Fun with Ion Engines

[Geschosskopf]

There seems to be a general consensus that ion engines are useless at worst, horribly boring at best. But I find them quite entertaining, especially when combined with mostly zero-mass airframe parts and the wonderful SP+ wings. Such as....

Anybody else enjoy ion engines?

Edited October 8, 2014 by Geschosskopf

[merendel]

Ions are fine for small craft. particularly since they got buffed a patch or two ago they are prety decent for small long range probes. Its just they are inefectual for large craft as burns can take hours even with tons of them. Still if your only pushing a craft thats a ton or so the TWR isnt horible compaired to most transfer stages so its a viable option.

[No one]

I generally use ion engines in getting Kerbals home. It's just so convenient, they weigh very little and they can get you from the surface of another world (other than moho, tylo, eve, and duna) back to Kerbin in a single stage.

[Jouni]

TWR isn't really a problem with ion engines anymore. You only need one engine for every 2-3 tonnes of payload to get TWR above 0.05, which is high enough that burns rarely last longer than 10-15 minutes with physics warp. The real problem is that you usually need 2-5 xenon containers per tonne of payload, increasing the part count ridiculously.

Of course, bigger xenon containers would make nuclear engines obsolete, except as lander engines in some specific situations.

[cantab]

Agreed, the .23.5 buff made them a lot more practical, if arguably OP. I just wish there were bigger engines and xenon tanks in stock; I've turned to Near Future Propulsion which is an excellent mod but really is OP compared to stock.

[moogoob]

I have a whole line of Ion-propelled solar-powered Landers for use on Minmus or other low-gravity worlds. Some of them have enough delta-v to take off from Minmus, fly to and land on Gilly, then come back. All it takes is a little abuse of massless parts and solar panels. Especially solar panels.

[Geschosskopf]

Agreed, the .23.5 buff made them a lot more practical, if arguably OP. I just wish there were bigger engines and xenon tanks in stock; I've turned to Near Future Propulsion which is an excellent mod but really is OP compared to stock.

It depends on what you mean by OP . I mean, this is KSP, where the laws of physics are very different at a fundamental level than those in the universe we inhabit. I mean, in KSP, the 4 fundamental forces have different values than here, the speed of light is not a limit on velocity, heat does not transfer by radiation, there are no conservation laws for mass or engery, Newton's 2nd Law isn't enforced in all cases, and the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics usually doesn't apply. Therefore, it is totally unreasonable to say something in KSP is "op" or "broken" when compared to something in this universe, because they're apples and oranges .

But anyway, I was just posting this to show that ion engines are fun for uses other than spacecraft. Such as being an alternative to jet engines for small airplanes. 70m/s might not seem very fast, but it's plenty fast enough when you're flying under bridges at KSC .

[Mitchz95]

I've never understood the appeal of ion engines. By the time you strap on all the Xenon and solar panels needed to keep the thing running (with a painful TWR) the design is way overcomplicated. Why not just use a simple LFO tank with a small engine?

[Sky_walker]

It depends on what you mean by OP . I mean, this is KSP, where the laws of physics are very different at a fundamental level than those in the universe we inhabit.

KSP doesn't have any "laws of physics".

But anyway, I was just posting this to show that ion engines are fun for uses other than spacecraft. Such as being an alternative to jet engines for small airplanes.

But... everyone already know that you can build planes propelled by ion engines.

I've never understood the appeal of ion engines. By the time you strap on all the Xenon and solar panels needed to keep the thing running (with a painful TWR) the design is way overcomplicated. Why not just use a simple LFO tank with a small engine?

Some people like to have efficient designs, and Ions are currently the most efficient engines in a game.

[lazarus1024]

Agreed, the .23.5 buff made them a lot more practical, if arguably OP. I just wish there were bigger engines and xenon tanks in stock; I've turned to Near Future Propulsion which is an excellent mod but really is OP compared to stock.

Speaking of, it would be cool if at some point a high ISP, low/medium thrust engine were added at some point above the xenon engines and possibly below the NERVA engine.

My thoughts are something like a VASMIR that takes either a lot of solar panels, or requires a nuclear power plant to power it, but can produce something like 20-40 thrust, around 1t of weight (1.5m part) and has an ISP in the 1,500 range.

Maybe a far future Fusion drive engine or something as a 2.5m part around 100 thrust, 3t and an ISP around 2,000.

Just vague general thoughts.

Anyway, it would be nice to having something with better ISP than the NERVA, vaguely similar thrust (+/-50%), somewhat less mass (probably, even if it requires a nuclear power plant weighing a few tons to power it, or multiple) and "futuristic". Something to aspire to above the current top of the tech tree, even if no FTL is ever added to KSP, it would be cool to see some more futuristic drive types at higher than current tech trees (just like it would be cool to see an honest to goodness scramjet eventually, maybe even something like a Busard Ramscoop to as a topest level engine tech that has "unlimited" ISP, but produces modestly low thrust at modest weight, but takes a huge amount of power).

Edited October 8, 2014 by lazarus1024
added studd

[Geschosskopf]

KSP doesn't have any "laws of physics".

Sure it does, and you can discover them the same way folks in this universe discovered the laws here, by performing experiments and making observations. Not the experiments that score science points in career mode, but actual physical experiments. If you do this, you will discover that KSP does in fact have its own set of internally consistent laws of physics that are different from the laws of physics in this universe. That of course is no problem from a realism standpoint because our own physics contemplates parallel universes with different physical laws than we have, as a way to explain why our physical laws are they way they are.

But... everyone already know that you can build planes propelled by ion engines.

Yeah, but they weren't ever much fun before. 20 minutes to reach Airbase Island, if you remember . Now, however, ion planes rock and maybe not many people know it yet. It's a combination of several factors: the buffing of the stock ion engine, certain key stock parts becoming massless, and now the smaller SP+ wing parts.

[nine_iron]

Ha you Americans and your Fun-Ions

[cantab]

It is totally unreasonable to say something in KSP is "op" or "broken" when compared to something in this universe

Did you not read the bit of my post that said "compared to stock"?

[Geschosskopf]

Did you not read the bit of my post that said "compared to stock"?

Do you not recall saying the stock ion was OP compared to stock?

[SorryDave]

I use a twin ion engine lander for minmus science missions, mostly so I can call it a TIE lander. It docks with a science lab in orbit to recharge equipment. Works great...during the day.

[rentaspoon]

I've never understood the appeal of ion engines. By the time you strap on all the Xenon and solar panels needed to keep the thing running (with a painful TWR) the design is way overcomplicated. Why not just use a simple LFO tank with a small engine?

They are light weight and make good low orbit mun landers, I've made a few "life boats" for stranded Kerbal and the fuel efficiency was better than a LFO lander.

But apart from that they are pointless to me.

[Mitchz95]

They are light weight and make good low orbit mun landers, I've made a few "life boats" for stranded Kerbal and the fuel efficiency was better than a LFO lander.

But apart from that they are pointless to me.

Yeah, I guess they make good lifeboats. My current flagship has an ion-powered escape pod on board for when things go south; it has 2,000m/s which should be enough to safely enter a stable orbit if I find myself falling into an atmosphere without the main engines. Not a lot of room for life support, though.

[moogoob]

I use a twin ion engine lander for minmus science missions, mostly so I can call it a TIE lander. It docks with a science lab in orbit to recharge equipment. Works great...during the day.

One of my older designs has two engines.

If you make it lighter, you can get away with only one. Less power consumption and greater delta-v at the cost of TWR.

[Madrias]

Ion Engines + Procedural Wings = Ion Gliders. Best way, in my opinion, to travel if speed is not essential.