Functions (Konstruction)
The Konstruction mod adds several pieces that facilitate moving the larger MKS parts around. A list of all the parts can be found here.
Konstruction introduces some key components:
- Servos & Magnets are similar to items provided by Infernal Robotics but are solely implemented in MKS. They have their own interface that allows very detailed configuration and manipulation.
- Construction Ports resemble and behave like the stock docking with on major exception: They can be fused together to weld two parts together.
See Konstruction Vehicle Examples for some examples of how the parts can be combined.
Servos & MagnetsThe adjustable Konstruction parts listed below can all be controlled from the Servo GUI. You can access it by pressing the servo icon.
This will open the following window. From here you can control every joint individually. You can also set parts into groups so they can all be controlled together. You set one to master and the rest of the group to slave, and then the whole group will follow the master. All parts have two modes, 'Free' and 'Goal'. In free mode they will move at the set speed until they reach their limit. In goal mode they will move at the set speed towards their set 'Goal'. See the key below for more information.
- Minimizes Part Settings
- Highlight Part
- Set Master/Slave
- Set Group Number
- Set All Parts Free/Goal
- Stop All Parts
- Adjustment Name
- Enter Goal Value
- Goal Value Currently Set
- Current Value
- Change Direction Of Adjustment
- Set Speed Zero
- Set Goal/Free
- Change Speed Negative Direction
- Current Speed
- Change Speed Positive Direction
The three variants of construction ports (Jr., Regular, and Sr.) behave like the stock ports except that they have a "Compress Parts" option that removes the docks and welds the parts together. This is extremely handy for orbital ship building. You can design your large final ship in the VAB, and then break off parts with construction docks to ship into orbit. Once there, compress the parts and you'll have the ship as if it had been constructed in the VAB as a single piece.
Make sure your construction ports are not the root node before you leave the VAB! Construction ports cannot be compressed if they're the root node. Make sure you move the root node to the "inside" of your ship/station part relative to any construction ports to avoid any possible movement of the root node during construction / flight that might assign the construction port as the root node.
Note that stock ports and construction ports are not compatible.
The Constructions Ports have adjustable settings to assist with building stations and bases. The settings control the strength of the magnet in different axis and there is also an option to limit when the dock will engage. This allows you to preset the required orientation and the dock will not engage until the angle requirement is met. The docks can then be 'collapsed' removing both docking ports and re-joining the parts on either side. This can greatly reduce part count when bases and stations are built in small sections.
In its simplest usage without "Angle Snap" enabled and with the default settings, the construction ports behave like regular docking ports: they "acquire" and start magnetically attracting each other when they are within a certain distance of each other(default: 0.5m).
It is up to you to ensure that the roll orientation is correct, because this alignment will persist even after you have permanently connected the two Vessels.
Once you have docked the craft as desired, click the "Compress Parts" button in the right-click Menu. This will make the docking ports disappear and join the two vessels together at the nodes where the docking ports were previously attached.
There are several options and tricks that you can use to make construct your bases and stations just the way you want to.
For that, it is best to understand that during Docking and Construction, the Ports undergo several stages:
- Ready: This is how your docking ports start out, before they have seen any of their friends. They are ready to mate.
- Acquire: Starts when your docking ports move into close proximity. The actual distance when the ports start acquiring is configurable with the "Port Range" setting (see below), and is 0.5m by default. In this state, the ports apply magnetic forces to each other, such as pulling closer, aligning the axes and rolling to the correct snap (if enabled).
- Docked: once the ports start touching each other and are aligned, they become docked. In this state, the two vessels are connected, but the docking port parts are still there. From this state, you can "compress" the parts, to make them disappear and create a new connection. Note that when "Angle Snap" is turned on, the ports will not dock until they are aligned at a certain angle to each other (see below), even if they are kissing.
- Disengage: After undocking, your ports go into this state to signal that they want to stop being docked now. In this state, they do not apply forces to each other, and they can not be docked. Ports in this state should revert back to the "Ready" state after you moved away a little bit (about 1m, according to tests). Alternatively, you can click the "Reset Acquire" button, to manually jump them into the Ready state, even if they are still within close proximity to each other.
Regular Stock Docking ports and the MKS Konstruction Ports with Default settings are "isometric": they don't care about rotation around an axis. That would mean, that you dock crafts tilted to the right by 90° or 40°, or 17° to the left ... While this comes in somewhat handy in regular docking where you don't care so much about a crafts rotation - this kind of "freedom" is sometimes undesired when constructing stations or bases. Imagine how silly a base would look, if all modules were askew!
This is where "Angle Snap" comes in. Angle Snap prevents the docking at random angles, and instead only allows docking when ports are at very specific roll position to each other. In order for Angle Snap to work, both ports must have it enabled, and the Angle on both ports must be the same. If that is not the case, the ports will not even acquire.
Angle Snap works by allowing the vessels to dock if and only if their respective roll angle is an integer multiple of the angle set in the "Angle" setting (see below). Huh? 😕 What does that mean?
Look at the picture of the Konstruction port above. You are looking onto it along the "docking axis". The Port itself has a preferred orientation: the black rectangle is what we call the "top". What I mean when I say "respective roll angle" is the angle between the UP direction of one port and the UP direction of another port. So at 0° roll angle, the black rectangles of the Konstruction ports are above each other, at 180° roll angle they are on opposite sides.
The angle set in the "Angle" setting is the interval of the allowed roll positions. For example, if the Angle is set to 180, there are only 2 allowed positions: 0° and 180°. If the Angle is set to 90, there are 4: 0°, 90°, 180° and 270°. If the Angle is set to 30, there can be : 0°, 30°, 60°, 90°, 120°, 150°, 180°, 210°, 240°, 270°, 300° and 330°. An exception is the special Angle 0: it means that there is only one allowed position (not infinite), namely 0°.
The Konstruction ports can be set manually (by using the "Port Roll" setting) to exert a roll force, and help with alignment. Unfortunately due to a stock game restriction, the roll force (which should really be called Torque) will always try to orient the ports towards the 180° position, so basicall "upside down" to each other.
Note that if your Angle setting is 0°, this means that the ports will roll towards a position where docking will not happen. A possible workaround for this restriction is to either Set the Angle to 180°, which allows ports to be in either 0° or 180° position to each other.
This function is intended to take the whole rolling/angle snapping business off your hands. However, some caveats are involved.
Basically, this function combines the compression of ports (see above) with an invisible roll. The crafts halves end up as if the ports were connected at 0°, regardless of the roll angle they were actually connected to. This comes in handy if you dock the crafts and don't care about the roll angle, but want the final craft to be aligned.
But BEWARE THE KRAKEN! Even though the position after Compress Parts (Rotate) relative to each other is fixed at 0°, the position of the whole craft to another reference point is somewhat unpredictable. It appears to be the average of the angles. For example, if one port is at 90° relative to the "up" direction (relative to the ground), the other one is at 30° relative to "up", then the final craft will be at a 60°. Since this transition is "instant", any resulting collision with the ground (or nearby vessels) will generate enormous forces and almost certainly tear your base to pieces, or at the very least send it hurling into the sky.
Unfortunately, even RAPID UNPLANNED DISASSEMBLY can occur, if the original roll angles between the ports are too high! For example, if the roll angles are at 180°, your craft might disassemble and send spinning parts all over the rest of your base!
The Port Torque setting is how strong the force will twist the whole ship that's being docked into alignment laterally.
If the "docking axis" is coming out of a port, then the Port Torque setting is the force that will align the docking axes of both ports so that they coincide.
Note that this force only occurs during the "Acquire" state.
The roll setting is how strong the force will roll a ship into the correct docking orientation, i.e. make up match up on both ports.
If the "docking axis" is coming out of a port, then the Port Roll setting is the force that rotate the port (and the attached ship) around this axis. Currently, this force will drive the ports to opposite positions (180°).
The force only exists in the "Acquire" state, and only if both ports have "Angle Snap" enabled and the same Angle is set.
The range setting is the distance between the ports when the ports start "Acquiring" and exerting forces and torques on each other.
If the "docking axis" is coming out of a port, then the Port Force setting is the force along the docking axis that pulls two ships together.
When Angle snap is enabled, this is the angle interval of possible snap positions (see above). Note that when Angle Snap is enabled, both Angles must be set to the same value for the ports to acquire and dock.
