Super floppy rockets

[Elonmuskrat]

First off, if this is thr wrong section I  apologize, as i just joined 20 seconds ago. I got KSP a few days ago, and have started to build my own rockets. My issue is that whenever i build a rocket with more than 2 stages, the nosecone ends up in the engine. Why is that and what can I do to fix it? Thanks!

[Abpilot]

58 minutes ago, Elonmuskrat said:

First off, if this is thr wrong section I  apologize, as i just joined 20 seconds ago. I got KSP a few days ago, and have started to build my own rockets. My issue is that whenever i build a rocket with more than 2 stages, the nosecone ends up in the engine. Why is that and what can I do to fix it? Thanks!

i recommend kerbal joint reinforcements 

 

 

[Spricigo]

 

welcome.

Already asked for a moderator to move your thread to Gamepay Question where it belongs.

From what you told us so far,  we can only guess what your issue may be, so more info is required to offer better help.

What do you mean by "the nosecone ends up in the engine"?  your rocket flips, dismantle or what? What happens before it? If you can provide with a few pictures of a rocket that is suffering with the issue and a description of the flight profile we may stand a better chance to figure out what is happening and help to figure out an effective solution.

 

 

[Gaarst]

20 hours ago, Abpilot said:

i recommend kerbal joint reinforcements 

 

@Elonmuskrat I don't recommend it. It's better to learn how to properly design your rockets and why they fail than to shove the problem under the carpet and never learn from it.

 

Spricigo gave a few instructions for you to provide more information so that we can help you. General guidelines to avoid this problem is to avoid building rockets that are too tall or that have too many stages (tank-decoupler-engine-tank junctions tend to be very wobbly), reduce the gimbal of your rocket engines as too much can cause wobble, improve the rigidity of your rocket by using longer parts if possible, reducing the number of junctions or using struts...

[bewing]

Using struts or autostruts is the typical first solution to noodly rockets. Autostruts is the easiest, but can cause other problems. Other than that, good suggestions above.

 

[putnamto]

Noodle  rockets  are  funny.

I  had  one  that  would  bend 90° in  the  middle  but  could  still  make  orbit.

As  for  the  question, design  your  rocket  better, or  struts lots  of  struts

[Warzouz]

Most of the problem is about flying the rocket. If your rocket is properly powered (TWR around 1.4 to 1.6), you shouldn't need to turn forcefully. Adjust you turning angle using THRUST instead of directions, It'll create much less wobble and be more efficient. Reducing gimbal to 30% is also a solution. SAS will make direction change smoother. Location of reaction wheels can be a problem too if they are very far from the engines.

Sure if your rocket is very wobbly, keeping it straight will be a hassle... Add some struts

Edit : as for KJR mod, you can use it while learning how to fly to orbit rocket properly, then you'll notice you don't need it anymore. KJR is still useful for unreasonably large rockets. But for now, even my 600T to orbit rocket SSTO didn't need it.

Have fun.

Edited February 11, 2018 by Warzouz

[foamyesque]

Screenshots would go a loooooong way towards allowing specific advice. If you have Steam, you can use it to take screenshots via F12 and use it's built-in upload service to share them. Otherwise you can use KSP's ingame capture tool and upload them to Imgur or wherever.

 

That said: There's four main things I have found that tend towards floppiness and that a couple of struts will solve:

 

1. A lot of stacked parts in short succession. This is particularly obvious between stages, since you're usually going tank-engine-decoupler-tank. A pair or trio of struts running from the lower decoupler to as high up the tank above the engine as is feasible will make it far more rigid.

2. Boosters, especially as they burn out, and lots of other things mounted radially, like to twist in various ways. Struts on the nose and tail hooking it into the main stack will usually stop, or at least strongly mitigate, this.

3. Complicated payloads, particularly spindly satellites and so on, will flop on their connection points under manouvering stresses. A couple of struts to widen the connection or attach it to fairing/cargo-bay walls can solve a lot of headaches.

4. Multisegment wings usually need some spacetape to make them move as a unit, not warp ridiculously, or not tear off from the fuselage. Exactly where to hook them together depends an awful lot on the wing layout and isn't as simple as the other three cases.

 

Also wise is avoiding, as much as feasible, really long, spindly things and excess nodes. Life is a lot easier if you're putting your fuel in one -32 2.5m tank instead of 8 -4 1.25m ones.

[Flavio hc16]

another reason why your rocket might be flipping: you are putting a too light payload on top, so when the rocket get lighter and lighter the centre of mass goes too far forward and it's like you are trying to shoot an arrow backwards, you can't get how many times putting a fuel tank at the top of my rocket saved me from crashing it