Wheels... its official

[alacrity]

Either...

A) Wheel attachment point are insanely weak and are pre determined to fail regardless of load, set up, terrain or lack there of, or ease of use or abuse.

or

I am missing some basic design elements of use the wheel systems in the current 20.2 build.

To be clear...

I have tried every wheel size on a variety of cart sizes. Tried launching on the runway and the launch pad, tried limiting me speeds, not turning, adding struts where I could. Tried haulers all the way down to mini rovers. Tried locking the wheels, locking the back wheels, locking the front wheels.

Everyone of them suffered some level of fault... vehikle fall apart, random bits exploding (ithink from contact with the ground) but most often one or more of the wheels just broke loose from the vehikle.

So in the end I have a couple of conclusions...

1) replace the elmers with super glue of attaching the wheels... especially the really big ones... I have plans for those

2) there is a gaping middle ground in wheel sizes. from the great bigs to the next size down is an order of magnitude change. we needs us a middle ground

3) Axles ... I wants them

4) Ground clearance... if nothing else the wheels need to ride higher... they side mount so the left over clearance is laffable.

Maybe I was just spoiled by the bobcat bits and pieces but not a single vehikle has made it 1000 meters so far before random bits fall off or explode. Or both.

If anyone can think of something basic I am forgetting please let me know. I don't wanna have to make all my vehikles with lazer suspencer fields.

Alacrity fitz

[El Coronel]

Perhaps post a picture? Then we can see what's going on with your wheels. Here are my two designs, both of which have yet to fail me unless I do a turn at 20m/s or something like that. I agree with your point about axles and clearance, so it's necessary to make your own. I've shown under body shots too which may help.

Rover:

Jeep:

Edit: How does one attach pictures? I posted links from steam.

Edited June 18, 2013 by El Coronel

[spacecake]

I haven't done much with wheels/rovers but I do know they burst at around 50-60m/s. Apart from that I have never seen any complaints.

[Odo]

Dunno what's wrong with your rover, but I've driven one of my favorite rover designs completely around the mun with no difficulty. :/

[bsalis]

Admittedly I don't have that much experience with wheels. However, I haven't had much of a problem with them. It's only the big wheels that seem a bit dodge to me.

[Evil Acrylic]

Have a look at http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/28911-Landing-Rovers there is quiet a few pictures on there so you can see how other people make there rovers and should be able to help.

Rule of thumb i use for a rover is 6 wheels, make sure it is wider that it is tall and anything heavy is low as possible on the rover.

spacecake is correct the wheels do have a maximum speed.

[ash73]

Part of the fun is designing rovers to be resilient. I include a little strut under each wheel to strengthen it, plus roll-over protection for the vulnerable bits, it can survive corner-pounding pirouettes at 60m/s+

[katateochi]

The only wheel problems I have are due to Jeb driver error. Going too fast -> tyres burst, turning too hard -> rolling. But I've never had the wheels falling off, even during some fairly fast crashes where the tyres all burst and the rover flips, the wheels don't fall off and I can often (if it has a righting mechanism) get going again.

I have heard of other people who have had the wheels randomly falling off and no amount of putting struts has helped (I'll ask them if they found a solution).

What part are you connecting the wheels to? If I had to guess I'd say that some parts do not make good wheel mount points, but it would help to see a pic of your rover.

[alacrity]

OK some of those requested pics

This is my heavy carrier I plan to deploy to duna... each wheel has 6-10 struts trying to hold it on. Since there was no middle ground wheel sets this thing is HUGE. 150 parts or there about... I think it is as big as my current space station.

Yes its 3 stories tall... I think it weighs near 120 tonnes fully loaded. Centre of grav is almost centered front to back and right between the upper and lower fuel decks.

This is the same vehikle 30 secs later after trying to move... I made it maybe 10 meters... top speed 1.6 m/s

I lined up the carrier with the ramp and as soon as I hit the gas, the right front tire twisted and cam off. It tipped over and some of the smaller my volatile bits blew up.

Alacrity Fitz

[Pulstar]

How heavy is that anyway? I'm not familiar with any of the non-stock parts you use. Although it looks like you could use 4 more wheels so that the weight per wheel is halved.

[rryy]

I can see that the front wheel is already broken under the weight of all of that mass. Try adding another pair or two of wheels to help lower the load per wheel. Try lightening the rover up a bit, too, so it isn't as heavy.

[Evil Acrylic]

I might be wrong but i think it is to do with the weight of it with kerbins gravity. on your first picture the front wheel is already popped as Pulstar said i think you need alot more wheels on there 120 tonnes is alot of weight.

At a guess because your wheel has already popped when you drive that is digged in and the force starts the wobble of death.

[eurybaric]

Dude, those two pairs of wheels are in no way gonna handle the weight of that monster! as users before me said, add a couple of pairs or more! and you got the space for them on that thing anyway!

Cheers!

[Johnno]

I am missing some basic design elements of use the wheel systems in the current 20.2 build.

This.

Everything has its limitations, nearly any rover no matter how well designed will flip over or break if you abuse it enough with high speeds or quick turns. It's as much about design as about learning limitations and how to drive each different rover. The controls don't allow smooth enough control with small enough adjustments at high speeds, you can't expect to just press and hold your turn key at 50 m/s, which in fact is 180 km/h (or over 100 miles an hour). Just the same as you can't expect that 4 wheels will work for a vehicle that looks to be about 100 tons if not more (I don't know those mod parts either, but two red tanks plus bits?).

I'd advice you to go back to basics and start small. If you really can't design a 4 or 6 wheel rover around the rovemate hull and drive it more than 1000 meters at reasonable speeds (10-15m/s) then you really are doing something fundamentally wrong.

Be patient, start small, learn the different wheels and their limitations. Just because the wheels don't pop until you're going 216 km/h doesn't mean you should.

[katateochi]

ah, yes, well, your rover needs to go on a diet or it needs more wheels. The heaviest rover I made that could be supported by just 4 of the large wheels was 65 tons and even that had to be driven v gently on Kerbin (

). I could drive it faster on Mun, but if 65 tons on Kerbin was pushing the limits of what 4 of those wheels could take your 120 ton monster is going to need more wheels!