Gyroscope
Gyroscopes allow for the turning of a spacecraft, in any direction.
Gyroscopes are a crucial component to the movement of any spacecraft. They gyroscope occupies a single block, the size only proportionate to the type of ship that it is being placed on. Gyroscopes take little energy to power, and with a small ship with three reactors, one could support two or so gyroscopes.
Function
Gyroscopes allow for the turning of a spacecraft, in any direction, simply by using the arrow keys or moving the mouse around. The gyroscope offers:
- 6 Degrees of freedom
- Prevention of drifting when paired with thrusters
- Overall, stabilization of the ship it is on
More often than not, ships will have multiple gyroscopes to allow for sharper turns and a more responsive ship
Realism / Flaws
The gyroscope has a large mass (because of the number of Steel Plates used at the beginning of construction).
Rotating this mass would cause a moment upon the ship it's attached to, making the ship rotate in the opposite direction on a parallel axis through it's centre of gravity.
So for perspective, a single Gyroscope on a very small ship may rotate 20 times to rotate the main ship a single degree
(I haven't done the math on this, so please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong)
Basic Operation Scenario
Consider the following scenario: both the Gyroscope and ship are at rest (not rotating)
- The Gyroscope's rotational velocity begins to increase, so too does the ship it's connected to (at a fraction of its acceleration)
- The Gyroscope's rotational velocity is steady, so too is the rotational velocity of the ship it's connected to (at a fraction of the Gyro's rotational velocity)
- The Gyroscope's rotational velocity begins to decrease, so too does the ship it's connected to (at a fraction of its acceleration)
(you see the pattern here) - The Gyroscope comes to rest, and so too does the ship.
Flaw: Offset Thrusters
In a real realistic scenario, all moments caused by thruster forces would cancel out, causing zero ship rotation.
However, in Space Engineers, a ship may have all forward thrusters placed on the top of a ship (for example), and a Gyroscope "stabilizes" the ship, preventing it from spinning out of control.
This stabilizing effect implies that the Gyroscope is absorbing the moment caused by the offset thrusters entirely.
If the reverse thrusters were all placed on the bottom of this hypothetical ship, then the only way for the Gyroscope to prevent ship rotation is to gain even more rotational velocity in the same direction.
All that energy, would explode (literally)... but it's a game!, and a great one, so have fun! ;)
