Gyroscopes, how many?

[The Old Guard]

How do work out how many gyroscopes you need on a ship? Is there a formula or something?

[Master Queef]

more weight= more gyros

[DrEarlInsanity]

I tell by feel.

[MysticMalevolence]

More gyros give higher turning sensitivity, so it'll eventually come down to preference.

[Karmaterrorᵁᴷ]

Its kind of different for every ship because shape comes into play aswell as weight. So usually....

Long thin ship = great roll awfull yaw
Ship closer to a square/cube = much more balanced on all axis

Same rules apply to gyro placement so you can try to counter those effects with different gyro configs inside the ship.

Basically its just lots of testing for each build and tayloring it to that ship :)

[The Old Guard]

So it's basically a guess then? I thought with this game being very physics based it would be more of a formula (as in mass and gravity etc) rather than just guesswork.

[The Big Brzezinski]

I'm assuming you're still in the design phase for the ship, meaning you're in empty space building it.

I start with a few gyros and see how it handles. On large ships, I like to hang them off my jump drives in the engineering room. If it turns too sluggishly, I add more until it rotates fast enough for my purposes.

Keep in mind each new gyro adds a lot of weight. This means you're getting a reduced effect from each new gyro.

[mmille14]

Originally posted by The Old Guard:

So it's basically a guess then? I thought with this game being very physics based it would be more of a formula (as in mass and gravity etc) rather than just guesswork.

Well first you would have to state what you wanted as in yaw, pitch and roll in degrees ( or radians, etc) per second. Then with that you could work backwards to find out the number of gyro to provide those rotational speeds. I don't know if anyone has the caculations but, it shouldn't be too hard to work out the ratios on a test grid.

[DrEarlInsanity]

Originally posted by The Old Guard:

So it's basically a guess then? I thought with this game being very physics based it would be more of a formula (as in mass and gravity etc) rather than just guesswork.

essentially we all have done our time of doing maths on things but no longer do it b/c we all have personal ratios that our guts have established.

kinda like cooks that use a pinch o' this and that...

[dga8705]

At one point it was posted on a thread here as 1 gyro for every X kg ship weight, but I don't remember what it was. I typically just add gyros until I get the effect I want. It also changes depending on what kind of ship it is. I don't expect a massive carrier or super battleship to handle amazingly well, while a corvette or cruiser needs to be pretty darn maneuverable.

[delleds]

I think it matters where you put them, as well. I heard that if you place the gyros further away from the center of mass those gyros will be stronger.

[Drome]

For good turning, i generally go with 1 gyro per 1,000,000Kg of weight on a large ship.

[SJ]

Originally posted by delleds:

I think it matters where you put them, as well. I heard that if you place the gyros further away from the center of mass those gyros will be stronger.

If you want to rotate a mass in space and if Space Engineers model real physics, then gyros would work better at the centre of mass.

Reaction Controls Systems(thrusters) work better when place farther away from the centre of mass.

[Karmaterrorᵁᴷ]

Originally posted by Drome:

For good turning, i generally go with 1 gyro per 1,000,000Kg of weight on a large ship.

Hmm my big ass cruiser is 35mill with over 300gyros.....turns like a brick haha

Originally posted by mmille14:

Originally posted by The Old Guard:

So it's basically a guess then? I thought with this game being very physics based it would be more of a formula (as in mass and gravity etc) rather than just guesswork.

Well first you would have to state what you wanted as in yaw, pitch and roll in degrees ( or radians, etc) per second. Then with that you could work backwards to find out the number of gyro to provide those rotational speeds. I don't know if anyone has the caculations but, it shouldn't be too hard to work out the ratios on a test grid.

Would that be able to factor in ship shape and gyro arrangement or would it be more of a rough guess assuming all gyros on center of mass amd a cube shaped ship?

[MysticMalevolence]

Originally posted by Karmaterrorᵁᴷ:

Originally posted by Drome:

For good turning, i generally go with 1 gyro per 1,000,000Kg of weight on a large ship.

Hmm my big ass cruiser is 35mill with over 300gyros.....turns like a brick haha

Originally posted by mmille14:

Well first you would have to state what you wanted as in yaw, pitch and roll in degrees ( or radians, etc) per second. Then with that you could work backwards to find out the number of gyro to provide those rotational speeds. I don't know if anyone has the caculations but, it shouldn't be too hard to work out the ratios on a test grid.

Would that be able to factor in ship shape and gyro arrangement or mould it be more of a rough guess assuming all gyros on center of mass amd a cube shaped ship?

Since when does shape matter? Turning is, for as long as I can remember, affected only by center of mass, which is shifted most significantly by gyroscopes...
I don't think SE does anything more complex than that.

[The Old Guard]

Originally posted by The Big Brzezinski:

I'm assuming you're still in the design phase for the ship, meaning you're in empty space building it.

I start with a few gyros and see how it handles. On large ships, I like to hang them off my jump drives in the engineering room. If it turns too sluggishly, I add more until it rotates fast enough for my purposes.

Keep in mind each new gyro adds a lot of weight. This means you're getting a reduced effect from each new gyro.

Am building a small ship with a grinder at the front to disassemble larger ships. It turns ok empty but when it's got materials in it turns sluggish. The same for my small ore miner, when empty with just the weight of the ship it turns ok but when full of ore it's like turning an aircraft carrier. Gonna have to add more to take into account the weight of materials, which is why I was wondering if there was a formula or something that could work out the number of gyros per kg/ton etc.