Keen Software House’s Space Engineers graduated from Early Access at the start of March. The game continues to receive some pretty cool mods for the space sim, including a tunnel boring machine.
The 15 meter diameter drill will basically penetrate any surface within Space Engineers and drill a hole while filling in the gaps with plate sectors, essentially allowing you to create large underground transportation passages, or your very own evil underground lair… like a space-faring version of Elon Musk.
A demonstration of this extremely complex mod was outlined in a video by Youtuber JackRPG.
You can check out the eight minute demonstration below, which covers the functionality of the tunnel boring machine as well as the mechanical functions that allow for extended pipe-laying.
The creator of the mod, OctoMoose, explained that it can be a little tricky getting the hang of it, but offered some advice in the comment section, writing…
“Just a quick tip to anyone watching: Don’t hit the “3” immediately after starting, you should just hit 1 and 4. “3” is mainly for restarting the tbm if you’ve stopped the cycle for some reason. 1 and 3 do the same thing, 3 builds full tunnel and 1 builds a guide rail onto the launch platform before autotriggering 3 in following cycles :)”
This is a very realistic modification for Space Engineers, so it’s not like you can just plop it into the world and just turn on it. You first have to lay down a guiding rod and then move the tunnel boring machine close to the wall where you plan to drill so that it aligns with the rock or dirt surface.
You’ll need to make sure that everything is properly operational so that the generators are feeding power to the drill, and that the assemblers are properly working with the erector to build out the tunnel while the drill is boring through the surface.
As showcased in the video above, you can align the TBM to drill horizontally or vertically, which is great if you plan on building a sinkhole in the water that leads down into an underground base or facility.
Alternatively this works well for anyone looking to build out a tunnel for underground transportation.
The only thing you’ll need to keep in mind is that you’ll need to manually dispose of the ore ingots otherwise as the tunnel boring machine keeps going for a long period of time it’ll end up getting too heavy and collapsing in on itself.
Otherwise it’s a pretty simple four-button setup that will allow you to build some rather large and impressive underground structures.
You can download the tunnel boring machine from over on the Steam Workshop page. Just click on the big green ‘Subscribe’ button.
If you’re interested in other realistic construction and industrial equipment, there’s a Workshop collection you can check out that features everything you need to get started.
Space Engineers is available right now for just $19.99 over on the Steam store.
