Landing Legs for Incredibly Massive Ore Tank

[wisnoskij]

I am having a lot of trouble with landing legs on super massive "craft". I want to deploy a standalone ore tank with a mining mission to Minmus. Using tweakscale I created a (I think it was) 10m tank that held approximately 1,000t of ore. Deploying any normal legs just have them fall off the moment I deploy it on Kerbin, Maxing out tweakscale, 8 legs, all comically large, even for the huge tank, and they stay on but all instantly get damaged, such that they cannot retract. Presumably, it would fare far better on Minmus's rarified gravity; But I also want to sort of land on it to connect and shuttle it around. Presumably I would just be hovering over it, but invariably it will put some extra strain on the legs.

Any ideas? It does not even have to be legs. For example, does anyone know if you can use Roverdudes airbags for this?

Edited July 6, 2015 by wisnoskij

[Reddeyfish]

Maybe try using girders/I-beams directly under the tank to take the main part of the weight, combined with landing legs on the edges for suspension?

[Dangerous_Beans]

as Reddeyfish said, just use girders. or just sit the tank on the ground, just make sure to land carefully.

if you really want landing legs, i think there are some heavy duty deployable ones in the Karbonite mod. Nova-Punch also had heavy duty static ones.

[Dilli]

Girders connected end on end and each one rotated to form wide landing legs work well (I normally use 3, first one connect to the structure parallel to the ground, the next rotated 45 degrees to wards the ground, the last rotated to meet the ground perpendicularly). The girders have a fair amount of spring which absorbs a bit of the impact on landing and tend to be more hardy when supporting massive weights.

[Sharpy]

Another option is MK3 parts. They are insanely impact-durable. Make them your legs and use radially attached engines for lifting. E.g. consider this:

Mk3 to 3.75m Adapter

50m/s impact resistance and a wide, firm flat base.

[selfish_meme]

Large Landing Gear, will hold up hundreds of tons

[GoSlash27]

Don't use legs at all. Just set it (gently) on the ground.

Best,

-Slashy

[wisnoskij]

Thanks for all your suggestions, will play around with them tonight and get back to you on what worked.

[Snark]

Don't use legs at all. Just set it (gently) on the ground.

+1 to this. Landing on Minmus at low speed (under 3 m/s) is really easy, given the low gravity.

[wisnoskij]

Just tested the deployable airbags, and they seems great, and very very light. But they make me wonder why ever use landing legs?

Even just 3-4 four of the small ones hold the tank off the ground.

[Snark]

Just tested the deployable airbags, and they seems great, and very very light. But they make me wonder why ever use landing legs?

Even just 3-4 four of the small ones hold the tank off the ground.

Because deployable airbags aren't in the stock game, and not everybody uses whatever mod you're using.