TerraTech

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How to make balanced plane
By NightbladeGreyswandir
We all know that when building palnes in Terratech left and right side should be mirrored... But how to acheive perfect longitudinal stability of your plane you can find in this guide.
   
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Plane design: longitudinal stability
Plane build guide

Longitudinal stability
Perfectly stabile plane will not be able to take off if wheels make it horizontal. First thing to do if your plane is not taking off is to put height on front side (so nose is higher than tail, and whole plane is not horizontal but under small angle compared to ground). If your plane can take off after this, than make only corrections so it is stabile in flight.

Influence of positions of engines to longitudinal stability:


Influence of position of wings on longitudinal stability:


Influence of position of tail on longitudinal stability:


Influence of position of additional weight on longitudinal stability:


Plane techs from videos:





Conclusion on longitudinal stability:

*all moving should be done in small steps, so one or one pair (symmetrical) of engines/wings per one block.
*tail parts of planes in all corporations have small lift but good stabilizing effect, so for bigger planes should use wings on tail section in combination with stabilizing tail block.

If you have pitch up, you can stabilize it by:

1 - Moving engines upward. Try to do it one engine per one block up, until you find balance.
2 - Moving engines forward. This will move centar of gravity toward nose of the plane and reduce pitching up.
3 - Move wings down. Try one pair of wings (symmetrical left and right) per one block down, until you find balance.
4 - Move wings backward. This will both move center of gravity and will move centar of lift toward back side of plane.
5 - Move horizontal tail (wings) more backward.
6 - Add more wings on horizontal tail.
7 - Put more weight on front side of plane.
8 - Remove extra weight from back side of plane.

Or if you have pitch down, you can stabilize it by:

1 - Moving engines downward. Try to do it one engine per one block up, until you find balance.
2 - Moving engines backward. This will move centar of gravity away from nose of the plane and reduce pitching down.
3 - Move wings up. Try one pair of wings (symmetrical left and right) per one block up, until you find balance.
4 - Move wings Forward. This will both move center of gravity and will move centar of lift toward front side of plane.
5 - Move horizontal tail (wings) more forward.
6 - Remove wings from horizontal tail.
7 - Put more weight on back side of plane.
8 - Remove extra weight from front side of plane.
12 Comments
Atlas47 6 Sep, 2020 @ 7:20pm 
give us a trim feature!!
d41337n8r 12 Apr, 2020 @ 12:42pm 
i just throw something together and change it until it's almost stable.
Trans Girl Kasyu 30 May, 2018 @ 1:03pm 
so, basically, everything.
NightbladeGreyswandir  [author] 30 May, 2018 @ 10:30am 
:P
ZeroGravitas 30 May, 2018 @ 9:21am 
Also, this one.:sfsmile:
NightbladeGreyswandir  [author] 8 Jan, 2018 @ 3:46pm 
In meaning of balancing yes. as you have to be aware of weights and center of mass, and where lifting forces are...
Trans Girl Kasyu 8 Jan, 2018 @ 3:03pm 
Oh. what i do want to know is that if anything from the real world translates to terratech.
NightbladeGreyswandir  [author] 7 Jan, 2018 @ 1:29pm 
Balancing not to stall itslef is pure adding more engines. it is not balancing at all. What is balanced plane is one that you can fly with SHIFT only, without need to adjust altitude non stop. That is why the first line in this guide is "Plane design: longitudinal stability".
I am not sure about plane building games, i have been building planes in RL for few years, designing them actually.

All stabilizers in Terratech are in same time vertical and horizontal. Depend where you put them. Check models in steam wokshop.
Trans Girl Kasyu 7 Jan, 2018 @ 1:22pm 
also why do planes in this game not have any vertical stabiliser fins?
Trans Girl Kasyu 7 Jan, 2018 @ 1:20pm 
the reason you want a balanced plane is so that it doesnt stall itself due to it pitching up by its own weight, which is accomplished by having the center of mass slightly above the center of lift, while with a VTOL you have the center of thrust on the center of mass, since lift doesnt really matter for VTOL. you should know this if you have played any plane building physics based game.