10-16-2015, 10:35 AM
Just a quick guide to help our mappers. Code is located at code\modules\power\UNSC_fusion and is functional. I plan to add some extra features to it eventually. Firestorm is currently working on sprites, at the moment it's just using placeholder sprites.
Firstly, there is the 1x1 core. Put this in the middle with cables going out from under it (in the code it starts anchored, and it can't currently be unanchored or moved). Around the sides place 1-3 cooling machines, called "coolant manifolds" because I couldn't think of anything... cooler... to call them. It's important you leave one side open so that engineers can access the core itself. The manifolds need to have the large maroon conduit going in towards the core, and once in place they can be anchored down with a wrench. While unanchored, they can be pushed/pulled around or rotated to get into the right position.
The core requires fuel to operate. Make sure there are plenty of fuel packets stored away around the ship in hard to find places so engineers have to play hide and seek to refuel the engine. I'm thinking I'll add the UNSC fusion coils as a sort of mobile SMES later so they can be stored conveniently close to all the fuel packets. Processing is based off delta time, so production and consumption will be consistent regardless of lag. Fuel packets hold 3600 units of fuel, and the default consumption rate from the reactor is 1 unit per second. Just whack the reactor with your packet to insert it, and whack the button on the interface when you're ready to eject the empty packet. There is a colourful bar overlay on the sprite to easily tell you how much fuel is left. Power production is 200,000W per unit of fuel consumed. Fuel consumption can be modified between 0 and 10 units per second (there's currently a bug with that, but it's a quick fix).
Cooling works by pumping cool gas with a large heat capacity into one end of the manifolds. Heat is extracted from the core and put in the coolant which then goes out the other end. The flow direction is fixed, and goes in a clockwise direction (cold coolant goes in from the earlier clockwise side of manifold, hot coolant comes out from the later clockwise side of manifold). Each unit of fuel consumed produces 2C of heat. If there is no active cooling (or it's really really bad) the minimum amount of cooling coming from passive automated vents and shit (think Macbook type technology) is 1C per second. The active cooling was hella tricky to balance and I can't remember what I eventually settled on (you can see some random calculations in coolant_manifold.dm) but I believe 1 canister of a phoron coolant pumped through 1 manifold provides slightly more than enough cooling for the default consumption rate of 1u/s.
Please remember to factor in appropriate piping according to how much cooling you want the reactor to have, keeping in mind how much power it may be expected to output. The UNSC Pillar of Autumn had 3 fusion reactors powering it, with notes that two were "auxiliary" generators, so I'll probably be adding a variant of this eventually which takes up more space but produces more power. This small one will need a lot of tweaking as well. Slipspace engines are powered by plasma from the fusion reactors, so when we add the galaxy map with working slipspace drives I'll add a conduit piping plasma from the reactors to the drives. I also had a cool idea to recreate the Star Trek EPS conduits as an alternate power network to provide some extra fun for engies.
Firstly, there is the 1x1 core. Put this in the middle with cables going out from under it (in the code it starts anchored, and it can't currently be unanchored or moved). Around the sides place 1-3 cooling machines, called "coolant manifolds" because I couldn't think of anything... cooler... to call them. It's important you leave one side open so that engineers can access the core itself. The manifolds need to have the large maroon conduit going in towards the core, and once in place they can be anchored down with a wrench. While unanchored, they can be pushed/pulled around or rotated to get into the right position.
The core requires fuel to operate. Make sure there are plenty of fuel packets stored away around the ship in hard to find places so engineers have to play hide and seek to refuel the engine. I'm thinking I'll add the UNSC fusion coils as a sort of mobile SMES later so they can be stored conveniently close to all the fuel packets. Processing is based off delta time, so production and consumption will be consistent regardless of lag. Fuel packets hold 3600 units of fuel, and the default consumption rate from the reactor is 1 unit per second. Just whack the reactor with your packet to insert it, and whack the button on the interface when you're ready to eject the empty packet. There is a colourful bar overlay on the sprite to easily tell you how much fuel is left. Power production is 200,000W per unit of fuel consumed. Fuel consumption can be modified between 0 and 10 units per second (there's currently a bug with that, but it's a quick fix).
Cooling works by pumping cool gas with a large heat capacity into one end of the manifolds. Heat is extracted from the core and put in the coolant which then goes out the other end. The flow direction is fixed, and goes in a clockwise direction (cold coolant goes in from the earlier clockwise side of manifold, hot coolant comes out from the later clockwise side of manifold). Each unit of fuel consumed produces 2C of heat. If there is no active cooling (or it's really really bad) the minimum amount of cooling coming from passive automated vents and shit (think Macbook type technology) is 1C per second. The active cooling was hella tricky to balance and I can't remember what I eventually settled on (you can see some random calculations in coolant_manifold.dm) but I believe 1 canister of a phoron coolant pumped through 1 manifold provides slightly more than enough cooling for the default consumption rate of 1u/s.
Please remember to factor in appropriate piping according to how much cooling you want the reactor to have, keeping in mind how much power it may be expected to output. The UNSC Pillar of Autumn had 3 fusion reactors powering it, with notes that two were "auxiliary" generators, so I'll probably be adding a variant of this eventually which takes up more space but produces more power. This small one will need a lot of tweaking as well. Slipspace engines are powered by plasma from the fusion reactors, so when we add the galaxy map with working slipspace drives I'll add a conduit piping plasma from the reactors to the drives. I also had a cool idea to recreate the Star Trek EPS conduits as an alternate power network to provide some extra fun for engies.
