[1.12.x] Kerbal Atomics: fancy nuclear engines! (August 18, 2024)

[Cynor]

2 hours ago, B-STRK said:

If I'm interpreting your request right, which is that you don't mind the Nerva not having the LH2 option and just using LF for the rest of your game, you could just open up the Patches/NTR folder within KerbalAtomics and deleting the patch referring to Squad parts, which reverts the LV-N to stock behavior. Though if I got it wrong, please feel free to ignore this.

You're not 100% wrong there, and indeed that is the easy solution I may use, but ideally I'd like to find/write a patch that adds the option to toggle between the two. There is one for Interstellar Fuel Switch posted earlier, but one for B9 would be nice since I'm not 100% sure if that is in my mod list atm and I know B9 is. 

[Nertea]

B9 doesn't have the ability to do this unfortunately. You're better off just implementing ModuleMultiEngine and having two engine modes. 

On 8/12/2017 at 7:38 AM, B-STRK said:

I really really really am sorry for bringing this up, Nertea, especially now that you're working on SSX after having passed through all the other mods in your family, and bringing up either a bug or an oversight would cause schedules to slip (and I may just incur everyone's wrath at this point). But with the latest update making all tanks coolable... well for USI spherical and cylindrical tanks it does bring up the "disable cooling/enable cooling" toggle. But once launched, no cooling effect, no power draw for any cooling enabled tanks, no toggle to switch it on or off... and with LH2 loaded, no boil-off despite cooling disabled in editor prior to launch (And for the cluster tanks, no enable/disable option at all). With stock tanks the effect is applied. I guess it might be unique to the USI tanks?

Really really really sorry for bringing this up and potentially causing schedules to slip please don't kill me and everyone else please don't kill me if the schedule slips as a result i wanna see improved station parts expansion too

If I'm interpreting your request right, which is that you don't mind the Nerva not having the LH2 option and just using LF for the rest of your game, you could just open up the Patches/NTR folder within KerbalAtomics and deleting the patch referring to Squad parts, which reverts the LV-N to stock behavior. Though if I got it wrong, please feel free to ignore this.

That sounds kinda weird. can you tell me what tanks exactly?

[blowfish]

Am I interpreting correctly that you want to have nukes on vessels already in flight use LF, but have newly launched ones use LH2?  I think this could be done via a part upgrade.

[B-STRK]

4 hours ago, Nertea said:

[snip]

That sounds kinda weird. can you tell me what tanks exactly?

Tested this against a clean install, only Kerbal Atomics and USI Core (where the tanks come from) installed, with latest dependencies (in Core's case, there is a later separate update of USI_Tools than that found in Core (changelog dated May 31 for the update vs. May 25 in the latest Core download), also installed. Can confirm the same behavior as I indicated earlier, with the following tanks:

• "Kontainer Tank", all sizes (1.25/2.5/3.75/5m): PAW displays toggle for "Enable/Disable Cooling" in editor. In-game PAW only displays USI Logistics own toggles (Local/Planetary Warehouse), no other toggles or switches. No boil-off if LH2 is loaded, no power draw even if cooling is enabled in editor. 
• "Kontainer Tank - Round", all sizes: same behavior as above.
• "Kontainer Tank - Mk V Saddle Tank": same behavior as above
• "Kontainer Tank - Cluster", all sizes: no "Enable/Disable Cooling" toggle in editor PAW or in flight scene. No power draw or boil-off. 

And this is even when these tanks and both your own cryo tanks and stock tanks with LH2 are on the same vessel: your tanks and stock tanks have cooling, boil-off and appropriate power draws (and if the stock tanks are loaded with anything but LH2 or LH2/Ox, the cooling function is appropriately suppressed as advertised), but the Kontainers with LH2 right next to them don't act the same way (they behave like stock tanks, except with USI Logistics functions, which I think I can't access anyway since I don't have MKS installed).

Would you need an output log, just in case? (And thanks for all your work, Nertea! )

[Stratickus]

3 hours ago, blowfish said:

Am I interpreting correctly that you want to have nukes on vessels already in flight use LF, but have newly launched ones use LH2?  I think this could be done via a part upgrade.

I think you were responding to Cynor, but I'll chime in here, since I had requested a B9 option a few posts back.

My proposal was to have a B9 option to switch the fuel used by the LV-N (none of the additional engines added by KA) in the VAB/SPH only. In an effort to lock the player into a design choice of using either LF or LH2 (not both) for their LV-N application. For my use, the LH2 for rocket designs and LF for Space planes/SSTO's.

However, as Nertea pointed out, using the Multi mode option would probably be easier to implement. This seems a bit cheaty/overpowered to me, turning the LV-N into a bimodal/augmented motor as opposed to a dual fuel motor. That's how I imagine it anyway. I tried to implement the multi mode option via MM because I thought it would be easier, but I was unsuccessful. Perhaps as the keeper of B9 part switch, you may better suited to implement such an option. Or at the very least see if its possible.

Cheers,

[blowfish]

12 minutes ago, Stratickus said:

I think you were responding to Cynor, but I'll chime in here, since I had requested a B9 option a few posts back.

My proposal was to have a B9 option to switch the fuel used by the LV-N (none of the additional engines added by KA) in the VAB/SPH only. In an effort to lock the player into a design choice of using either LF or LH2 (not both) for their LV-N application. For my use, the LH2 for rocket designs and LF for Space planes/SSTO's.

However, as Nertea pointed out, using the Multi mode option would probably be easier to implement. This seems a bit cheaty/overpowered to me, turning the LV-N into a bimodal/augmented motor as opposed to a dual fuel motor. That's how I imagine it anyway. I tried to implement the multi mode option via MM because I thought it would be easier, but I was unsuccessful. Perhaps as the keeper of B9 part switch, you may better suited to implement such an option. Or at the very least see if its possible.

Cheers,

B9 Part Switch can't currently interact with other modules (e.g. engines), so that option is out for the foreseeable future.

[Nertea]

11 hours ago, B-STRK said:

Tested this against a clean install, only Kerbal Atomics and USI Core (where the tanks come from) installed, with latest dependencies (in Core's case, there is a later separate update of USI_Tools than that found in Core (changelog dated May 31 for the update vs. May 25 in the latest Core download), also installed. Can confirm the same behavior as I indicated earlier, with the following tanks:

• "Kontainer Tank", all sizes (1.25/2.5/3.75/5m): PAW displays toggle for "Enable/Disable Cooling" in editor. In-game PAW only displays USI Logistics own toggles (Local/Planetary Warehouse), no other toggles or switches. No boil-off if LH2 is loaded, no power draw even if cooling is enabled in editor. 
• "Kontainer Tank - Round", all sizes: same behavior as above.
• "Kontainer Tank - Mk V Saddle Tank": same behavior as above
• "Kontainer Tank - Cluster", all sizes: no "Enable/Disable Cooling" toggle in editor PAW or in flight scene. No power draw or boil-off. 

And this is even when these tanks and both your own cryo tanks and stock tanks with LH2 are on the same vessel: your tanks and stock tanks have cooling, boil-off and appropriate power draws (and if the stock tanks are loaded with anything but LH2 or LH2/Ox, the cooling function is appropriately suppressed as advertised), but the Kontainers with LH2 right next to them don't act the same way (they behave like stock tanks, except with USI Logistics functions, which I think I can't access anyway since I don't have MKS installed).

Would you need an output log, just in case? (And thanks for all your work, Nertea! )

This is a problem with USI Core. This file is an outdated spec. I will make a PR to fix this today but it'll be up to @RoverDude to release the change. 

edit - PR is done

Edited August 15, 2017 by Nertea

[TheRagingIrishman]

11 minutes ago, Nertea said:

This is a problem with USI Core. This file is an outdated spec. I will make a PR to fix this today but it'll be up to @RoverDude to release the change. 

Merged

[B-STRK]

Forgive me for another question--though anyone besides Nertea can chime in to help, just looking for some help in MM patch editing (which, though I know usually am encouraged to learn, still isn't exactly a strength of mine, and I'm not sure how to transplant the configs I see in KA to this target. Also, if I'm posting on the wrong board, and should have gone to the other mod instead, I will gladly appreciate the correction.)

Stock Mining Extension's Size 3 ISRU should be able to produce LH2, based on the KA patch it comes with. But, in-game there's no option to produce the LH2 at all, just the stock resources. (The atmospheric condensers the mod introduces does produce LH2 though). This is what it says in the patch:

@PART[SMX_Size3ISRU]:NEEDS[KerbalAtomics]
{
	MODULE
	{
		 name = ModuleResourceConverter
		 ConverterName = LH2
		 StartActionName = Start ISRU [LH2]
		 StopActionName = Stop ISRU [LH2]
		AutoShutdown = true
		TemperatureModifier
		{
			key = 0 50000
			key = 750 25000
			key = 1000 5000
			key = 1250 2500	
			key = 2000 2500	
			key = 4000 0
		}				
		GeneratesHeat = true
		DefaultShutoffTemp = .8
		ThermalEfficiency 
		{
			key = 0 0 0 0
			key = 500 0.9 0 0
			key = 1000 1.0 0 0
			key = 1250 0.9 0 0
			key = 1500 0.5 0 0
			key = 3000 0.0 0 0 
		}
		UseSpecialistBonus = true
		SpecialistEfficiencyFactor = 0.2
		SpecialistBonusBase = 0.05
		Specialty = Engineer
		EfficiencyBonus = 1

		 
		 INPUT_RESOURCE
		 {
			ResourceName = Ore
			Ratio = 2
		 }
		 INPUT_RESOURCE
		 {
			ResourceName = ElectricCharge
			Ratio = 45
		 }
		 OUTPUT_RESOURCE
		 {
			ResourceName = LqdHydrogen
			Ratio = 3.6
			DumpExcess = false
		 }
	}

}

What correction would I have to apply (either by editing the SMX patch directly or via a separate MM patch) to restore the intended LH2 functionality? Thanks! (Would save on some part count, methinks)

[mikerl]

On 8/6/2017 at 11:38 AM, Stratickus said:

@mikerl Did you ever finish the B9 version of this patch?

Or does anyone have a working MM patch that effectively does what mikerl was trying to do?

I do not use IFS, so this patch does not work properly for me. I messed around with it a bit, but was unsuccessful. I'd like to do what mikerl was attempting to do, for essentially the same reasons. 

My ideal preference would be a B9 part switcher (if this is possible) type to make the stock LV-N use either LH2 or LF, in order to more or less lock the decision to use one fuel over the other in the editor. As opposed to the mulitmode/bimodal RAPIER style, which allows you to change fuel in flight/mid mission. 

I attempted a MM patch using the RAPIER config as a template, but the patch did not work. I think it might be because the LV-N uses the older ModuleEngines and a multimode engine requires the newer ModuleEnginesFX but I'm not sure. Either way, my MM abilities are insufficient to achieve what I am trying to do, but I figured someone else has probably done this successfully.

Cheers,

@Stratickus, When I made that patch, I tried to make it a multi-mode engine where i could switch the engine type to use different fuel types.  The IFS tank switcher was to change the mass of the engine, since Nertea rebalanced masses of the engines as well.  I had problems with effects not changing correctly. and eventually gave up on the project.  The easier solution was to change the patches from "@PART" to "+PART" which creates duplicates that each have separate fuel and masses and does not change existing ships.

Never did make it for B9 as that was starting to become popular at the time, so I was less familiar with it.  The upgrade system did not exist then either.  I posted the code knowing others might have the same problem and so others could help improve it.

This is the second time this has been brought up, which makes me feel like trying to finish it, or at least collaborating to do so.

[Trash_Lord]

Hey-love this mod, I've just got two(hopefully simple) questions:

1. Do the exhaust animations interface with realism overhaul (more specifically realplume)? 

I've been having issues with it and was wondering if it was a quick fix on my end, or a more complicated issue.

2. Is there a correct way to create patches for the engine stats? (I've been using really ugly code for liquid methane/ammonia variants)

Thanks in advance for anyone who can answer!

[mikerl]

Ok, Now I went back and reviewed my code.  Only a small portion of which is actually for IFS and most of it is for turning the Nerva into a dual-mode engine.  It was never actually tied into engine mode, but it could change the mass of the engine based on a choice the player makes in the VAB.

Spoiler

@PART[nuclearEngineDM]:FINAL
{
	MODULE
	{
		name = InterstellarFuelSwitch
		resourceNames = LiquidFuel;Hydrogen
		resourceGui = Liquid Fuel;Hydrogen
		resourceAmounts = 0;0
		basePartMass = 3
		tankMass = 0;-0.5
		displayCurrentTankCost = false
		hasGUI = true
		availableInFlight = false
		availableInEditor = true
		showInfo = false
	}
}

This is the only code that pertains to IFS and can be deleted leaving the mass for the Nerva at the default value 3t.

@blowfish, how would this code be written for B9?  It starts with default mass for the "Liquid Fuel" variation, then changes the mass to the value Nertea changed it to which is 2.5t for the "Hydrogen" version.  For IFS, I had it add a negative mass to reduce it.  I wanted to maintain the default mass for any current ships, but be able to use the updated mass for new vessels.

I think the upgrade system can also change mass, but I haven't looked into doing that.

[Crixomix]

Nertea, could you help me understand why your Kerbal Atomics Mod, coupled with your NFE mod, make the basic LV-N nuclear engine cost over 50k funds? As far as I could tell (I could be wrong, I don't know much) it looked like a patch in your "extras" folder in your Kerbal Atomics mod says "MM config to set fancy nuclear engines if NFE is around". and then a few lines down, there's an @cost += and then a huge number. This seems to be true for all of your nuclear engines. Why they get so expensive yo? I don't have those kinds of funds! If I don't like it should I just change those costs to something I like better? Could you help me understand why you make them so expensive?

[Nertea]

6 minutes ago, Crixomix said:

Nertea, could you help me understand why your Kerbal Atomics Mod, coupled with your NFE mod, make the basic LV-N nuclear engine cost over 50k funds? As far as I could tell (I could be wrong, I don't know much) it looked like a patch in your "extras" folder in your Kerbal Atomics mod says "MM config to set fancy nuclear engines if NFE is around". and then a few lines down, there's an @cost += and then a huge number. This seems to be true for all of your nuclear engines. Why they get so expensive yo? I don't have those kinds of funds! If I don't like it should I just change those costs to something I like better? Could you help me understand why you make them so expensive?

Nuclear fuel is expensive. Because of the way KSP calculates costs, to add 50u of enriched uranium to the engine I must add the cost of the uranium to the part. If you change this, your engines will end up with negative costs. 

[Crixomix]

18 minutes ago, Nertea said:

Nuclear fuel is expensive. Because of the way KSP calculates costs, to add 50u of enriched uranium to the engine I must add the cost of the uranium to the part. If you change this, your engines will end up with negative costs. 

Ohhhh. So all of those costs are the cost of the uranium being added? I'm still learning how to best use your mods. Thanks. 

 

Is there an easy way to disable boiloff?

[Nertea]

41 minutes ago, Crixomix said:

Ohhhh. So all of those costs are the cost of the uranium being added? I'm still learning how to best use your mods. Thanks. 

Yup that is what they are for. The actual engine cost is the same (which you can see if you remove all the uranium in the VAB). 

42 minutes ago, Crixomix said:

Is there an easy way to disable boiloff?

Delete SimpleBoiloff.dll. 

[Crixomix]

Thanks so much Nertea. Sorry to keep bothering, but I just can't find any documentation or help on how to work these atomic engines. I would consider myself decent at figuring things out. But I can't seem to figure out the NFE reactor control panel buttons, and what they do.

 

So I hit the on button (I think get what that one does :P). After a bit of spool up time, it shoots up to the regular temp. Then there's a power setting. This makes sense for reactors, but I don't understand what this does for engines. with the nerv, it doesn't seem to do anything. Is this because it's an atomic engine that has a nuclear reactor, that just happens to generate no electricity?

 

And what are the two advanced settings? Once seems to be auto shutoff at temp. Is the other auto shutoff at a certain warp speed?

 

What is reactor power/available power? This is measure in kilowatts, but it seems unrelated to the "internal flux" number in my heat management readout in kerbal engineer. Is this because the "core" of a nuclear reactor can heat up without actually heating the part? Is this a number that relates to how much thermal dissipation I need on my craft? Does it matter where I put the thermal dissipation? i.e. do I need radiators ON the part, or somewhere else?

 

Do I need radiators both for the internal heat of the reactor (1100kw on a nerv) AND the internal flux I see when I actually use the engine to produce thrust?

 

Why do 3 small radiator panels (they say rated for 50kw each) keep the nerv reactore core (1100kw) from heating up? it just sits happily at it's 3600 or whatever. But then if I timewarp, it shoots up past critical?

 

So sorry for all the questions, but I really want to understand how all this works so I can build a kickass spacecraft

[Nertea]

5 hours ago, Crixomix said:

So I hit the on button (I think get what that one does :P). After a bit of spool up time, it shoots up to the regular temp. Then there's a power setting. This makes sense for reactors, but I don't understand what this does for engines. with the nerv, it doesn't seem to do anything. Is this because it's an atomic engine that has a nuclear reactor, that just happens to generate no electricity?

You can run some of the engines as electricity generating engines so being able to adjust the power downwards is helpful. In addition, running the reactor at 50% could be useful as it reduces the time for the spool up. However keeping enough radiators on your ship to handle power at 100% will be painful, so you could provide enough radiators to run it all the time at 50% and get some response time benefits. Additionally, if you turn the power down, the reactor will try to guess what power it needs for running the engine and automatically power up when your throttle up the engine. So you can safely in most cases keep power low and rely on the throttle compensation.

5 hours ago, Crixomix said:

And what are the two advanced settings? Once seems to be auto shutoff at temp. Is the other auto shutoff at a certain warp speed?

Yes and yes.

5 hours ago, Crixomix said:

What is reactor power/available power? This is measure in kilowatts, but it seems unrelated to the "internal flux" number in my heat management readout in kerbal engineer. Is this because the "core" of a nuclear reactor can heat up without actually heating the part? Is this a number that relates to how much thermal dissipation I need on my craft? Does it matter where I put the thermal dissipation? i.e. do I need radiators ON the part, or somewhere else?

 

Do I need radiators both for the internal heat of the reactor (1100kw on a nerv) AND the internal flux I see when I actually use the engine to produce thrust?

Reactor heat management is not related to things you can see in KER. All the Core Heat using components (drills, converters, reactors) use the... Core Heat system. It's a heating component that is orthogonal to the internal heat system and they don't really interact. That reactor power number is the amount of Core Heat generated by the part, which is directly dissipated by a radiator's Core Heat Transfer parameter.

You can put radiators anywhere if they are configured that way. Some stock radiators (the small fixed ones) only work on parts up to 1 part away. 

5 hours ago, Crixomix said:

Why do 3 small radiator panels (they say rated for 50kw each) keep the nerv reactore core (1100kw) from heating up? it just sits happily at it's 3600 or whatever. But then if I timewarp, it shoots up past critical?

Stock heat bug apparently fixed in 1.3.1. In situations at low timewarp, even 1 kW of radiator power can cool anything! Gotta love that stock code. 

[Krakatoa]

45 minutes ago, Nertea said:

-snip-

Stock heat bug apparently fixed in 1.3.1. In situations at low timewarp, even 1 kW of radiator power can cool anything! Gotta love that stock code. 

Hah! That's mighty good to know.  I've got a monster of a mother ship built almost entirely out of NFT parts and have built it with 2 of the large square microchannel graphene radiators and 4 of the triangles, forming a bit of a shell around a Scylla. They're also cooling an Excalibur. Was doing a test on the runway with the Scylla in LH2/Ox mode and all the generators running at full and the heat didn't wiggle. Did I actually overkill the cooling, or is that likely a heat bug?

[The_Joe]

On 8/12/2017 at 7:38 AM, B-STRK said:

If I'm interpreting your request right, which is that you don't mind the Nerva not having the LH2 option and just using LF for the rest of your game, you could just open up the Patches/NTR folder within KerbalAtomics and deleting the patch referring to Squad parts, which reverts the LV-N to stock behavior. Though if I got it wrong, please feel free to ignore this.

Solved my only issue with this mod.  I like my spaceplanes that go to and from Minmus, and they are all based on use of the NERV engine.  I love the idea of this mod, and removing this file allows me to have both.  Thanks!  

[prcreeper]

Hello! I want to participate in translation of Kerbal Atomics into Russian Language

[Kerbal101]

@Nertea    friendly pinging for awareness of the post above ^^^

[ThreePounds]

2 hours ago, prcreeper said:

Hello! I want to participate in translation of Kerbal Atomics into Russian Language

Not Nertea, but I think you can go right ahead on github. The link is in the OP, or here. Look for the folder /Localization/. Inside you'll find a guide. You can work from the English version as a basis. Once you're finished, just send Nertea a pull request and he'll merge the translation in.

[Stratickus]

On 8/18/2017 at 9:26 PM, mikerl said:

I had problems with effects not changing correctly. and eventually gave up on the project.  The easier solution was to change the patches from "@PART" to "+PART" which creates duplicates that each have separate fuel and masses and does not change existing ships. The upgrade system did not exist then either. This is the second time this has been brought up, which makes me feel like trying to finish it, or at least collaborating to do so.

So I was toying with the idea of using the +PART method as well and tried to work it out over the weekend. I ended up with a 95% solution, but ran into similar problems. I tried to have the LH2 LV-N retain the FX added by KA, while reverting the LF LV-N to stock FX to help differentiate the different fuel types. I was able to get a working engine with proper FX, but when I tried to add the NFE reactor compatibility to the 'new' +PART LV-N. It didn't behave properly. Though I didn't see it in the config file it was almost as if the NFE added reactor had LH2 hard coded to it. Also, the LF LV-N produced thrust without the reactor on, which it shouldn't. I ended up abandoning it was well because I did not like having duplicate parts and it just wasn't the solution I wanted. I tried the upgrade method as well for the same reasons a while back, but the upgrade system does not support ModuleEngines. Good luck if you continue to try and find a solution.

For what its worth, I did find a solution that suits my needs. I decided to leave the LV-N alone and instead use the LANTRN from Atomic Age as my sole LF powered NTR. It's smaller, lighter, augmented and in my tech tree unlocks at the same node as the LV-N, so it pretty much checks all my boxes for a dedicated space plane NTR. As a bonus @linuxgurugamer just re-released Atomic Age.

Though I have run into a snag. I have only managed to revert the LOX augmented ModuleEngines back to LF. The LF only mode is still being converted to LH2 by a MM patch. I'm pretty sure its the dynamic LH2 patch by Toric included with KA.

Spoiler

@PART[*]:HAS[@MODULE[ModuleEnginesFX]:HAS[@PROPELLANT[LiquidFuel],!PROPELLANT[Oxidizer],!PROPELLANT[IntakeAir]]]:NEEDS[!NTRsUseLF]:FOR[zzLH2NTR]
{
    @mass *= 0.75
       @MODULE[ModuleEnginesFX]
    {
        @PROPELLANT[LiquidFuel]
        {
            @name = LqdHydrogen
            @ratio = 1.0
        }
        @atmospherecurve
        {
            @key,*[1, ] *= 1.1
        }
    }
}

As far as I know KA only comes with two LH2 patches that would affect this engine. Confusing, I know. This is what I used to patch the LANTRN back to LF after the KA patches converted it to LH2:

Spoiler

    @MODULE[ModuleEnginesFX]:HAS[!PROPELLANT[Oxidizer]]  
    {
        @heatProduction *= 0.1
        @PROPELLANT[LqdHydrogen]    // Reverts propellant back to LF for space planes
        {
            @name = LiquidFuel
            @ratio = 1.0
        }
        !atmosphereCurve {}
        atmosphereCurve
        {
            key = 0 775
             key = 1 300
             key = 2 50
             key = 5 1
        }
    }
    @MODULE[ModuleEnginesFX]:HAS[@PROPELLANT[Oxidizer]]   
    {
        @heatProduction *= 0.1
        @PROPELLANT[LqdHydrogen]    // Reverts propellant back to LF for space planes
        {
            @name = LiquidFuel
            @ratio = 0.9
        }
        @PROPELLANT[Oxidizer]
        {
            @ratio = 1.1
        }
        !atmosphereCurve {}
        atmosphereCurve
        {
            key = 0 555
            key = 0.4 520
            key = 1 420
            key = 10 1
        }
    }

The problem is, like I said only augmented mode is using LF+O. I tried using:

:AFTER[KerbalAtomics]
:AFTER[zzLH2NTR]
:AFTER[KerbalAtomics,zzzLH2NTR]
:AFTER[KerbalAtomics]:Final

But none of these converted the entire motor back to LF. Either there is another MM patch that is adding LH2 that I cant find, or my MM skills just aren't good enough. If anyone has any ideas, I would appreciate it.

Cheers,

Edited August 29, 2017 by Stratickus

[Ivy]

I'm getting a real strange problem with any nuclear engine, apparently (happened with the good ol' original nuclear engines as well but I thought little of it, maybe a one-time bug). Apparently the engines will just straight up stop providing thrust after existing for a while after their initialization. Even restarting the game hasn't fixed it. 

As you can see, the engines are receiving full fuel and burning it appropriately, but no thrust is exerted. I had originally managed to raise my orbit to that elliptical height with these same engines, but now I can't budge at all.