Smart Landing Gears

[stellarator]

I'm going to put a copy of this article on the Add-On Affairs section. I think that's a godd idea, but , if Squad aren't interested on it, anyone could develop it (i don't knwo how to create or modify any part of the game or a game code).

The idea is very simple:

You are going to land land on a Planet/Moon. You're alreday deorbited and your trajectory couldn't be changed if you don't use a big supply of fuel. Suddenly, you noticed (Duna could be the most frequently case) that the place were you're going to land isn't as flat as it seemed from space. When you touch down, your ship is inclined on its side and fell heavily to the ground, destroying much of it and leaving you with no ability to take off again.

If my assumptions are correct, you will feel very frustrated and in your next mission you will try to solve this coming up with other landing gear system..

But if all else fails, you ask:

and if there is a sensor in your ship and special landing mechanism to bend or extend the landing gear enough so that your ship is kept as stable as possible? I do not know if it has been entirely clear what I intend to suggest, but a picture can be worth a thousand words.

[CaptainKipard]

If you have some programming knowledge you can use Infernal Robotics and kOS to write a script that controls some gantries with legs attached to do exactly that.

Still the planets in stock are bumpy enough that maybe it should be in stock.

[stellarator]

If you have some programming knowledge you can use Infernal Robotics and kOS to write a script that controls some gantries with legs attached to do exactly that.

Still the planets in stock are bumpy enough that maybe it should be in stock.

I haven't got aby programming knowledge so i'm afraid I can't do that.

[Frozen_Heart]

I agree. The landing gear suspension simply made this even worse than when they didn't have any suspension at all.

If they automatically adjusted that would be nice.

[trekkie_]

i think the issue is being able to adjust soo quickly, without the legs getting caught up on the terrain, which would just cause a push and you'll probably bounce or topple over anyways. and that's not even considering that it would be a tremendous amount of work just to make the legs extend intuitively.

landing gear with suspension also wouldn't be that stable since it would again, bounce and wobble, worsened on a slope.

and after a certain ship height, the landing gear wouldn't be able to compensate for the off axis balance of the weight hanging over it and just topple over.

the simple solution is just to use large enough landing gear. if your landing legs are wider than the ship is tall, it would be difficult to flip such a ship over, even on a slope.

[Capt Snuggler]

could the suspension height be tied in to the SAS module some how so the ride height automatically adjusts (where possible) to try and maintain orientation?

failing that, a manual suspension height tweakable would be nice. would be great for space plane landing gear too.

[Somtaaw]

One of the issues I have, related to this, is that suspension is usually an all-or-nothing proposition. Excluding damage from an overly hard landing, lander gear either deploys fully, or retracts fully. So even if you can rotate to try put a landing gear exactly along the angle, and manually deploy or retract, you can't stop it's deployment halfway to act as a quasi gear.

Even though normally I never install any kind of mod for anything, until I prove I can do it with stock, a mod for landing gear to stop these sort of "aw crap, this landing zone wasn't supposed to be mountains" would be quickly installed.

[kerbiloid]

I strongly doubt if such great leg height range would be in reality, as any spring size is limited.

You would better try to choose a plain instead  as Armstrong did.

If you use Mechjeb, there is an option to keep you vertical speed constant while you are doing this.