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[1.0.x] [V1.9f] Kerbal Foundries wheels, anti-grav repulsors and tracks

lo-fi

By lo-fi
in KSP1 Mod Development

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What to work on next?  

1,282 members have voted

  1. 1. What to work on next?

    • More wheels
      123
    • More tracks
      453
    • Rover bodies
      241
    • Landing gear
      137
    • Landing legs
      108
    • Something completely different
      193

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Robotengineer

Robotengineer

Posted
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I see a few new challenges coming on ;)

Can you get right around Minmus with one tank of RCS

Can you reach escape velocity over the lakes

Land speed records for each celestial body...

I take it these are not supposed to be done with the same craft? :P

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lo-fi

lo-fi

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I guess the repulsors really open that up :D Fantastic!

Robot: No rules, go for it however you like!

Happy enough for me to release an alpha later in the week? I can't fault the steering code yet, and I'm relatively happy with the way most things are behaving. Any comments? Spanner had a weird kraken issue about 3k out from base, but I'm unable to replicate any of his issues so far :/

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Neutrinovore

Neutrinovore

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On repulsors I would say go for alpha, haven't tested the wheels much, so no input there. I would recommend better textures, but not an issue really for me.

I agree about the textures. The stark white is a bit bright to blend in with most textures used in the game, stock and mod alike. And the carbon fiber... don't get me wrong, it looks neat, I mean it really looks like real carbon fiber, but that's seems to be what's out of place to me, it's a little too 'perfect'. It's hard to explain. Anyway, I'd take the parts just as they are now, but at least think about having another go at the look of the parts. I recommend looking at the 'Spaceplane Plus' mod for a great mix of black and white without looking either too clean or too 'dirty' as some modders like to overdo. But PorkJet's parts have the perfect look, IMO.

Just a suggestion. :)

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lo-fi

lo-fi

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Also...

Thoughts on gravitic drive.... (Movement other than levitation)

I've played about coding it, it's pretty simple. But just because you can, doesn't mean you should... They're pretty powerful parts as they are.

My idea was: force applied will be proportional to local gravity and will consume electric charge (other things have been suggested, but I don't want dependency on other mods). Obviously doesn't rule out using RCS or liquid fuel, but does increase the scope of usage.

Still to implement is charge usage based on weight carried. This will happen! At the moment usage is totally free of resources.

Also: I don't don't career (I prefer to set my own goals), so suggestions for tech tree placement and price are most welcome :)

Thanks guys, really stoked to get this lot out there!

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BudgetHedgehog

BudgetHedgehog

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So I finally had a chance to play with these and first off, I love them. Finally, wheels that don't suck! I was whizzing around KSC at 20m/s on the wheels in the first video with no worries, it was pretty fascinating watching the anti-roll numbers and stuff.. Though one thing I did wonder was what use the repulsor mode had? Maybe I'm missing something (or the mod is) but it just flipped my wheels.

However, I'd like to offer pointers to areas of possible improvement (apologies if you know about any of these):

1, unless they're perfectly balanced around the CoM, the heavier side/end of the vehicle will droop and sag. I guess this is due to the advanced suspension, but it'd be great if the effect was minimised by a fair amount.

2, they are, for the most part, really quite big. Almost unusabley big for me - I can't see anything using the big wheels fitting inside a fairing (which is needed because FAR). I'd love to use them but, like with the stock large wheels, they're just too darn big. Are there smaller versions/ideas in the works?

3, the repulsors are a brilliant idea. Lovely stuff but they suffer from the above problems and additionally, they're not powered. If they were real, they could move and change direction by pointing in different directions - I know they're basically an invisible wheel so that's not possible here but it also means that it wouldn't really be OP to enable them to be powered. I don't know if it'd be possible to make something that can be powered but has no traction with the ground but yeah..

So those are my ideas and feedback. I should note that I got these on the 27th, so if either of those things has been addressed/changed, I'll redownload. Also, when I get back tonight, I'll see about ideas for placement and cost (though, there's probably nothing wrong with using the stock wheels stats).

EDIT: Also, I'd like to throw my name into the hat for serious testing. I can run a clean install (on both 32 and 64bit versions) and with any mods you care to test against. Plz? :D

Edited by ObsessedWithKSP
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lo-fi

lo-fi

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Thanks for the feedback. In order:

Great, that's exactly what I was aiming for. Repulsor mode on the wheels is so you can have rovers that can stay planted on the ground and drive around for precise manoeuvring, while also be able to whizz about at high speed. Unless there's a bug, they should pick up, turn over and act like repulsors. Do not use the action group, this just triggers the animation!!!! (this is a bug). Use the GUI button. Proper action group support to come.

1) Anti-roll has actually been removed for the moment. The calculation is still there and I've left the debug code in so it still displays, but it does nothing. Some KSP weirdness to overcome. See the GItHub commit comments for when I changed things.

2) Yep, part of the reason they're stable. Have an eye on smaller designs, but I wanted big wheels so that's what I built. The big wheels were really only meant for Kerbin, though I'm sure some crazy person will launch them all over the place! Open to ideas for smaller designs, just post some pics. Inspiration is always welcome, though I won't pretend I'll like every idea! A design that folds up flush has been mooted, so perhaps this would be better? I love setting animations up. The hard bit isn't really modelling, it's setting the code up and the damned texturing! The heavy code work is done now and it's a lot easier now I know more. Might actually get back to making some parts again! Justin is soldiering on with the texturing and hoping to get some stuff out this week to get a feel for how it all looks/fits in-game.

3) It's possible in a way, but I'm in two minds about it at the moment. Making them too much of a magic bullet seems a bit OTT. Really good results with small engines or hefty RCS. I've taken the approach that these take care of levitation and the rest is up to you! Smaller is actually easier than wheels; expect a downscaled version at some point. (Hint: Look at the 'Command Seat' :wink: )

Thanks, appreciate thoughts on tech tree and cost. The repulsors seemed like they should take some extra work getting to in the tech tree - probably more than wheels. Though, again, I have no experience in career.

Edited by lo-fi
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Darren9

Darren9

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I think they're fine as just levitation, for me a repulsor needs a solid surface to "repulse" against and if you're not near a surface they wont do anything. For resource consumption, if it's far above a wheel then there's decreasing reason to use one, also unless you've got one of the nuclear-electric mods installed there's only solar panels and RTG's (assuming it's electric powered like the wheel it replaces) and if you happen to be in an atmosphere only the small surface mount solar panel if you want scoot about. It should be harder to power than a wheel but not too much harder?

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Gaalidas

Gaalidas

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Obviously he's quite mad. I believe the scribblings to be a form of writing that, unfortunately, has absolutely no patterns in it whatsoever. It is extremely difficult to decipher, however I believe it is related to his culture's myth about the beginning of the world and how the great wheel deity created the world in his own literal image and then had a great cosmic seizure and out came our planet. How this represents the topic we are discussing here, I have no clue. The downside of madness, I suppose.

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BudgetHedgehog

BudgetHedgehog

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Ummmm. OK! Little interpretation? ;)

I did say they were from a madman! :D

Ok, so I wanted to try and come up with some smaller designs/foldable ones. That was the result of a couple of hours at work, along with the following paper prototypes (yes, the piston even works, it's not just a piece of paper underneath another and yes, those are staples for hinges They don't call me a perfectionist for nothing...):

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Both fold away to reduce width and both use said folding mechanism as suspension (I don't know if this was a good idea or not). Thoughts? I'll get to testing now :)

Edited by ObsessedWithKSP
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lo-fi

lo-fi

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Oh, and any suggestions for the actual wheel/tyre design? Large ones are sort of generic monster-truck type affair, medium are loosely based on Curiosity. though larger, obviously..

Something else? I need a little inspiration. Something quite Sci-Fi maybe? Must be something cool out there that will spawn an idea..

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