[1.9-1.10] Throttle Controlled Avionics

[_Astra_]

It happens on landings and takeoff. Auto deploying or retracting  gears and brakes immediately resets Level.

Level is also reset in Cruise and Go To modes.

 

Edited February 21, 2017 by _Astra_

[martinezfg11]

Apologies if it's been asked. But is there anyway to add compatibility for the FSEngine Module? These are used by the Airplane Plus rotors, and I haven't been able to use TCA with these.

[allista]

3 hours ago, _Astra_ said:

It happens on landings and takeoff. Auto deploying or retracting  gears and brakes immediately resets Level.

Level is also reset in Cruise and Go To modes.

Level is mutually exclusive with the other modes that control horizontal component of the thrust, that's why Cruise, Go To, Stop, Anchor and Follow Path will disable Level. All of them use the same core module to control thrust with different purposes. If you want a copter-style control over your craft you should use the VTOL Control mode in Advanced Tab instead of Level.

What resets the Level after takeoff is the VTOL Assist module (also in Advanced Tab); you can safely disable it. During manual landing, though, nothing should interrupt Level mode.

1 hour ago, martinezfg11 said:

Apologies if it's been asked. But is there anyway to add compatibility for the FSEngine Module? These are used by the Airplane Plus rotors, and I haven't been able to use TCA with these.

Currently these are not supported. Only stock ModuleEngines and its derivatives (like ModuleEnginesFX and such) are supported. To add support for FSEngine I need to compile against the Firespitter.dll, thus making it a hard dependency, which is unacceptable. So I will be forced to move the FS dedicated code into a separate optional .dll, which in its turn entails many technical difficulties.

What it boils down to: this is on my TODO list, but not a priority.

[allista]

TCA v3.4.1 for KSP 1.2.2 (2017.02.22)

ChangeLog:

Spoiler

• Rendezvous Autopilot:
  • Lambert Solver now works properly for retrograde transfers.
  • In rare cases when a rendezvous maneuver went perfect and the ships are on a collision course at rendezvous point, the brake burn now accounts for ships' sizes to stop before the collision.
  • Improved trajectory optimization by using the closest elliptic transfer when a para/hyperbolic transfer time is given and by adding additional maneuver start time prescan.
  • Improved fine-tuning by selecting initial transfer time to be equal to the current nearest approach time.
  • Additional fine-tuning of the approach after Match Orbits is used only when the target is out of loading range (i.e. not yet visible).
  • Coast stage is only used when distance to target is grater then the tolerance threshold to avoid unnesessary fine-tuning.
• Deorbit Autopilot:
  • Landing Trajectory corrects brake time to get the proper fly-over altitude. This fixes the inability to land on a very-low-gravity worlds like Minmus.
  • Improved trajectory calculation for extremly high-lat targes (i.e. poles) + improved trajectory optimization times.
  • Initial eccentricity estimation uses current vessel orbit instead of a curcular derivative. Works better, less calculations.
  • Removed redundant label from Deorbit Settings.
• Macros:
  • Added tooltips to Macro Actions and Conditions.
  • Added Dynamic Pressure condition and Execute Maneuver action.
• Interface:
  • Updated the Manual
  • Added separate icons for Toolbar and AppLauncher. Made the new MAN icon.
  • Made Module Selector available in flight to show the modules installed on a ship.
  • Added hotkey removal by pressing BACKSPACE when selecting the ky.
  • In Editor Window renamed TWR to TMR (thrust to Mass ratio).
• Engine clusters are not switched while in time warp anymore.
• TCA's time warp control stays enabled when KSP limits warp rate by altitude.
• Added emergency dewarping if TCA's time warp is disabled and the ship is in time warp near the upcoming maneuver.
• Maneuver offsets now take into account minimum turn time of a ship.

 Download

 

[Jarin]

Just tried rendezvous in the new version, moving from an 8km equatorial orbit around minmus to a geostationary station on the opposite side of the moon. Engines engaged at full instantly, without changing direction, then the ship started rotating to somewhere near radial-out. I let it run for a few thinking it was trying for a direct transfer, but it kept burning, until the course was a straight line out of the SOI, then the game crashed. 

I... don't think I've ever actually gotten Rendezvous to work before, so I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong. Do I need to do anything other than have my target selected and click the rendezvous button? Is there some prep I should be doing?

[allista]

7 minutes ago, Jarin said:

Just tried rendezvous in the new version, moving from an 8km equatorial orbit around minmus to a geostationary station on the opposite side of the moon. Engines engaged at full instantly, without changing direction, then the ship started rotating to somewhere near radial-out. I let it run for a few thinking it was trying for a direct transfer, but it kept burning, until the course was a straight line out of the SOI, then the game crashed. 

I... don't think I've ever actually gotten Rendezvous to work before, so I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong. Do I need to do anything other than have my target selected and click the rendezvous button? Is there some prep I should be doing?

Err... no, nothing but target is required. There's definitely something wrong with it, though you can imagine how much I tested it, and I never saw anything like this. 

The normal operation should be like this: 

1. initial orbit correction for resonance with the target (max. dV 100m/s)
2. calculation of the transfer orbit and execution of the corresponding maneuver
3. matching orbital velocity with the target at nearest approach

So it should've never even tried to fire engines without a maneuver node...

Edited February 23, 2017 by allista

[Jarin]

Just now, allista said:

So it should've never even tried to fire engines without a maneuver...

That's what I was worried about. I think I have a save before the attempt, I'll see if the issue is repeatable.

[allista]

Just now, Jarin said:

That's what I was worried about. I think I have a save before the attempt, I'll see if the issue is repeatable.

There should be an autosave that TCA does before attempting the rendezvous maneuver. If it worked at all, the save should be there.

[Jarin]

13 minutes ago, allista said:

There should be an autosave that TCA does before attempting the rendezvous maneuver. If it worked at all, the save should be there.

Persistence file hadn't updated since it crashed mid-burn, so I loaded up in the right spot. Here's the sequence of events:

Spoiler

Starting positions. Spaceplane in low orbit trying to rendezvous with the station on the left.

Current settings:

Ship not pointing any direction in particular, pre-burn:

Click the button, and - 

excrements excrements excrements ABORT ABORT

Are there any known mod conflicts? I have Atmosphere Autopilot, but it was disengaged. OPT and SP+ parts on the craft, but nothing else that should affect controls in any way. Does it rely on the stock maneuver node somehow? I've got DMagic's maneuver node mod in there...

 

Edit: If it helps track anything down, the ship reoriented itself to perfectly surface-vertical on the navball, not just radial-out. 

Here's the orbital view as the game crashes again:

Spoiler

 

Edited February 23, 2017 by Jarin

[allista]

1 minute ago, Jarin said:

Persistence file hadn't updated since it crashed mid-burn, so I loaded up in the right spot. Here's the sequence of events:

  Hide contents

Starting positions. Spaceplane in low orbit trying to rendezvous with the station on the left.

Current settings:

Ship not pointing any direction in particular, pre-burn:

Click the button, and - 

excrements excrements excrements ABORT ABORT

Are there any known mod conflicts? I have Atmosphere Autopilot, but it was disengaged. OPT and SP+ parts on the craft, but nothing else that should affect controls in any way. Does it rely on the stock maneuver node somehow? I've got DMagic's maneuver node mod in there...

Gravity turn!!! Oh boy...

The "problem" is the low altitude. TCA "thinks" you're still not in orbit and tries to raise ApA to at least 10km, before trying anything else.

You see, Rendezvous program also works from surface; you can use it while your ship is landed and it will calculate the launch window and perform the classic rocket-style launch with gravity turn before actual rendezvous maneuver...

Anyway, I need a more accurate definition of in-orbit state. Some not hard-coded PeA threshold.

Meanwhile, you can either allow TCA to raise ApA, or do it yourself.

I'm sorry for the inconvenience

[Jarin]

4 minutes ago, allista said:

The "problem" is the low altitude. TCA "thinks" you're still not in orbit and tries to raise ApA to at least 10km, before trying anything else.

Ah good, I can work with that. The only reason I was that low to begin with is that my ground base isn't on the equator and I'd circularized at the equatorial descending node. 

Still, it raised my AP a heck of a lot higher than 10km (see previous post edit). (I'm assuming the crash was some kind of infinite loop on orbital calculations) What was it trying to do there?

Edited February 23, 2017 by Jarin

[allista]

Just now, Jarin said:

Ah good, I can work with that. The only reason I was that low to begin with is that my ground base isn't on the equator and I'd circularized at the equatorial descending node. 

Still, it raised my AP a heck of a lot higher than 10km. (I'm assuming the crash was some kind of infinite loop on orbital calculations) What was it trying to do there?

I'll have to test this myself to figure it out.

Probably, It was trying to move ApA around the moon to achieve resonance at the peak.

Sometimes I don't understand how it works anymore... 

Issue to track: https://github.com/qfeys/ThrottleControlledAvionics/issues/35

[Jarin]

6 minutes ago, allista said:

I'll have to test this myself to figure it out.

Probably, It was trying to move ApA around the moon to achieve resonance at the peak.

Sometimes I don't understand how it works anymore... 

So... I was actually orbiting between 5km and 6km, at which point it's entirely reasonable to assume I'm not properly in orbit yet. The response was still weird, but at least the starting state makes more sense.

Okay, attempt #3, now with 100% less crazy-low orbits:

A bit aggressive, but looking better. 215m/s direct transfer.

 

[allista]

2 minutes ago, Jarin said:

So... I was actually orbiting between 5km and 6km, at which point it's entirely reasonable to assume I'm not properly in orbit yet. The response was still weird, but at least the starting state makes more sense.

Okay, attempt #3, now with 100% less crazy-low orbits:

A bit aggressive, but looking better. 215m/s direct transfer.

 

Yep... trajectory optimization is far from perfect  

I'm already working on the replacement with the proper multi-dimensional dV minimization algorithm (conjugate directions type). But it will take some time to integrate.

[redmonddkgamer]

For some reason the hover isn't hovering, it just keeps the helichopper going up even past the set altitude. Piloting a chopper is hard!

[allista]

14 minutes ago, redmonddkgamer said:

For some reason the hover isn't hovering, it just keeps the helichopper going up even past the set altitude. Piloting a chopper is hard!

Some screenshots would help to understand the situation better.

[redmonddkgamer]

Just now, allista said:

Some screenshots would help to understand the situation better.

I think I got it to work. I'm trying to do a Mercury-Redstone recovery with a Sikorsky S-64 Skycrane. How do I get it to hover directly over the capsule like this?

[allista]

3 minutes ago, redmonddkgamer said:

I think I got it to work. I'm trying to do a Mercury-Redstone recovery with a Sikorsky S-64 Skycrane. How do I get it to hover directly over the capsule like this?

I'm to sure it's possible. Some Firespitter engines are not supported (see above the discussion of that).

[redmonddkgamer]

1 minute ago, allista said:

I'm to sure it's possible. Some Firespitter engines are not supported (see above the discussion of that).

It uses three KH-1 Kuey Main Rotors, one TR24 Tail Rotor, and two J-33s for forward propulsion. The rotors are from the Kerbal Rotor Expansion mod, which directed me here from it's "recommended mods" section. It does use the Firespitter FS23C Helicopter Cockpit and two sets of tweakscaled winches and electromagnets from KAS, but the airframe is stock.

[allista]

6 minutes ago, redmonddkgamer said:

It uses three KH-1 Kuey Main Rotors, one TR24 Tail Rotor, and two J-33s for forward propulsion. The rotors are from the Kerbal Rotor Expansion mod, which directed me here from it's "recommended mods" section. It does use the Firespitter FS23C Helicopter Cockpit and two sets of tweakscaled winches and electromagnets from KAS, but the airframe is stock.

I'll try it myself then.

[redmonddkgamer]

1 hour ago, allista said:

I'll try it myself then.

It's easily the most stable KSP chopper I have ever flown. But then again, I haven't flown very many.

[Hacki]

On 13/02/2017 at 10:30 PM, allista said:

Well, this is intentionally not so obvious; the feature was added specifically for color-blind users, while general public is mostly happy with the defaults. So I left it without UI and provide the answer I gave you per request.

This is just like with other .glob files where tons of options and settings are "hidden"; and any of them could be overridden via corresponding .user file.

 

Hey, thanks.
I just had a somewhat of a what experience with the default UI because you absolute cannot tell the yellow and green apart if you happen to be part of the 8% of people with a red-green colorblindness. 

So... It's a good thing there's a feature to change that.

Its a bad thing to have a UI that has Colors by default that cannot be told apart by a not even particularly small fraction of users. 
I see no logical reason to do that. 
Either change the default color layout or add a note to the manual in the "Button switches" section. 

 

Enough complaining. I really love your mod. Keep up the good work.

 

[allista]

11 hours ago, Hacki said:

Hey, thanks.
I just had a somewhat of a what experience with the default UI because you absolute cannot tell the yellow and green apart if you happen to be part of the 8% of people with a red-green colorblindness. 

So... It's a good thing there's a feature to change that.

Its a bad thing to have a UI that has Colors by default that cannot be told apart by a not even particularly small fraction of users. 
I see no logical reason to do that. 
Either change the default color layout or add a note to the manual in the "Button switches" section. 

Enough complaining. I really love your mod. Keep up the good work.

You're right, I'll add this to the manual, thanks!

Or maybe just make the configuration UI at last...

Edit: github issue: https://github.com/qfeys/ThrottleControlledAvionics/issues/36

Edited February 27, 2017 by allista

[gilflo]

Is there any way to set up the gravity turn ?

Beginning the gravity turn just after lift off from Eve sea level is not a good option? Is it?

[allista]

12 hours ago, gilflo said:

Is there any way to set up the gravity turn ?

Beginning the gravity turn just after lift off from Eve sea level is not a good option? Is it?

EDIT: Wait, there is for To Orbit. The steepness parameter. The higher it is, the higher and more pronounced will be the turn. Alas, currently it can't be configured for Rendezvous from surface. That I will fix.

Edited February 28, 2017 by allista