Radially mounting cargo bays onto a rocket?

[PTNLemay]

A while back I was watching DasValdez's stream and saw something really cool. Sorry in advance if sharing screengrabs from his stream is frowned upon, I just want to reference what I'm talking about.

http://i.imgur.com/aqP0FLZ.png

http://i.imgur.com/3sSdPJW.png

It's a really clever way of mounting the cargo bays onto rockets (whereas they are meant to work only on spaceplanes normally). I really like the notion of having a rocketship with bays like that so I tried to build my own. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, but the cargo bay automatically sticks itself into the center axis of the tank I'm trying to attach it to.

http://i.imgur.com/8SCs73M.png

I'm using Editor Extensions, if that makes any kind of difference. Can someone point out to me the mistake I might be making?

Edited November 15, 2014 by PTNLemay

[cantab]

Not all the spaceplane parts radially attach properly. The fuel tanks do, but as you've seen the cargo bays don't. So you need to start with a part that attaches properly then build down. If it works (I've not tried) the drone core might be a good pick because it's so short.

[Wanderfound]

There's a couple of ways around it. The simplest is to first attach a Mk2 fuselage part that doesn't have this problem (e.g. any of the fuel tanks, but not the bicouplers) and then build the cargo bays off that. And, of course the Kerbal cure-all: cubic octagonal struts, which is what I suspect DasValdez has done.

There are simpler ways to use cargo bays in vertical rockets, however. Just build the whole thing out of Mk2 bits:

Edited November 15, 2014 by Wanderfound

[PTNLemay]

Yeah, I got something to work after a while, though I suspect it may benefit from a whole heaping dose of reinforcement struts...

http://i.imgur.com/EzULMQ1.png

I suppose it's what I wanted, still, I do wonder if there would be a "smoother" way of integrating them. I suppose I can always look for mods that offer rocket-bays.

[DerekL1963]

Yeah, I got something to work after a while, though I suspect it may benefit from a whole heaping dose of reinforcement struts...

I have found that Kerbal Joint Reinforcement is a much better solution.