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B9 5.0 pre-release (with download)

K3-Chris

By K3-Chris
in KSP1 Mod Releases

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Taverius

Taverius

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I'm trying an SSTO-focused career and I'm really confused by the different jet engines available. Their performance in the tooltips doesn't seem to have much to do with the way the engines actually perform. Which ones should I be using for different purposes? (Using stock aero, not NEAR/FAR)

Blame squad for useless tooltips.

TFE731/CF34: subsonic

VA1: mach 1 and a bit if you're lucky

F119: mach 2+

D30-F7: Mach3+

SABRE: SSTO

Similar questions with the air scoops - they all have fancy descriptions but the stats shown don't seem to vary much. A couple of the intakes are really heavy (0.4 tons) while most are 0.01 or so, and the stats on them don't seem to differ that much. For example, the DSI Diverterless Supersonic Inlet has an Intake Area of 0.005 and 0.1 Intake Air resource and weighs 0.011 tons. The Ram Air Intake has an area 0.01, 0.2 Intake Air, and weighs 0.012, so I guess it's twice as good for about the same weight? But its stats are the same as the RNM which weighs 0.402.

The larger intakes are heavier because the connection strength depends on the mass of the part.

Since you can stick landing gear to the DSIX, it has to be heavier.

Likewise the RBM/RNM must be heavier because of their size and what you can stick to them.

If you're using FAR/NEAR, drag won't change much since they're all roughly the same size.

If you're not using FAR/NEAR, we have nothing to say to you because stock model is not supported (though we perform black magic maths with intake values to make it have the right drag, roughly speaking).

As far as actual performance goes, only effective intake area matters, because ModuleResourceIntake is ...., and you cant actually differentiate by speed or anything else.

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wasmic

wasmic

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I'm trying an SSTO-focused career and I'm really confused by the different jet engines available. Their performance in the tooltips doesn't seem to have much to do with the way the engines actually perform. Which ones should I be using for different purposes? (Using stock aero, not NEAR/FAR)

Similar questions with the air scoops - they all have fancy descriptions but the stats shown don't seem to vary much. A couple of the intakes are really heavy (0.4 tons) while most are 0.01 or so, and the stats on them don't seem to differ that much. For example, the DSI Diverterless Supersonic Inlet has an Intake Area of 0.005 and 0.1 Intake Air resource and weighs 0.011 tons. The Ram Air Intake has an area 0.01, 0.2 Intake Air, and weighs 0.012, so I guess it's twice as good for about the same weight? But its stats are the same as the RNM which weighs 0.402.

Confused. Rockets are so much simpler :)

That's because of most variables regarding jet engines and air intakes being invisible, unless you go look in the cfg files. The jet engines all have different thrust curves, which are not visible in-game.

EDIT: Ninja'd.

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Taverius

Taverius

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Is there a chance we'd ever see a covered docking port JR port, I don't think it would be to massively difficult to scale down the regular one, but then again i'm far from knowledgeable with that stuff.

I'm not sure what the use case would be of a Jr port in a pack with 200-ton spaceplanes? :D

But if you can think of a compelling reason, sure, I'll think about it.

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Murph

Murph

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I'm trying an SSTO-focused career and I'm really confused by the different jet engines available. Their performance in the tooltips doesn't seem to have much to do with the way the engines actually perform. Which ones should I be using for different purposes? (Using stock aero, not NEAR/FAR)

Personally, for B9 and SSTO, SABREs every time, regardless of the aero in use. I also think that Ferram is very wrong to 50% nerf them, as it just doesn't make sense to me that they only produce half thrust in air mode, so I strongly recommend de-nerfing them (with NEAR & FAR, they should be fine in stock).

As for intakes, use the SABRE intakes 1:1 with the engines, if the plane design works for it, otherwise it's mostly area that matters, and the capacity is just misleading noise (but does give some indication in the resources panel that you're about to run out of air, although not very well).

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Grease1991

Grease1991

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I'm not sure what the use case would be of a Jr port in a pack with 200-ton spaceplanes? :D

But if you can think of a compelling reason, sure, I'll think about it.

It's not so much for the 200-ton spaceplane and more for the small ships being hauled inside, I have a batch of really small spaceplanes that i want to keep in a mothership of sorts, and it would be cool to have a covered docking port JR instead of the regular stock JR one on the craft.

I know it's a small thing but it seems like a neglected part in that there's various covered standard docking ports but no JRs.

Great work on everything B9 BTW.

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Taverius

Taverius

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Posted (edited)
Personally, for B9 and SSTO, SABREs every time, regardless of the aero in use. I also think that Ferram is very wrong to 50% nerf them, as it just doesn't make sense to me that they only produce half thrust in air mode, so I strongly recommend de-nerfing them (with NEAR & FAR, they should be fine in stock).

As for intakes, use the SABRE intakes 1:1 with the engines, if the plane design works for it, otherwise it's mostly area that matters, and the capacity is just misleading noise (but does give some indication in the resources panel that you're about to run out of air, although not very well).

Makes perfect sense, actually - even with them derated KSP jets have much better TWR than real jets, and you still need ~1/2 as much engine as you do in stock.

It's not so much for the 200-ton spaceplane and more for the small ships being hauled inside, I have a batch of really small spaceplanes that i want to keep in a mothership of sorts, and it would be cool to have a covered docking port JR instead of the regular stock JR one on the craft.

I know it's a small thing but it seems like a neglected part in that there's various covered standard docking ports but no JRs.

That's kind of a limited-use thing, but here:


+PART[B9_Utility_DockingPort_CDP]:NEEDS[B9_Aerospace]
    @name = B9_Utility_DockingPort_CDP_Small
    @rescaleFactor = 0.5
    @title ^= :$: Jr.:
    @description ^= :$: Junior version, for baby planes!:
    @cost *= 0.6
    @mass *= 0.125
    @MODULE[ModuleDockingNode] {
        @nodeType = size0
    }
}

Untested, but if you paste that into a new .cfg file and put it anywhere in GameData ModuleManager will create a scaled-down version.

Edited by Taverius
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Murph

Murph

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Makes perfect sense, actually - even with them derated KSP jets have much better TWR than real jets, and you still need ~1/2 as much engine as you do in stock.

Yeah, NEAR & FAR don't need as much thrust as stock in the lower atmosphere, but I strongly dislike the huge imbalance created between air and closed cycle. I prefer to fix that by deleting Ferram's nerf. The SABREs just felt annoyingly weak in air mode with the nerf in place, so the nerf got nerfed.

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bonesbro

bonesbro

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Thanks!

Seems like the D-30F7 is the one to boost to near orbit (haven't unlocked the Sabers yet). Its stats seem pretty similar to the stock Turbojet in the tooltip. I found an old forum post that described how to read the atmosphereCurve and velocityCurve (http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/50522-Velocity-curve-and-atmosphere-curve) and it seems like the stock TurboJet is still better, probably in an unrealistic way that makes you growl and seethe ;)

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bonesbro

bonesbro

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As for intakes, use the SABRE intakes 1:1 with the engines, if the plane design works for it, otherwise it's mostly area that matters, and the capacity is just misleading noise (but does give some indication in the resources panel that you're about to run out of air, although not very well).

Hmm - they'll have enough air to cruise at 30000m or so on just their own SABRE intakes? The SABRE S intake looks like it's just about the same as the other intakes from its stats, though it's much cooler looking.

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Taverius

Taverius

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the stock TurboJet is still better, probably in an unrealistic way that makes you growl and seethe ;)

That's correct.

Even the D30 is a little OP - the highest speed achieved by anyone ever with a turbine engine is an unofficial record of an (Iranian, I believe) MiG escaping from an Israeli missile.

The plane (briefly) achieved Mach 3.2 over the Sinai pensinsula, before the HP turbine stage overheated due to overspeed and spewed metal all over the countryside.

The D-30F7 in B9 will top out at mach 4 ... the stock TJet will go way past mach 5, where even ramjets stop working due to hypersonic dissociation and the heating of the intake air from the deceleration to subsonic velocities.

Hmm - they'll have enough air to cruise at 30000m or so on just their own SABRE intakes? The SABRE S intake looks like it's just about the same as the other intakes from its stats, though it's much cooler looking.

Sure. The SABRE intake is 10% larger than a ram-air, and is pointed 5 degrees down - since you're generally at something at or over 5 degrees of angle of attack, that gives better performance when you need it. Its designed to let you operate like the real ones, which have a final settle altitude before the climb to orbit of 26k.

I suggest going to 23k, though, holding till you reach mach 5.5, and then dropping briefly to 20k before you smoothly start pulling up to 15-20 degrees pitch. Kerbin atmosphere isn't as tall, so you don't have the same lift at 26k as someone on earth would.

Your speed should hold at mach 5.5-ish, and the thicker air will let you change pitch-up more without stalling.

At about 28k you want to manually switch over to rocket mode - due to being past the peak thrust you can keep going for longer, but you won't be producing much thrust, so you won't be accelerating.

Flown that way the HL spaceplanes can carry a red tank into 90km orbit with more than 1/2 their LFO left after circ.

I'll make a wiki page when I have a little time about stuff like this.

Edited by Taverius
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Murph

Murph

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Hmm - they'll have enough air to cruise at 30000m or so on just their own SABRE intakes? The SABRE S intake looks like it's just about the same as the other intakes from its stats, though it's much cooler looking.

It depends on the plane, and how you're flying it, but they can still produce some thrust above 25km if you've built up enough speed, on just a single SABRE intake per engine (i.e. yeah, with a gradual ascent, but maybe not if you do a steep climb to get there).

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Arron Rift

Arron Rift

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It's not so much for the 200-ton spaceplane and more for the small ships being hauled inside, I have a batch of really small spaceplanes that i want to keep in a mothership of sorts, and it would be cool to have a covered docking port JR instead of the regular stock JR one on the craft.

I know it's a small thing but it seems like a neglected part in that there's various covered standard docking ports but no JRs.

Great work on everything B9 BTW.

They might even be able to just make the normal covered docking port scalable via the right-click menu.

Also, on the issue of Sabres, will they have automatic switching like the Rapiers do? And how will they compare with the rapiers? Sorry if this has been asked before ;)

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Taverius

Taverius

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They might even be able to just make the normal covered docking port scalable via the right-click menu.

I'm not interested in including TweakScale for one part - that kind of thing is for the TweakScale mod to cover.

Also, on the issue of Sabres, will they have automatic switching like the Rapiers do? And how will they compare with the rapiers? Sorry if this has been asked before ;)

They're using the same stock Multi-mode module, so yeah.

Compared to the RAPIER, better thrust, slightly higher mass. This because I actually balanced mine, and when Squad copied my part they just pasted the values from existing engines into it :P

Air fuel consumption is slightly higher, but they can fly higher without flaming out.

[h=2][0.24.2] USI Kolonization Systems (MKS/OKS) (0.20.6) [2014.08.26][/h]

And this mod are not compatible CTD every time

Tell it to RoverDude, please, after you make sure you're not just running out of memory.

Could you please add a SABRE type engine that is only for athmospheric flight?

No? Don't turn on rocket mode?

Anything as far as real fuels for the tanks and fuselages? I edited the CFG, but modular tank functionality would be useful

That's up to NKell, really, and he's tackling DRE configs first.

We're co-ordinating for MFT/RF coverage, its coming.

Main issue right now is ModularFuelSystems doesn't support tank cost, that has to be added.

Edited by Taverius
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