elukka
Junior Member
Posts: 73
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Post by elukka on Dec 28, 2016 17:28:05 GMT
I tried to experiment with frontally mounted, non-turreted weapons (namely lasers with big optics) but I ran into a problem - the game just doesn't seem to be capable of pointing the ship accurately enough for a weapon like this to work. Any control system seems to wobble. Whenever a gimbaled engine is burning, it's wobbling a bit all over the place. RCS thrusters will be pulsing and burning almost constantly in a similar wobble in an effort to accurately point the ship towards the desired direction but they don't quite seem to be capable of getting it right.
Is there anything I can do to make it work, or could this be improved in the future? I can imagine that it might be decidedly nontrivial issue to solve...
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Post by David367th on Dec 28, 2016 17:41:37 GMT
When I was doing experiments with it, I found that really insensitive controls were spending more time on target. So weak RCS thrusters and narrow gimbal angle on main engines. Still that's more time on target not always on target, they still wobbled.
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Post by the_Demongod on Dec 28, 2016 19:16:16 GMT
I often end up building weapons that aren't realistically feasible to gimbal with reaction wheels (gah can't wait for hydraulics/motors) so in those cases I nose-mount them. I haven't tried it with no gimbal at all, but you don't need much. The turret only needs enough rotational speed and traverse angle to take care of the fine-tuning to take that load off of the engines. Has proven effective so far.
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elukka
Junior Member
Posts: 73
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Post by elukka on Dec 28, 2016 20:51:22 GMT
Is there some way to provide just a bit of gimbaling? My problem is, as an example, that I might have a laser with a 10 meter mirror that masses 30 tons. I put it in a turret (with no armor) and it's 1000 tons. That's not particularly workable.
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Post by newageofpower on Dec 28, 2016 21:00:18 GMT
Is there some way to provide just a bit of gimbaling? My problem is, as an example, that I might have a laser with a 10 meter mirror that masses 30 tons. I put it in a turret (with no armor) and it's 1000 tons. That's not particularly workable. IRL we'd use adaptive optics/mirror micromotors for fine tuning laser targetting. For cannon we'd use electrical drivetrains on the turret and screw the rotational inertia. Balance it out (somewhat) using RCS, if necessary.
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Post by apophys on Dec 28, 2016 22:31:20 GMT
Is there some way to provide just a bit of gimbaling? My problem is, as an example, that I might have a laser with a 10 meter mirror that masses 30 tons. I put it in a turret (with no armor) and it's 1000 tons. That's not particularly workable. That problem is caused by gigantic reaction wheels. You have options: 1. Make the wheels from lithium or potassium. 2. Reduce the turret inner radius as far as it will go, and enter custom values to get it even smaller.
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Post by newageofpower on Dec 28, 2016 23:19:55 GMT
That problem is caused by gigantic reaction wheels. You have options: 1. Make the wheels from lithium or potassium. 2. Reduce the turret inner radius as far as it will go, and enter custom values to get it even smaller. When your weapon goes past the multi-hundred ton mark, lithium/calcium (my personal favorite on most turrets) give your turret a turn time of 1 rotation per hour. Sadly, Osmium wheels are necessary until we get qswitch invents some nice electrical motors ;p
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Post by David367th on Dec 28, 2016 23:20:48 GMT
That problem is caused by gigantic reaction wheels. You have options: 1. Make the wheels from lithium or potassium. 2. Reduce the turret inner radius as far as it will go, and enter custom values to get it even smaller. When your weapon goes past the multi-hundred ton mark, lithium/calcium (my personal favorite on most turrets) give your turret a turn time of 1 rotation per hour. Sadly, Osmium wheels are necessary until we get some nice electrical motors ;p Iridium is cheaper but weaker I guess...
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Post by Dhan on Dec 28, 2016 23:47:25 GMT
UHMPE makes for good reaction wheel material if you don't mind the cost. It's both light and strong so it can handle the higher rpms. Boron can also be used in a similar role.
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Post by David367th on Dec 29, 2016 0:00:42 GMT
Anyone have luck with VanChromeSteel? Medium weight and stong, probably could be good.
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Post by lawson on Dec 29, 2016 2:50:43 GMT
I tried to experiment with frontally mounted, non-turreted weapons (namely lasers with big optics) but I ran into a problem - the game just doesn't seem to be capable of pointing the ship accurately enough for a weapon like this to work. Any control system seems to wobble. Whenever a gimbaled engine is burning, it's wobbling a bit all over the place. RCS thrusters will be pulsing and burning almost constantly in a similar wobble in an effort to accurately point the ship towards the desired direction but they don't quite seem to be capable of getting it right. Is there anything I can do to make it work, or could this be improved in the future? I can imagine that it might be decidedly nontrivial issue to solve... I've had good luck with spinal mounted guns on drones if I keep the turnabout time above 5 seconds and engine rotation speed above 100rpm. I still run into precision problems at >100Km ranges because the game has a small "good enough" firing cone, and RCS always sits on the edge instead of centered. With current code, I think we'll need ship-mounted reaction wheels to get full accuracy. With better attitude controller tuning, gimboled engines should be able to get fully accuracy by thrusting at small angles. MPD's should be especially good for pointing stability because they can thrust continuously without using much fuel.
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Post by dragonkid11 on Dec 29, 2016 4:11:09 GMT
The current main problem with thruster is that they always fire at full power and never at lower power.
Which make aim an incredibly hard task.
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Post by AdmiralObvious on Dec 29, 2016 4:37:08 GMT
Anyone have luck with VanChromeSteel? Medium weight and stong, probably could be good. It's pricy, but it does get the job done reasonably well. I tend to prefer Lithium or Calcium myself. I've had far better results using VanChrome as turret armor than anything else really.
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Post by Dhan on Dec 29, 2016 4:49:09 GMT
What about having a main engine with very weak gimbals combined with strong gimbaling side engines that provide most of the turning and can be disable for finer aiming?
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elukka
Junior Member
Posts: 73
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Post by elukka on Dec 29, 2016 6:49:51 GMT
Is there some way to provide just a bit of gimbaling? My problem is, as an example, that I might have a laser with a 10 meter mirror that masses 30 tons. I put it in a turret (with no armor) and it's 1000 tons. That's not particularly workable. That problem is caused by gigantic reaction wheels. You have options: 1. Make the wheels from lithium or potassium. 2. Reduce the turret inner radius as far as it will go, and enter custom values to get it even smaller. Huh. The second one really makes a difference. An 11 meter radius turret masses something like 1kt while a 10.606 meter turret masses less than half a ton. There's gotta be some funky scaling going on here. The square-cube law doesn't quite begin to account for that. Turns out the default 100 MW violet laser will absolutely murder drones and disarm ships at 1000 km with 10 meter mirror. We need longer engagement ranges. And AI that realizes it should maybe spend more than 500 m/s on a missile intercept if it has 9 km/s to play with.
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