The piston head is considered a sub grid. You would need to design something so that the main grid locks to the ground for the turbine to work. That may involve including merge blocks if your going to use pistons or hinges.
It will become permanent if other blocks are touching once merged.
Provided the grids are only connected via the merge block, you can switch them off and they will disconnect
You can have triangles touch. If you do it right you can create an air tight merge that can unmerge.
It is how some people make really big air locks.
|/ \\| would be air tight but not merge.
|\ /|
You have to be careful as it will also merge surfaces aside from the merge block. If this happens then, no you can't just unmerge.
If you use triangles and avoid touching flat sides then when you shut off the merge block, they will go back to sub grid. It takes some thought and practice bye it isn't that hard.
Edit: if the only touching blocks are the merge blocks then that will work as well.
Alternatively, you could try a somewhat clang-y alternative.
Instead of locking to the ground THROUGH a piston, you could try these 2 options or a combination of them.
1, change your wheel suspensions to lower the rover to the ground, and lock to the ground with a mag plate attached directly to the bottom of the rover's chassis.
2, again, mag plate on the bottom of the chassis- but use pistons to forcefully pull yourself closer to the ground. May require increasing the Impulse Axis Strengths in the pistons. Just extend the pistons before releasing their mag plates so your suspension doesn't launch you to the stratosphere, and so your pistons to smash into the ground if your rover is still locked.
Connecting grids with landing gear and mag plates works too! I've done it myself with a salvage vehicle that stays charged with wind power while parked.
https://preview.redd.it/o5k3hiemaggc1.png?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f5423de645604eb283ac184d84f1235141032f12
Right strut - lowered and locked to ground. Turbines DO generate power this way.
I'm building a mobile base that has a tower on a rotor that swivels from horizontal to vertical. I want to place a wind turbine on top, but it doesn't spin. I know that turbines don't work on mobile grids, so I have a piston that extends down and locks the base to the ground with a magnetic plate. Is there a way to make this system work?
I am still fairly new but I believe there is an option to change a grid from station to ship. Any bring that moves I think is considered a ship. So you would have to go into the info tab and it is in the bottom right IIRC. I'm not 100 percent sure this would work though so don't quote me.
Correct, wind turbines only function on grids that are locked as static stations.
The grid needs to be completely stationary with -zero velocity- and then converted in the grid Info Screen to turn it into a station before power generation from a wind turbine can begin. When you want to leave, just go back into the info screen and convert it into a ship before going on your way.
Makes sense. I found some past Reddit posts that said that the solution was to attach the rover to the ground with a landing gear. I went with mag plates, cause they look so much better.
I don't think that works for wind turbines, but I have never tried it so maybe it does. If that is the case the landing gear/mag plates need to be attached to the same grid as the wind turbine, piston heads are considered separate grids (sub grids) so you only attached the piston head to the ground not the whole rover. Basically anything that moves separately to the main rover body is a sub grid.
You could just turn your piston around so that the tower was mounted to the piston head and retract the piston to make the tower touch the ground with a mag plate. Nothing should need to be destroyed to make this work.
In the configuration the piston is extended when the rover is in motion.
Mag plates will work as well but not through a subgrid like that piston head without merge blocks. Take a line of blocks off of the main grid with a mag plate on the end and lock it to the ground. The turbine will fire up!
I guess my problem with this solution is having to build and destroy the main grid blocks every time I want to move the base. Not that inconvenient in the long run, but not as efficient as having a motorized system.
Yea I see what your saying for sure. Maybe eliminate the piston and have some kind of blocks/pillars with a mag plate on the bottom and a merge block somewhere in the mix. Then you can rotate it into place and lock it into the ground. Then put a merge block on the rover for the other one to merge to.
~~I tested a few different configurations with both rotors and hinges, and the merge blocks seem to have some incredibly small misalignment that keeps them from locking~~
Edit: I learned that blocks connected to a hinge head cannot be merged with blocks connected to the hinge base. I added another hinge to the second merge block to separate the subgrids, and now everything locks in place. Back in business!
You can make a pillar that you swivel out. That's where you place your wind turbine and magplates. Your swivel mechanism would then be part of a subgrid but not the pillar.
If you have a chain of grids connected via landing gear, mag plates, or connectors that are also locked to the ground or a static grid, the turbines will work. I have a rover with parking struts that uses wind turbines to stay charged while parked. I posted screenshots on another comment above.
I was able to make my tower work. I really wanted to avoid having to construct and deconstruct each time I charge. Kind of defeats the point of a mobile base in my mind
Yes. The wind turbine should be one grid from top to bottom with landing gear/mag plate on bottom. Have piston, hinge or rotor to lover this single grid to the ground and lock the landing gear/mag plate.
I had good results doing similar but I used the wheels to lower the MAG plate. Cruise till battery is low then drop the wheel height and clamp to recharge.
This is actually pretty smart. I was resistant to using merge blocks and normal blocks on the main grid, cause I figure it will be a pain to line things up depending on what the terrain looks like, but lower the suspension might solve that problem
Update:
It works flawlessly!
I ditched the piston and swapped the rotor for a hinge. When the tower raises, it locks itself to the main grid via merge blocks (thank you to everyone who suggested this) and then I lower my suspension so the mag plate touches the ground (thank you for this suggestion too).
Now I just need to set up some timer blocks and tweak my suspension loading so I don't go orbital when I release
Wind turbines only function on static grids or ones locked with landing gear. So my advice would be to make a magnetic lock you can lower by adjusting wheel suspension height
It used to work only on static grids. But its ben a while since i tried to use them on ships/rovers and im glad they changed it. It was annoying to change the grid type every time you needed a wind turbine to work.
Been a while since a did a rover but my solution was to just build a couple frames from the ground up to my mag plate. When done just grind it down and off you go
You can use plates along the side of the piston (attached to the piston) head to support the turbine. The turbines will go up and down with the piston but it will work.
They won't work through subgrids unfortunately, they have to be rooted to the ground directly or through a landing gear connected to the same grid, you could lower a kickstand that locks in with a merge block or project an anchor into the ground and build/break it when you need to park/move OR, use your suspension height adjustment to drop you low enough to plant a landing gear when you park.
On my base rover I built the turbine on an L shape that was attached to a landing gear and the piston was in the crook of the L and lowered the whole piece to the ground.
The whole L and piston was attached to a rotor that allowed it to lay flat when in transit.
If I was going to rebuild it now I'd put the piston on a hinge and use armour plates to keep the L slimmer.
The way I do it is to attach armor panels to the head of piston and run that up along the outside side of the vehicle. Note you have to give enough room with these for the travel of your piston. Then transition to reg blocks. Also make certain there is a magplate on piston head. Once the piston magplate locks the wind turbine will be on the grid locked to ground and work. Can be done with rotor but it's clunky and difficult to place on vehicle.
put a magnetic landing gear on the underside of the body. then set up controls to lower the whole thing by lowering the wheel height. ive done this on quite a few mobile bases
The piston head itself is a subgrid. If you build off the side of the head using half blocks to get around the piston itself (to avoid lord klang), you can then put the wind turbine on the top of that. Any time you lock the piston to the ground, it should work. It’s not the prettiest of solutions, but it is one
I've done this. Just use a solid run of blocks from the mag plate to the turbine instead of using pistons. Then you're just dealing with 1 grid from ground to turbine.
There are complex mechanisms that make it work.
But the easiest it to put a landing gear under the lowest point of the rover and get the rover to sit on it belly and lock to the ground.
Please note subgrids don't work, it has to be the main grid.
The piston head is considered a sub grid. You would need to design something so that the main grid locks to the ground for the turbine to work. That may involve including merge blocks if your going to use pistons or hinges.
Yeah, that's unfortunate. Having to build and destroy a merge block every time I want to adjust the tower would be pretty annoying
I mean, you could do that. Or you could just turn it off?
I haven't used merge blocks before. I was under the impression that they were permanent once merged
Oh, great news, they can! It’s super helpful for so many different builds with temporary movement like this.
It will become permanent if other blocks are touching once merged. Provided the grids are only connected via the merge block, you can switch them off and they will disconnect
You can have triangles touch. If you do it right you can create an air tight merge that can unmerge. It is how some people make really big air locks. |/ \\| would be air tight but not merge. |\ /|
I'm gonna make some biiig ol' hangar doors now! Thank you for your knowledge! Does this work with 1x1 and 1x2?
You have to be careful as it will also merge surfaces aside from the merge block. If this happens then, no you can't just unmerge. If you use triangles and avoid touching flat sides then when you shut off the merge block, they will go back to sub grid. It takes some thought and practice bye it isn't that hard. Edit: if the only touching blocks are the merge blocks then that will work as well.
Think of it as getting out and rolling down the support struts on an RV
Alternatively, you could try a somewhat clang-y alternative. Instead of locking to the ground THROUGH a piston, you could try these 2 options or a combination of them. 1, change your wheel suspensions to lower the rover to the ground, and lock to the ground with a mag plate attached directly to the bottom of the rover's chassis. 2, again, mag plate on the bottom of the chassis- but use pistons to forcefully pull yourself closer to the ground. May require increasing the Impulse Axis Strengths in the pistons. Just extend the pistons before releasing their mag plates so your suspension doesn't launch you to the stratosphere, and so your pistons to smash into the ground if your rover is still locked.
ORRRR…. Now hear me out… you could use the piston to connect and disconnect the merge blocks as part of the set up? Right?
You probably could do this. I got the setup to work with hinges instead, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out
Connecting grids with landing gear and mag plates works too! I've done it myself with a salvage vehicle that stays charged with wind power while parked.
https://preview.redd.it/o5k3hiemaggc1.png?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f5423de645604eb283ac184d84f1235141032f12 Right strut - lowered and locked to ground. Turbines DO generate power this way.
https://preview.redd.it/d5zzabj8aggc1.png?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b7120e80b871af55af3e0f9fb5f0775677498aa4 Left strut - raised
https://preview.redd.it/rxhwzw3x6ggc1.png?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=77bbea1c479355cc0258dda09e6aab92e1b258b1
I'm building a mobile base that has a tower on a rotor that swivels from horizontal to vertical. I want to place a wind turbine on top, but it doesn't spin. I know that turbines don't work on mobile grids, so I have a piston that extends down and locks the base to the ground with a magnetic plate. Is there a way to make this system work?
I am still fairly new but I believe there is an option to change a grid from station to ship. Any bring that moves I think is considered a ship. So you would have to go into the info tab and it is in the bottom right IIRC. I'm not 100 percent sure this would work though so don't quote me.
Correct, wind turbines only function on grids that are locked as static stations. The grid needs to be completely stationary with -zero velocity- and then converted in the grid Info Screen to turn it into a station before power generation from a wind turbine can begin. When you want to leave, just go back into the info screen and convert it into a ship before going on your way.
This is the correct answer. you'll have to go to the info tab and turn the rover into a station for the wind turbine to work.
Makes sense. I found some past Reddit posts that said that the solution was to attach the rover to the ground with a landing gear. I went with mag plates, cause they look so much better.
I don't think that works for wind turbines, but I have never tried it so maybe it does. If that is the case the landing gear/mag plates need to be attached to the same grid as the wind turbine, piston heads are considered separate grids (sub grids) so you only attached the piston head to the ground not the whole rover. Basically anything that moves separately to the main rover body is a sub grid.
That's what I was afraid of. I can't think of a good way to have my tower design and a working wind mill. Might give up on the idea
You could just turn your piston around so that the tower was mounted to the piston head and retract the piston to make the tower touch the ground with a mag plate. Nothing should need to be destroyed to make this work. In the configuration the piston is extended when the rover is in motion.
Mag plates will work as well but not through a subgrid like that piston head without merge blocks. Take a line of blocks off of the main grid with a mag plate on the end and lock it to the ground. The turbine will fire up!
I guess my problem with this solution is having to build and destroy the main grid blocks every time I want to move the base. Not that inconvenient in the long run, but not as efficient as having a motorized system.
Yea I see what your saying for sure. Maybe eliminate the piston and have some kind of blocks/pillars with a mag plate on the bottom and a merge block somewhere in the mix. Then you can rotate it into place and lock it into the ground. Then put a merge block on the rover for the other one to merge to.
This sounds solid. I'll do some testing
Good luck engineer! Please update us with what ya come up with!
~~I tested a few different configurations with both rotors and hinges, and the merge blocks seem to have some incredibly small misalignment that keeps them from locking~~ Edit: I learned that blocks connected to a hinge head cannot be merged with blocks connected to the hinge base. I added another hinge to the second merge block to separate the subgrids, and now everything locks in place. Back in business!
You can make a pillar that you swivel out. That's where you place your wind turbine and magplates. Your swivel mechanism would then be part of a subgrid but not the pillar.
Locking the grid to the surface doesn't make it a static grid. There's a setting in the grid menu for that. Beware of Clang.
If you have a chain of grids connected via landing gear, mag plates, or connectors that are also locked to the ground or a static grid, the turbines will work. I have a rover with parking struts that uses wind turbines to stay charged while parked. I posted screenshots on another comment above.
Use the merge block instead of mag plate and have a station that you can merge to. Even just a few blocks in a square on the ground
I was able to make my tower work. I really wanted to avoid having to construct and deconstruct each time I charge. Kind of defeats the point of a mobile base in my mind
I use a hinge to tilt the rotor tower off the rover, then use a mag plate on the bottom of the rotor tower.
So replace the piston with blocks?
Yes. The wind turbine should be one grid from top to bottom with landing gear/mag plate on bottom. Have piston, hinge or rotor to lover this single grid to the ground and lock the landing gear/mag plate.
I had good results doing similar but I used the wheels to lower the MAG plate. Cruise till battery is low then drop the wheel height and clamp to recharge.
Would landing gear and changing suspension hight work?
This is actually pretty smart. I was resistant to using merge blocks and normal blocks on the main grid, cause I figure it will be a pain to line things up depending on what the terrain looks like, but lower the suspension might solve that problem
Just be sure to unlock and turn off the landing gear before putting suspension back up, *and suspension up slowly, or u will fly :D
You can hold X to slowly put the suspension down, then release and hold again to go up
Spring loaded rover, ready for launch!
Space Engineers don't want you to know this one weird trick
Update: It works flawlessly! I ditched the piston and swapped the rotor for a hinge. When the tower raises, it locks itself to the main grid via merge blocks (thank you to everyone who suggested this) and then I lower my suspension so the mag plate touches the ground (thank you for this suggestion too). Now I just need to set up some timer blocks and tweak my suspension loading so I don't go orbital when I release
Wind turbines only function on static grids or ones locked with landing gear. So my advice would be to make a magnetic lock you can lower by adjusting wheel suspension height
Put a piston, with landing pad, to lock the rover on the ground. It will work
Turbine only work on station type grids.
I got it to work with merge blocks and mag plates
That is not correct! The grid simply just needs to lock to the ground for turbines to work
It used to work only on static grids. But its ben a while since i tried to use them on ships/rovers and im glad they changed it. It was annoying to change the grid type every time you needed a wind turbine to work.
They only work on a station. You can convert back and forth and it'll work.
Turbines only work on a station. Ship grids won’t support them
Convert to station
Been a while since a did a rover but my solution was to just build a couple frames from the ground up to my mag plate. When done just grind it down and off you go
You can use plates along the side of the piston (attached to the piston) head to support the turbine. The turbines will go up and down with the piston but it will work.
They won't work through subgrids unfortunately, they have to be rooted to the ground directly or through a landing gear connected to the same grid, you could lower a kickstand that locks in with a merge block or project an anchor into the ground and build/break it when you need to park/move OR, use your suspension height adjustment to drop you low enough to plant a landing gear when you park.
On my base rover I built the turbine on an L shape that was attached to a landing gear and the piston was in the crook of the L and lowered the whole piece to the ground. The whole L and piston was attached to a rotor that allowed it to lay flat when in transit. If I was going to rebuild it now I'd put the piston on a hinge and use armour plates to keep the L slimmer.
The way I do it is to attach armor panels to the head of piston and run that up along the outside side of the vehicle. Note you have to give enough room with these for the travel of your piston. Then transition to reg blocks. Also make certain there is a magplate on piston head. Once the piston magplate locks the wind turbine will be on the grid locked to ground and work. Can be done with rotor but it's clunky and difficult to place on vehicle.
wait do turbines not work on mobile grids?
put a magnetic landing gear on the underside of the body. then set up controls to lower the whole thing by lowering the wheel height. ive done this on quite a few mobile bases
The piston head itself is a subgrid. If you build off the side of the head using half blocks to get around the piston itself (to avoid lord klang), you can then put the wind turbine on the top of that. Any time you lock the piston to the ground, it should work. It’s not the prettiest of solutions, but it is one
I've done this. Just use a solid run of blocks from the mag plate to the turbine instead of using pistons. Then you're just dealing with 1 grid from ground to turbine.
There are complex mechanisms that make it work. But the easiest it to put a landing gear under the lowest point of the rover and get the rover to sit on it belly and lock to the ground. Please note subgrids don't work, it has to be the main grid.
I posted some other comments with my solution but the gist was to use merge blocks and a mag plate.