3m Crew capsules

[Bill Phil]

My version of the SLS can lift 41 tons to LKO

Block II can lift 47t to LKO,

Block III(Pryios) can lift 72t to LKO.

Actually, that IS about half...

[sedativechunk]

In the mean time you might be interested in this mod: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/75074-25-Taurus-HCV-3-75-m-Crew-Pod-and-other-parts-v1-3-Oct-7-2014

I used the Taurus for LONG time, wonderful mod, ties perfectly into KSP!

Personally, I don't really care for a 3.5m crew capsule apart from the Taurus mod. Even that particular mod, I have it uninstalled because I wasn't using it too much (and KSP is a memory hog with too many mods I have to cherry pick which ones to keep). I don't see it on the horizon as an official part by Squad, and they are so slow at creating/adding new parts it will probably never happen.

One mod I like that fills the void in sizes is KW Rocketry. One of you mentioned KSP is missing some good "in between" parts for sizes. I agree. The cylindrical fuel tanks to attach different sized tanks are great. Also, I'm a lobbyist for 5M parts being added to the game. KSP's rockets are vastly underpowered compared to real life. 5M parts would more so resemble the actual Apollo Saturn V in size and could be the main workload of heavy lift launches in KSP. I would rather have official 5M parts and engines at this point than a 3.5m crew capsule.

[Pthigrivi]

Just as a +1, I am into this .....

[Northstar1989]

I disagree. I didn't(and still don't) care about whatever a hypergolic is, nor do I care about the ISP of real world fuels. Those don't exist in KSP. In KSP rockets are powered by Fuelâ„¢ and Oxidizerâ„¢. We don't need to over complicate things by saying what their chemical composition is. They have their own densities and ISPs that make complete sense in their universe, so stop thinking they are some real-world thing. Your quest for realism will turn KSP into a real-life space sim, something I am against.

I said this before, but you either didn't see the post before the one you quoted, or it didn't sink it.

These unrealistic features of KSP actually make for a HARDER game.

If you had access to 460-480 second (vacuum ISP, typically 400-420 sec at sea-level) Hydrolox rocket engines, things would be *MUCH* easier. If you had realistic aerodynamics, then you could reach orbit with less Delta-V (especially with larger rockets). If you had realistic rocket engines, your rocket engines would have MUCH better thrust for their mass and size. If you had multi-body physics (somebody's actually making a mod for this, so it *IS* possible with KSP's engine) then you could have things like LaGrange points that would actually open up more exciting possibilities for Mun missions and orbital fuel depots. If you had the ISRU options that are being considered in real life, rather than just the "asteroid mining" Squad seems to be leaning towards, well you get the idea...

Even realistic-sized planets/moons, one of the few features that would make the game significantly harder, actually makes landing easier by increasing atmospheric scale-height (so you can rely on atmosphere to absorb more of your velocity) and making the landscape flatter (the planets/moons in KSP are far too hilly even in the "flat" areas compared to their real-life counterparts, as a result of the devs wanting to create sufficiently dense elevation maps that they look good from orbit).

KSP is a *harder* and *less* fun game for its lack of unrealistic features, not the other way around. It's like Squad went through a list of real-world principles, and decided to strip out of the game half the ones that would actually make the game easier and more interesting, at times.

Regards,

Northstar

P.S. I know there are *some* features that would make KSP harder, such as larger planets/moons (which would increase Delta-V requirements to make orbit), re-entry heat (although it's still one of the most-requested features, for immersion reasons), and aerodynamic failures. But these features are actually in the *minority* of realistic features.

Edited December 19, 2014 by Northstar1989

[Northstar1989]

I know that technically things aren't that simple. However I've found that if I build a rocket in KSP to half the size of the real one, the payload is also about half.

E.g SLS replica can lift 35 tons to LKO. S-V replica can manage 50.

I know that in reality things are much more complex but I've just found that this works out as a very good estimate.

No, that's less than a tenth the performance.

What?! You must think I'm crazy, obviously 35 is 70% of 50. But once again, it's not that simple...

First of all, in stock's favor, a half-diameter SLS is actually only a QUARTER of the size of a full-diameter SLS. It is also about half the height.

And actually, the SLS can carry 70 tons to LEO in its relatively anemic Block I configuration, and 130 tons or more with the heavier configurations down the line that KSP actually imitates.

So, comparing 130 tons to 50 tons, you already have only around 40% of the payload capacity. However, the Delta-V required to get to LKO (4.5 km/s in stock) is LESS THAN HALF that in real life (10 km/s). That means, the stock KSP SLS could only get 40% of the payload less than halfway to orbit on Earth, which is a LOT less impressive...

And since the Rocket Equation says that fuel requirements increase exponentially with Delta-V requirements, 40% of the payload to 45% of the Delta-V gap is less than a tenth the performance of the real life rocket.

My point was that the stock-sized KSP rockets are MUCH lower-performance that real-life rockets, not that the game is ultimately harder because of it. The greatly-reduced Delta-V requirements to orbit somewhat make up for the reduced performance. The greatly-reduced Delta-V requirements from orbit to any other destination make up for the rest (unless you're trying to launch a massive LKO space station- in which case you need more than TWICE as many launches with the KSP analogs, as the payload components generally have the same mass as in real life, but equivalent rockets less than 40% the payload capacity to LKO as real rockets to LEO...)

Regards,

Northstar

Edited December 19, 2014 by Northstar1989

[r4pt0r]

I said this before, but you either didn't see the post before the one you quoted, or it didn't sink it.

These unrealistic features of KSP actually make for a HARDER game.

If you had access to 460-480 second (vacuum ISP, typically 400-420 sec at sea-level) Hydrolox rocket engines, things would be *MUCH* easier. If you had realistic aerodynamics, then you could reach orbit with less Delta-V (especially with larger rockets). If you had realistic rocket engines, your rocket engines would have MUCH better thrust for their mass and size. If you had multi-body physics (somebody's actually making a mod for this, so it *IS* possible with KSP's engine) then you could have things like LaGrange points that would actually open up more exciting possibilities for Mun missions and orbital fuel depots. If you had the ISRU options that are being considered in real life, rather than just the "asteroid mining" Squad seems to be leaning towards, well you get the idea...

Even realistic-sized planets/moons, one of the few features that would make the game significantly harder, actually makes landing easier by increasing atmospheric scale-height (so you can rely on atmosphere to absorb more of your velocity) and making the landscape flatter (the planets/moons in KSP are far too hilly even in the "flat" areas compared to their real-life counterparts, as a result of the devs wanting to create sufficiently dense elevation maps that they look good from orbit).

KSP is a *harder* and *less* fun game for its lack of unrealistic features, not the other way around. It's like Squad went through a list of real-world principles, and decided to strip out of the game half the ones that would actually make the game easier and more interesting, at times.

Regards,

Northstar

P.S. I know there are *some* features that would make KSP harder, such as larger planets/moons (which would increase Delta-V requirements to make orbit), re-entry heat (although it's still one of the most-requested features, for immersion reasons), and aerodynamic failures. But these features are actually in the *minority* of realistic features.

I dont think you are getting it. The ISP's and other stuff are tailored to the game, otherwise as you have stated, it would be easy. A rocket with all your real world stats launching off kerbin(10x smaller than earth) would be WAY too easy. These inconsistencies from the real world have balanced the game.

That said I dont think KSP should have realistic sized planets. I dont want 15 minute launches into orbit.

TL;DR The current scale is perfect IMO, and the current part stats are tailored to work perfectly in that scale.

edit: I want to say that I realize you mention that real-sized planets are a minority, but note that all the part stats are changed to be balanced in the stock planet sizes

edit 2: So back on the topic of 3m crew capsules, I think it would be nice if we could do our own version of the potential Orion Mars mission, but with Duna obviously. A capsule similar to the Orion one would be pretty neat for that purpose, were it to be made stock

Edited December 19, 2014 by r4pt0r