Landing Gear
| Landing Gear | |
|---|---|
| |
| Category: | Functional |
| Function: | magnetically attaches to voxels or grids |
| Fits small grid | |
| Mass: | 104 kg |
| PCU: | 35 |
| Size: | 1x2x3 |
| Time to Build: | 12 sec |
| Fits large grid | |
| Mass: | 3304 kg |
| PCU: | 35 |
| Size: | 1x2x3 |
| Time to Build: | 30 sec |
| Data Controls: | [edit] [purge] (?) |
Landing Gear allows a ship to lock onto any voxel surface and dock to most block structures.
See also Magnetic Plate for a more compact variant with the same functionality, and Large Magnetic Plate for a large variant.
Usage
It's important to configure your Cockpit Controls and specify whether you want that pressing P key to cause any landing gear on the ship in proximity to unlock/lock.
Once locked, depending on the size of either ship, when one changes motion, the other will move with it. Locking a ship to a static grid (a station) or voxels (planets or asteroids) will arrest all motion until you unlock.
Landing gears are magnetic and do not require power to lock on to a surface. Make sure to explicitly use the unlock action — switching them off is not enough to free yourself.
Control panel
The landing gear itself has no terminal port.
You can control the following properties of the landing gear from a ship's Control Panel Screen.
- Toggle Block on/off manually. Note: When switched off, the magnet will not unlock!
- Lock and unlock buttons
- Autolock" checkbox
When enabled, the landing gear automatically locks when any object comes into proximity. When disabled, you must use the Lock/Unlock actions manually.
How to dock to a carrier
Large jump ships can have functional hangar bays where smaller craft can be safely docked, smaller ships can also maglock to the outer hull.
After docking a smaller ship to a carrier, turn off the docked ship’s thrusters and Inertial Dampers! Otherwise the docked ship's thrusters will fight the carrier.
How to undock safely
Consider your inertia: When magnetic locks are disengaged, both ships retain their inertia. It is important to keep this in mind when disconnecting from a ship in motion. For example: when undocking a small ship from a moving carrier, turn on your Inertial Dampers right before unlocking the landing gear.
How to grab grids
A grid can grab a smaller grid by approaching with its landing gear and locking. Then the stronger ship pulls the weaker (or propulsionless) ship with it. At the target, unlock the landing gear to drop the other grid.
- Salvage ships use this method to grab wrecks and floating debris like a grapple, and then drop the wrecks into grinder pits.
- Tugs can position salvaged blocks (such as batteries) precisely next to Merge Blocks. They can also use landing gear to pull disabled ships through welder pits for repairs, or to haul cargo modules into storage.
- Boarders and breaching drones similary use landing gear to grab onto enemy ships.
How build a new ship safely
When starting to build a rover or ship, you don't want it to tip over or float away. Drop a landing gear and start building on it. The Landing Gear will temporarily lock to any surface even before it has been welded. This makes landing gear the ideal foundation when building a new mobile grid. You can build a bit above ground so you can e.g. build wheels more easily.
When the new grid is ready, carefully weld of the landing gear and let it stand "on its own feet."
How to use wind power on a mobile base
Mobile large grids cannot use wind power whiloe driving, turbines produce power only on stations.
Wind turbines will work while the grid is made temporarily stationary with landing gear against a stationary grid:
- Build turbines on the mobile base. Notice they don't work.
- Build a landing gear on the side of the mobile base. Do not use hinges or other mechanical blocks.
- Build a small temporary tower of static blocks on the ground in front of the landing gear.
- Drive forward and park locked against the static tower.
- The grid is now static and the wind turbines recharge you batteries.
When you want to start driving, unlock and grind off the little tower and become a mobile grid again. The wind power will stop again.
How to tell whether it's locked
The "foot" of the landing gear has a colored ring around it that provides status info for troubleshooting. You can see the same info spelled out on the Control Panel Screen and inside the toolbar slot as well.
- White - The gear is not within range of a suitable surface.
- Blue - The gear is in auto locking mode and will lock as soon as any mass is in range.
- Yellow - The landing gear is not yet locked, but is within range of a suitable surface to attach itself to.
- Green - The gear is magnetized to a surface and secured.
- Red - The gear is Turned off or has no power.
An indicator in the HUD informs the player whether landing gears are engaged.
Should Autolock be on or off?
Autolocking is not always desireable, better make it a toggle on the toolbar.
- If you want to quickly grab floating a grid, touch down quickly in an emergency, or if your drop pod is rolling down the hill, then autolock may save the day.
- On the other hand, a crane grabbing a block from a specific angle, or for a utility vehicle that uses Landing Gear for stabilisation, benefit more from precise manual locking.
What can landing gear NOT do?
- Locked landing gear do not connect power, the conveyor system, or the terminal networks of the two ships or stations. For that, use
Connector blocks. - Landing gear cannot magnetise to floating items, you will need a
Collector to catch them.
Construction
The landing gear attaches to whatever is directly beneath the pads and is unaffected by objects next to them. This allows landing gear to be recessed into the hull for a more streamlined appearance, similar to Magnetic Plates.
- It can be effective to build an armor skid plate around landing gear as armor blocks are more resilient to impacts. This can allow a small ship to perform a "combat landing" with reduced risk to the landing gear. So long as the landing gear itself is not damaged, the ship will still be able to engage magnetic locks. The damaged armor segments can be repaired later.
- Another option is to use large ship landing gear or Magnetic Plates as a landing pad for smaller ships, and double-lock them (both large ship and small ship engage their landing gear). This has the advantage that large ship landing gear have a longer locking range than small ship landing gear do. If the small ship's landing gear are flush or nearly so, this can result in the large ship gear also grappling the small ship's hull, for added strength.
- Landing Gear and Magnetic Plates can magnetise through thin blocks (such as Windows, Catwalks, Panels).
Recipe
| Landing Gear | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Component | Large Ship/Station Required | Large Ship/Station Optional | Small Ship Required | Small Ship Optional |
 Steel Plate | 100 | 50 | 1 | 1 |
 Motor | 6 | — | 1 | — |
 Construction Comp. | 20 | — | 5 | — |
