open panels on duna rover?

[quasarrgames]

I want to have deployable solar panels on my duna rover, to save part count and improve efficiency.

I know that deployable solar panels break easily in atmospheres, but i'm not sure if they'd break when only travelling 30m/s at max in duna's exceptionally thin atmosphere. Do you know if it'd work?

Also, do solar panles have health that wears down overtime, or is there a set impact force in which they just break? I dunno, i heard rumors that they had health.

also, can they be fixed by engineers?

[Tex_NL]

AFAIK engineers can not repair broken panels. But with KIS/KAS they can replace them as long as you brought a spare.

To test if your panels survive Duna you could use HyperEdit to send it there and see for yourself. After it succeeds/fails just recover back to the VAB/SPH and no time/funds are lost.
Some would call that cheating, I'd call it a realistic windtunnel test.

[Sir_Robert]

To be safe, always put atleast a few surface panels on.

For the deployable panels: Try driving your rover around KSC, and see if the panels stay intact. If so, definitely safe on Duna

[Snark]

Engineers can't repair broken panels.

Panels do not have "health"; either they work, or they're shattered.

Given that Duna has less than 7% of Kerbin's sea-level pressure, I expect you'll do just fine on Duna.

6 minutes ago, Sir_Robert said:

For the deployable panels: Try driving your rover around KSC, and see if the panels stay intact. If so, definitely safe on Duna

I'm afraid that won't be much of a test-- I think the deployable panels break pretty quickly at even modest rover speeds at sea level on Kerbin.

[AlphaMensae]

5 hours ago, Snark said:

I'm afraid that won't be much of a test-- I think the deployable panels break pretty quickly at even modest rover speeds at sea level on Kerbin.

Yup, they do indeed break very easily when driving a rover on Kerbin, as I've found out.  Now I only use RTGs.