How do you stop a rover?

[Talonsin]

My rovers continue to move even if I disable the motor on all the wheels. I have had to resort to using landing gear as a sort of park brake. Surely there is a way to apply brakes and park the rover other than landing gear?

[Johnno]

... yes there is. Press B to use your brakes while driving, once you stop click the brake icon (exclamation mark thingie) at the top of your screen.

[Dangerous_Beans]

on the right of the altitude display there are 3 buttons. the bottom red one is the parking brake, and if you click it the brakes will be locked on (top one is lights, i can't remember what the centre one is).

you can also press b to engage the brakes, though they will disengage when you release the key. the brake button will change colour when you press b.

[Talonsin]

Are you serious? There is an actual brake?

[Talonsin]

OMG there is!

[nhnifong]

It's an excessively strong brake though. If you just engage it at a regular speed your rover will flip over.

[Dangerous_Beans]

It's an excessively strong brake though.

watching my 10 ton Mun bus pull stoppies on the space centre runway was pretty cool though.

[LeadMagnet]

How do you stop a rover? Give it a bone!

but brakes work too!!

[blizzy78]

It's an excessively strong brake though. If you just engage it at a regular speed your rover will flip over.

Exactly, especially on lower-gravity worlds this can lead to disaster. It's better to brake by repeatedly tapping (not holding!) the key to go backwards, and only activate the real brake when the rover has come to a stop.

[Tiron]

Exactly, especially on lower-gravity worlds this can lead to disaster. It's better to brake by repeatedly tapping (not holding!) the key to go backwards, and only activate the real brake when the rover has come to a stop.

There's actually another way. In the VAB/SPH, there's a 'Brake' action group, which all wheels are assigned to by default. You can prevent flipping in one direction by removing some of the wheels from the 'brake' action group: For example, removing the front wheels will allow you to use full brakes while travelling forward, but still flip you going backwards, on most rover designs.

[nhnifong]

There's actually another way. In the VAB/SPH, there's a 'Brake' action group, which all wheels are assigned to by default. You can prevent flipping in one direction by removing some of the wheels from the 'brake' action group: For example, removing the front wheels will allow you to use full brakes while travelling forward, but still flip you going backwards, on most rover designs.

That's very clever. I'll have to try that.

[blizzy78]

Hmm, I don't like removing wheels from the "Brake" group that much because when the permanent brake is active, they don't all brake because you removed them.

[Dunbaratu]

Put the little teeny orange side-engines placed with nozzles facing up on front and back of rover. Make sure they're active when you drive. if you start to flip, or need better traction for your "S" key, throttle them up a little to push your rover into the ground harder and make the wheels work better. use tiny fuel tank for them - you only need them powered up here and there.

Edited August 23, 2013 by Steven Mading
typos

[HeadHunter67]

The most reliable way to stop a rover is attempt to drive it over terrain that has even the slightest irregularity. A wheel is sure to break.

[capi3101]

Put the little teeny orange side-engines placed with nozzles facing up on front and back of rover. Make sure they're active when you drive. if you start to flip, or need better traction for your "S" key, throttle them up a little to push your rover into the ground harder and make the wheels work better. use tiny fuel tank for them - you only need them powered up here and there.

I used to use a system like that to flip rovers back upright (only on one side). In 0.21 that's proven to be largely unnecessary; my baby rovers can flip themselves back over with just probe torque even on Kerbin.

A Round-8 toroidal fuel tank works well for this purpose. Doesn't take much thrust to do this, either.

I've heard of folks using ion engines for downforce.

Anyway, yes there is a brake as folks have already pointed out. Only thing I will add is that you should definitely not hit the brake and apply backwards force to the wheels at the same time - your rover will try to flip over for sure if you do.

[PetWolverine]

The most reliable way to stop a rover is attempt to drive it over terrain that has even the slightest irregularity. A wheel is sure to break.

This is extremely effective. Many of my rovers have managed to stop during testing despite the steep slope of the side of the runway. Even repeatedly repairing the wheels did not impair their ability to break again and keep me on the runway, proving the reliability of this braking method.

[Amoun]

There's actually another way. In the VAB/SPH, there's a 'Brake' action group, which all wheels are assigned to by default. You can prevent flipping in one direction by removing some of the wheels from the 'brake' action group: For example, removing the front wheels will allow you to use full brakes while travelling forward, but still flip you going backwards, on most rover designs.

...................i love you......

[Zeroignite]

My approach to stop rovers from front-flipping while braking is to remap rover controls to ijkl and hold nose-up during hard stops. This only works well if you have a decent reaction wheel. It's also nice since you can manually align for a landing if a jump gets you airtime, and you can "lean into turns" to maneuver a bit faster.

[DisarmingBaton5]

The brakes exist, but I find sometimes it is easier and faster to use the "s" key.

[lumpman2]

It doesn't help that it's a handbrake, which makes it a lot more aggressive. It'd be better if there was a pedal-type brake that would let you decelerate more slowly.

[zekes]

this is an excellent question. And up untill 16.0, i hadn't the faintest idea...

[Skorpychan]

The brakes are strictly digital. Much like in a car, feather them. Tap tap tap, hold and release, and stabilise the rover with bursts of power in each direction.

For less of a tippy effect at speed, just hold S to retard the wheels. Combine this with braking in extreme descents.

ALWAYS leave the brakes toggled on by clicking the icon when the rover is flying, or the wheels will eat control input.

Lander legs are the ultimate parking brake, though. Just prop that sucker up.

[Superfluous J]

My preferred* method of stopping my rover is to turn 1 degree left or right. You have to do it about 3 km before the point you want to stop (on Mun. On Minmus you may need 5km or so), and your rover (and Kerbals) may be unusable once you've come to a complete halt.

*Okay, not preferred... but surely I've stopped this way more times than with the far more pedestrian built-in brake.

[blizzy78]

My preferred* method of stopping my rover is to turn 1 degree left or right. You have to do it about 3 km before the point you want to stop

You, sir, seem to be a man of patience.

[FastMINI42]

With my first rover, I found you can't take a corner too quickly on the Mun either:

*No Kerbonauts were harmed in the taking of this screenshot*