Radial decouplers as rover suspension

[diegzumillo]

Hey, so I always thought the suspension on the rover wheels to be too little. Frequently I drive too fast over a small step or crater and burst my tires or, even worse, break the vehicle. I also realized, as many others already did, that radial decouplers have some flexibility in a specific axis, thus I decided to use this to make a rover suspension and it worked pretty well. I made a gif to show the effect by climbing the runway steps

[astropapi1]

*Bookmarks.

[regex]

*Bookmarks.

Seriously. Great tip, OP!

[7499275]

Who thought of this?!?! We must share this with the people!

Seriouslly good find, great idea, going to keep this idea saved somewhere! Thanks!

[NoMrBond]

You can put them out on clamp-o-tron's as well

[magnemoe]

Looks like it works well however don't press space )

[antiquark]

Repped. Would be interesting to experiment to see what part has the greatest "shock absorber" value.

[_Aramchek_]

Ohhh decouplers!! thats a new one, at first I thought you meant the docking ports. Interesting, I'll have to give that a try. thanks!

[diegzumillo]

I'm glad you people like it I'm actually surprised no one used this before, as I've seen radial decouplers being used even as the elastic of giant slingshots (Danny2462, probably lol)

I did this rover in 2 minutes just to test the idea, if anyone makes something meaningful please share :]

[Whackjob]

I think I can make use of this. Thank you, OP.

[Tw1]

Nice. This is why we need to be able to remove things from the staging sequence.

[SuperWeegee4000]

*Bookmarks.

Huh?

tenfrigginchar

[Nephas]

This opens up disastrous new possibilities for accidental space-button-hits...

[arq]

Nice. This is why we need to be able to remove things from the staging sequence.

Agreed. It would be nice if there were a 'unstaged' stage above stage zero that couldn't be triggered by the staging button. Instead it would require moving the part to an active stage or right-clicking to manually trigger the part.

[British_Rover]

Just use stage lock.

[Whackjob]

You know what? It just occurs to me... I can use these in the Arkingthaad Lander's legs.

It would give them a lot more flex, but I'd also have to go heavy with the suspension trusses and struts. Though that's no big deal.

I'll give it a whirl tonight. Do some testing.

[Rosarium]

eham you forget.... ASAAAA!

and 0.17 rovers

all these rovers has been made with radial decoupler almost 1 year ago.

let's teach something more

even this one has been made with the same trick

ASAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!

Edited August 23, 2013 by Rosarium

[Whackjob]

Blimey! Is that the way of it?

If we're going to start waving about transplanetary tower landers, we'll be at it all day!

[Sordid]

Personally I prefer using I-beams as suspension due to their curiously weak connections. Look:

All four wheels touching the ground! That's what I call axle articulation!

[SuperWeegee4000]

eham you forget.... ASAAAA!

and 0.17 rovers

all these rovers has been made with radial decoupler almost 1 year ago.

let's teach something more

even this one has been made with the same trick

ASAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!

Asaaaaaaaaaaaa?

[Whackjob]

All four wheels touching the ground! That's what I call axle articulation!

Nice. How does it handle rough ground at speed, though?

[diegzumillo]

Very cool stuff!!

[littlebattler]

The "bendy hinges" (structural pylons) work too, just in case any of you wonder.

[Scorpi15]

Woah! I know what to use on my next rover. Be sure to lock staging though, imagine if all your wheels popped off XD

Edited August 24, 2013 by Scorpi15
spelling error

[Joshington]

*tries it*

*presses space bar on accident*

*goes back to colonizing Duna*