Advanced Grabbing Unit question

[CubertFarnsworth]

Going on my first asteroid capture EVER and I am experimenting with my build. It sits on four (4)  Advanced Grabbing Units pointing down. Now my question is will the  Advanced Grabbing Units grab the asteroid when I "land" on it. The reason I ask is because my  Advanced Grabbing Units are not grabbing the launch pad when I send my ship to launch and also it did not grab the surface of Minmus when I touched down on it. 

Thanks

[Foxster]

If I remember correctly, the claw will not engage with a planet or moon, only with other craft and asteroids. 

 

[bewing]

You just need to make sure you are perpendicular to the surface when you hit it.

[Clipperride]

Did my first astroid capture last night.  It took a couple of "bumps" with the Claw before it attached, so don't panic if it doesn't engage first time around.

[Superfluous J]

Also, unlike docking ports you can't grab an asteroid with multiple Claws on the same ship. When the first one attaches, the asteroid becomes part of the ship and will clip through the next Claw to come close to it.

You CAN claw an asteroid with multiple claws and if they're separate craft. It's how I made my astro-glider. You can also utilize the new auto-struts to achieve the same result as multiple claws.

[CubertFarnsworth]

29 minutes ago, 5thHorseman said:

 

You CAN claw an asteroid with multiple claws and if they're separate craft. It's how I made my astro-glider. You can also utilize the new auto-struts to achieve the same result as multiple claws.

Auto-struts?

[Zhetaan]

58 minutes ago, CubertFarnsworth said:

Auto-struts?

It's in the right-click menu.

Also, if you're using the Claw for the first time, know that it usually takes a bit more force to engage.  Docking ports ideally should contact at less than 0.3 m/s; the Claw should contact at 0.3 to 0.5 m/s.  That's not a set rule, but it's what works best for me.  Just don't ram your asteroid so hard that you break something important.

[KevinTMC]

3 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

You CAN claw an asteroid with multiple claws and if they're separate craft. It's how I made my astro-glider.

I managed to destroy the physics of an entire savefile by doing this in an earlier version of KSP. (All the attached craft got weird and noodly...and that was just for starters.) Is it no longer dangerous to attempt this?

Would be nice if it is no longer so treacherous. I've been afraid to use the Klaw ever since.

Edited December 6, 2016 by KevinTMC

[Superfluous J]

2 hours ago, KevinTMC said:

I managed to destroy the physics of an entire savefile by doing this in an earlier version of KSP. (All the attached craft got weird and noodly...and that was just for starters.) Is it no longer dangerous to attempt this?

Would be nice if it is no longer so treacherous. I've been afraid to use the Klaw ever since.

I really don't know. I never found multiple claws useful except in that one case.  and now with auto struts I may never need them again. 

[bewing]

5 hours ago, KevinTMC said:

I managed to destroy the physics of an entire savefile by doing this in an earlier version of KSP. (All the attached craft got weird and noodly...and that was just for starters.) Is it no longer dangerous to attempt this?

Would be nice if it is no longer so treacherous. I've been afraid to use the Klaw ever since.

Klaws won't destroy physics now. That aspect of it is fixed. However, depending on the flexibility and placement of your reaction wheels -- having multiple ships attached to the same parent thing, all with SAS turned on, can cause violent wobbling.

[radonek]

Also, it's kinda hard to land at perfect CoM and having multiple claws linked would prevent you from using freewheeling mode to finetune, even if physics would allow it. Landing them separately may be a good idea, or krakenbait - probably both. If you wan to go this way, pack some quantum or KAS struts - inflight autostrutting is gonna be patched away at some point. Also, be wary of attaching struts directly to klaw, it may also be a krakenbait. Definitely was last time i tried (sometime around 1.0) but maybe it was fixed since.