more careful with struting and I wouldnt recomend a multilayerd onion design just due to weight concerns.

[problemecium]

I'm posting it here because this is the thread that made me think of it: They should add Whackjob to the Experimentals team. I'm aware that right now his computer is on the fritz, but next time maybe. After all, he'd be the best qualified to discover potential bugs related to 283574928054-part spacecraft.

[mellojoe]

No, the Falcon Heavy uses fuel crossfeeding. When the boosters are jettisoned, the core stage is still almost full.

The Delta 4 Heavy in turn doesn't use crossfeeding.

yes. I was confusing the two. Delta Heavy uses the launchprofile I described. the Falcon Heavy is supposedly using true fuel crossfeeding. My bad.

[boomerdog2000]

My guess is the SLS was added as a sort of precursor to a more realistic aerodynamics system (not that I'm saying we'll be getting one soon, just in the future). As many have been keen to point out in other threads, most asparagus designs tend to be somewhat less than aerodynamic. The SLS should allow us to have more typical launch vehicles but keep our heavy payloads.

[Pecan]

It's incredible how many experienced people still don't get the point of asparagus staging - it's more efficient. Why is it some people will happily put boosters around their rockets but balk at attaching pairs with fuel lines?

Whatever size of rocket you're making, staging will still make it more efficient and asparagus will still be the most efficient staging strategy. Neither different parts nor different aerodynamics changes that. Yes, people can make excessively wide asparagus ships but others can make excessively, erm, dramatic ones by strapping loads of radial boosters on them. The only plausible arguments I've heard against asparagus are still either a) conservation of rotational energy and I just don't like it. For any payload mass (up to 40 tonnes because I haven't bothered much beyond that) I bet I have a more efficient yet aerodynamic launch vehicle than most peoples' using other staging, or none.

[Spartwo]

I don't like it because..

1:It looks ugly.

2:It requires a ton of staging.

3:I don't really care about mass efficiency more about part efficiency,and linear staging leaves me with a lower part count for almost all ships.

[qromodynmc]

With new parts,definelitely asparagus is becomes less used by lazy players(like me) ^^ also Im really suprised that I can put tons of payload to orbit on simple rockets.

[Daze]

The new SLS Parts is amazing, with less than 40 parts you can put 100 ton in orbit with only center stack + 3.75 mt boosters. So happy for my new family of rocket!

[Zad Fnark]

I career mode, I was seriously struggling to get a kerbral-carrying interplanetary ship up. The new engines should solve that.

ZF-

[maccollo]

Regardless of whether the aerodynamic model is accurate or not asparagus will still be the most efficient method.

You build one rocket column as tall as you can, maximizing the terminal velocity. Then you have to build outwards and at this point there is no difference between a serial setup and asparagus, because you need extra columns in both cases.

[Moar Boosters]

It all depends on how you define efficiency really. Asparagus is always going to be the most weight-efficient technique, but it's very heavy on the part count. With the new parts, you can replace several hundred parts with of asparagus stacks with a booster made of about 10 parts.

[jwenting]

It's incredible how many experienced people still don't get the point of asparagus staging - it's more efficient. Why is it some people will happily put boosters around their rockets but balk at attaching pairs with fuel lines?

Hardly. I rarely use it, and when I do it gives me about a 1% increase in the dV of the affected stages on average. Not worth writing home about, if you're that critical in your dV budget it's time to rethink your design concept.

[AmpsterMan]

Meh. I like using serial staging for one simple reason. It usually has a higher TWR than a asparagus stage. That means that my gravity and turn losses are less (though this is negligible in most cases) but more importantly it means I reach orbit much faster.

So it's my playstyle. For launchers I use cheap (i.e. Low part), reliable vehicles whereas my spacecraft are part heavy machines.

[Sophistry]

Asparagus staging with the new parts is easy, but you have to use Sepratrons. And Rockomax-sized asparagus got even better, because the new liquid-fuel boosters beat the Skipper and the Mainsail with (equivalent fuel tanks) in every category bar thrust vectoring (off the top of my head) with only a small increase in weight in the case of the Skipper.

I think the thing that would actually kill Asparagus would be accurate modelling of the inertia of the fuel - which I don't think is likely. All that fuel sloshing rapidly inwards and sideways would make the rocket spin like crazy until it flew apart.

[EtherDragon]

I have already used asparagus with the new boosters and large tanks. It's actually really useful. But I will note that at that size, those tiny yellow fuel lines seem under-sized somehow. I doubt that much fuel mass could realistically flow through them like that. But this is KSP - and Asteroids float on water, so...

That said, this is sand-box or playground space exploration. If we wanted ultra-realism, we would all be playing Orbiter Space Flight Simulator.

Edited April 2, 2014 by EtherDragon

[spikeyhat09]

whackjobs next task - bring a class E asteroid down to kerbin, and then launch it back into orbit

[TheScareCake!]

why not both? you could do the asparagus with the new part, but it would be hard as they are really big and if you want them to detach without damaging anything, you should use the small srb's as sepatrons

[cantab]

I think the thing that would actually kill Asparagus would be accurate modelling of the inertia of the fuel - which I don't think is likely. All that fuel sloshing rapidly inwards and sideways would make the rocket spin like crazy until it flew apart.

Simply putting a significant mass on the fuel lines, essentially assuming their mass includes the fuel pumps needed as well, would nerf asparagusing.