PLEASE stop the way space stations ROTATE

[edd]

The OP is right to a point.
Of course a station can be oriented so it both mirrors tidal locking and axial rotation, angular motion with respect to perpendicular axes is independent, you can spin in 3 directions if you want.

No, when you've set the station rotating with an axis pointing at the planet then that axis is fixed from that point on. If you start adding another component of rotation it sets the total angular momentum with a new axis - it doesn't start rotating the previous axis of rotation.
Edit: well it gets kind of complicated when you're trying to figure out what's happening in some cases like torque free processions but I don't think you can get the station to behave in the way you want.

 

[Wile_E]

Read my posts on this and the previous thread. Without reaction wheels or or some other way of applying torque to the station, there simply is no way one end of an O'Neill cylinder type station would always point at the astronomical body it orbits around. No tidal locking or other natural phenomenon will allow that.

Having said that, it would probably be interesting to live on either end of the station. The fact that the station is forced to turn against it's gravity roll axis will likely play havoc with one's inner ears. The effect would be most noticeable on the ends where that angular velocity is best noticed.

 

[Himmel Tropf]

Some food for thought:

Spoiler

Spoiler

and the obligatory...

Spoiler

 

[Himmel Tropf]

If you look at the little yellow trucks driving around, or more correctly driving in circles. They are actually standing still. the movement is from the station not by the trucks themselves.
try to turn auto rotation off in your ship, that is really fun inside a station. The bigger and more expensive a ship you own, the more exciting it is.

wait what?.. wouldn't the trucks have the same inertia as the thing they're in contact with (the station)...
.. unless you're saying they aren't actually driving at all, which kinda makes sense :S
GGthread.

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

Read my posts on this and the previous thread. Without reaction wheels or or some other way of applying torque to the station, there simply is no way one end of an O'Neill cylinder type station would always point at the astronomical body it orbits around. No tidal locking or other natural phenomenon will allow that.

Having said that, it would probably be interesting to live on either end of the station. The fact that the station is forced to turn against it's gravity roll axis will likely play havoc with one's inner ears. The effect would be most noticeable on the ends where that angular velocity is best noticed.

Isn't the habitation ring a giant reaction wheel?

Control the pitch of the supports and you have a reaction wheel that can be offset slightly from the main bulk of the station, that should be sufficient given it's size and the ability to control the pitch in real time with hydraulics.

Coriolis stations can use their potable and waste water cycles similarly with different channels used for different angles.

Really though, all of that is only necessary to maintain the orientation as it degrades over the years. All you have to do to start the process is manufacture the station so that it has a second axis of spin at an appropriate speed along Y. It's going to be moving while you build it no matter what you do, so doing that much more isn't difficult.

 

[Doolittle]

There's a reason they put the entrances on the side toward the planets. It's the same reason they put all the stations on the same plane as the planets rings. So there is less rendering of all the details and the framerate doesn't suffer if the rings or planet were in view. Would be cool to pop out of a station and see the rings of a planet, but they made sure you can't see them.

 

[Zorronov]

They make me dizzy...

 

[Blastbeats]

I just assume that stations spin so they can generate artificial gravity around the rings.

 

[3941]

Didn't read through the whole thread, so excuse me if someone already said it.
I guess it comes down to having exciting visuals. Seeing a planet or any stellar object when you exit a station is far more exciting than, well, seeing none.

 

[specialsymbol]

Isn't the habitation ring a giant reaction wheel?

Control the pitch of the supports and you have a reaction wheel that can be offset slightly from the main bulk of the station, that should be sufficient given it's size and the ability to control the pitch in real time with hydraulics.

Coriolis stations can use their potable and waste water cycles similarly with different channels used for different angles.

Really though, all of that is only necessary to maintain the orientation as it degrades over the years. All you have to do to start the process is manufacture the station so that it has a second axis of spin at an appropriate speed along Y. It's going to be moving while you build it no matter what you do, so doing that much more isn't difficult.

No.

It's not a giant reaction wheel, unless you
1st) decouple from the rest of the station and
2nd) use this decoupling to stop / accelerate the wheel

resulting in either deadly gravity or problematic zero gravity

Also it would only serve to maintain the rotational speed of the main body but NOT change its orientation. For this you'd need more than one axis. Even then it wouldn't work because the distribution of momentum wouldn't allow for even just slightly precession free corrections.

 

[Witcherman]

This used to bug me as well when I first started playing but I quickly got used to it and have mastered docking so well that I hardly even notice the rotation anymore.

Just keep in mind that FD have limited resources and so do our PCs. I'd love to see tweaks to the space stations as well but, I'd rather see FD focusing their limited resources on other things first, like better navigation systems and a freakin Captain's log for starters!

Just saying ��