Retro Thrust?

[davidweb]

I'm a born-again newbie (haven't played in like four or five years)... I've tried playing both on a laptop as well as a regular desktop with a joystick... but I cannot seem to get retro-thrust to work. With zero thrust, I've hit the "-" on the numpad, I've tried it with ctrl first, etc. Am I missing something silly here?

Please help! I'm about to set up a final approach to the ISS and obviously retrothrusts would be immensely helpful!

Thanks!
David

 

[Urwumpe]

not all spacecraft have retro thrusters. And some, like the DG, disable retrothrust when the thrusters can't be used, for example because the RETRODOORS are closed.

 

[davidweb]

Oooo good... Now I'm getting somewhere. I should have been more clear: I am using the DG. Next obvious question is how do I open the retrodoors?

 

[Scarecrow]

Oooo good... Now I'm getting somewhere. I should have been more clear: I am using the DG. Next obvious question is how do I open the retrodoors?

Open the doors by flipping the switch on the right of the 2D panel (press <F8> to see it).

 

[Andy44]

I don't think there is a hot key for the retro doors. Go to the virtual cockpit and look at the rocker switches on the panel on the right side of the cockpit. One of them opens the retro doors.

 

[myles]

or hit control-space and look at the dialog box

 

[polaris149Tiberius]

Or

Or you can hit numpad / and use the RCS in translation mode. But this is not retro thrust its RCS. You should hear "translation". Hit again and you will hear "rotation" This is how LOLA slows to station keeping.
Good luck and welcome back to Orbiter.

 

[Master of Blades]

Depending on your CVEL (Closing Velocity), you might want to use translational RCS rather than retro, however, if you need to "slow down" quickly, or have ALOT of CVEL, you would want to use the retro thrusters (or perhaps even the main engines, depending on your CVEL).

 

[ar81]

If you use laptop, you might like to remap keys
[ame="http://www.orbithangar.com/searchid.php?ID=2848"]Keybinder Wizard 1.0[/ame]