RemoteTech advanced SatDish

[IGNOBIL]

I don't like much the antennas on Remote Tech, I mean, the plugin is brilliant, but the antenna models, especially the big ones, aren't very practical. Thats why, inspired by NASA folding antennas, mainly TDRS, I came up with this!

The thing is, although I can model, programming gives me headaches, and I can seem to make it work. It's big, over 3mt long, but folds to a width of 1.25 for easy packing and compact TDRS satellites, but deployed should preform as CommTech-1, since it unfolds to the same size.

Is anyone interested in further developing this, I'll be more than happy to share the 3d model, it's animated in Cinema4D.

Next will be a exact replica of the advanced TDRS currently in space, with the draw back that once unfolded can't be folded again, but should be around 3mt deployed and folded to 1.5mt, also projecting out.

Some pics of the TDRS packed and deployed.

folded

Deployed

[Helix935]

whoa now that looks great! great work so far

[BLUAV8R]

Yes! Looks amazing and could really be used as I just got into RemoteTech

[TMBakeNaut]

Brilliant! No more IR with ugly poles to fold out Dish arrays.

[peter.alfredsen]

This is *very* nice. Hope someone takes you up on the offer.

[SpannerMonkey(smce)]

Hi , I've a feeling you could just create the part as per a normal ksp part and use a module manager MM cfg to give it the remotech feature such as the example below (I use something very similar to fit remotech to other non antenna parts). nothing fancy needed in the way of programming, in fact non at all, so go for it, if you get stuck I'd be happy to port it to the game although it'd probably need reanimating etc in unty, as c4d historically tends to spit out models that are studio rather than game quality.

@PART[[COLOR="#FF0000"]YOUR PART NAME HERE[/COLOR]]:FINAL
{
	%TechRequired = largeElectrics
	@MODULE[ModuleAnimateGeneric]
	{
		%allowManualControl = false
	}

	%MODULE[ModuleRTAntenna] {
		%Mode0OmniRange = 0
		%Mode1OmniRange = 5000000
		%MaxQ = 3000
		%EnergyCost = 0.6

		%DeployFxModules = 0

		%TRANSMITTER {
			%PacketInterval = 0.3
			%PacketSize = 2
			%PacketResourceCost = 15.0
		}
	}

	%MODULE[ModuleSPUPassive] {}
}

[Nori]

That looks pretty awesome.

[CaptainKipard]

I didn't realise I needed this, until I saw it.

[IGNOBIL]

OK, definitely I can't animate this, managed to get it as a blender .DAE on KSP to check proportions, animation doesn't work, but just to show the scale and how practical it is, here it is in KSP wit a Reflectron GX-128 and a CommTech-1 for scale, sidewise it stands between the twoo, so would be fair to range 350Gm like CommTech-1, and you can pack a lot of them in a 2.5mt fairing (2.5mt cone for scale).

Hi , I've a feeling you could just create the part as per a normal ksp part and use a module manager MM cfg to give it the remotech feature such as the example below (I use something very similar to fit remotech to other non antenna parts). nothing fancy needed in the way of programming, in fact non at all, so go for it, if you get stuck I'd be happy to port it to the game although it'd probably need reanimating etc in unty, as c4d historically tends to spit out models that are studio rather than game quality.

@PART[[COLOR="#FF0000"]YOUR PART NAME HERE[/COLOR]]:FINAL
{
	%TechRequired = largeElectrics
	@MODULE[ModuleAnimateGeneric]
	{
		%allowManualControl = false
	}

	%MODULE[ModuleRTAntenna] {
		%Mode0OmniRange = 0
		%Mode1OmniRange = 5000000
		%MaxQ = 3000
		%EnergyCost = 0.6

		%DeployFxModules = 0

		%TRANSMITTER {
			%PacketInterval = 0.3
			%PacketSize = 2
			%PacketResourceCost = 15.0
		}
	}

	%MODULE[ModuleSPUPassive] {}
}

SpannerMonkey, my problem isn't the config, is the unity and animation, the cfg just copied it from RT parts, if you know Unity and want to have a go at it tell me if you want the .DAE file from blender with the animation and I'll send it.

[IGNOBIL]

Another

[Kommitz]

You should be able to animate it in unity considering it's just a bunch of geometric parts that move around hinges.

Alternatively you could rig it and animate then export it from C4D, don't think you can export animations without skeletal rigs for unity.

Either way it looks great so far. I'd be happy to help with texturing or animating if you need

[IGNOBIL]

Brilliant! No more IR with ugly poles to fold out Dish arrays.

That's what got me scratching my head for start, the common hate for awkwardly ugly IR dish struts! Although IR is brilliant and a must have for other stuff like rover bays and so on!

[CaptainKipard]

You need to animate it in blender, and export as .fbx, then import the fbx into unity and export as .mu

No one uses .dae any more. you must be reading very old tutorials.

edit

I just read you use Cinema4D, so I can't really help you there.

Edited October 18, 2014 by Cpt. Kipard

[Mekan1k]

Hi , I've a feeling you could just create the part as per a normal ksp part and use a module manager MM cfg to give it the remotech feature

... I agree with Mr. Monkey.

[weeble]

Bookmarked and eagerly waiting for the release. Looks amazing!

[IGNOBIL]

Freeking out on unity, following all the tutorials and it just won't animate

[IGNOBIL]

Finally did it, hope to release this one and a smaller one by next weekend, thank you all for the feedback

Jeb likes to use it as a solarium, all those shiny parts give him a good tan!

"Whoa!, this some big ass antenna!"

[Floppster]

Absolutely gorgeous, im glad you got it working!

[Mecripp]

Very nice can't wait to throw it in space .

[Helix935]

oh god that looks amazing, can't wait to shrink this and use it with boxsat

[Dr. Jet]

You need to animate it in blender, and export as .fbx, then import the fbx into unity and export as .mu

No one uses .dae any more. you must be reading very old tutorials.

edit

I just read you use Cinema4D, so I can't really help you there.

.fbx export is unneeded and bug adding step. Unity 4.2.2 perfectly eats .blend files with their inbuilt animation. Of course you need to set it up correctly when importing to Unity (only "legacy" animation works flawlessly in KSP).

Edited October 21, 2014 by Dr. Jet

[IGNOBIL]

Well, it turns out it eats cinema4d with animation pretty well too, because I just did everything in cinema 4D (animation, textures, just haven't tried bump) and imported straight in and it's working, only took me more to find out I was using the wrong version of part tools.

[Niemand303]

Wow, love it!

[Itsdavyjones]

Wow, can't wait for the release.

[Felbourn]

I need this. I need this now.

I need it for my YouTube show that does a lot of focusing on satellite deployment and uses RT.

I know how to make CFGs and Modules (and custom plugins, etc) so... how about just making that MU and related PNG/MBM/TGA available even if not 100% ready for public consumption? The pic looks ready to me.