Archive: 20 posts

---

After much frustration and annoyance with the immensely aggrivating wobble bolt, I decided it was time to find out what exactly made it work. I'm pretty sure I finally nailed down how it works. I tested out the "opposite of where you think it would be" theory posted earlier and I couldn't find any evidence to reinforce it. So, I decided to do some tests, since it seems to always be totally random how far off the angle is and just where it's going to end up. Here is what I found: The wobble bolt acts in respect to the rear object's INITIAL UPWARD ORIENTATION. With this in mind it's actually quite easy to build with the wobble bolts. I understand that this isn't at all clear, so let me walk you through how I came to this conclusion. When you create an object, like a right angle triangle, the top point is what is considered to be the initial upwards orientation. However, unfortunately, it's more complicated than just how you've placed the object. When the shape is selected from the menu to be placed, the upwards orientation has already been defined. If you rotate the triangle to lay on a different side (before you even press X to place it into the level), the upwards orientation will also be rotated. It makes things a real pain... if you want to build practically anything you have to know how exactly you initially made that object. This orientation will be retained, even if you completely draw over the shape. (make a triangle with wood, draw over the it with a bigger square that is rotated. the triangle's original upward orientation will be preserved, the square's will be ignored). If you draw over the shape with a different material, the Initial Upwards Orientation of that material will be the one that is referenced, since it is not in anyway a part of the prior shape. Walkthrough: To familiarize yourself with this annoyance, take any shape (to make the test easier, take one with flat sides... square, pentagon, hexagon). Without rotating it at all, place it into your level on a level surface. Take out a sticker (I used an arrow sticker) and point that sticker towards the top of your shape. Next pick a shape (for testing purposes, just use the arrow) and point it in the same direction of your sticker. Stick this infront of your object to be bolted to it. Next, take out your wobble bolt, and bolt the two together. You should notice that the arrow will oscillate back and forth around the arrow. Next, delete the bolt. Rotate your shape (a right angle triangle is best for illustrating this) until it lies flat on a different side. Place your arrow upwards (this time NOT aligned with the sticker) and bolt the two together. You'll notice that the arrow will immediately go back to oscillating around the sticker you placed earlier. The initial upwards orientation of the object has been rotated, and now the display that is placed on top of the wobble bolt when editing is oriented wrong. But you can make some sense of why you always have to constantly fuss with the angle/direction values. Likely, you haven't been taking this into consideration. Finally, to complete the exercise of understanding how this thing works, We're going to make a totally new shape. Select the right angle triangle from the menu, rotate it to the left so it's resting on the side, and [i]then place it. Once again place your arrow sticker upwards toward the top of the pentagon and bolt your arrow shape in line with the sticker. You'll immediately notice that the arrow does not oscillate around the sticker, but this time around the point to the left hand side. When you initially select the triangle shape, the initial upwards orientation has already been defined. By rotating the shape before bolting things to it, you can see how you're making it much much more difficult for yourself. Here's what I'm getting at, in picture form... I hope this helps. (Thanks Risen for creating the image!) http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/2554/wobblebolthe0.png Final notes: *All of this is assuming that the front object is movable. If for some reason the front object has been glued down (or is just immobile), then the angle on the rear object will be reversed. Due to them physics laws, if the wobble bolt is pushing in a direction on an object, but that object refuses to move, the opposite effect will be applied to the other object that is movable. This means that if the front object is not movable, you'll have to apply the opposite angle to achieve the desired results. *Another frustration that a lot of people are seeing is the angle being reversed. After some testing, it has been confirmed that when you mirror an object the initial upward orientation is mirrored as well. This means that if you attempt to rotate an object on the wobble bolt 90 degrees clockwise, it will react by rotating 90 degrees counter clockwise. This could be the source of a LOT of confusion with some users, and fully explains the "opposite of where you think it would be" theories that have been floating around. *The chronological order in which you create your objects to be bolted together is irrelevant. *Despite numerous claims that the wobble bolt is effected by weight, it is completely oblivious to weight distribution. I will be continuing to add more to this guide as I have a chance to test it. I plan on doing more testing tonight to clarify a few points. I will post my results once I have them. I hope this helps all you creators start creatorizing in a much more efficient manner!! I know it'll help me!

2009-01-19 15:45:00 Author: Inspectigater Posts: 126

---

Wow. This explanation is awesome and totally make sense according to my experiences with wobble bolts. It's hard to believe MM came up with such a bad design though. Seriously, the wobble bolt shouldn't mind the piece's orientation a single bit!! I seriously want to slap the programmer that made those bolt in the face. So not user friendly...

2009-01-19 18:33:00 Author: RangerZero Posts: 3901

---

Something I find helpful is to place a bolt down and adjust it slowly while in play mode. You can get a feel for which way it's orientating itself, and can hopefully avoid forcing it to move where it will collide with something else unintentionally and break. If you pause a wobble bolt and adjust it, it will often do all sorts of spins to try and get itself to the orientation it thinks it needs to be. This is often where it will break itself. If you can avoid adjustments in pause mode then you can likely avoid this. It always needs to "wobble" a bit to sort itself out. It's also important to remember as well if you have a switch attached to a wobble bolt which is making it stop, it will likely do it's self correcting thing next time it's fired. So that might be why it's breaking things as soon as it's activated. If you really need to adjust a bolt while paused or stopped, be sure you know which angles it is referencing to so it does not snap itself. But overall it's a very interesting theory and a well written guide. Wobble bolts are great when they work, but getting them calibrated sure can be a pain.

2009-01-19 20:25:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

---

Does this mean that If I make a tiny square of a material before I make any object, then make the actually object over it and on the same level (so the square essentially "disapears") that it will always have vertical orientation? Even if the object is turned? This thread is VERY helpful, thanks Can somebody explain the difference between B and C in the picture please? I don't see what the triangles do to affect anything..

2009-01-19 21:55:00 Author: Pinchanzee Posts: 805

---

That is a really well detailed explanation. Think this might just help conquer those frustrating times spent tinkering them wobble bolts

2009-01-19 22:08:00 Author: KAPBAM Posts: 1348

---

Does this mean that If I make a tiny square of a material before I make any object, then make the actually object over it and on the same level (so the square essentially "disapears") that it will always have vertical orientation? Even if the object is turned? This thread is VERY helpful, thanks Can somebody explain the difference between B and C in the picture please? I don't see what the triangles do to affect anything.. Yeah, I'm fairly certain that it means exactly, that. I can't see any reason why it wouldn't. Which as you said, is enormously helpful. Keeping this in mind should help anyone make things dramatically easier. As far as the difference between B and C, Risen made the diagram. I asked him about the difference, and he said that it illustrated my point better... so I went with it ^^. The primary reason for C is to show that despite the rotation of the shape BEFORE placing it in the level, the initial upward orientation has been rotated as well. But I agree, the sticker in the different position is a bit confusing... however he has illustrator available to him, and I have mspaint... I think that's explanation enough. Thanks for all the nice comments I try to be clear.

2009-01-19 23:27:00 Author: Inspectigater Posts: 126

---

Ah this is great. Good explanation and tactic to find it out and illustrate it (I keep underestimating the power of stickers). EXTREMELY helpfull. I think that if I'm going to make something with a wobble bolt next time, I'll just slap a temporary arrow on the material... In response to the "live tweaking" It works fine, if you have the room. If you have a door that hasn't got the space to fully rotate it becomes quite a frustrating excercise.

2009-01-20 08:14:00 Author: Wyth Posts: 263

---

B shows an object that is drawn and then rotated. C shows an object that is rotated before being drawn. (You pick the shape to drawn with, rotate it, and then draw). If you make a point to always place the sticker so that it shows where the game thinks 'up' is, you'll never get confused even if you rotate the shape later. I don't think Inspectigater did any tests with adding additional material to the original shape.

2009-01-20 14:27:00 Author: Risen Posts: 251

---

I don't think Inspectigater did any tests with adding additional material to the original shape. I did a few basic tests. I created a pentagon with the upwards sticker arrow and drew entirely over it with a crooked square of the same material. This overwriting with the square yielded no change in the initial upwards orientation... aka, the initial upwards orientation of the pentagon was preserved, regardless of modifications via the square. So if you were to create a small object, like mentioned above, sticker it for your own sanity, and then draw over it, I see no reason why you would not retain it's initial upward orientation.

2009-01-20 14:42:00 Author: Inspectigater Posts: 126

---

Finally a reason for the madness!!! Thanks for posting this awesome tip and walkthrough!!! You probably have saved many hours of frustration from creators!!

2009-01-20 14:51:00 Author: Mattrick Posts: 214

---

I've added a final notes section, I will also be adding more to this guide soon. Have a few more questions I've thought up that need to be clarified.

2009-01-20 16:12:00 Author: Inspectigater Posts: 126

---

EDIT: TO BE TESTED. After talking over a bit of this with Risen, we believe that the direction that your wobble bolt will rotate to will also be mirrored if the object itself has been mirrored (ie: if you tell it to rotate 90 degree clockwise it will actually rotate 90 degrees counter clockwise). In other words, we have reason to believe that when any object is mirrored, the initial upwards orientation is also mirrored. Whoa that makes sense. I'm getting the urge to go mess with wobble bolts just from reading this thread xD You should definitely make a video if you can, and post it here and on the LittleBigWorkshop in the workshops section! Bet people will be extremely happy to have this figured out!

2009-01-20 16:33:00 Author: KAPBAM Posts: 1348

---

Yeah, I'll certainly post it over there. Just want to put the finishing touches on this, first.

2009-01-20 16:36:00 Author: Inspectigater Posts: 126

---

After some short testing last night, we've confirmed the mirrored object theory.

2009-01-21 13:11:00 Author: Risen Posts: 251

---

What picture C is showing is that the engine automatically rotates the bolt to the final position and then starts it's rotate cycle. Even though the thing being rotated is "up", it forces it to what it "thinks" is up. Is that right? It's just that because it suddenly leaps to the final point, this might be confusing for some people.

2009-01-22 00:25:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

---

What picture C is showing is that the engine automatically rotates the bolt to the final position and then starts it's rotate cycle. Even though the thing being rotated is "up", it forces it to what it "thinks" is up. C is there to demonstrate that the shapes themselves have an initial upward orientation. If you rotate the shape, and then place it, the change is irrelevant as the orientation will be rotated as well. The rest of the image is just showing how the same process in B can be repeated and achieve the same results although different methods were used to get there.

2009-01-22 14:19:00 Author: Inspectigater Posts: 126

---

Thanks a lot! That was very easy to understand, Wobble Bolts have always been trial and error for me. They're so weirdly made, you'd think MM would have made it more user-friendly. http://i.neoseeker.com/mgv/272671-Blackfalcon/671/5/animal0064hb2_display.gif

2010-05-06 19:54:00 Author: Blackfalcon Posts: 409

---

Hmm...an interesting theory which actually makes sense when you think about it.

2010-05-18 01:49:00 Author: Ungreth Posts: 2130

---

Figured out a version of this for myself a while ago Good to see it all written out and fancy-like!

2010-05-25 08:34:00 Author: KablooieKablam Posts: 364

---

oh the irony, if its not affected by weight explain to me why i could not get a wobble bolt on a small object, rotate a significantly larger object. it moved, just not higher than / <--- those lines. had to add a piston to help the weight, then it worked instantly

2010-06-05 06:19:00 Author: johnrulz77 Posts: 835

Posts: 1077139    Threads: 69970    Members: 9661    Archive-Date: 2019-01-19

Aus dem Archiv wurden alle persönlichen Daten wie Name, Anschrift, Email etc. - aber auch sämtliche Inhalte wie z.B. persönliche Nachrichten - entfernt.
Die Nutzung dieser Webseite erfolgt ohne Speicherung personenbezogener Daten. Es werden keinerlei Cookies, Logs, 3rd-Party-Plugins etc. verwendet.