Smallest omnidirectional frame motor? Just 5 blocks

[gavjenks]

Inside the assembler (this could be a deployer. I just made it an assembler to make the following descriptions easier to understand since there is also a deployer inside the turtle)

1 screwdriver

Inside the turtle

1 frame motor

1 deployer

1 solar panel

1 screwdriver

2 frames

To move up or down:

1) turtle moves around to the side of the assembler, to control it

2) turtle places the deployer underneath the assembler.

3) assembler screwdrivers the deployer to face to the side (powered by turtle)

4) turtle "drops" the frame motor into the deployer's inventory

5) deployer deploys the frame motor (powered by the turtle)

5B) the frame motor will be pointing down by default (this only happens when the deployer deploys it, not the turtle). But if you want to go up, the turtle now "drops" its screwdriver into the deployer, then activates the deployer twice to reorient the frame motor upward. If you want to go down, just leave things as they are.

6) The turtle sucks out the screwdriver (if applicable) then digs the deployer

7) the turtle places a frame where the deployer was.

8) the turtle moves back and places another frame, so all 4 frames are connected in an "L" shape in front of the now correctly oriented frame motor.

9) the turtle moves around and places the bluetricity solar panel above the frame motor.

10) the turtle waits until the frame motor is charged, then digs the panel, moves down, and activates the frame motor, pushing everything up or down.

11) The turtle digs the frame motor and the frames, and moves to catch up with the rest of the rig one up or one down. Machine is now in its previous state, but one block higher or lower (including anything and everything attached to the 1 permanent frame, which is the highest one up in the above screenshot).

If you want to move in any of the 4 horizontal directions:

1) turtle places a deployer under the assembler.

2) the assembler screwdrivers the deployer so it is facing to the side where the turtle is in the above screenshot (it has since moved out of the way and is now powering the assembler)

3) turtle places the frame motor directly in front of the deployer. Unlike assemblers or deployers, which always palce frame motors with the tracks facing one side, a turtle will always place a frame motor with tracks facing up. I have no idea why this is, but it makes this whole thing possible.

4) turtle "drops" its screwdriver into the deployer's inventory.

5) deployer screwdrivers the frame motor so it is facing in the desired direction, any of the 4 horizontal directions being possible. (deployer powered by turtle)

6) turtle sucks out screwdriver and digs the deployer.

7) The turtle digs the frame which is above the frame motor now.

8) turtle places the solar panel where the frame was (so it is on top of the frame motor), and waits for the frame motor to charge.

9) turtle digs the solar panel and replaces it with the frame again.

10) turtle activates the frame motor from a direction which will not cause it to be in the way (depends on overall direction of movement selected)

11) turtle digs the frame motor and catches up with the rest of the rig. The whole rig is now as it was before, but one block to any of the 4 sides, along with anything attached to the one permanent frame (the highest one in the screenshot)

So do I win? =) Only 5 blocks exist in the world in its resting state, and only 10 blocks total, including in the inventory of the turtle. Only ONE frame motor is used. And yet the setup can (slowly) move 1000 block frame construction in all 6 directions.

NOTE: the above was using computercraft 1.4, which allows you to interact with inventories directly. If you're playing with currently standard tekkit computercraft, you can still get this to work, but it is a bit more complicated, requiring the turtle to also carry a transposer and a pneumatic tube or two so it can drop stuff and then have it injected into inventories

Bonus Edit:

If you free up one additional inventory slot by sharing the screwdriver between the assembler and the turtle, then it could actually carry around its own entire MFFS force field system + HV solar + lapotron crystal to protect the frame ship at a moment's notice (set up time probably about 5 seconds)

Or alternatively, 2 portable, separate, 6 directional scatter beam/explosive laser turrets

[Xylord]

That is bloody amazing, my friend. Just by curiosity, about how much code does all of this need?

[gavjenks]

Wait, I'm an idiot. Those top two blocks are leftover from an earlier, less efficient plan, and it never even occurred to me to remove them. it's actually THREE blocks.

And technically, both the frame and the deployer could be stored inside the turtle and placed every turn. The single "everything in one turtle" possibility would still have its uses though, for instance in transporting the whole thing on site to pick up a frame sled and tow it somewhere, etc. I.e., when the system is not actually towing anything, it can just move around as a simple turtle. But when it is towing something, there would be no need to store those two blocks (just extra unnecessary steps)

So

^That is possible (and useful for moving it around when it is not towing anything). Although please note that if you do this, you will have to reorient the whole rest of the machine to accommodate whatever direction a turtle naturally places an assembler in.

That is bloody amazing, my friend. Just by curiosity, about how much code does all of this need?

Very very little, actually. It would pretty much just be a bunch of short scripts spelling out exactly what the turtle should do step by step, like what I wrote above (but more painstakingly detailed, obviously). Not anything very clever or coding complicated though. Then you would have a tiny shell program that just listens for wireless instructions and decides which of the 6 scripts to run

Shrug.

The main disadvantage is not coding. The disadvantage is that it would move like 5x slower than other frame motors. However I think this is MASSIVELY made up for in most situations in terms of ease of deployability, cheapness, and the fact that once you write the code, you can upload it to pastebin and make another one of these in like 10 minutes, even in survival.

NOTE: to help in practical situations, you may want to add a few more blocks to have a permanent battery and solar panel sitting there. Wouldn't be quite as small, but it would make the whole thing move VASTLY more quickly, since waiting for the frame motor to charge from scratch is the main bottleneck here.