Breaking Ground robotics parts - are hydraulic levers possible?

[Omeran]

I was wondering - is there a way to make this kind of contraption work?

I would like to have a hinged telescopic arm support another hinged part so it can handle higher torque.

Edited January 6, 2020 by Omeran
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[Stamp20]

You could enable Same Vessel Interaction on the areas where they should connect, but it might not work.

Using struts is another option, but it would most likely break the contraption. I'll do some testing.

[Omeran]

Tried to outsmart it with docking ports. I got the "cycle" I wanted, but then the hinge got loose...

[Stamp20]

Did some testing. Same Vessel Interaction makes no difference at all with the legs.

However, I got some more luck when I strutted the bottom hinge on the piston part to the leg. By turning up the traverse rate and turning off damping on the truss' hinge, I could use the piston to make a difference on the landing legs, but only when gravity was hacked in the debug menu to a level similar to the Mun. For reference, I tried to recreate the setup seen in the screenshots, but the piston part was attached to the fuel tank.

[Vanamonde]

Breaking Ground question moved to the Breaking Ground subforum. 

[AHHans]

12 hours ago, Stamp20 said:

However, I got some more luck when I strutted the bottom hinge on the piston part to the leg.

Yes, that would also be my approach. I'd attach the hinge - I-beam - leg to the fuel tank and then the hinge - piston - hinge to the fuel tank. But at the lower hinge of the latter I would also add a cubic octagonal Strut and add then strut that to the I-beam.

I tried it, and got it to work after a fashion. But not reliably, something always got stuck after a few cycles. One important thing is to set the hinges and piston to be "free" after a power loss, and not to set autostruts on the robotic parts themselves. Also don't try to extend the landing gear when the hinge between tank and I-beam is not locked! Otherwise I got 100% kraken-bait.

And finally: I think just  the lower part, without the piston and with an autostrut on the I-beam, would work just as well if you only move it in microgravity - with no forces on the structure - and lock it whenever there is some load on the structure.

[Ruedii]

They should add an option to attach two parts together IF they align close enough.  This could allow for much better options.