Yeah,I would like to see a robotic arm
Should be possible, Martins even provides a sample in Space Shuttle Atlantis source code. And yeah, the more I think to it, the more I see it necessary to grapple small satellites and service them, would make the spacecraft quite versatile despite its limited dimensions. Maybe not something as articulated, but enough to secure things in the payload bay.
---------- Post added at 08:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:16 AM ----------
Spend the (dev) day on the docking mechanism again. Those hooks looked ugly, so I redraw them the proper way (the IDSS document has schematics for nearly any part). In fact each pair of hooks has an active and a passive one. Which makes sense, so that they can grapple the hooks on opposite docking port. Each active hook locks with a passive hook, and vice versa.
Also found a much better picture of the Shuttle docking port.
So still work to do, but it begins to look better :
The interesting thing is that you have to understand (at a basic level) how the thing works to model it properly.
---------- Post added 08-19-19 at 07:17 PM ---------- Previous post was 08-18-19 at 08:02 PM ----------
Took a looot of time, but we're getting there. Still a couple of pins to add, but I have good hope to merge it with the spacecraft tomorrow. Now I see that kind of model as an investment. Animating it in Orbiter is going to be a looot of fun. But first things first.
---------- Post added 08-20-19 at 05:47 PM ---------- Previous post was 08-19-19 at 07:17 PM ----------
Here we go. Should fit just right under the bay doors once the docking collar retracted. The docking tunnel will be as large as a phone booth but well, that's the idea.
Given the small size of the payload bay, the robotic arm needs 3, maybe 4 segments to be really useful.