Blimps, Zeppelins, and Dirigibles

This is a guide on the diffrences of Blimps, Zeppelins, and Dirigibles, how to make them, and how to use them.

Introduction

This is a guide on how to make Blimps, Zeppelins, and Dirigibles. This will make sure your attempts dont end up like this anymore.

The diffrences between Blimps, Zeppelins, and Dirigibles

First of all, Blimps are airships that do not have a frame, but are more like a balloon. They have ballonettes inside that control pitch whenever they are inflated or deflated. The Rudder and Elevators control the side to side and up and down movements. The engines provide thrust, which make it go forwards. A Zeppelin has multiple balloons inside its main frame. Zeppelins control their side to side and up and down movements the same way a blimp does, but they also have ballast to control. The zeppelin takes off by dropping some of its water ballast to get lighter and rise above the ground. It can also vent the lifting gas that it has to go down. The engines provide forward movement as a blimp does. Dirigibles are anything that can steer. For example, a flying pirate ship would not be a Blimp nor a Zeppelin, but a Dirigible. The picture below can help.

Robocraft Airships

Now we get on to making airships in robocraft. The same things from above apply here except ballast. Now what we want to do is make a frame. Any shape will do. You will then want to add helium to the frames top. If you put it in the bottom, it will flip over. Here is an example. As you can see,the Helium blocks are at the top. You need to place equal amounts of helium in the back and front. Of course, the bigger the airship, the more helium you will need. This frame as seen in the picture can actually fly and is very manuverable. The front end angles up to much though. This will either need more weight or less helium in the front end. You need the airship to not angle up or down, otherwise it will not fly. The Los Angles's tail angles up dangerously in this photo. .............................Actually the Los Angles's tail was caught in some wind,and lifted dangerously up. But you get my point. You should also make sure that it is sitting neutral, which means that it isn't going up or down by itself. My large zeppelin goes down slowly if not moving. I should mention that you will need some powerful thrusters to move it, because the helium slows it down heavily. My Zeppelin has 3 cheetah thrusters in it to make it move at a fair pace. With a fair bit of experimenting, you can make something great.

Weapons and Tactics

For Weapons, it really depends on the size of your airship. The bigger it is, the more you can fit on. For smaller airships, i suggest using one or two Railguns. For bigger airships, i suggest plasmas and some sort of anti air. Anything that does lots of damage in a short time is good. Make sure that after adding weapons, it is still balanced and won't fall down. Now for Tactics, you should stay closer to your base unless the enemy are noobs. Fire from afar, as you dont want to get hit yourself. If you get to damaged, you wont usually fall down. You'll float up. This will leave you an easy target high in the sky. You can still sneak around the edges and hope to not die, but i wouldn't advise it. Depending on how strong you've made your airship, you can really give the enemy a hard time.

Final Words on Airships

Zeppelins and Blimps in game, can be of some use, but are not the best. There are far better options in terms of flying, but if you want to fly something diffrent for a change, try this. Im talking about actual blimps, but you can make something far better like an armoured chain shredder that uses helium as its main lift. DONT GET ANY IDEAS. Zeppelins are useful but are big slow targets. If you make one, be cautious.

About The Author

Aviator1987 is an aircraft and airship enthusiast. He knows alot about Zeppelins and Blimps, so you can ask him about anything related to those. If you ever see a space shuttle called "Blast Off", that would be me. In game name is carsonwerner555.

An Idea:

[Blitz]

Ive made one in the past mind you, but that was awhile ago. Not Practical really.

[rileyNIKO]

ILL MAKE AN AERIAL LANDING FIELD

[Blitz]

Send me a screenshot if you can!

[RG]

Aerial landing field? *Builds a huge blimp with a flat top and calls for some friends who make tiny planes*

[Comedy Mode]

Challenge accepted. I will make an aerial landing feild.

[Blitz]

yup

[c_phoenix]

Cool. Will try one myself, thanks for the guide (:

[Blitz]

Depending on how you build it, yes. They cant just shoot out your helium like a wing or helicopter blades.

[c_phoenix]

Are these actualy effective?

[Blitz]

hmm, i havent done one before, but ill try