Heat shield decay in vacuum

[SkyKaptn]

Is it a new feature in 1.1.2 that the ablator is slowly decaying when cruising through space (vakuum)? I noticed this first when on a very long journey that lasted 7 years. The 1.25m heatshield had lost about half of its ablators. I do have a few reactors onboard for EC, but my cooling system is way overbuilt for them. Internal heating should not be a problem.

The only "realism mod" I use is RSS

Edited May 13, 2016 by SkyKaptn
typos

[sardia]

Are you too close to the sun? Picture of the ship and your orbit please. 

[SkyKaptn]

1 hour ago, sardia said:

Are you too close to the sun? Picture of the ship and your orbit please. 

Not even close to the sun. I was going to Saturn (RSS).
Tried a few more tests and it looks as if it only happens at higher time warps. After 30ish orbits at 5800km (last pic) the heat shield was down 5 ablators.
The ship is nothing special. 4 small fission reactors that create EC for 4 ion drives. The radiators are barely idling when dumping heat.

 

 

Edited May 13, 2016 by SkyKaptn

[JoeNapalm]

 

Termites.

 

-Jn-

[AbacusWizard]

Space termites. Very dangerous.

[Hydrazine_Soup]

Maybe it's due to a bug when paired with RSS, idk.

Did you post the issue on the RSS thread? Maybe Nathan can help you.

Edited February 18, 2020 by danilon62

[NathanKell]

RSS is not going to do that. My guess is the reactors spiking during high warp.

[samstarman5]

I can see this actually happening in real life, as space is not a perfect vacuum and I bet even the solar wind erodes away at craft if at just the miniscule levels.

But to happen in game where it is a perfect vacuum?  Fingers definitely go to a mod.  For stock the only thing I can think of is high core heat perhaps affecting it. Might be worth testing a drill that is right next to a heat shield.

[Luke Skycrawler]

Micro meteorites

[ExtremeSquared]

Bugs with time warp cause havok with conducted heat even in stock. It wouldn't surprise me if it's due to craft heat.

[Streetwind]

Turn on thermal debug display (Alt+F12 -> Physics tab -> Thermal tab) and check the temperature and pyrolysis activity on your heatshield. If there's heat pooling in it, check the other parts of your craft for where that heat is coming from.