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Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Sun Aug 14, 2011 1:19 pm
by Swaffy
I have an edited Elco 80 that is really fast, in which I call Elco 80 Speeder. Yeah, how original.
Anyway, here's the issue: It bounces in the water. It bounces when not moving. It bounces while moving at 95 knots.
What causes [or can cause] the boat to bounce around in the water? How can this be fixed?
3DS Max 7 screenshot:
http://img801.imageshack.us/img801/303/elco803dsmax.png
In-game screenshots:
http://img854.imageshack.us/img854/4926 ... hot2ty.jpg
http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/304/screenshot1lc.jpg
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Sun Aug 14, 2011 11:29 pm
by Apache Thunder
The floaters are likely trying to float the object above the water instead of keeping it level with the water. It still takes me quite some tweaking to get mine to behave. But try tweaking the hull height setting for the floaters which should lower the float level for the boat and stabilize it. (reducing the value should make the floater sink more into the water. Also make sure the floaters lift settings aren't too high as that can contribute to vehicle bouncyness. Not enough will result in the vehicle sinking or trying to sink)
Also how many floaters are you using? I think for a vehicle like that, you need a minimum of 4. One for each corner. I only use one floater on tiny things like the soccer ball or keg projectiles from my BFH mod. I have not yet found a vehicle that would only use two. Also try spacing them further apart. Put the rear floaters further to the back and visa-versa for the front floaters.
Example code from my jeep floaters:
Code: Select all
ObjectTemplate.create FloatingBundle JeepFloater
ObjectTemplate.saveInSeparateFile 1
ObjectTemplate.setHullHeight 0.7
ObjectTemplate.setFloatMaxLift 5
ObjectTemplate.setFloatMinLift 5
ObjectTemplate.setSinkingSpeedMod 1
ObjectTemplate.setDragModifier 4
I haven't really nailed down what the difference is for the FloatMinLift and FloatMaxLIft settings, so I generally keep them the same. The sinking-speed mod I think is used to allow the vehicle to sink when it dies. Not having this set correctly will result in dead boats not sinking.
Also, unless your boat's center of mass is serously out of whack, then usually all the floaters have the same float values.
DragModifier should be obvious. It adds drag to the vehicle while it's in the water. Without this it would move more easily but would likely never slow down on it's own as if it was on ice. Try increasing it or adding one if your floaters don't have it. It will keep your boat from going too fast and may help with the bouncing issue.
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 4:48 am
by Swaffy
If you look at the 3ds Max image I provided, you'll notice that all I did was reduce the hull's visual height [along with its shadow and collision meshes]. Then, I just raised up the floaters and the other crap to fit the new hull. Think of it this way: the bottom of the hull was raised up, and the top of the boat is still in the same position.
I'll Swaff around with the floaters. The boat has 6 floaters, so I'll greatly reduce the SetFloatLift lines to see what happens. I saw that the HullHeight was set at "1" but then changed it to "0.4" to see what happens. I'll come back if I figure it out [or not].
[Edit]How can I make the boat not sink in the water? Meaning, always stay on top of the water without ... sinking even an inch. I remembered the speedboats in the HydroThunder mod. I guess I'll look at those.
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 8:52 pm
by Apache Thunder
I think increasing the minFloat value reduces the sinking effect when the boat moves around. SinkingMod may also determine this. I don't know a whole lot about the floaters mind you as I have not dealt with them a whole lot in my modding adventures.
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 9:34 pm
by Swaffy
I had the boat's drag at 0, which caused it to flip around and launch into the air. I set it to 0.4, which greatly increased the stability.
It still wants to sink down then fly into the air, but is reduced a lot.
I realized that, if you look at the 3ds Max image in the first post, the boat's center of mass is really low. The center of mass is the blue box [named after the vehicle, Elco80Speeder, which is what everything on the boat is attached to]. Is there a way I can move that center of mass up to the bottom of the boat's hull? I have already highlighted everything other than that blue box and moved it down to my desired position, but the CollisionMesh, 1st person mesh, and the other nonvisible objects get all screwed up.
This image shows the center of mass for a boat from the HydroRacers mod:
http://img717.imageshack.us/img717/4916 ... ofmass.png
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2011 10:07 pm
by Apache Thunder
Try this code for adjusting the center of mass:
Code: Select all
ObjectTemplate.centerOfMassOffset 0/0/0
It's a vector 3. I have not really used this myself so I can't give much explanation on how to use it.
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Wed Aug 17, 2011 5:06 am
by Swaffy
I've been playing with it to figure out the orientation of the coordinates.
Code: Select all
rem ----- [Center of Mass coordinates] -----
ObjectTemplate.centerOfMassOffset 0/0/0
rem 0/-/- Right [+] and Left [-]
rem -/0/- Up [-] and Down [+]
rem -/-/0 Forward [+] and Backward [-]
Thank you, Apache. I've been wondering about the center of mass for about a year.
I'll come back if I run into further issues.
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 5:41 am
by Swaffy
My boat no longer bounces. But it feels like it is draggin in the water as if it has a parachute in the water below it.
Do you have any tips for me? It leans forward as if the drag is attached below the boat. It also goes slow even though I give it a ton of power. The boats in HydroRacers are not like that ...
Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 2:56 pm
by freddy
try give it more mass
Re: Boat bounces around in water
Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2011 3:43 pm
by Swaffy
To make it go faster? Okay, I'll give it a shot.
