[1.2.2] B9 Aerospace | Release 6.2.1 (Old Thread)

[blowfish]

I regret that I must discontinue using B9 Aerospace. With the direction that this mod seems to be going in, I no longer see much use for it personally. The mandatory requirements for FAR/NEAR means that B9 no longer fits into my play style. I can only hope that KSP eventually gets more modders that wish to expand on what KSP is, rather than trying to make it more realistic to the human universe.

That's a little bit overdramatic, don't you think? Here are some things to consider:

1) B9 doesn't explicitly require FAR/NEAR, it's just unsupported without it - the CFGs are set up to work in stock aero, though obviously there might be some balance issues.

2) Squad has stated that the aerodynamics are going to be overhauled to be more realistic in the near future. If you don't like realistic aerodynamics then maybe you should get out of KSP altogether.

3) For a lot of people, myself included, the main motivation for using FAR isn't realism, but rather the fact that stock aerodymaics are counterintuitive. Sure there are some subtleties to designing planes with FAR, but I'll take it over "how many engines and wings can I put on this brick?" which seems to be the way to make things fly in stock. There's a little bit of a learning curve for FAR, yes (I would know - I went through it), but it's rarely frustrating and it often leads to a very basic design principal - things that look like they would fly in real life will probably fly pretty well with FAR. I highly recommend giving it a try - I would never go back to stock and again, I don't particularly care about realism.

[Hary R]

I regret that I must discontinue using B9 Aerospace. With the direction that this mod seems to be going in, I no longer see much use for it personally. The mandatory requirements for FAR/NEAR means that B9 no longer fits into my play style. I can only hope that KSP eventually gets more modders that wish to expand on what KSP is, rather than trying to make it more realistic to the human universe.

As stated by SQUAD, better aerodynamic is what they will do in the near future, so B9 (with FAR and NEAR) direction is somewhat the same as what KSP is going to be, well you can always say that better aerodynamic is not necessarily FAR or NEAR but that's what we got now.

edit, wow nija'd

[JamesL86]

That's a little bit overdramatic, don't you think? Here are some things to consider:

1) B9 doesn't explicitly require FAR/NEAR, it's just unsupported without it - the CFGs are set up to work in stock aero, though obviously there might be some balance issues.

2) Squad has stated that the aerodynamics are going to be overhauled to be more realistic in the near future. If you don't like realistic aerodynamics then maybe you should get out of KSP altogether.

3) For a lot of people, myself included, the main motivation for using FAR isn't realism, but rather the fact that stock aerodymaics are counterintuitive. Sure there are some subtleties to designing planes with FAR, but I'll take it over "how many engines and wings can I put on this brick?" which seems to be the way to make things fly in stock. There's a little bit of a learning curve for FAR, yes (I would know - I went through it), but it's rarely frustrating and it often leads to a very basic design principal - things that look like they would fly in real life will probably fly pretty well with FAR. I highly recommend giving it a try - I would never go back to stock and again, I don't particularly care about realism.

I have tried to use FAR (and NEAR after it came out) at least a dozen times over the last year or so. I have never been able to use it because I require MechJeb, and lately other programs, to play the game. I do not have the physical ability to reliably pilot craft in atmosphere due to disabilities. As for the requirements not really being requirements, it says right in the OP that no support will be given for B9 on stock aero games. So while I could use it, if I have a problem I basically can't get any help for it so why bother. As for future aerodynamics changes by squad, I can only hope they don't totally ruin what already limited ability I have to play this game. Ideally, I'd be perfectly happy with a squad integrating something like FAR if they also integrate something like MechJeb that actually works with that type of aerodynamics without screwing up. At least that way I can continue to play KSP the way I am now by designing really good efficient craft and "letting the kerbals fly it".

[blowfish]

I have tried to use FAR (and NEAR after it came out) at least a dozen times over the last year or so. I have never been able to use it because I require MechJeb, and lately other programs, to play the game. I do not have the physical ability to reliably pilot craft in atmosphere due to disabilities. As for the requirements not really being requirements, it says right in the OP that no support will be given for B9 on stock aero games. So while I could use it, if I have a problem I basically can't get any help for it so why bother. As for future aerodynamics changes by squad, I can only hope they don't totally ruin what already limited ability I have to play this game. Ideally, I'd be perfectly happy with a squad integrating something like FAR if they also integrate something like MechJeb that actually works with that type of aerodynamics without screwing up. At least that way I can continue to play KSP the way I am now by designing really good efficient craft and "letting the kerbals fly it".

FYI, there is a FAR module for Mechjeb. I haven't tested it (yet) but it's there.

[JamesL86]

FYI, there is a FAR module for Mechjeb. I haven't tested it (yet) but it's there.

Yea, one of my happiest, and then saddest moments with KSP was when I found that, and it basically did nothing. All it did was reduce by a small amount the huge number of SAS modules that every non-rocket thing I build requires to fly. Their is no reason why I should have to add 20-30 SAS modules to a plane to make it fly without wigging out.

I actually had more success making FAR work with that new pilot assist mod that came out recently than with MechJeb, with or without that module. Even then, I crashed half the time. And don't even get me started on trying to land a plane with FAR installed and MechJeb piloting. I basically have to resort to landing the plane with chutes to get it back safely. So I switched to using vertical SSTOs for crew transfers but FAR makes MechJeb totally unable to land anywhere remotely close to where its supposed to when landing vertically.

To be perfectly honest, I did not intend to get into a discussion in Bac9's thread about the merits of FAR and MechJeb, though I appreciate you trying to help, blowfish. I really only intended to speak my piece about the mod and leave it at that. Thankfully there aren't really too many mods that rely on FAR so its not like I am losing half of the mods that I have downloaded. I'm just not gonna subject myself to trying and failing to make FAR work when I have proven to myself time and time again that its just not possible with my limitations. Thus all mods associated with FAR are now off limits for me.

[steve_v]

What about Pilot-Assistant? it needs a little tuning for FAR, but once set you can do 'fly to 25000m @90°' and hands-off

Mechjebs 'auto-land' works just fine for me - in conjunction with 'use stock sas', 'pid tuner' to remove the wobble & a reasonable approach course.

Edited November 20, 2014 by steve_v

[JamesL86]

What about Pilot-Assistant? it needs a little tuning for FAR, but once set you can do 'fly to 25000m @90°' and hands-off

Yea, I mentioned that in the post above yours. While it did work better than MechJeb with FAR, my attempts to figure out how to tune it just made it handle worse. If I wanted to dedicate a couple of weeks to trying to figure out how to get it working just right, it might actually be okay. The only issue there is that I still have to land the thing. So far, there is nothing I have found that can land a plane safely hands-off, and that is with AND without FAR. Though FAR makes it even more difficult. I wish there were more mods like Stock Drag Fix that simply repaired obvious bugs in the stock aero models rather than trying to replace them entirely. Even though SDF made some pretty strong changes to drag, it only extends MechJeb's vertical landing accuracy (on bodies with atmospheres) by a few tens of meters rather than completely dumb-founding the entire landing guidance system.

[blowfish]

Sorry to hear about your troubles then. For what it's worth, landing seems to be an exercise in trial and error even with manual controls.

And if you're very attached to B9, it might be worth trying it even if support is not guaranteed. The stock aerodynamic configuration is hard to mess up and easy to change in the event that there are errors. If that doesn't appeal to you then there are a few other mods which might satisfy your need for spaceplane parts (here and here) which are built with stock aero. Both are WIP so no guarantees there of course, but if you encounter errors you can at least get support.

[TheHypnotoad]

I had a question about the m27 cockpit. Is it possible to rotate the nav ball orientation from the top of the cockpit to the front?

[JamesL86]

Sorry to hear about your troubles then. For what it's worth, landing seems to be an exercise in trial and error even with manual controls.

And if you're very attached to B9, it might be worth trying it even if support is not guaranteed. The stock aerodynamic configuration is hard to mess up and easy to change in the event that there are errors. If that doesn't appeal to you then there are a few other mods which might satisfy your need for spaceplane parts (here and here) which are built with stock aero. Both are WIP so no guarantees there of course, but if you encounter errors you can at least get support.

Thanks blowfish. In reality, dropping B9 is gonna get me to give the Spaceplane+ parts the attention they deserve. Though, that tubby little spaceplane in that first link here http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/51395 is frickin' cute as hell. Ya just want to give it a squeeze.

Edit: As for the landing bit, yea it sucks. Though I am getting pretty good at designing Vertical SSTOs. At any rate, by finally burying FAR for good, at least MechJeb can once again reliably land vertically. The only weird bit was that FAR as even screwing up MechJeb landings on bodies with no atmosphere. However, that is something for the MechJeb thread I reckon, or the FAR thread.

Edited November 20, 2014 by JamesL86

[Hary R]

Edit: As for the landing bit, yea it sucks. Though I am getting pretty good at designing Vertical SSTOs. At any rate, by finally burying FAR for good, at least MechJeb can once again reliably land vertically. The only weird bit was that FAR as even screwing up MechJeb landings on bodies with no atmosphere. However, that is something for the MechJeb thread I reckon, or the FAR thread.

Well now I can understand your problem. You should have say that from the beginning. You see, saying that some mod just intent to "trying to make it more realistic to the human universe" was a little confusing (for me FAR make plane fun). Well at least you have a good reason to not wanting it. As for the quote above, I think it's a mechjeb issue.

[Ser Brynden]

Those HX spacecraft pictures in the OP are ridiculously awesome! Can you post the craft files for those, please? Me want!!!

[funk]

After a bunch of work I've managed to get my B9 Spaceplane flying to the Mun. It's a VTOL for Mun landing and delivers an AES exploration lander. In LKO it has 3000m/s dv so it could get nearly anywhere... eh... I hope. Nevertheless I've had some problems with the VTOLs.

Javascript is disabled. View full album

The craft is perfectly balanced using RCS build aid, DCOM is nearby COM and CoT is aligned with COM/DCOM in z-axis and in y-axis. In space there is no spinning using SABRE and/or both pairs of VTOLS in z-direction. Y-direction is fine too.

In flight it is rock stable, though it takes some time to ascend...

Now to my problem. When ascending at Kerbin it reaches 37-38km and Mach 5.3. Then I switch mode of SABRE engine and activate all VTOLs. The plane starts to spin left or right. Minimal trim changes at one or two of the VTOLS result in massive opposite spin direction.

Until there's is no solution for this I'm getting to orbit with SABRE only,

It is really weird. Because I don't see any reason for the spinning, as I've said in space it's all fine. I've checked thrust, trim, COM alignement, angles and colliding parts for the VTOLs, but it's all fine too.

Anyone an idea?

I'm using FAR and DRE. Also tried some Throttle Control mods, but they are annoying. They're doing things I don't want and which aren't neccesary. Especially when a craft is designed well. For the problem above they were disabled and enabling them didn't help.

Another thing, which is just aesthetical ... When attaching the first fuselage to the main body the texture is rotated (see pictures). The heatshielded side is rotated towards the main body. Any help here?

P.S I love B9, it's pure fun!!!

edit: thx Kerbas!

Edited November 20, 2014 by funk

[Kerbas_ad_astra]

FYI, to embed an Imgur album, take the album ID (in this case, ISsFg) and put it between a set of [imgur] tags.

[How2FoldSoup]

Hey b9 team,

Would it be possible to be able to have the option to switch out textures of the heat shielding on cargobays? This would allow some very cool things. Perhaps allow the option of heatshielding on the door side, normal, or no shielding at all. That would be absolutely wonderful!

[Tacotown99]

im sorry if this is to general but my MFD don't turn on or do any thing with out JSI installed, and even then that is gliched out, and can only view from the camera which colors everything a light blue and white, any ideas why?

thanks

taco

[boostedM]

Installed and I'm only getting a small number of parts (less than 50). Any suggestions? I've installed an run other mods fine (MechJeb, KWRocketry, BDArmory, FASA, etc)

[Tacotown99]

there is less parts in this pack because the have a new option were if you mouse over a part it will say x4 or x8 or I think x15 this means when you place said part and right click it should say next tank setup and you can cycle through tanks for fuel or strutlal styles

[Lei07]

Taco, the multi function displays REQUIRE the JSI folder to be installed. Thats what the JSI folder does. Thats what it is there for. And use the version bundled with B9 over the one from the main Raster Prop Monitor page.

Boosted, make sure you have installed correctly, and if you are referring to your career game, make sure you are purchasing the parts in each node.

[DivisionByZero]

Are there any problems remaining with landing gear alignments? I'm having a terrible time on landing. My firespitter is out of mks, could that be it?

[Tacotown99]

ok I tried that and, im stuck to a camera view only(but no weird blue and white textures), at least for B9's cockpits stock seams to work fine though.

[boostedM]

there is less parts in this pack because the have a new option were if you mouse over a part it will say x4 or x8 or I think x15 this means when you place said part and right click it should say next tank setup and you can cycle through tanks for fuel or strutlal styles

Yes but I installed it on .24 and .25. In .25 I'm not even getting a quarter as many parts as .24. Exact same install. On my .25 install I'm not getting a few cockpits, no landing gear, no cargo bays or tail pieces, etc. A lot of stuff just not showing up

[Guest]

Wrong installation. Before, you could get away with this, as the pack was less optimized and use more of the legacy system. Well, now you can't.

[DivisionByZero]

So, I tried a whole series of landings to try and sort out what is happening. When I take off, it stays perfectly straight. When I land though, it tends to pull to the left, flip over and explode. The landing speed isn´t excessive, about 150 m/s. At least, it doesn´t seem excessive to me.

Any thoughts on what to check?

[Guest]

Landing gear placement and nose wheel steering. Try using Bahamuto's adjustable gear instead of B9 ones. Veering to the left is a well known problem with KSP.