Has anyone created a hinge or a turntable?

[Gary_P]

Since I'm knee deep in modding I was wondering if anyone created a part that you can stick 2 other parts to it for bending or twisting. I was thinking it was about the size of an airlock but turned with a motor. This way the top "thing" would turn and it would be possible to point an engine in a direction, or have a tower crane move.

Another part would act as a hinge for sticking 2 parts together. I'm sure the models would be simple but I didn't want to recreate the wheel. No pun intended.

[sumghai]

DamnedRobotics (and its successor, InfernalRobotics) has turntables and hinges.

[Devo]

click link in my sig

[Gary_P]

Looking now. Thanks

[kellven]

If you want to make something that doesn't require multiple parts, or is too complex for that, what you want is probably a single "Part" that is composed of multiple unity gameobjects, connected to the base gameobject with unity hingejoints/configurablejoints. The real problems with multiple "Parts" is that the overhead of each full part is massive compared to the overhead of just a gameobject; and if you're using parts, you have to fight the KSP spaghetti code to get them to behave the way you want. I'd start with reading some of the unity documentation tutorials here: http://unity3d.com/learn/documentation.

When I had my helicopters flying, I was manipulating the rotor gameobjects directly, the white untextured monstrosity is all a single "Part" as far as KSP is concerned. In this case, I was setting their rotation directly each frame, rather than using joints, this is how the gimbal on engines works, or at least how it used to work.

On that note, did nexis ever fix the spoiler tags, and if so, where's the syntax?

[Gary_P]

Hi kellven! Couldn't a Unity game object be like using multiple parts parented together? I'm taking some UnityCookie classes as we speak, trying to get interested in Unity again.

I was thinking a simple hinge part: 2 flattened cubes with a hinge at one end, that could be controlled with a small window like the kerbal attachment system works. I like their wench controls. Then 2 more cubes that rotate. Each one would have an attachment point on them and I was going to make multiple sizes. The problem I see and this may be because I'm new with KSP, is keeping the windows active. I assume that when clicked/right clicked it could bring up a small window with 2 buttons for in and out, (bend) or left and right rotation.

I came up with this idea when I was trying to get a space station in orbit and I thought it may be cool to fold it.

This morning I was thinking it may be better to create some folding geometry that opens up like a structure.

Unity rocks but I'm a bit lost, looking for KSP's docs.

[Devo]

Hi kellven! Couldn't a Unity game object be like using multiple parts parented together? I'm taking some UnityCookie classes as we speak, trying to get interested in Unity again.

I was thinking a simple hinge part: 2 flattened cubes with a hinge at one end, that could be controlled with a small window like the kerbal attachment system works. I like their wench controls. Then 2 more cubes that rotate. Each one would have an attachment point on them and I was going to make multiple sizes. The problem I see and this may be because I'm new with KSP, is keeping the windows active. I assume that when clicked/right clicked it could bring up a small window with 2 buttons for in and out, (bend) or left and right rotation.

I came up with this idea when I was trying to get a space station in orbit and I thought it may be cool to fold it.

This morning I was thinking it may be better to create some folding geometry that opens up like a structure.

Unity rocks but I'm a bit lost, looking for KSP's docs.

The problem is, without the specific code to link the item to the base parent, the item will not move with the animation. Even if you attach it to an animated convex collider and tick movie physics with animation, any part you attach in KSP to a moving animated part will not travel with it.

There are plugins to get around this, but generally there is no 1-fix all plugin that allows it -thats why I started helping Sirkut on infernal robotics. The only reason I ever used to use the older damned robotics was simply that, to attach something to a part that moves and have the piece move with it.

A hinge made of two colliders just wont work I'm afraid feel free to try and you will see the result. The best you can do with a stock part is class it as a Hlandingleg, or make it an animated part that 'pushes' another object that's attached.

[Gary_P]

Oh crap, Devo. That's bad news. But thank you for all the info. I tried the damned robotics a while back and it hosed my 2.0 because it was (to my knowledge) never updated to 2.0

Then maybe I'm better off with my collapsible beam structure? I could add an attachment point to each end.

That may not work either huh? Or maybe after it's deployed it could be connected. There has to be a way to fold up a space station part.