How do you stack multiple pistons on top of each other?

[TheZBillDyl]

I want to have like 4 pistons on top of each other, pushing each other down to drill into the earth? The game doesnt want me to connect more than 2 pistons it seems.

[TheZBillDyl]

It doesn't let me attach a second piston or a third piston to the end of another one. The Piston top just stops spawning and I can't just attach one either

[Smetrix]

There is no limit on the stacks, so the basic places to start is reloading the game, disable any mods that may conflict, make sure there’s nothing in the way that could prevent you from placing more, etc.

[TheZBillDyl]

For anyone in the future, there is a button on the control panel for pistons that says "Add piston heads". Try that. Im still investigating this issue.

[herrschaftg35]

The piston head should automatically be there when you place the piston. In survival, the head will need to be welded up as well for it to work. There is no limit for stacking pistons. I usually have to move the mouse slightly for the game to "snap" another piston on since the mounting point on the piston heads seems smaller than it should be.

[Lord Lorcan]

Hi
You need free space around the piston head to attache anything on it.
More space that normaly needed for the piston to glide
at least one block of free space in all direction

[Jeff]

As Lord Lorcan said, you need space around the piston to add another piston. If you are trying to add pistons pointing down toward voxels, you need quite a bit of clearance to be able to do so as the collision box for placing a piston extends up to 10 meters in front of the piston head. The game won't allow you to place a piston where any part of the collision box intersects voxels as sub grids cannot be placed into voxels.

I imagine the box I see around blocks I try to place when I'm playing comes from a mod called BuildInfo. I have the plugin version of that mod enabled so it is available to me whenever I play. It shows the collision box for the blocks so I can tell if it intersecting with other blocks or voxels.

One thing I usually do for mining rigs like this is to place a couple pistons pointing up and extend them fully, put some conveyors on top of them horizontally and then place as many retracted, downward pointing pistons as I can (I think four down works with two extended up). This gives you another 20 meters of distance as after the downward pistons are fully extended you can start retracting the upwards ones.

[TheZBillDyl]

Sometimes the game doesn't spawn in the piston head when i build a piston. This makes it so another piston cannot be placed on the end of it. When I try to place a piston head manually to it, it won't let me because the block literally wont attach itself to it. In other words, the game doesnt even let me get to the point where i could click to place it and get an error message. Instead, the game literally wont let me place the head on the end of the piston or even get to the point where i could because the block will not locate itself in the correct position.

[Jeff]

I've never had a piston I placed not have a piston part on it. If the piston part gets removed, you still need to make sure that the new part's collision box doesn't intersect with other blocks or voxels before the game will let you add a new part.

However, it sounds like you might be trying to add a new piston part incorrectly. To add a new piston part to a piston, you don't place a piston part in the world, you just go into the control panel of the piston and click the button that says "Add Piston Head". This will put an unwelded piston part to the end of the piston and you can then get the parts and weld it up.

It doesn't help that the terminology gets mixed as the separate piece is called a "top piston part" and in the control panel it is referred to as a "piston head".

[Dan2D3D]

Hi, the only time I saw this problem it was when building underground / into Voxel and removing more Vovel around the area where i wanted to add a Piston fixed the problem.

EDIT
1 - Deleted more Voxel
2 - Deleted my "bugged" piston and placed a new one.

[TheZBillDyl]

My friend and I built a rover using the large grid and the largest wheels. We carved a 2x2 hole in the middle of the rover to be the drilling area. We then built a pillar of armor blocks upward to hold the pistons on the side. The problem occurs the moment after we place the first piston at the top of the armor block pillar and it's facing downward towards the ground. When we try to attach the 2nd piston to the end of the first one, the 2nd piston places, but the piston head doesn't appear and therefore we cannot attach anything to the end of it so the third piston cannot be placed because of it. We have gotten it to work once or twice after just deleting it and replacing it over and over, but it appears to almost never work.

EDIT: I also have no mods installed

[Dan2D3D]

Just save with character in front of the bug so ready for me to place that second Piston and see the bug and I will be able to confirm it's a bug to report.

How to publish a world save :

1 - Select your save (with character saved in front of the bug).

2 - Click the "Publish" button on the left.

3 - Choose a proper Tag, check Steam upload and click the OK button.

4 - Your world will be uploaded to Steam Workshop.

5 - Paste the Workshop item link here.

[Dan2D3D]

OR

Send it to the ones working on the game so they can have a look at this bug you found.

All report to the SE Programmers :

Support Portal = https://support.keenswh.com/spaceengineers/pc
(create "Bug report" or "Request help"(Private) or "Feedback"(Petition) on the Portal)

All may use the Support Email to report the bugs found if they prefer :
Email = [e-mail]

[TheZBillDyl]

Ill get to it soon then. Thank you!

[Baratheon79]

Originally posted by TheZBillDyl:

My friend and I built a rover using the large grid and the largest wheels. We carved a 2x2 hole in the middle of the rover to be the drilling area. We then built a pillar of armor blocks upward to hold the pistons on the side. The problem occurs the moment after we place the first piston at the top of the armor block pillar and it's facing downward towards the ground. When we try to attach the 2nd piston to the end of the first one, the 2nd piston places, but the piston head doesn't appear and therefore we cannot attach anything to the end of it so the third piston cannot be placed because of it. We have gotten it to work once or twice after just deleting it and replacing it over and over, but it appears to almost never work.

EDIT: I also have no mods installed

By the sound of it, you might need more clearance around the pistons. The opening you're extending them through should be 3x3, so you've got one block of clearance around it, assuming you're planning to use just a single drill.

And since you're trying this with a mobile grid, you'll have some additional issues to contend with. You'll want a way to lock the drill rig in place when the rover is moving. And you want to anchor the rover to the ground when the drill rig is in use. Landing gear, or the newer magnetic plates, is the normal solution for both.

[ZombieHunter]

Using pistons for this is a very bad idea. The vibrations caused by the drill will wreak havoc on your pistons and when fully extended there is a chance they will simply break apart. It is better to use a long separate shaft guided by wheels and has 2 landing gears to lock it at the min and max extents. If you look at elevator tutorials you can use this info to create a long large drill. But keep in mind even though this setup works it makes the vehicle very hard to drive b/c it is top heavy. I have created several working mobile drills but as you drill more and more the vehicle gets heavier and heavier and becomes difficult to drive.

It is better to find the ore you want and then create a drilling platform above it using the elevator tutorial information. Large blocks seem to work better than small blocks and if the base does not have to move it works very well. You can let these drill and leave and come back and offload the ore onto your ship or vehicle and bring it back to your main base.