Better Than Starting Manned (Flower's WIP KSP mod )

[E.B. Farnham]

Hmmmm...what is it about the large docking ports that's making them so desirable? If there is a key aspect to them I'm missing, then it would really be helpful for me to know what it is so I can place them appropriately in the tech tree. Up until now, I had assumed they were "just another docking port", and never paid much attention to them.

I think they pretty much are, though they might have a higher breaking tolerance. Not sure. I want them for their mystical part count reducing qualities. It's easier to make more secure docking assemblies with them over using a larger number of smaller ones. Meaning bigger ships built in orbit. Which means more landers, habs etc on a single ship without my system grinding to a halt. Thing is in vanilla there's no way to attach struts in orbit, you need KAS for that. So to avoid wobbly interplanetary ships you need to use multiple docking clamps between sections. So it's just a performance thing.

To give you an example this is a ship I built ages ago using various mods. It had one lander for Duna, one for Ike and a rover for the Ike lander, plus one drop habitat and a drop vehicle garage with a buggy in it. It's about the limit of what my system can run without heavy slowdown. It was built in about 8 separate launches and used multiple docking clamps for the main sections as the bigger ones didn't exist at that point.

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[Stormweaver]

Huh. I think I may have buggered up my install, but I thought I'd check here first before I go messing with all of that.

Has anything changed that would affect how a simple goo re-entry probe (a QBE with a parachute on top, two Goo tanks on the sides, with a decoupler + heatshield on the bottom) behaves when re-entering? It's a neat little design that I've been using in the early game these past few updates and it's pretty reliable for going arse-first into any atmosphere I throw it at. Well, kerbin's at least. But now I'm having a lot of trouble making anything with the basic heatshield actually point the heatshield downwards. Sticking the parachute up on 2-3 octagonal struts works, but it also looks silly. The same probe without the heat-shield behaves exactly as expected, rotating so the chute points away from the fiery burny death.

Any thoughts, or should I just reinstall?

[FlowerChild]

I dunno man, that design doesn't sound particularly bottom heavy with the probe core and good canisters being rather heavy themselves and being at the top of your probe. Ablative heat shields also lose mass as they burn off. It sounds like most of your weight is actually towards the top.

Doesn't sound like a problem install. I'm kinda surprised it worked for you in the first place.

[Marasambala]

I'm having similar problems. Goo canisters on the heat shield, one octagonal strut with probe, finally a couple of struts on top with the parachute. I was going to try sticking a full RCA tank on the bottom above the heat shield next. Will report back after awhile.

[Stormweaver]

I dunno man, that design doesn't sound particularly bottom heavy with the probe core and good canisters being rather heavy themselves and being at the top of your probe. Ablative heat shields also lose mass as they burn off. It sounds like most of your weight is actually towards the top.

Doesn't sound like a problem install. I'm kinda surprised it worked for you in the first place.

I suppose I may have been working with an edge case and somehow not managed to go the few pixels wrong that would cause it to flip out?

Ah well. I think I've figured out why it's flipping - and need to find out if 'Center of drag' is a real term - it's just annoying that I've been using a design that is a hairsbreadth from not working at all, and haven't seen anything but reliable results from it >.>

[FlowerChild]

I'm having similar problems. Goo canisters on the heat shield, one octagonal strut with probe, finally a couple of struts on top with the parachute. I was going to try sticking a full RCA tank on the bottom above the heat shield next. Will report back after awhile.

Please don't. You need to make your reentry modules bottom heavy. This isn't a bug, it's gameplay.

[FlowerChild]

I suppose I may have been working with an edge case and somehow not managed to go the few pixels wrong that would cause it to flip out?

Ah well. I think I've figured out why it's flipping - and need to find out if 'Center of drag' is a real term - it's just annoying that I've been using a design that is a hairsbreadth from not working at all, and haven't seen anything but reliable results from it >.>

The edge case might be the weight that's burning off the heat shield man. Depending on your angle and speed at reentry, you may be losing more or less mass off of it. Biasing your weight heavily towards the bottom would create a safety margin where you'd stay bottom heavy regardless of how much you lose off of it.

[Stormweaver]

The edge case might be the weight that's burning off the heat shield man. Depending on your angle and speed at reentry, you may be losing more or less mass off of it. Biasing your weight heavily towards the bottom would create a safety margin where you'd stay bottom heavy regardless of how much you lose off of it.

It isn't; when it failed the second time I did a little testing in the lower atmosphere, and it flipped regardless of any ablation.

I can design around it, it just irks me that I was doing something that shouldn't work for...3 playthroughs?

Anyways, it's less a case of putting more weight at the bottom than making the top higher. which is kinda the same thing. Huh.

[FlowerChild]

Might of been a case of a wonky install in the past rather than one now. Any of my modules that have even been vaguely top heavy have always flipped like crazy.

Not sure why it would have happened man, but definitely fishy. All that is vanilla related as BTSM doesn't change anything there, and I don't believe DR does either.

[jorgebonafe]

I checked the kerbin list of biomes, and it includes the space center, launch pad and runway. Those biome are included in the gravioli scans? If so... how does one even aim for that?

[TheGatesofLogic]

i find it extremely funny that hose are indeed biomes when the riverlands which really OUGHT to be a separate biome are not

[jorgebonafe]

Just landed my first probe on Minmus. Wow... That was a lot of science just there...

That was way easier then landing on the Mun...

[devak]

Hmmmm...what is it about the large docking ports that's making them so desirable? If there is a key aspect to them I'm missing, then it would really be helpful for me to know what it is so I can place them appropriately in the tech tree. Up until now, I had assumed they were "just another docking port", and never paid much attention to them.

They are a LOT more solid, almost like a decoupler.

[TheGatesofLogic]

Ok, i have another thing to mention about structural fuselages. When you rotate them to be perpendicular to the surface you are attaching it to it clips through but does not prevent placement in any way, allowing for them to serve as early game radial attachment nodes, that just seems REALLY off.

[jorgebonafe]

God dammit! Its the fifth time I dock on my lander and the thing breaks in half as I dock! This is getting ridiculous... I lost count of how many hours I spent on this already.

[TheGatesofLogic]

how fast are you docking your ships man? anything faster than .3 m/s and at any higher of an inclination than about 10-15 degrees and your ship will either break, or the connection won't be stable and will release your ship and send it spinning

[FlowerChild]

Ok, i have another thing to mention about structural fuselages. When you rotate them to be perpendicular to the surface you are attaching it to it clips through but does not prevent placement in any way, allowing for them to serve as early game radial attachment nodes, that just seems REALLY off.

K, thanks man. I'll take a look at them.

There's bound to be a few parts here and there that have attachment rules that break the progression as Squad is extremely loose with them. There seems to be yet another identity crisis going on there, as there are obviously rules in place for how you can build things, but every second part allows you to violate them.

Just let me know when you find one and I'll take care of it.

[FlowerChild]

God dammit! Its the fifth time I dock on my lander and the thing breaks in half as I dock! This is getting ridiculous... I lost count of how many hours I spent on this already.

Yup, in addition to what gates said above, more struts may be in order to improve structural integrity if you're already docking at a reasonable speed and angle.

I've never had that much trouble with ships breaking apart on docking. In fact, I don't think I've ever had it happen.

You're using RCS thrusters for forward and backward motion here right, not main engines?

[FlowerChild]

I checked the kerbin list of biomes, and it includes the space center, launch pad and runway. Those biome are included in the gravioli scans? If so... how does one even aim for that?

You don't. While I knew of their existence, I balanced the science values as if they aren't there. Also, as far as I can tell, they seem to only exist on the surface of Kerbin. I've never hit them in orbit, and I've also flown planes over them at low altitude and never been able to hit them, which leads me to believe they can only be accessed on the surface, which has no science value in BTSM anyways.

They are a LOT more solid, almost like a decoupler.

K, that makes a lot of sense, and I probably should have thought of that myself. I'll make sure they're in an appropriate portion of the tech tree to take advantage of that, probably around the same tech as the Rockomax Node. I know I had one or two nodes in tech 7 that were feeling a little weak.

[jorgebonafe]

how fast are you docking your ships man? anything faster than .3 m/s and at any higher of an inclination than about 10-15 degrees and your ship will either break, or the connection won't be stable and will release your ship and send it spinning

Slowly... Almost still.... Basically all the speed I have while docking is the speed the two rockets gain when the docking ports start to attract each other....

I don't know, man... Maybe I should add more strut connectors or something... The rocket always break on those octagonal struts I use to place my goo canisters....

[jorgebonafe]

Yup, in addition to what gates said above, more struts may be in order to improve structural integrity if you're already docking at a reasonable speed and angle.

I've never had that much trouble with ships breaking apart on docking. In fact, I don't think I've ever had it happen.

You're using RCS thrusters for forward and backward motion here right, not main engines?

Yeah, just rcs, I'm going in pretty slow... I'll try to add struts to reinforce my module... Like I mentioned, the ship always break on the octagonal struts, they seem to be the week link here....

[FlowerChild]

Yeah, just rcs, I'm going in pretty slow... I'll try to add struts to reinforce my module... Like I mentioned, the ship always break on the octagonal struts, they seem to be the week link here....

Ah yes, they probably are. If you take a look at E.B. Farnham's Duna probe that he screenshotted above, you'll see how he runs struts along the length of his narrow structural parts to reinforce them. You can also see me do something similar with my manned Mun mission rocket a few pages back. Should give you some ideas, but in general if you're having trouble with stuff breaking apart on launch or otherwise, the applicable mantra is "more struts" :)

Those gigantic saturn-style rockets I build would fly apart on launch if they weren't heavily strutted.

[TheGatesofLogic]

Wait, why are people building so thin? once i get rockomax parts i pretty much never build main thrusters and fuselages to be much smaller until i reach nuclear thrusters.

[TheGatesofLogic]

another thing, i've just learned the incredible value of building spacestations. I've built them before, but they've always seemed like a hassle, but now it seems positively rewarding. I now have a space station in keosynchronous orbit over the KSC and just designed a lifter capable of delivering a completely full orange rockomax fuel tank to it with a side accessory of extra monopropellant. god i am having a fuckload of fun using it as a refueling depot. i also have like 7 orbiting smaller fuel depots in low orbit that i used before i realized how the keosynchronous one would be so much more useful.

[E.B. Farnham]

Moho is proving to be a difficult place to get to. You really need a lot of delta V, I'm guessing 7000m/s +.

So I've decided to construct a rather large rocket in orbit to get the job done. It should take 4 launches, consisting of launching the engine section first. Then two launches to refill it with fuel and lastly one to put the probe on top. If this doesn't do it I might have to wait till nuclear engines.

Launch 1

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The launch vehicle


The Engine Section

Launch 2

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Same launch vehicle different payload

Docking the fuel transfer vehicle

Two more launches to go. Tomorrow I'll try them and then Moho will be mine. Hopefully. :)