Ways to move a docked object?

[artwhaley]

Hello all -

For my ship project I'm looking for a way to build a satellite launch and recovery arm for the cargo bay. Because of the small size of the bay it's going to take at least 3 joints to move the target completely clear of the structure before releasing it.

I know I could accomplish this with three separate infernal robotics parts... but that asks the user to do more setup than I'd really like to burden them with, since the way the small arms go together might not be obvious from the VAB. Ideally I'd like to attach one part and have it just work with a single click "Deploy" or "Recover" toggle.

Is there a way to make several pieces move at once with IR, either telescoping or rotating? Or another plugin? My preference is to use one of the most common plugins so many mod users won't have to download something else.

I'm not totally opposed to writing my own plugin to accomplish this, but I haven't played with any of the animation bits in the api... I've only grabbed flightdata and orbit info to display it. Would it be possible to just move the node with the stock animation module and add a plugin to my part that jumps to the attachment node every fixed update? I guess you'd probably have to detach and reattach with each fixed update, which sounds laggy and obnoxious.

Edited October 17, 2014 by artwhaley

[sirkut]

Hello all -

For my ship project I'm looking for a way to build a satellite launch and recovery arm for the cargo bay. Because of the small size of the bay it's going to take at least 3 joints to move the target completely clear of the structure before releasing it.

I know I could accomplish this with three separate infernal robotics parts... but that asks the user to do more setup than I'd really like to burden them with, since the way the small arms go together might not be obvious from the VAB. Ideally I'd like to attach one part and have it just work with a single click "Deploy" or "Recover" toggle.

Is there a way to make several pieces move at once with IR, either telescoping or rotating? Or another plugin? My preference is to use one of the most common plugins so many mod users won't have to download something else.

I'm not totally opposed to writing my own plugin to accomplish this, but I haven't played with any of the animation bits in the api... I've only grabbed flightdata and orbit info to display it. Would it be possible to just move the node with the stock animation module and add a plugin to my part that jumps to the attachment node every fixed update? I guess you'd probably have to detach and reattach with each fixed update, which sounds laggy and obnoxious.

You could save the IR arm as a subassembly and tie an action group to the "deploy."