Orbital Station Expansion — Structural Load Planner

Station Expansion

Click a glowing port ring on the station, then confirm with Add Module. Every joint back to the core is colour-coded live by how much bending load it currently carries.

No port selected

Next module mass

–

Modules attached

Expansion Strategy

Structural Readout

Station total mass

20.0 t

Worst joint stress

Structural safety margin

100%

Joint safe — load well within margin

Joint elevated — approaching design limit

Joint critical / failed — arm blocked

How the load model works

Every module you berth adds its mass to the whole station's inertia, and the further out it sits on a chain, the longer the lever arm it puts on every joint back toward the core. Each joint's stress here is a simple cumulative bending-moment estimate: it sums mass × distance for every module still supported beyond that joint, then compares it against the joint's rated capacity.

A joint near the core, or one that only carries one short branch, sees a small moment and stays green.
The base joint of a long single-arm chain has to carry every module further out at ever-larger lever arms, so its stress climbs fast — that's the joint that redlines first.
Spreading new modules across several ports keeps every individual chain short, so no single joint accumulates enough leverage to fail.
Once a joint's stress reaches 100% it is marked failed (flashing red) and that arm stops accepting further modules — plan your sequence before it gets there.

Core / main truss Module Joint OK

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