[Tutorial] Six places you should be using more struts!

[nhnifong]

The StrutCraft Kersmic Strut Company would like to bring you this informational bulletin on how to use MORE STRUTS.

Powerful vectoring engines tend to slip on the bottom of tanks or drive themselves right through your craft, exploding everything in their path! No amount of strutting the tank to the things above it will help. You must connect struts directly to the source of power!

Your rocket is wobbly, and the ladies don't like a wobbly rocket. Stiffen that thing up with some struts! A decoupler alone is not sufficient to transmit the torque from your fancy vectoring engine up to the mass of junk at the top of your rocket. You need stuts!

Are you enjoying those nice new docking clamps that Hogdriver and Erkle and generously provided? Well with your crappy piloting you won't! Keep those mysterious dockamajiggers from snapping off your ship when you come smashing into them at some crooked angle going 10 m/s.

These things look like they are made of struts. That means they are trustworthy right? NO! at the atomic level, they are actually just a single rigid physics joint. Reinforce them with some short struts at the ends and make them work like they look.

Those big boosters need something to lift! But if they are only lifting the tank they are attached to, it will put extreme forces on the puny decoupler above it, possible breaking. Plus shortening the chain of rigid bodies between a force applying part and the command pod, lessens the noise in the pod's measurement of the rocket's angular momentum!

You may be protecting your radially mounted boosters from vertical and lateral shakes, but are you protecting them from SHEAR FORCES? Probably no enough to help us meet our yearly strut sales quotas! Make an X between your boosters to keep them from twisting and giving your rockets unwanted spin.

Remember customers,

STRUTS ARE THE KEY TO HAPPINESS

Edited October 12, 2012 by sal_vager

[Grand Lander]

How do you know that people don't already do this?

[VincentLaw]

With some camera trickery, you can hide stealthy struts inside the connection between fuel tanks.

[Tommygun]

How do you know that people don't already do this?

Corporate sponsored Public service announcements are good for raising a corporation's reputation.

Especially after any large industrial accidents involving test pilots.

[nhnifong]

How do you know that people don't already do this?

A serendipitous market survey among the three largest shareholders over beer and steak concluded that people don't use enough struts.

[Flowz0r]

I almost feel like this should be in the "How to..."-section, that's some very good advice for new/less experienced players you got going there.

[Atimed]

Dam, 5 out of 6..

haha survey, generally struts ~0.4 T on my Lunar crafts..

[Seanoog]

Thats some useful information.

Will be very informative for new/struggling players on how to re-enforce there rockets.

I think this thread should be stickied...

Just two extra additions about struts.

1. Each strut weights (0.1) Mass. So good placement an conservative usage allows for strong, but lighter craft.

2. Struts are strong an mavellous. However they must play by the rules (Physics). Once your System Simulation falls below 10FPS,

Phyics calculations (Strut Control) is sacrificed.

Meaning your supper strong craft, may become supper wobbly, because the Simulation left out some important strut calculations.

[HoneyFox]

Well, good tips but there are lots of places which need struts but cannot be attached to.

[LukeTim]

But struts take so much time! I just want to FLY.

[nibula]

hah nice

[RoboRay]

How do you know that people don't already do this?

Youtube.

Look at Youtube.

[Exclipse]

How do you know that people don't already do this?

Who cares if everyone who ever played KSP does this.

His post was funny.

[EndlessWaves]

I almost feel like this should be in the "How to..."-section, that's some very good advice for new/less experienced players you got going there.

I thought it was supposed to be amusingly bad advice, I don't know about the mod parts in question but on stock parts you don't need anywhere near that many. Chances are if you're using more than a dozen or so it's time to look at redesigning.

[burnie]

Some neat ideas here. I'll have to revisit some of my designs and incorporate more struts. May even save a Kerbal or two!

[nhnifong]

I thought it was supposed to be amusingly bad advice, I don't know about the mod parts in question but on stock parts you don't need anywhere near that many. Chances are if you're using more than a dozen or so it's time to look at redesigning.

For that particular engine, you do need something like six to hold it onto it's tank for some reason, but as for the rest of the places, yeah it's far too many.

[khearn]

I had one stack that was always failing because a large decoupler just couldn't take the thrust going through it. It took lots of struts before I finally got it strong enough. I guess I should have been buying my struts from the StrutCraft Kersmic Strut Company.

[fusty]

Thats some useful information.

2. Struts are strong an mavellous. However they must play by the rules (Physics). Once your System Simulation falls below 10FPS,

Phyics calculations (Strut Control) is sacrificed.

Meaning your supper strong craft, may become supper wobbly, because the Simulation left out some important strut calculations.

That is very good to know, thank you!

[lazarus2405]

I thought it was supposed to be amusingly bad advice, I don't know about the mod parts in question but on stock parts you don't need anywhere near that many. Chances are if you're using more than a dozen or so it's time to look at redesigning.

Sir, that would depend on how big your rocket is. With stock 2m parts, large boosters and multiple stages, you certainly need struts. 300t on the pad without struts is not a fun time.

Anyway, thanks for the rundown. In your screenshots, your struts are all so very straight. How do you keep everything so nice and perpendicular?

[nhnifong]

Anyway, thanks for the rundown. In your screenshots, your struts are all so very straight. How do you keep everything so nice and perpendicular?

I'm just picky about that. I use the angle snap feature, and I put struts on places where there are lines or dots on the tank textures to mark the spot. also, I line up my camera and use the aliasing effect of the pixels to tell when they are straight. It's a ridiculous habit. By they way, those are the Anagara struts from CardboardBoxProcessor. The can have unlimited length, and they are strong, and have very few polys.

[phoenix_ca]

Heheh. That was amusing. I've only played a few hours total, so to those who say that "everyone" (mistaken reasoning if ever there was) knows how to use struts, well...let's just say things were very interesting before I knew that adding struts to my boosters wouldn't prevent them from decoupling (I mean...it's only logical to think that attaching something with one piece that detaches, and another that doesn't, is rather counter-productive to detaching said thingamajig).

[TheDarkStar]

Nice tips, I've used these a lot already and it's the reason most of my rockets don't explode.. The only problem is when you make a large ship that needs 150-200 struts...

[pebble_garden]

The original post is brilliant in its clear presentation. Well done!

[YukiCruentus]

._. Some of these I discovered via trial and error, others I had seen in use... Some I never considered XD