@pbirb Here's what I had also made same time as you were making your engine :)
@MAHADI or @SledDriver Was this by any chance either of your creations? I had downloaded lots of stuff by you two, when I joined a number of years ago, due to the amazing work you did. Which is why my mind immediately goes to either of you being who could've created it...
Or perhaps either of you might know who had made the original that I based this on...? (The engine pods are done in a slightly unconventional way, compared to everyone else: they use 6 axially-overlapping fuselage pieces to make the circular housing, instead of a single one set to"circle" shape. That stands out for me. It was also before "LandingGear" input was added, as it had used VTOL and AG2 to raise the landing gear.) EDIT: Beginning of the file, containing the original name -
<Aircraft name="Lockheed SR-71A Blackbird (USAF)" url="FA1pKa" theme="Custom" size="17.60421,5.777977,32.92536" boundsMin="-8.802105,1.720855,-16.46268" xmlVersion="6">
Man that thing flies nice :O lol
I got it up to Mach 3.84 (2630mph) at 30,000ft and Mach 2.05 (1560mph) at 1500ft.
Changes I made: hanged the nose top/bottom to "Fuselage-Inlet-1" instead (and re-attached their points), then moved the chaff/flare launchers and insignia closer to the wings since they had a large gap, then swapped those round wing inlets near the cockpit, to the square version with 0.5 Height scale and nudged towards the wings and a slight nudge towards the main fuselage. Though I anticipate they did nothing, since it looks like my drag is 2811 now :}
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I definitely need to figure out that flight control system! Boy that's nice...
I get what he's saying, frankly.
Basically, it'd be nice if every part in the menu system could just be configured in a setting file, to personalize the order they appear in.
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Furthermore, it'd be nice if each engine just allowed you to define it's power and scale, without the need for XML editing (be it in actual file, or via Overdrive mod). That way we can use it as we see fit: either as a proper engine with more or less power in a bigger or smaller diameter or as a tiny detail part that has no power, such as some of us do. :)
Personally, my OWN gripe with the menu system is that the built-in "Fine Tuner" and the "Attachments Editor" buttons aren't available in the main menu, as it's annoying having to always click on the "Move Menu" first.
I also don't even use the built-in Fine Tuner, partly for that reason, but also because it lacks the Scale ability of the actual Mod :P I use the absolute crap out of the Attachment Editor though, so just being able to customize the menu system would be handy there as well since it'd let me put its button out on the designer screen, always there for me to click!
Didn't crash my computer, though it did send the Cockpit flying at 74,000MPH ;)
@7VCKretrovoid There's only 3 parts connected to the Cockpit, is my guess. The rest are just part of the "build" due to simply existing in the designer heh (as to not limit folk for what they can create and upload, is my assumption)
@Hawker180hurricane I'm nnnnoooooot sure this is going to happen..... lol
At least not in the context of having it be flyable <_> It looks fine and all, and like I can get it flying sorta, but in my efforts to get it flying properly, it breaks the laws of Unity-Physics whereby sending the plane rocketing at a few hundred thousand MPHs. That is if it's only that slow. Sometimes it tried to enter another dimension, at which point SP said "NNNnnopEE! This isn't what I signed up for, I'm out!" and crashes.
EDIT:* Ok, it's done, this is the best I can do, and if this is still too big for the airport (this is 1/16th scale), then I can make it smaller, but it'll only be a static model! I refuse to try and get anything smaller to try and fly! lmao https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/yahqD1/Kicking-Fish-MicroRC-Mk-II
@ChiChiWerx Hopefully you approve of the work! :}
To reduce the drag so much, I disabled calculateDrag on a lot of the things that were rather unnecessarily/unrealistically being calculated, such as the USAF roundels, tail-fin decorations, and a ton of internal components that were still being calculated despite.... being, well, internal! I also disabled it on all the hard-points simply to help remove some of its tendency to roll, since for some reason the physics engine refuses to considered mirrored parts as having the same drag profile... *epic-shrug* It can be lowered a bit further if the wing's leading edges are removed, but that wouldn't have been right! And disabling drag on them seemed to result in them wanting to flail about during maneuvers, which just looked horrible >_> (rather the opposite effect one would expect...)
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I had to leave the Input "Max" at 5 it seemed, in order to get a 'smooth' animation on the exhaust and to keep that those beautiful mach diamonds! Though, I did re-orient the thruster nozzles inside the vectoring unit so that they looked a bit better *(I think in an update, it must've changed how they auto-orient so they looked weird), and THEN I angled them so the 4 corners focused on a center point, which resulted in a great cone shape just as I had hoped.
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Oh, and I fixed one that was inverted when using AG7 and VTOL, as well as set their max angle at 45deg instead of 90. Not that I'm too sure of the purpose of using their rotation for additional pitch?
Which on that note, I'm also not sure the point of the two inner-most thrusters being assigned to "brake", given when you apply brake it throttles down, and renders them facing forward (ie reverse thrust) pointless it seems? Nevertheless, I left all of that as-is, and chalked it up to there being a reason that I was simply not understanding! :D
Looks great! CJ's really do lend themselves to be recreated in SP very well, thanks to being A) really boxy for the most part or using simple lines/angles B) that hood, which arguably is the defining feature of Jeep CJs (or similar, like the old Toyota Land Cruisers).
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My only minor critique? It's missing the rollbar :P
@ChiChiWerx No apology needed, I appreciate you taking the time to drop some knowledge :D It may not have been entirely related to what I had asked, BUT it was still valuable info you shared nonetheless! After all, my entire goal of this post was to learn about stuff, particularly in relation to them fffunky, funky trees haha
@ChiChiWerx " I usually use AoA to extend SBs"
What does SB mean in this context? (I might've missed what it's referencing, sorry...)
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Also, I think the AoA you're referring to might be physics engine related, whereas what I was asking about (and edensk replying to) is an XML entry that's part of Wing surfaces. It's default is 0, and I've also tried changing it to no observable effect on performance or flight behavior. Which seems to be corroborated by what was listed in the SImpleCheats document. Granted, the document is old and updates have undoubtedly been released which might have changed it to having some impact. Similarly, it could be as you're pointing out and requires actual direct use through input scripting, and only then does it do anything... *shrug* heh
Still, that's very handy info to have, thank you! :D
Well hot damn. Wasn't quite expecting anyone would be able to single-handedly answer them all... So many thanks, @edensk :D :D
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EDIT: Yea, I can see how the SimpleCheats guide is out of date, as some of it is different now, but also some of it isn't exactly accurate. (Though that could just be due to author's choice in wording; "Numbers" being inclusive of Whole or Decimal can be confusing since not all support Decimal, and some that do will only allow changing/setting it in 10ths)
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I wish I would've thought about setting the Hinge Rotator to 1+<input> (or minus) hah That immediately sounded like it'd indeed do the trick! :)
And of course, I can't wait to try out that clamp for things. I feel like that's going to make my life much easier AND more interesting! <3
@edensk Forgive me, I have come down with a slight case of The Dumb, can you provide a couple examples where people may want to use this? (either as a replacement for everyday builds instead of a standard way of doing it, or also maybe even a fringe example that may not be used by many but provides insight into the range of applications it has...)
@Clutch
Here is my updated version to address a few problems I missed on my original, and tweak it (add air brakes primarily) so you actually had a chance of landing with it...
I could be wrong, but landing seemed rather important... hahah
@Clutch Tag, you're still it!
103 parts, much better :P This was my first build, but I wasn't entirely sure if my engine arrangement qualified (hence my question last week) and so I made the Raven just in case.
@Clutch TAG, you're it!
Apologies for going over the 300 parts limit. I didn't realize it since in my head I was thinking each of the V8s I made was 1 part... but duh... no it's not, it's like 40 parts... and there's 4 lol *facepalm*
This is old, but so cool lol
Love how the silly stuff in SP ends up being so well behaved while flying.... -_-
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@MrVaultech One thing I noticed though, is you really stumbled across something rather interesting -- at least in this current version of SP as I'm not sure if it behaves the same as it did at the time of release. In that you can actually create a "Zero Power" challenge using this kind of design...
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How? Because this thing, as long as you enter the water at a high enough speed, turns into a... very strange fish, of sorts.
Seems as though if you enter at >250-300MPH speed, that then the water physics --even with a 0% throttle, hence the "zero power", which I later tested with engines set to have 0HP-- somehow cause the rotational energy that the air imparted on the propellers ("turbines wheels") gets amplified, rocketing you to 650MPH!
NOT ONLY THAT... but your flying wing design allows for actual underwater control, albeit rather labored, yet sufficient enough to let you sustain level "flight" underwater OR to breach and MAINTAIN your speed!
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In other words, you're a literal Flying Fish and if you've ever seen a video of how they swim and fly, it's just like that (except your plane can use that to achieve roughly 6000ft of altitude after breaching the surface). It has such a wonderful glide profile that it can travel significant distance using only that water-imparted speed...
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Furthermore, just to make a long-ass-comment even longer... If you scale the Chord size up on all of them, it significantly increases the speed boost the water gives you. EXAMPLE: With your design as downloaded, under full power and submerging the plane, you're boosted to 850-900MPH. However, with the blade width (chord) set to 3.0x, under the same conditions you are boosted to >1400MPH, WHILE UNDER WATER... Even though the max air speed it can achieve is only 758MPH at sea level!
Using this, I managed to 0% throttle glide/dive-fly from Krakatoaa, make a loop around the volcano (flying through the canyon pass with heavy banking), make it back to Wright with a couple 'speed boosts', bank around its mountain, travel under water @ 1400mph for awhile, breach the surface and glide to Myamar, before finally losing too much speed and crashing in the small 4ft deep pond near the ocean lol (didn't expect to be that shallow...)
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TL:DR - Man this thing is fun when improperly using it to swim like a dolphin!!
Here you go, give this a shot? Took me a few hours but it SEEMS to be better, at least for me....
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/G6S3fL/Proyect-CK-2-Thrust-Vectoring
@EternalDarkness Rumor has it... That's from multiple bird strikes during the delivery flight, the day before its press-unveiling event, and here was simply no time to fix it nods
:}
@11qazxc Given SP is a Unity powered game (unfortunately), it's really finicky in terms of processing power. I think if it's primary processing thread on the backend gets too taxed by physics, it crashes. So the better computer you have, the more it can handle w/o crashing, be it part counts, explosion, size, or zero-mass. One person's 200 Explosion Scale 'nuke' crashes his game, but mine handles it no problem. Similarly, it seems mine doesn't have issue with this craft being 0lbs, as I just tested that. (Although the craft just gets sent forward somersaulting through the air since the thrust has nothing to actually "move" heh).
Definitely fun to find the limitations though! I'm sure with a zero-mass on a higher part count vehicle, it may cause mine to crash.
lol Diiiid I just get trolled? ;) ;)
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EDIT: Ok, Started at E32, and no crash, but any throttle causes aircraft to be literally frozen in the sky. It stays there until engines produce no more thrust, and then it resumes falling. It does this for all values down to E24.
From there I jumped down to E20. That one actually worked.
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1E+20 is not Warp Drive though, it's some sort of quantum tunneling....
The screen goes black, the speed becomes: 223,694,000,000,000,000mph... which is 333564648.11399627x faster than the SoL (according to Google). I use 'tunneling' tongue-in-cheek though heh Because before I went back into the Designer, my altitude was at some -1.4million Feet. So it had caused me to literally tunnel through the Earth. :P
@Hedero I cracked lightspeed. Though... not without the obvious caveat.
Changed the engines to 1E+12 and the results are.... Well, basically what one would expect would happen: reality becomes completely distorted.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/765012057807781888/853709811422068786/unknown.png
As least, when traveling at 74x Lightspeed... <_<
Most of the view angles are actually just a couple geometric shapes displayed in a glitchy intermittent way. lol That was, after a minute of precision mouse movements, the best view I could achieve where everything happened to produce a recognizable result.
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I'm sure 1E+10 would've likely been a little bit saner of a next step, and might've achieved your goal of "only" 10x SoL :]
@Kerrak Just in case you are like me, and wondering about "How are people able to format their plane descriptions when SP's upload box doesn't allow it?"...
You do it via the site here on this page, but it's poorly designed in my opinion, as the option to "Edit" is squirreled away in that [ ▼ ] to the right of "Download".
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Just thought I'd mention that since even though I knew back when I originally played, I'd forgotten after coming back to the game, only re-discovering it last week. So just in case you wanted to actually list what AG2 does in the description, you actually can :D Oh and of course, editing via the site also allows you to add in the line breaks (new lines by hitting 'enter'), since in game doesn't.
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The only other handy thing I'd figured out so far, is that using # on a new line in front of the text, creates a "Header" (aka font re-sizing) to let you make categories. I'm sure this is all documented somewhere, I just haven't bothered to check lol But I digress, for example, typing in "#Action Groups:" (w/o quotes) on a new line in the description will produce:
I don't want to upload this as Public as to not steal your thunder, so if you'd like to implement these fixes/changes, I would download my fix from the link included, CTRL+S and save it with whatever name. Then go in and open that .xml file, and copy out everything except the top few lines (which would properly remove me from being credit) and paste it into YOUR "V5" .xml
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Save the changes to your file, load the plane, and re-upload, which I think should take care of it. :P
(Or I can re-up it as public if you'd prefer; just didn't feel right for me to do it so soon after you shared it! heh)
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/7i8gBh/Stout-2021-V5-2f-Handling-Fix
1) "AG2 controls somethin."
Classic! haha
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2) "Predecessor: Lockheed SR-71A Blackbird" lmao
I mean, I get why, but it still caught me off guard reading that :P
@Kerrak I did everything I could, short of adding servos to give it thrust vectoring, or changing wing/engine angles. :\
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It at least flies now in a kinda-sorta stable way, so long as you don't look at it too funny... But hoo-boy does it have considerable nose-down (in part due to having a couple dead sumo wrestlers packed into the nose-cone...). which I just couldn't rectumfry unfortunately :(
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/1V5rD0/Kerraks-Ship-Mk-ICXVII-f
What I'm finding is that it mainly has too low of a lifting area.
I've added internal (mostly hidden completely from view) wings and it flies now, but it is oh-so-horribly sluggish to respond, and under just the turbo-fans, barely wants to go anywhere.
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It also seems to have quite a high stall speed, which makes any serious attempts at climbing rather difficult...
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I'm just trying to work out the responsiveness at the moment though.
I DO have a really nifty visual glitch happening with my designer view, which sadly doesn't get captured in a screenshot. It's basically like X-Ray Mode except everything is colored (so it looks really cool) paired with a "Clipping" effect (which ruins the coolness of the x-ray heh).
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EDIT: Oh... derp. The turbofans aren't the ones that are enabled by default... hahah GG me :} That sure does explain why changing their power scalar isn't impacting speed at all!
TWO HUNDRED
and SIXTY EIGHT
BILLION
Gallons of fuel?!?!? lmao
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That's some impressive Quantum Storage fuel tanks you've got goin on, given it only ends up weighing 35,500lbs!
Anyways I'm no expert but having just gone through all that with what I uploaded last night, I'll see if I can figure something out heh If not through normal UI accessible stuff, then with using Overload mod... fingers crossed
Primary paint color is what I initially thought, but then I compared the specs... Whatever they did, involved adding 5 parts lol
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Which seems to have:
INcreased the Empty Weight by 30kg
DEcreased the Loaded Weight by 30kg
thus Improving the Power/Weight Ratio by 0.052
but Adding 90 more Drag Points.
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I'll load them both in Notepad++ and run a comparison, just... cuz I'm also curious haha
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EDIT: Ok @Astro12 here's what I'm seeing...
Engine Power INcreased by +1000
Added +1 Propeller Blades (has 4 now)
Changed Chord Scale to to 3.0
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Part ID 184 (hollow fuselage) is showing difference in drag for... SOME reasons. Bug between iOS and Android versions maybe?? (every single part is also moved by about 0.000001 on Z axis, but I'm pretty sure that's a rounding error on Unity Engine's part)
YOURS:
drag="0.003, 0.003, 0, 0, 0.02691771, 0.002961559"
THEIRS:
drag="0.001, 0.001 , 0, 0, 0.07314558, 0.0009961354"
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Similar behavior on Part 188
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Part 273 (normal fuselage part) was rotated a bit... but by thousands of a decimal, nothing substantial. (a bug as well??)
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Changed 2 or 3 Connection Points...
That's it! Which, makes things more confusing since SP thinks that translated into parts being ADDED??
Granted, I scrolled through a lot because every single part had one change highlight due to the rounding-error difference in iOS and Android, so I could've missed something... HOWEVER, both yours and his each have a total a 300 Part IDs, so I'm thinking that might be a legitimate bug on the website's end. shrug Color me confused lol
Well, it didn't crash my game, but it DID send my cockpit flying at escape velocity :D
(full disclaimer: I didn't actually use yours, but changed my own design's explosive size to the same as yours, figuring that's what's implied as the reason it crashes the game lol)
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EDIT: Apparently it did not send me at escape velocity! I tabbed back to the game and to my amazement, my cockpit had splashed down!
@Mixx I might've worded my message poorly (it was also long so... skimming is understandable hah). What I meant was, the "Connections" don't mirror correctly. If I go through and do a lot of Auto Connect, which gain additional (new) connections... when I mirror the entire engine pod -- by selecting the big silver cylinder arms off the main hull and pressing Tab -- those same mirrored parts do not retain those new connections.
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If I want to ensure everything has the same connections on both sides, then I have to do Auto Connect on both sides myself.
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HOWEVER, simply removing one side's pod and mirroring the other, doesn't SEEM to mess up too much, at least in my minimal testing heh The main thing I notice is it Yaws Right (vs a very very minor Yaw Left normally, likely due to the Gyro), and that the Air Brakes control inputs remained in sync with the side mirrored from. Roll-turning left/right and braking or hovering all seemed ok otherwise.
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But yea, the mirroring of Pods that I mentioned was solely to point out that it wasn't a viable option unfortunately, due to the Connections not getting accurately mirrored. (but also for the reasons you mentioned)
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I too tried to add a "bumper", which actually worked decent...ish. I used a Resizable Wheel, placed at the same 15deg angle, only slightly exposed out of the engine pod's front bottom curve. I then added an angled Shock (scaled to be longer) with a tiny piece of fuselage to act as a 90deg flange, to connect the shock to the wheel. Then I connected (manually Add Connection) the shock to the bottom side of the pod's front bulkhead, right above the third jet engine.
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Colored that wheel the same reflective silver and scaled it to be juuust a bit bigger than the pod's natural curve. Could barely tell it was there after :D Then I disabled "Aircraft Collision" on the wheel (via Overload) and changed its Drag and Traction modifiers to 0.0, which then overall did help out like I hoped by letting me run into stuff a little faster... Albeit, not to an appreciable amount lol I only really tested it up to 65mph, which survived, whereas before it'd do considerable damage at only 45-50mph. Problem with that was, despite changing traction to 0, it still had CONSIDERABLE 'grip' and wouldn't deflect how I expected by rolling (perhaps DUE to setting traction to 0). Instead it just bounced back and induced an uncontrolled hover-flip/spin lol
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Adding the additional Connections to stuff ended up allowing me to hit t
I know this might not lead to anything getting fixed, buuut... Here's my Bug Report @MOPCKOEDNISHE :P (Not sure how to determine my game version hah Latest at time of posting though)
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1) Input Controls for the (quality) engine's thrust vectoring do not seem to work for "Roll". Roll-Left results are identical to Pitch Down; Roll-Right results are identical to Pitch Up. Pitch and Yaw seem to work fine, though.
1b) Enabling the Wing's Input Control to Roll does not do anything. Pitch works (didn't try Yaw). Changing that Input from Pitch to Roll did not solve it, so it seems maybe it's a core Roll problem?
2) In Designer, after changing the engine's "Scale" (using Fine Tuner) the Engine Flaps are properly sized... BUT any time you return to the Designer, just the Engine Flaps are returned to their full-size and do not match the Engine's scale. (Note: They are displayed correctly while playing, so this is only a minor Designer bug)
3) Setting Sliders: Seems that any of them that can do + or - with 0 in the middle, have an issue getting back to "0" and instead want to have it set to values "-0.0999999995" or "0.049999999". This is a problem since we don't have the ability to type in the value. (I've been using Overload to go in each time and manually set it so they're 0 again)
4) Bug? Request? There's no "...OffsetZ" or "...OffsetScaleZ" for a number of things, which left me unable to distort the part how I needed/wanted. :(
Might be outside the scope of this mod, but... any chance you'd be willing to add in a speed readout and altimeter to it as well?
Reasoning is that it'd be nice to be able to keep the Action Groups open and still know my speed and altitude :} (this takes care of the throttle level, which is what I was also needing!)
@Leftybar Better late than never.... heh
Try clicking each Wing and then opening the Configuration for it. (Gear on the right side of the screen)
Change any VERTICALLY ALIGNED wing on the car so that they are now configured as "Symmetrical".
(vertically aligned, such as any being used as a body panel or vertical stabilizer; the Tail Fin parts are set to Symmetrical by default for this reason.)
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My GUESS as to why you're pulling to the right is because they're "Semi-Symmetrical" by default and due to how you installed some of them, they may all be "facing" the same way.
So if my guess is correct, as a result, the "Lift" being produced by the vertically aligned wings was to the left-side of them all, causing it to push you to the right. Changing it to Symmetrical then produces equal force on both sides, negating the 'pull'.
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ALTERNATIVELY... It might be a simple derp by SimplePlanes during any Mirror action. Sometimes I experience that where a part I've modified (specifically with Fine Tuner mod) has been mirrored but not attached at the same snap point as the other side. As a result it causes my craft to be Asymmetrical and has more Drag on one side, making it have a constant yaw|pitch|roll (case dependent) while in operation.
(In those scenarios the solution is that I have to manually do everything I did on the one side, to the other. Placing whatever it may be on the same original snap point, then moving it with Fine Tuner over to where it was when mirrored.)
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Hope that helps you, or, someone else at least... heh
(edit: oof, parsing multiple carriage returns sure does breaks my rambling heart! lol)
Thanks @MAHADI
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@SpiritusRaptor Are you able to confirm whether this is your work I modified?
Thanks @Thunderhawk :D
@pbirb Here's what I had also made same time as you were making your engine :)
@MAHADI or @SledDriver Was this by any chance either of your creations? I had downloaded lots of stuff by you two, when I joined a number of years ago, due to the amazing work you did. Which is why my mind immediately goes to either of you being who could've created it...
Or perhaps either of you might know who had made the original that I based this on...?
(The engine pods are done in a slightly unconventional way, compared to everyone else: they use 6 axially-overlapping fuselage pieces to make the circular housing, instead of a single one set to"circle" shape. That stands out for me. It was also before "LandingGear" input was added, as it had used VTOL and AG2 to raise the landing gear.)
EDIT: Beginning of the file, containing the original name -
<Aircraft name="Lockheed SR-71A Blackbird (USAF)" url="FA1pKa" theme="Custom" size="17.60421,5.777977,32.92536" boundsMin="-8.802105,1.720855,-16.46268" xmlVersion="6">
Man that thing flies nice :O lol
I got it up to Mach 3.84 (2630mph) at 30,000ft and Mach 2.05 (1560mph) at 1500ft.
Changes I made: hanged the nose top/bottom to "Fuselage-Inlet-1" instead (and re-attached their points), then moved the chaff/flare launchers and insignia closer to the wings since they had a large gap, then swapped those round wing inlets near the cockpit, to the square version with 0.5 Height scale and nudged towards the wings and a slight nudge towards the main fuselage. Though I anticipate they did nothing, since it looks like my drag is 2811 now :}
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I definitely need to figure out that flight control system! Boy that's nice...
I get what he's saying, frankly.
Basically, it'd be nice if every part in the menu system could just be configured in a setting file, to personalize the order they appear in.
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Furthermore, it'd be nice if each engine just allowed you to define it's power and scale, without the need for XML editing (be it in actual file, or via Overdrive mod). That way we can use it as we see fit: either as a proper engine with more or less power in a bigger or smaller diameter or as a tiny detail part that has no power, such as some of us do. :)
Personally, my OWN gripe with the menu system is that the built-in "Fine Tuner" and the "Attachments Editor" buttons aren't available in the main menu, as it's annoying having to always click on the "Move Menu" first.
I also don't even use the built-in Fine Tuner, partly for that reason, but also because it lacks the Scale ability of the actual Mod :P I use the absolute crap out of the Attachment Editor though, so just being able to customize the menu system would be handy there as well since it'd let me put its button out on the designer screen, always there for me to click!
Oooh, and it appears as though it makes waffles as well! :D
Didn't crash my computer, though it did send the Cockpit flying at 74,000MPH ;)
@7VCKretrovoid There's only 3 parts connected to the Cockpit, is my guess. The rest are just part of the "build" due to simply existing in the designer heh
(as to not limit folk for what they can create and upload, is my assumption)
Thanks @IndonesianMan :)
@Hawker180hurricane I'm nnnnoooooot sure this is going to happen..... lol
At least not in the context of having it be flyable <_> It looks fine and all, and like I can get it flying sorta, but in my efforts to get it flying properly, it breaks the laws of Unity-Physics whereby sending the plane rocketing at a few hundred thousand MPHs. That is if it's only that slow. Sometimes it tried to enter another dimension, at which point SP said "NNNnnopEE! This isn't what I signed up for, I'm out!" and crashes.
EDIT:* Ok, it's done, this is the best I can do, and if this is still too big for the airport (this is 1/16th scale), then I can make it smaller, but it'll only be a static model! I refuse to try and get anything smaller to try and fly! lmao
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/yahqD1/Kicking-Fish-MicroRC-Mk-II
Thanks @Clutch :D
@ChiChiWerx Hopefully you approve of the work! :}
To reduce the drag so much, I disabled
calculateDragon a lot of the things that were rather unnecessarily/unrealistically being calculated, such as the USAF roundels, tail-fin decorations, and a ton of internal components that were still being calculated despite.... being, well, internal! I also disabled it on all the hard-points simply to help remove some of its tendency to roll, since for some reason the physics engine refuses to considered mirrored parts as having the same drag profile... *epic-shrug* It can be lowered a bit further if the wing's leading edges are removed, but that wouldn't have been right! And disabling drag on them seemed to result in them wanting to flail about during maneuvers, which just looked horrible >_> (rather the opposite effect one would expect...).
I had to leave the Input "Max" at 5 it seemed, in order to get a 'smooth' animation on the exhaust and to keep that those beautiful mach diamonds! Though, I did re-orient the thruster nozzles inside the vectoring unit so that they looked a bit better *(I think in an update, it must've changed how they auto-orient so they looked weird), and THEN I angled them so the 4 corners focused on a center point, which resulted in a great cone shape just as I had hoped.
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Oh, and I fixed one that was inverted when using AG7 and VTOL, as well as set their max angle at 45deg instead of 90. Not that I'm too sure of the purpose of using their rotation for additional pitch?
Which on that note, I'm also not sure the point of the two inner-most thrusters being assigned to "brake", given when you apply brake it throttles down, and renders them facing forward (ie reverse thrust) pointless it seems? Nevertheless, I left all of that as-is, and chalked it up to there being a reason that I was simply not understanding! :D
Looks great! CJ's really do lend themselves to be recreated in SP very well, thanks to being A) really boxy for the most part or using simple lines/angles B) that hood, which arguably is the defining feature of Jeep CJs (or similar, like the old Toyota Land Cruisers).
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My only minor critique? It's missing the rollbar :P
@ChiChiWerx No apology needed, I appreciate you taking the time to drop some knowledge :D It may not have been entirely related to what I had asked, BUT it was still valuable info you shared nonetheless! After all, my entire goal of this post was to learn about stuff, particularly in relation to them fffunky, funky trees haha
Gotcha. Thanks :)
@ChiChiWerx " I usually use AoA to extend SBs"
What does SB mean in this context? (I might've missed what it's referencing, sorry...)
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Also, I think the AoA you're referring to might be physics engine related, whereas what I was asking about (and edensk replying to) is an XML entry that's part of Wing surfaces. It's default is 0, and I've also tried changing it to no observable effect on performance or flight behavior. Which seems to be corroborated by what was listed in the SImpleCheats document. Granted, the document is old and updates have undoubtedly been released which might have changed it to having some impact. Similarly, it could be as you're pointing out and requires actual direct use through input scripting, and only then does it do anything... *shrug* heh
Still, that's very handy info to have, thank you! :D
Well hot damn. Wasn't quite expecting anyone would be able to single-handedly answer them all... So many thanks, @edensk :D :D
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EDIT: Yea, I can see how the SimpleCheats guide is out of date, as some of it is different now, but also some of it isn't exactly accurate. (Though that could just be due to author's choice in wording; "Numbers" being inclusive of Whole or Decimal can be confusing since not all support Decimal, and some that do will only allow changing/setting it in 10ths)
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I wish I would've thought about setting the Hinge Rotator to
1+<input>(or minus) hah That immediately sounded like it'd indeed do the trick! :)And of course, I can't wait to try out that
clampfor things. I feel like that's going to make my life much easier AND more interesting! <3@edensk Forgive me, I have come down with a slight case of The Dumb, can you provide a couple examples where people may want to use this?
(either as a replacement for everyday builds instead of a standard way of doing it, or also maybe even a fringe example that may not be used by many but provides insight into the range of applications it has...)
@Clutch
Here is my updated version to address a few problems I missed on my original, and tweak it (add air brakes primarily) so you actually had a chance of landing with it...
I could be wrong, but landing seemed rather important... hahah
@Clutch Tag, you're still it!
103 parts, much better :P This was my first build, but I wasn't entirely sure if my engine arrangement qualified (hence my question last week) and so I made the Raven just in case.
@Clutch TAG, you're it!
Apologies for going over the 300 parts limit. I didn't realize it since in my head I was thinking each of the V8s I made was 1 part... but duh... no it's not, it's like 40 parts... and there's 4 lol *facepalm*
This is old, but so cool lol
Love how the silly stuff in SP ends up being so well behaved while flying.... -_-
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@MrVaultech One thing I noticed though, is you really stumbled across something rather interesting -- at least in this current version of SP as I'm not sure if it behaves the same as it did at the time of release. In that you can actually create a "Zero Power" challenge using this kind of design...
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How? Because this thing, as long as you enter the water at a high enough speed, turns into a... very strange fish, of sorts.
Seems as though if you enter at >250-300MPH speed, that then the water physics --even with a 0% throttle, hence the "zero power", which I later tested with engines set to have 0HP-- somehow cause the rotational energy that the air imparted on the propellers ("turbines wheels") gets amplified, rocketing you to 650MPH!
NOT ONLY THAT... but your flying wing design allows for actual underwater control, albeit rather labored, yet sufficient enough to let you sustain level "flight" underwater OR to breach and MAINTAIN your speed!
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In other words, you're a literal Flying Fish and if you've ever seen a video of how they swim and fly, it's just like that (except your plane can use that to achieve roughly 6000ft of altitude after breaching the surface). It has such a wonderful glide profile that it can travel significant distance using only that water-imparted speed...
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Furthermore, just to make a long-ass-comment even longer... If you scale the Chord size up on all of them, it significantly increases the speed boost the water gives you.
EXAMPLE: With your design as downloaded, under full power and submerging the plane, you're boosted to 850-900MPH. However, with the blade width (chord) set to 3.0x, under the same conditions you are boosted to >1400MPH, WHILE UNDER WATER... Even though the max air speed it can achieve is only 758MPH at sea level!
Using this, I managed to 0% throttle glide/dive-fly from Krakatoaa, make a loop around the volcano (flying through the canyon pass with heavy banking), make it back to Wright with a couple 'speed boosts', bank around its mountain, travel under water @ 1400mph for awhile, breach the surface and glide to Myamar, before finally losing too much speed and crashing in the small 4ft deep pond near the ocean lol (didn't expect to be that shallow...)
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TL:DR - Man this thing is fun when improperly using it to swim like a dolphin!!
Here you go, give this a shot? Took me a few hours but it SEEMS to be better, at least for me....
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/G6S3fL/Proyect-CK-2-Thrust-Vectoring
In a future where the DoD selects John Deere as a contractor for a Mobile Gun Carriage....... lol
@EternalDarkness Rumor has it... That's from multiple bird strikes during the delivery flight, the day before its press-unveiling event, and here was simply no time to fix it nods
:}
@11qazxc Given SP is a Unity powered game (unfortunately), it's really finicky in terms of processing power. I think if it's primary processing thread on the backend gets too taxed by physics, it crashes. So the better computer you have, the more it can handle w/o crashing, be it part counts, explosion, size, or zero-mass. One person's 200 Explosion Scale 'nuke' crashes his game, but mine handles it no problem. Similarly, it seems mine doesn't have issue with this craft being 0lbs, as I just tested that. (Although the craft just gets sent forward somersaulting through the air since the thrust has nothing to actually "move" heh).
Definitely fun to find the limitations though! I'm sure with a zero-mass on a higher part count vehicle, it may cause mine to crash.
@Nerfaddict As soon as I hit Shift...
"SimplePlanes.exe has stopped working."
lol Diiiid I just get trolled? ;) ;)
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EDIT: Ok, Started at E32, and no crash, but any throttle causes aircraft to be literally frozen in the sky. It stays there until engines produce no more thrust, and then it resumes falling. It does this for all values down to E24.
From there I jumped down to E20. That one actually worked.
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1E+20 is not Warp Drive though, it's some sort of quantum tunneling....
The screen goes black, the speed becomes: 223,694,000,000,000,000mph... which is 333564648.11399627x faster than the SoL (according to Google). I use 'tunneling' tongue-in-cheek though heh Because before I went back into the Designer, my altitude was at some -1.4million Feet. So it had caused me to literally tunnel through the Earth. :P
@Hedero I cracked lightspeed. Though... not without the obvious caveat.
Changed the engines to 1E+12 and the results are.... Well, basically what one would expect would happen: reality becomes completely distorted.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/765012057807781888/853709811422068786/unknown.png
As least, when traveling at 74x Lightspeed... <_<
Most of the view angles are actually just a couple geometric shapes displayed in a glitchy intermittent way. lol That was, after a minute of precision mouse movements, the best view I could achieve where everything happened to produce a recognizable result.
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I'm sure 1E+10 would've likely been a little bit saner of a next step, and might've achieved your goal of "only" 10x SoL :]
@11qazxc Actually... Yes... :}
But unfortunately SP doesn't let you set "Mass Scale -1" :( lol
@Kerrak Just in case you are like me, and wondering about "How are people able to format their plane descriptions when SP's upload box doesn't allow it?"...
You do it via the site here on this page, but it's poorly designed in my opinion, as the option to "Edit" is squirreled away in that [ ▼ ] to the right of "Download".
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Just thought I'd mention that since even though I knew back when I originally played, I'd forgotten after coming back to the game, only re-discovering it last week. So just in case you wanted to actually list what AG2 does in the description, you actually can :D Oh and of course, editing via the site also allows you to add in the line breaks (new lines by hitting 'enter'), since in game doesn't.
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The only other handy thing I'd figured out so far, is that using # on a new line in front of the text, creates a "Header" (aka font re-sizing) to let you make categories. I'm sure this is all documented somewhere, I just haven't bothered to check lol But I digress, for example, typing in "#Action Groups:" (w/o quotes) on a new line in the description will produce:
Action Groups:
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Tadaa! :P
Anyways...
[/rambling]
Star Wars stuff??
Instant upvotes and downloads from me! ;)
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Aah, just repaints. Still, looks good, deserves the updoot!
I do not require to be credited for this!
I don't want to upload this as Public as to not steal your thunder, so if you'd like to implement these fixes/changes, I would download my fix from the link included, CTRL+S and save it with whatever name. Then go in and open that .xml file, and copy out everything except the top few lines (which would properly remove me from being credit) and paste it into YOUR "V5" .xml
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Save the changes to your file, load the plane, and re-upload, which I think should take care of it. :P
(Or I can re-up it as public if you'd prefer; just didn't feel right for me to do it so soon after you shared it! heh)
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/7i8gBh/Stout-2021-V5-2f-Handling-Fix
It looked beautiful as it is....
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But then I enabled Smooth Surfaces on all the fuselage parts, and it melted my monitor! :D
1) "AG2 controls somethin."
Classic! haha
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2) "Predecessor: Lockheed SR-71A Blackbird" lmao
I mean, I get why, but it still caught me off guard reading that :P
@Kerrak I did everything I could, short of adding servos to give it thrust vectoring, or changing wing/engine angles. :\
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It at least flies now in a kinda-sorta stable way, so long as you don't look at it too funny... But hoo-boy does it have considerable nose-down (in part due to having a couple dead sumo wrestlers packed into the nose-cone...). which I just couldn't rectumfry unfortunately :(
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/1V5rD0/Kerraks-Ship-Mk-ICXVII-f
What I'm finding is that it mainly has too low of a lifting area.
I've added internal (mostly hidden completely from view) wings and it flies now, but it is oh-so-horribly sluggish to respond, and under just the turbo-fans, barely wants to go anywhere.
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It also seems to have quite a high stall speed, which makes any serious attempts at climbing rather difficult...
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I'm just trying to work out the responsiveness at the moment though.
I DO have a really nifty visual glitch happening with my designer view, which sadly doesn't get captured in a screenshot. It's basically like X-Ray Mode except everything is colored (so it looks really cool) paired with a "Clipping" effect (which ruins the coolness of the x-ray heh).
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EDIT: Oh... derp. The turbofans aren't the ones that are enabled by default... hahah GG me :} That sure does explain why changing their power scalar isn't impacting speed at all!
TWO HUNDRED
and SIXTY EIGHT
BILLION
Gallons of fuel?!?!? lmao
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That's some impressive Quantum Storage fuel tanks you've got goin on, given it only ends up weighing 35,500lbs!
Anyways I'm no expert but having just gone through all that with what I uploaded last night, I'll see if I can figure something out heh If not through normal UI accessible stuff, then with using Overload mod... fingers crossed
Upvote for the laugh, on account of:
"Lightweight upholstery creates almost no splinters ."
:P
Primary paint color is what I initially thought, but then I compared the specs... Whatever they did, involved adding 5 parts lol
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Which seems to have:
INcreased the Empty Weight by 30kg
DEcreased the Loaded Weight by 30kg
thus Improving the Power/Weight Ratio by 0.052
but Adding 90 more Drag Points.
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I'll load them both in Notepad++ and run a comparison, just... cuz I'm also curious haha
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EDIT: Ok @Astro12 here's what I'm seeing...
Engine Power INcreased by +1000
Added +1 Propeller Blades (has 4 now)
Changed Chord Scale to to 3.0
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Part ID 184 (hollow fuselage) is showing difference in drag for... SOME reasons. Bug between iOS and Android versions maybe?? (every single part is also moved by about 0.000001 on Z axis, but I'm pretty sure that's a rounding error on Unity Engine's part)
YOURS:
drag="0.003, 0.003, 0, 0, 0.02691771, 0.002961559"
THEIRS:
drag="0.001, 0.001 , 0, 0, 0.07314558, 0.0009961354"
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Similar behavior on Part 188
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Part 273 (normal fuselage part) was rotated a bit... but by thousands of a decimal, nothing substantial. (a bug as well??)
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Changed 2 or 3 Connection Points...
That's it! Which, makes things more confusing since SP thinks that translated into parts being ADDED??
Granted, I scrolled through a lot because every single part had one change highlight due to the rounding-error difference in iOS and Android, so I could've missed something... HOWEVER, both yours and his each have a total a 300 Part IDs, so I'm thinking that might be a legitimate bug on the website's end. shrug Color me confused lol
Well, it didn't crash my game, but it DID send my cockpit flying at escape velocity :D
(full disclaimer: I didn't actually use yours, but changed my own design's explosive size to the same as yours, figuring that's what's implied as the reason it crashes the game lol)
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EDIT: Apparently it did not send me at escape velocity! I tabbed back to the game and to my amazement, my cockpit had splashed down!
Yea that's indeed what I was afraid of :( Bummer.
Thanks for letting me know! :)
@Mixx I might've worded my message poorly (it was also long so... skimming is understandable hah). What I meant was, the "Connections" don't mirror correctly. If I go through and do a lot of Auto Connect, which gain additional (new) connections... when I mirror the entire engine pod -- by selecting the big silver cylinder arms off the main hull and pressing Tab -- those same mirrored parts do not retain those new connections.
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If I want to ensure everything has the same connections on both sides, then I have to do Auto Connect on both sides myself.
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HOWEVER, simply removing one side's pod and mirroring the other, doesn't SEEM to mess up too much, at least in my minimal testing heh The main thing I notice is it Yaws Right (vs a very very minor Yaw Left normally, likely due to the Gyro), and that the Air Brakes control inputs remained in sync with the side mirrored from. Roll-turning left/right and braking or hovering all seemed ok otherwise.
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But yea, the mirroring of Pods that I mentioned was solely to point out that it wasn't a viable option unfortunately, due to the Connections not getting accurately mirrored. (but also for the reasons you mentioned)
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I too tried to add a "bumper", which actually worked decent...ish. I used a Resizable Wheel, placed at the same 15deg angle, only slightly exposed out of the engine pod's front bottom curve. I then added an angled Shock (scaled to be longer) with a tiny piece of fuselage to act as a 90deg flange, to connect the shock to the wheel. Then I connected (manually Add Connection) the shock to the bottom side of the pod's front bulkhead, right above the third jet engine.
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Colored that wheel the same reflective silver and scaled it to be juuust a bit bigger than the pod's natural curve. Could barely tell it was there after :D Then I disabled "Aircraft Collision" on the wheel (via Overload) and changed its Drag and Traction modifiers to 0.0, which then overall did help out like I hoped by letting me run into stuff a little faster... Albeit, not to an appreciable amount lol I only really tested it up to 65mph, which survived, whereas before it'd do considerable damage at only 45-50mph. Problem with that was, despite changing traction to 0, it still had CONSIDERABLE 'grip' and wouldn't deflect how I expected by rolling (perhaps DUE to setting traction to 0). Instead it just bounced back and induced an uncontrolled hover-flip/spin lol
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Adding the additional Connections to stuff ended up allowing me to hit t
I know this might not lead to anything getting fixed, buuut... Here's my Bug Report @MOPCKOEDNISHE :P (Not sure how to determine my game version hah Latest at time of posting though)
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1) Input Controls for the (quality) engine's thrust vectoring do not seem to work for "Roll". Roll-Left results are identical to Pitch Down; Roll-Right results are identical to Pitch Up. Pitch and Yaw seem to work fine, though.
1b) Enabling the Wing's Input Control to Roll does not do anything. Pitch works (didn't try Yaw). Changing that Input from Pitch to Roll did not solve it, so it seems maybe it's a core Roll problem?
2) In Designer, after changing the engine's "Scale" (using Fine Tuner) the Engine Flaps are properly sized... BUT any time you return to the Designer, just the Engine Flaps are returned to their full-size and do not match the Engine's scale. (Note: They are displayed correctly while playing, so this is only a minor Designer bug)
3) Setting Sliders: Seems that any of them that can do + or - with 0 in the middle, have an issue getting back to "0" and instead want to have it set to values "-0.0999999995" or "0.049999999". This is a problem since we don't have the ability to type in the value. (I've been using Overload to go in each time and manually set it so they're 0 again)
4) Bug? Request? There's no "...OffsetZ" or "...OffsetScaleZ" for a number of things, which left me unable to distort the part how I needed/wanted. :(
Might be outside the scope of this mod, but... any chance you'd be willing to add in a speed readout and altimeter to it as well?
Reasoning is that it'd be nice to be able to keep the Action Groups open and still know my speed and altitude :} (this takes care of the throttle level, which is what I was also needing!)
Thanks either way!
@Leftybar Better late than never.... heh
Try clicking each Wing and then opening the Configuration for it. (Gear on the right side of the screen)
Change any VERTICALLY ALIGNED wing on the car so that they are now configured as "Symmetrical".
(vertically aligned, such as any being used as a body panel or vertical stabilizer; the Tail Fin parts are set to Symmetrical by default for this reason.)
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My GUESS as to why you're pulling to the right is because they're "Semi-Symmetrical" by default and due to how you installed some of them, they may all be "facing" the same way.
So if my guess is correct, as a result, the "Lift" being produced by the vertically aligned wings was to the left-side of them all, causing it to push you to the right. Changing it to Symmetrical then produces equal force on both sides, negating the 'pull'.
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ALTERNATIVELY... It might be a simple derp by SimplePlanes during any Mirror action. Sometimes I experience that where a part I've modified (specifically with Fine Tuner mod) has been mirrored but not attached at the same snap point as the other side. As a result it causes my craft to be Asymmetrical and has more Drag on one side, making it have a constant yaw|pitch|roll (case dependent) while in operation.
(In those scenarios the solution is that I have to manually do everything I did on the one side, to the other. Placing whatever it may be on the same original snap point, then moving it with Fine Tuner over to where it was when mirrored.)
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Hope that helps you, or, someone else at least... heh
(edit: oof, parsing multiple carriage returns sure does breaks my rambling heart! lol)
The "Download: Mod Settings" link directs you to the 'No Ocean' version of the mod instead. (possible copy-paste oopsie?)
Well fudge... lol There goes my plan of trying to make a curious/unique mid-engined propeller craft :P Very well done! If I could upvote it I would!
Gets my vote just for ingenuity! Sadly I can't upvote, but... words speak louder, right? :D