Project VesselBuilder for Orbiter

[jacquesmomo]

Bonjour Fred

I am not sure i undestood it correctly, but the issue may be that you set as the reconfiguration event trigger the dynamic pressure level. I honestly cannot remember what is the the DNS in the surface mfd, but the Dynamic Pressure is the DNP value.

Oh yes you are right : I confused DNS and DNP.

The check over the dynamic pressure was thought for things like reentry destruction or stuff like that. I can t remember now but i am not sure that an atmospheric pressure check is implemented in the events section.

No, it is'nt.... not yet ?

I will look for something else...

And thanks for your reply...

And just to show you : now, it can also do an EVA (tintin and DG'support are made with Vesselbuider)

 

[jacquesmomo]

Hi

I'm still passionate about this amazing module...

But here, I don't understand what the "reset @ Event" option is for...

(orange frame on the image)



Thanks in advance to anyone who can explain this to me...

May be that means "Reset all Events" ???

 

[fred18]

A lot of time has passed by and I had to go and check the code to see what it does. I am not 100% sure and you are right it is not clear but here what I think it is:
The RESET MET event changes the reference MJD from where the MET starts so you can set a new MJD0 from where the time will start counting. For example you know a launch date and time so you set the MJD0 accordingly and the MET will be referred to that time. But what if you want to reset the MET when for example the rocket clears the tower, or when a probe gets detached from the rocket, so you don't know in advance the exact moment? you can choose to put "reset @ Event" which means "reset the MET by putting the MJD of when this event occurs as MJD0" so you choose a trigger and when the event will be triggered the MJD0 will be set automatically from there on, without the need to know it in advance.
I really hope this does make sense and I did read correctly my own code...

 

[jacquesmomo]

Hello Fred

Thank you for these explanations.
It seems much clearer to me.

I am going to do some tests which - I think - will now allow me to understand well.

 

[jacquesmomo]

HELLO

This short video just to show you the possibilities of Vesselbuilder

All animations and sounds are with VesselBuilder module

Many thanks again to Fred18

 

[Buck Rogers]

Hi Fred, hoping you are well, testing VB in OO24 and so far no problems, maybe a good time for an official release?

 

[misha.physics]

Hi, I know the VB was made for the 2016 version, but nonetheless I'd like to ask if anyone use it with the last OpenOrbiter builds. Are you noticing some critical incompatibility problems, or just any problems, or some functionality limitations? For example, I notice a strange animation behavior when pressing Shift+G/Ctrl+Shift+G in the "Preliminary_Tests - Only DG" scenario. In Orbiter 2016 it works correctly and gives the right gear animation, but in OpenOrbiter I get the following:



I hope it's related to some broken animations (or mesh group name changes, I don't know) and it's not critical to be usable with OpenOrbiter for the vessel making/editing? Maybe someone who is familiar with animations in VB could try to repair the animations for the gear (for that DG scenario included in the VB addon) in OpenOrbiter just for the testing purpose, that is to know if such fixing is possible at all, and so it's possible to use the VB with OpenOrbiter?

And it's interesting what this feature could do:

Gyroscopic Attitude Control [TO DO]

 

[Buck Rogers]

Looks like wrong mesh groups assigned to the animation? Does this happen with other VB vessels? I'll take a look...

 

[misha.physics]

For now I've only tried this DG which is included to the VB addon, so I don't know right know.

 

[misha.physics]

Oh, I've just tried it with your Flash Gordon Spaceship. The gear and ladder animations work correctly with OpenOrbiter!

But I accidentally noticed another problem. Press Ctrl+Shift+left arrow in VC. In OpenOrbiter it leads to a crash, but in Orbiter 2016 this has no effect.

 

[Buck Rogers]

Ctrl+Shift+left arrow in VC

This is a standard Orbiter feature, does happen with the stock DG?
Downloading the latest beta, will experiment later

 

[misha.physics]

Downloading the latest beta, will experiment later

I suppose you mean the OpenOrbiter build on GitHub.

This is a standard Orbiter feature, does happen with the stock DG?

Oh, I just found it happened even with the stock DG and even in the external view. So, "Ctrl+Shift+arrow key" leads to a crash in OpenOrbiter. It doesn't happen in Orbiter 2016.

The coordinate axes aren't displayed in OpenOrbiter when the "FollowMe Tool" is activated, whereas in Orbiter 2016 it's shown. It seems to be a problem

I found one more problem with Flash Gordon Spaceship both in OpenOrbiter and Orbiter 2016. I'm starting moving on a runway (horizontally) and then starting braking. During that the front part of the ship falls into the ground and does not rise:



Maybe it could be fixed.

 

[Buck Rogers]

"Ctrl+Shift+arrow key" leads to a crash in OpenOrbiter.

nice catch

The coordinate axes aren't displayed in OpenOrbiter when the "FollowMe Tool" is activated

I noticed this too, but it's a bit buggy in 2016 as well

braking

try this, if it's ok I'll update in the hangar (thanks again for beta-testing)
will continue bug reporting here

 

[misha.physics]

I noticed this too, but it's a bit buggy in 2016 as well

I've never seen the axes of the "FollowMe Tool" in OpenOrbiter yet, whereas in Orbiter 2016 I see them stable. But the axes for a dock are visible in OpenOrbiter, so it gives hope:

 

[misha.physics]

I've noticed a bug with the Follow Me Tool in Orbiter 2016, that occurs every time, at least in the default "Preliminary_Tests - Only DG" scenario included into the VB addon.

Launch the scenario, press Ctrl+Shift+Spacebar to run the tool, and wait a couple of seconds. The dot cursor position always resets to the same position (on the ground under the DG), and the cursor can't move (namely its coordinates change but visually the cursor remains in that position):



But if we give a little thrust to make the DG move (even very slowly), then the cursor takes the right position, and it can move visually. So, the cursor only moves correctly when the vessel is moving.

Also, sometimes the cursor and its axes are invisible (even in Orbiter 2016), but after several game reloads they occur.

Maybe someone could try this and confirm or disprove this.

 

[misha.physics]

Using a standard DG_VB included into the VB addon I've experimentally found that only three TD points defined in SET 2 are enough to get a stable vessel on the ground and control it (steer and brake).

So, I've deleted all TD points from SET 1 and left the three lowest TD points in SET 2:



But to make it work I need to press APPLY on the SET 1 window after each scenario launching:



Maybe someone could explain the meaning of the two sets for the TD points, as well as the Stiffness, Damping, Mu, Mu lng. Or redirect me where I can find it out, because an experimental way isn't always the best.

 

[Buck Rogers]

the two sets for the TD points

The first one without gear, the second with, so the points are normally the same except the first three of set2.

Stiffness, Damping, Mu, Mu lng

Just went through this with the Eagle (my modding days in racing sims helped) IIRC, stiffness is how hard the suspension is, damping is how much is absorbed (bounce back), the mu's are how slippy the vessel surface is on the z, and x axis (see API_reference.pdf 17.57.3.315 for further details)

 

[misha.physics]

But to make it work I need to press APPLY on the SET 1 window after each scenario launching:

New observations: the minimum set for the TD points (at least for a plane) required for their correct work are the following:

Three TD points for SET 2 (for each of the three wheels)
Four TD points for SET 1 (they may be placed symmetrically)

And besides this the "Gear" animation must be set for the "Changeover Animation" option in SET 2 (it doesn't work correctly with other animations and without animation selected). The minimal set for the DG I've found is:

;<-------------------------TOUCHDOWNPOINTS DEFINITIONS------------------------->
 
TDP_1_0_POS = 0 -2 9
TDP_1_0_STIFFNESS = 1e+007
TDP_1_0_DAMPING = 100000
TDP_1_0_MU = 3
TDP_1_0_MULNG = 3
 
TDP_1_1_POS = 0 -2 -5
TDP_1_1_STIFFNESS = 1e+007
TDP_1_1_DAMPING = 100000
TDP_1_1_MU = 3
TDP_1_1_MULNG = 3
 
TDP_1_2_POS = -8.5 -2 -7.05
TDP_1_2_STIFFNESS = 1e+007
TDP_1_2_DAMPING = 100000
TDP_1_2_MU = 3
TDP_1_2_MULNG = 3
 
TDP_1_3_POS = 8.5 -2 -7.05
TDP_1_3_STIFFNESS = 1e+007
TDP_1_3_DAMPING = 100000
TDP_1_3_MU = 3
TDP_1_3_MULNG = 3
 
TDP_SECONDSET_ENABLED = TRUE
TDP_CHANGEOVER_ANIM = 5
TDP_2_0_POS = 0 -2.57 10
TDP_2_0_STIFFNESS = 1e+006
TDP_2_0_DAMPING = 100000
TDP_2_0_MU = 1.6
TDP_2_0_MULNG = 0.1
 
TDP_2_1_POS = -3.5 -2.57 -1
TDP_2_1_STIFFNESS = 1e+006
TDP_2_1_DAMPING = 100000
TDP_2_1_MU = 3
TDP_2_1_MULNG = 0.2
 
TDP_2_2_POS = 3.5 -2.57 -1
TDP_2_2_STIFFNESS = 1e+006
TDP_2_2_DAMPING = 100000
TDP_2_2_MU = 3
TDP_2_2_MULNG = 0.2

 

[jacquesmomo]

I've noticed a bug with the Follow Me Tool in Orbiter 2016, that occurs every time, at least in the default "Preliminary_Tests - Only DG" scenario included into the VB addon.

Launch the scenario, press Ctrl+Shift+Spacebar to run the tool, and wait a couple of seconds. The dot cursor position always resets to the same position (on the ground under the DG), and the cursor can't move (namely its coordinates change but visually the cursor remains in that position):

But if we give a little thrust to make the DG move (even very slowly), then the cursor takes the right position, and it can move visually. So, the cursor only moves correctly when the vessel is moving.

So yes, well done, you found the trick!!!
Like you, I noticed this bug, but as I don't use this tool, I didn't try to understand it!!!

So I confirm !!!

 

[fred18]

I've noticed a bug with the Follow Me Tool in Orbiter 2016, that occurs every time, at least in the default "Preliminary_Tests - Only DG" scenario included into the VB addon.

Launch the scenario, press Ctrl+Shift+Spacebar to run the tool, and wait a couple of seconds. The dot cursor position always resets to the same position (on the ground under the DG), and the cursor can't move (namely its coordinates change but visually the cursor remains in that position):

View attachment 37780

But if we give a little thrust to make the DG move (even very slowly), then the cursor takes the right position, and it can move visually. So, the cursor only moves correctly when the vessel is moving.

Also, sometimes the cursor and its axes are invisible (even in Orbiter 2016), but after several game reloads they occur.

Maybe someone could try this and confirm or disprove this.

This can be called a bug but it's also its very expected behaviour: objects sitting landed on planets gets their status updated by core orbiter process in a completely different way than if they are actually moving according to forces. It's like a switch: when a vessel switches to a landed position orbiter does not perform any further calculation on it and treats them as appendixes of the planet, just keeping them in the relative position to it. The follow me tool is a vessel itself and needs the full vessel status update to work properly so it must be used with non landed ships, otherwise it will just stay frozen there due to how the statuses of the vessels are updated as said above. I know that for some sort of realism or resemblance to other games like kerbal building a landed ship would be nice, but due to this status update fact, not only the follow me tool but also other stuff will definitely work better while flying in orbit.

Using a standard DG_VB included into the VB addon I've experimentally found that only three TD points defined in SET 2 are enough to get a stable vessel on the ground and control it (steer and brake).

So, I've deleted all TD points from SET 1 and left the three lowest TD points in SET 2:

View attachment 37781

But to make it work I need to press APPLY on the SET 1 window after each scenario launching:

View attachment 37782

Maybe someone could explain the meaning of the two sets for the TD points, as well as the Stiffness, Damping, Mu, Mu lng. Or redirect me where I can find it out, because an experimental way isn't always the best.

The reason why there are 2 sets fo TD points in the DG is that if you don't lower the gear and land on the belly of the ship you need to have a set of TD points, while if you lower the gear you need the wheels contact points as TD points. this is how the DG in orbiter was actually designed by Martin and i just replicated the schema. Since this is quite a common need because many vessels are designed with a landing gear or something like that there is the changeover animation definition and all that section. For the meaning of each parameter i strongly suggest to read the orbiter API docs since it's where they come from and in general VB is just a framework, a way to expose most of the API to the non programmers, but since it just give access to the API, the API docs still contains most of the answers when questions goes to physical parameters and not how VB actually works.