[WIP] Container Space Ship

[Mechbuilds]

Here's my newest project. A massive container transportation space ship. 
(Work in progress.)

This Spaceship is used for massive container transport from planet to planet, solar system to solar system. 
Maximum cargo is 3 extra large containers which are 5 studs tall, 7 studs wide and 13 studs long. 
Additional attachment rails allow different shape or size cargo to be attached. 
The ship is an ex military vehicle so it's easily converted back to military use as a troop/mech transporter ship. 
It's equipped with heavy armor and a chassis sturdy enough to be a support platform or a fighter hangar bay.

The ship can reach warp speed using it's massive thrusters. 
The engines are also cooled by massive cooling towers that are mounted on top of the cargo bay. 
The cooling towers are also blast shielded in order to minimize damage to the cargo. 















Currently i need some help with the rear of the container ship. 

Does anybody know how i can fit a mechanism there that'll deploy a sturdy singular 3 studs wide leg that extends the container legs by 1-2 studs. 
The mechanism has to be strong enough to hold the ship in place and the leg will be lift up and be semi or completely hidden. 

The original idea is to have the ship land on it's legs and then slowly lift the legs up so the two front legs will be mid way lifted and the rear one lifts completely and lowers the back end completely on the container legs.
Then just detach the containers and lower the legs down to lift the ship up. Pull the containers out of the way, replace with new containers and off to a new destination.  
 

Edited January 24, 2018 by Mechbuilds

[Lakop]

Hi,

Interesting build. Try a mini LA for your legs. It's trial and error but I look forward to seeing more.

H

[Mechbuilds]

7 hours ago, Horace T said:

Hi,

Interesting build. Try a mini LA for your legs. It's trial and error but I look forward to seeing more.

H

I don't have a mini LA at this time. 
Hmm. I'm wondering if i can build something with a worm gear there.. 
At first i was thinking about a linkage that locks in place but a worm gear would be sturdier and more controllable.

[Cumulonimbus]

Cool project. Maybe you could integrate some mechanisms to make it more interesting and make it a  true Technic MOC: You could use one of the large LA's from your 42055 parts to make a clamping system that can hold or release the containers for example. The other LA might be used for a retractable landing gear system I imagine. If your not sure how one LA can control three or four landing legs, take a look at the landing gear system in the 9396 helicopter (you can download the building instruction for that on the LEGO site).

Building a spaceship from the 42055 parts gives you huge creative possibilities. Good luck and happy building.

[Mechbuilds]

A system that operates fingers to grab the containers is doable but then i'd have to modify all other things that are going in transportation to fit the finger system. 
Also i'd have to pretty much redo the whole thing.. 

A long technic axle actually is possible to route trough the upper part of the cargo area all the way to the back to operate the landing gear with medium amount of modifications. 
In theory, i could make one crank that operates all 3 legs. 


As a side note; i'd like to see more space ships made 100% purely technic with 0-1% system pieces. 90% of the mocs here are construction vehicles.

Edited January 25, 2018 by Mechbuilds

[Frequenzberater]

To be honest, at first I thought the first image shows one of the mentioned containers. But then, I realized that this is the whole ship...

Because of the originality I will keep an I on the project.

[Mechbuilds]

The rear is deceivingly small so instead of one leg, i'm putting two outriggers at the sides.. 
Noting frequenzberater's comment, i'm thinking about redesigning the whole thing to have a thin middle section that can hold containers horizontally on both sides. That way, i could add 6 containers instead of 3. 
Maybe i could even get the structure a lot stronger and add actual functions inside.. 

Should i go for it or keep beating on this dead horse? 

[Cumulonimbus]

I wouldn't give it up yet, as said before the 42055 parts give you plenty of options: With the huge amount of 5x7 frames, you could make a open spine structure which holds the containers for example. The tracks could be used as engine cowling, with he curved track pieces you could make a rotating crew compartment (for artificial gravity), ... I see a lot of potential.

Yes, this will mean you will need to redesign and rebuild a couple of times, but this is just part of the game.

[Frequenzberater]

Giving up is never an option :D

[Mechbuilds]

This is why i love the eurobricks community.. You give me the best ideas and push me to make things much greater.

The version 1 cargo ship had a pathetic 3 container capacity... 
The version 2 has a whopping 10 container capacity. 










This version two will have 4 legs. 

Any advice how to make simple outriggers that work on the same axle? 
The outriggers will be deployed sideways and the whole ship will be standing on those 4 outriggers with full cargo so the legs will be wormgeared. 
(I only have 3 large linear actuators so using those is not an option.) 

The problem with the outriggers is:
They need to fit in a 5 stud space and be connected to a center drive shaft. 

So i need outriggers that are as small as possible and either worm geared or lockable to sustain the massive weight of this behemoth. 
And the rear outriggers will have a shaft going upwards to rotate the whole assembly. 

Edited January 25, 2018 by Mechbuilds

[Mechbuilds]

Ahh.. I've been wacking at the outriggers for the whole day. 
I just can't get a sturdy enough mechanism to fit in there. 

I wonder if i should discard the rotatable wheel on top and just have the rear engine spin to open the legs up. 
Then i'd have a very very long technic axle going trough the ship.

[Cumulonimbus]

Can you share a screenshot or photo of your progress on the legs so far? This can give us an idea what you are working on and makes it easier to suggest improvements. I think I can give some ideas for outrigger/landing legs, but I don't have access to LDD at the moment, I'll take a look tonight.

Another approach could be to change the configuration of the hull when landing, since it's a fictional craft, you can't get it wrong.  Yet another Idea I had is to hook you containers to a ring (made from the yellow gear sections) around your hull. Damn, I might be getting more excited about this spaceship than you .

[Mechbuilds]

I had something like this in mind:





The problem with worm gears is that it's hard to get the legs to deploy all at the same time. 

All i want is just 4 landing gear legs that deploy exactly at the same time and won't collapse from the weight of the ship. 


Also it's great if i get you exited with the space ship idea. I'd love to see more space ships in the technic forum. 
99% of space ships are made with system bricks because how easy it is. Building it from technic is a challenge.
Big bonus is technic functionality that lets you build pretty much anything.. 



Yeah what i'm asking for is help making the gearbox that has a long axle going trough it in the middle, and the outriggers deploy diagonally downwards. And once you lift them up, they get seamlessly straight against the ships body. The feet of the outriggers are connected with a blue pin that allows you to tilt them outwards a little to act as blast shields/deflectors. 

I need to make two gearboxes, one for the rear and one for the front. The rear gearbox will have the drive axle go trough it completely and i'll spin the driven axle by hand. 
Basically when you spin the engine turbine at the back, it deploys the landing gear. 


The landing gear has to exceed the ships bottom by two studs. (The container is 1 stud wider than the ships body.)

Edited January 25, 2018 by Mechbuilds

[Mechbuilds]

Here's a quick sketch of the whole thing:

https://i.imgur.com/5WQDElv.jpg

Out rigger functions in either of these two methods:



But since i don't have those big red outrigger parts nor the beams with teeth, i think that the first option is the only way to go. 



I've been thinking about widening the ship a little bit (but not from the middle)
To make the ship flush with the containers. That way i'd get much more room for those outriggers. 
And i think it'd also look more pleasing to the eye as well. 

Edited January 27, 2018 by Milan
Converted oversized image into the link.

[ColletArrow]

This is definitely an interesting project, although you might benefit from having more light when taking the pictures .

For the outriggers, how about the design from 8067 Mini mobile crane? I've used it well a couple of times, and it could be enlarged to suit the model. It should be able to support the weight, if the liftarms can be made to 'lock' into place when down. You could then have several pairs down the length of the ship, which would all deploy at exactly the same time.

[Mechbuilds]

25 minutes ago, ColletArrow said:

This is definitely an interesting project, although you might benefit from having more light when taking the pictures .

For the outriggers, how about the design from 8067 Mini mobile crane? I've used it well a couple of times, and it could be enlarged to suit the model. It should be able to support the weight, if the liftarms can be made to 'lock' into place when down. You could then have several pairs down the length of the ship, which would all deploy at exactly the same time.

Thanks! This post was extremely helpful. 

[Mechbuilds]

I made a simple outrigger while following the 8067 instructions.The problem i'm having is, only one input shaft will make the other outrigger go up and the other goes down.. Doesn't work. 
Thinking about giving up on the idea and just putting manually pullable simple legs that you have to pull one at a time.. 

I should probably widen and completely redesign the ship.. Maybe widen up the rear a bit. 
The part that the containers connect to is 90% complete. (Middle of the ship)

[Mechbuilds]

I'm going to take a break on this project. I'm pretty much stuck. 

[doug72]

On 1/25/2018 at 3:50 PM, Mechbuilds said:

I had something like this in mind:

 

Re Outriggers.
I see you are having issues the same as I did on my Mobile Dock crane.
The new housing and racks work without sagging and to get them working together I used  linear clutches and by keeping drive running until they all reach and an end stop they get back in sync again.

Thats why I started an Outriggers Thread so members can post solutions & ideas for them.

Best of luck getting them to function.

Edited January 27, 2018 by Milan
Please don't quote whole block of text and images.

[Mechbuilds]

I think it's easier to just ditch the mechanism and just make 4 legs that you pull outward and lock in place. 
I just can't figure out a way to make it work.

[Mechbuilds]

Update:




Just a little mockup has been made but there will be 4 thrusters at the back mounted like in the image. 



I think, if i put any kind of landing gear on this, it'll have to be a leg that goes down vertically. 
If you look closely at the image, you can see that gray axle sticking up with that round piece under it. The leg should look like that. Then it would actually fit the build. 
I wonder if there is a mechanism to make four legs like that and a mechanism that puts two of them down at the same time in both front and back. 
And once you lift them up, they lift up flush against the ship's bottom..




I think i should lenghten the rear of the ship at least 5 studs further and widen it a little bit. 
Maybe add the command center on top of the engines and a second one right at the front. 

Maybe a sliding dummy crane mechanism on top of the ship to manage containers in space. 




EDIT:
Am i also correct that i can make any kind of landing gear stay still if i add a worm gear + a large gear pretty much anywhere on the driveshaft? 
In theory, even if the full weight of the ship is on the legs, the legs can't move up because the worm gear on the long drive shaft prevents it from spinning. 

Edited January 27, 2018 by Mechbuilds

[doug72]

Take a look at the outriggers on my mobile dock crane MOC which use the new 1L worm to extend the outrigger arms, they are a linked together from one M motor via a 24/1 worm drive gearbox.

Then imagine them placed vertically.

By using worms on the outrigger racks they cannot move and can support a lot of weight.

Edited January 27, 2018 by Doug72

[Milan]

@Mechbuilds Take care about posting so big pictures, please. I have converted them to the links, in the future resize them to max allowed size on EB (1024).

[Mechbuilds]

44 minutes ago, Milan said:

@Mechbuilds Take care about posting so big pictures, please. I have converted them to the links, in the future resize them to max allowed size on EB (1024).

EDIT:

Okay apparently if i click "Huge thumbnail" It'll give me a 1024 image.. But it's showing exactly as large in my screen as the original one. 
So i don't understand what's the problem? 

Edited January 27, 2018 by Mechbuilds

[Erik Leppen]

For outriggers, I think it's wise to check out the instructions of some sets that have them. The first example of outriggers I came across was set 8460, the wonderful yellow mobile crane from the '90s. The idea is that the shape formed by frame, the two arms and the leg is not a parallellogram - it has unequal sides, which make leg rotate at the same time the outrigger is folding out. It's very hard to explain with words, so build it and find out how it moves.

Or, less work: check out the Technicopedia page on that set: http://www.technicopedia.com/8460.html, and in particular, view the animation of the outriggers.