Wheel sequences
by Andrew Locko · in Artist Corner · 07/05/2005 (11:02 am) · 8 replies
Hello. I'm trying to export a vehicle that also contains tires within the vehicle .dts shape. I've made " wheel " and " turn " sequences for each wheel, but the wheels don't rotate at all even though I manually animated them within the sequence duration. Does something need to be scripted in order to get the wheels to rotate as the vehicle drives. Keep in mind I'm not using a separate .dts shape for the wheel, because I'm making a semi-truck and I want the wheels to follow the trailer as it sways from side to side. Thanks for any help.
#2
For the most part there is a wheel.dts shape that is mounted to a node called hub# (ie. hub0, hub1, hub2, etc.) on your vehicle DTS shape. The code in torque from there handles how the wheels are handled and how the wheels affect the suspension and physics of the vehicle.
07/05/2005 (11:43 am)
Actually you might want to look into how wheeled vehicles are handled now by the code (since you are trying to use the old method, which to my knowledge still works but is a pain in the ass to work with). For the most part there is a wheel.dts shape that is mounted to a node called hub# (ie. hub0, hub1, hub2, etc.) on your vehicle DTS shape. The code in torque from there handles how the wheels are handled and how the wheels affect the suspension and physics of the vehicle.
#3
07/05/2005 (1:18 pm)
Thanks for the feedback! So there's more to it than just creating the wheel animations to make the wheels rotate properly? Cause I'm an artist and the difficult thing is trying to figure if something is not working due to the art process or programming process. In this case, its trying to figure out why my wheels won't rotate in game. So do the meshes rotation values need to be manuallly animated ot does the engine automaticlly do that?
#4
Try exporting without animations at all and see what happens? Wish I could be of more help.
07/05/2005 (2:42 pm)
The engine automatically rotates the wheels, As for the other animation aspects that are automatically done I don't quite recall. If I still had my 3D Game Programming All In One book I could look it up but I gave it to my nefew and need to purchase a new one. I think in the wheel datablock though it had something about animation which was for the turning and you may have to animate that but again unsure.Try exporting without animations at all and see what happens? Wish I could be of more help.
#5
07/13/2005 (8:48 am)
Thanks for the responses! I noticed in the DTS docs there are 3 different animation threads that are supported by Wheeled vehicles in Torque: spring, turn, and wheel. While I've gotten the spring and turn sequences to function correctly, it seems the wheel sequences get triggered in a different manner. I know about making wheels as separate dts shapes, but in this situation I want to make the wheels part of my car dts.
#6
07/13/2005 (8:52 am)
Andrew, why are you so dead set on having the wheels be included in your vehicles dts?
#7
07/13/2005 (9:07 am)
Because I need the rear wheels to follow the movement of the trailer since it sways left and right. I tried animating the hub nodes, but the wheel position stays fixed while the trailer animates - so it looks kind of weird. 
#8
07/17/2005 (9:12 pm)
What are you guys calling your joints on the wheels so that Torque knows how to hook them up to the springs? 
Torque Owner David Tiernan