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The Landing Leg is a part used to prevent rockets from landing on their engines and other parts, as they will break on impact if the rocket's velocity exceeds 5.5 m/s. It is also used to decrease a rocket's center of mass, making it less subject to toppling. As a rocket without an engine inside an atmosphere is virtually useless, this is a good way to protect the engines and other parts from being damaged. A landing leg can withstand impact speeds up to about 12.5 m/s.
Upon deployment, landing legs rotate to about 115 degrees, then extend downward.
In Version 1.5, a larger version of the leg was introduced which now overcomes the issue of needing to add structural parts to extend the legs further.
Both small and large landing legs fully deployed.
As they can be extended and retracted on click, they are a popular part used by engineers to develop new game mechanics. Landing legs can be used for hangar doors, mechanical arms, grid fins and many more fantastic creations.
Building tricks[]
- Antenna — Extended landing legs are often used as antennae for satellites.
- Hangar doors — The legs can act as doors. Alternatives include solar panels.
- Mechanical arms — For advanced builds.
- Payload Bay — used to deploy payloads
- Grid fins — used on reusable rockets to stabilize landings.
- Launch clamps — used on a launch tower to hold the rocket in place before launch.
- Service arms — used to access different parts of a rocket before launch.
- Booster Separator — can be used as another type of separator although only for a decorative purpose.
- Horizontal Solar Panels — when horizontal it can act as a horizontal solar panel.
Trivia[]
- The angle of the extension of the landing leg from its attached joint is about 115 degrees.
- When a part that is attached from a landing leg is destroyed, they will sometimes move around for a while.
- There's a logic when clipping a part to another landing leg on the air, when deployed, the part is still attached even when it looks like it's not connected.
- The landing legs look similar to the LT-1 Landing Strut in Kerbal Space Program.