Is it just me, or are rovers COMPLETELY USELESS?

[VBlackshadow]

I have just wasted an entire day trying to descend a gentle slope. The driver has died upwards of 30 times now. I've read threads on the subject here and on other sites, and followed all the suggestions: wide wheel base, low center of gravity, reaction wheels, RCS, heavy construction... and still the thing flips over on it's back and explodes every time it goes over 5 m/s. or brakes. or turns. or someone breathes on it. or looks at it.

please help me.

Edited October 22, 2013 by VBlackshadow

[Epthelyn]

I think your problem might be the controls you are using, particularly since every movement causes a flip. You can either bind the rover drive keys to IJKL instead of ASWD or switch to docking mode and drive with ASWD. If left in the other mode the same keys will try to rotate the vehicle.

At the same time, reaction wheels on a rover? Why?

[T-Pilot395]

Reaction wheels can stabilize a rover when it is flying off the ground due to some unforseen object in its path. A.K.A when launched.

But even then they should be disabled under normal operation.

[Dogface]

what planet are you on? did you run the rover on Kerbin first to make sure everything is set correctly?

I have had rovers on Duna and Mun and I generally have to keep them at a low speed (5-7m/s, 10 max) or else the lack of gravity makes them hop up. I have had rovers the size of a base or as small as a probe, and get the same problem. Its not necessarily the design but the gravity.

[Sirine]

Survive flips intact? well, below are example of "flips proof"..

http://www./view/x9cbaigb736jcv3/004-Ultimate_Rover_F.craft

And Fort...put more strut..

http://www./view/ws9bwxa3i9bm1pb/004-Ultimate_Rover_J.craft

And if you are looking for anomalies at Mun, you better change from Rover to something such as rocket type VTOL shuttle craft.

[lajoswinkler]

Use those plates as an armor for your Mün rover. It works for me. If you're visiting a world with a higher gravity, count your blessings.

Rovers were never meant to be used for racing on the surface of another body. That, and remember that planets and satellites are huge and you're on the ground, not orbiting in vacuum.

Oh and don't enter craters. Even if you don't flip and crash on the way down, coming up and over the rim is probably impossible in most cases.

[merlinux]

Test your rovers on kerbin. I have made good design with a low rate of destruction It also depends on your driving but as a general rule if it is unstable on kerbin do not believe it will be fine on the mun...

Yes you can design drivable rovers.

[Moar Boosters]

Did you switch to docking controls? Rovers work much better using them.

[Dkmdlb]

The problems you mentioned aren't bugs, they are features!

[Vanamonde]

5m/s is 18km/hr, or 10mph. Imagine trying to drive your car down a slope that steep at that speed. But also, I find that all my rovers have less wheel traction in .22, and they're just not fun to drive right now. Squad fixed this in a previous update, but it seems to be back.

[Stormwynde]

I have a pair of rovers on the Mun that have worked out OK for me so far, as long as I don't try to race them.

- outer structure should be all high impact pieces, like steel plates and steel beams

- I have the tough landing gear on a recessed area (protected by steel plating) on top of my rover in case it does flip.

A few other things I've found to be helpful when driving a rover. I'm assuming a four-wheel rover is used.

- turn off steering in the back two tires so it handles more like a car

- disable the brakes in the front tires so it doesn't nose and flip when braking

For some reason, I had to turn off the motor in the back wheels on the Mun; they were pushing with more power than the front. There could be something a bit off in my rover design, but it works so I'm not complaining.

[csanders]

Survive flips intact? well, below are example of "flips proof"..

And Fort...put more strut..

http://www./view/ws9bwxa3i9bm1pb/004-Ultimate_Rover_J.craft

Actually, less struts may help. Depending on where they're placed.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/50704-If-it-bends-it-won-t-break-Large-rover-wheel-placement

[VBlackshadow]

Survive flips intact? well, below are example of "flips proof"..

http://www./view/x9cbaigb736jcv3/004-Ultimate_Rover_F.craft

And Fort...put more strut..

http://www./view/ws9bwxa3i9bm1pb/004-Ultimate_Rover_J.craft

And if you are looking for anomalies at Mun, you better change from Rover to something such as rocket type VTOL shuttle craft.

Ok, if rovers aren't to be used for exploring surfaces... then what SHOULD they be used for? I thought that was their entire purpose. Also, could you post pictures rather than craft files? I'd rather build my own. Otherwise i'd just use a DEMV or something.

Did you switch to docking controls? Rovers work much better using them.

yep. Helped a little.

5m/s is 18km/hr, or 10mph. Imagine trying to drive your car down a slope that steep at that speed. But also, I find that all my rovers have less wheel traction in .22, and they're just not fun to drive right now. Squad fixed this in a previous update, but it seems to be back.

The problem is that it's borderline impossible to go down a slope under 16 m/s because, as mentioned before, I cannot brake in low gravity without dying. the only way i've found to descend any even slight incline is to use a winch and grappling hook from KAS, only that takes forever (1 m/s at most), And sometimes i'll STILL flip.

UGH. Haven't ever had this much difficulty with a rocket or plane... I mean come on, it's a glorified SUV! It shouldn't be that much harder!

Will try the rear brake/front steering trick next, thanks for the replies all.

EDIT: Ok, here's what I've got now:

http://imageshack.us/a/img546/4747/xxlq.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img34/3731/4n3x.jpg

The front steering/rear braking configuration seems to help a lot, but front wheel drive just seems to make it try and rip itself in half. Keeping that bound to an action group just in case it works better in low gravity, though. Now to figure out how to get it up there...

Edited September 29, 2013 by VBlackshadow

[rhoark]

Take the front wheels out of the braking action group.

[RocketPilot573]

You know what, the OP is probably trying to use the "ruggedized wheels"... Those things are possessed by evil spirits...

Simply swap out those horrible wheels for different ones, and all your problems will vanish.

[Teirusu]

The way I see it, you're pretty much -going- to flip and tumble at some point on the Mun or else where, so you might as well design your rover with that in mind, instead of designing against it, or to straight prevent it.

Here's my little buggy, its around 2 tons, so not too heavy. This thing is pretty tough and solid and I can basically drive it full speed on the Mun, slowing down only when I need to. It dives into and ramps out of craters with ease, I only have to stop occasionally and fix the tires. I have two of them on the Mun currently and they have both driven well over 100Kms from the landing site.

I've had them climb 45 degree slopes and I've occasionally tossed them off the 2Km+ deep canyon cliffs just to see how well they survive the fall/drive down. (F5ing before, of course!) Typically, if they tumble most of the way down, they'll survive mostly intact with only broken tires. (Bob and Bill have been ejected from their seat alot too. xD ) The top, front, and back fenders are key to this. Those plates and I-beams can absorb heavy impacts.

I actually just drive these things in Staging mode have have Mechjeb Rover Autopilot set the speed. This allows me to use Staging mode to keep my attitude and orientation proper.

[Person012345]

My rover works fine. I'm sending one to duna (it's on it's way) so I'll let you know how it performs there. Don't drive so fast that you lose control. My design goes fast enough without flipping.

[Person012345]

Well my duna one had a kerbalish mishap when the parachute + thrust stage seperated from the rest of the ship before said seperation was planned. The emergency lithobraking was not sufficient to preserve the rover well enough to be driven around. However, as a consolation prize we sent another one to the mun and here is it taking a corner downhill at >10m/s:

http://puu.sh/4E7L5 (ignore skype, seldon is always ruining my KSP pics. >.>)

http://puu.sh/4E7LB

It remains stable to at least 15m/s in a straight line and maybe more (making a turn at the above speeds requires caution but isn't too hard) and is pretty stable if you happen to break a wheel or two. It's also stable under braking (indeed, if you feel things getting out of control it's almost always recoverable due to this).

Edited September 30, 2013 by Person012345

[BubbaWilkins]

Most wheels have too much grip and suspension for the lighter gravity planets/moons. To offset this, they also have relatively low power at low speeds making it somewhat difficult to fight gravity and inclines. The new terrain on the Mun can be quite difficult to navigate without sending your rover flying,tumbling,and otherwise out of control.

This monster can safely travel 5 m/s. At 10, it becomes slightly more dangerous, be generally manageable. At 20, its more likely to be destroyed than not. More than 20 results in relatively immediate disaster.

This one can go much faster, but the suspension tends to bounce it off the terrain at 20m/s or more resulting in similar destruction.

[Khrissetti]

Teirusu, that's a gorgeous rover!

My solution was to incorporate a 'schrimech' or Self-Righting Mechanism. Simply add a couple of lightweight legs on the roof such that when it flips, the legs push it back onto its wheels. Make sure you've got a probe body so that it can flip itself over, even if the driver is ejected. If you look carefully, there is a wheel on the front and the back, so that if it flips onto its end, you can just drive it back onto its wheels.

This solution even works in the heavy gravity and crushing atmosphere of Eve, so it has no problems on the Mun:

Edited September 30, 2013 by Khrissetti

[Moar Boosters]

Teirusu, that's a gorgeous rover!

My solution was to incorporate a 'schrimech' or Self-Righting Mechanism.

Robot wars terminology.

[Wallace]

I put a reaction wheel on the bottom on my utility rovers and they can flip right over on the mun, my micro rovers can flip over on the mun with just the probe core reaction wheels. I have to put them in docking mode to drive them, but when they do start to flip, I just hold F and then switch to rotate and tip them right back onto their wheels. The only time I've broken one is descending a near vertical slope when one started to tumble and was destroyed.

Also, I find rovers are ok for finding anomalies, as long as you land quite close, I've found arches and the Neil Armstrong monument with micro rovers when I knew I'd landed about 10km-15km from them.

The slope my micro rover was destroyed on was twice as steep as this one at least.

The utility rovers are stable even when lifting things, due to extremely low centre of mass. The Infernal Robotics suspension helps with that as I can lower it right down when needed.

Edited September 30, 2013 by Wallace

[-Velocity-]

My mantra is:

NEVER build landers. ALWAYS build rovers!

Rovers just make much more interesting vehicles to land on other planetary bodies. When wheels don't really weigh much more than landing legs, why would you EVER make a lander? For real, what is the point or fun of a lander?! Unless you're simulating Apollo, make your lander a rover too! The only pure lander I've made was for Tylo, and even that is now getting replaced with a SSTO, fully reusable Tylo rover which I finally succeeded in making.

One of the keys to rovers on low gravity worlds, especially if the gravity is REALLY low, is actually equipping them with a rockets and a lot of delta V, and using them more as sub-orbital "hoppers" than as rovers that drive. Oh sure, you can drive them some, but the way that I cover most of the distance, especially on really small bodies, is to take low altitude, sub-orbital hops across the surface. Primarily, the wheels just serve to take you short distances across the terrain and enable rolling landings.

Here's my Low Gravity Rover (LGR), which proved highly successful before I largely replaced it with the LGRN. I created it for exploring low gravity worlds. It features a low center of gravity for stability during driving, has a starting (Kerbin) TWR of 1.67, and a delta-V of 2200 m/s:

I only use a VARIANT of the LGR (with parachutes) for Duna now, as it has been replaced by the LGRN, which is far superior in most regards. The "high" gravity of Duna plus the atmosphere mean that I selected the LGR over the LGRN for Duna exploration. Here's the LGR Duna variant:

The lander is actually a Tylo lander (modified with parachutes to give it landing capability on Laythe too), but I happened to have it along on my spacecraft (it was a BIG spacecraft) so what the hell, I landed it too

The LGRN (Low Gravity Rover Nuclear) uses two nuclear thermal rockets, has a starting (Kerbin) TWR of 0.4, and a delta-V of 5800 m/s. The LGRN is capable of many, many suborbital hops on small worlds like Minimus. Don't let people tell you that the NTR engine is useless for lander designs- they are just FLAT OUT wrong for worlds with low gravity, where the TWR is so much higher. The downsides of the LGRN is mainly that the center of gravity is a bit higher than the LGR's center of gravity, but that is more than made up for by the super-high delta-V which allows many suborbital hops, giving the LGRN much more exploratory potential.

Notice that on all my landers, I like to have a forward-facing AI core. When controlling the rover from this forward-facing component, sub-orbital flying becomes more intuitive. For example, if I want to fly low at suborbital speeds, I just control from the forward-facing AI core and keep bumping the engines when the velocity vector dips below the horizon line. I can maintain sort-of level flight. With the forward-facing AI core, it's also easier to see which direction the rover needs to point during rolling landings.

Here's some more screenshots from the LGRN.

Edited September 30, 2013 by |Velocity|

[VBlackshadow]

You know what, the OP is probably trying to use the "ruggedized wheels"... Those things are possessed by evil spirits...

Simply swap out those horrible wheels for different ones, and all your problems will vanish.

THANK YOU. THANK YOU SO MUCH. This was the whole problem. I switched to some other wheels and added some lander legs, now I can get this thing going 25 m/s and taking sharp turns with minimal problems, even on the mun. It even survived its lander crashing (though that, i'm guessing, was due to the extra plating.)

How do I get rid of the [unanswered] in the thread title?

Edited October 15, 2013 by VBlackshadow

[Person012345]

Edit the first post (go advanced).