EC flow ( ion engine always on )

[brusura]

Something has changed in 1.1.X to how EC is consumed , example if you leave ion engine on with solar panels deployed they will keep going draining EC to zero, you lose control of craft of course but the ion engine is keeping going off solar panels

Have you found how EC manage priority if any, and how one could avoid the always on ion engine? ( other than avoid to reach zero EC )

[KerikBalm]

this has always happened.

The solution is to right click on thr xenon tanks and disable their Xe flow. The ion engine has no propellant to access, and thus it stops using EC.

enabling/disabling resource flow on parts is one of the few things you can do when a probe core is offline.

[yorshee]

I haven't had a chance to use ion engines in 1.1 yet, but would right-clicking the engine and clicking 'shutdown engine' force it to deactivate?

[FullMetalMachinist]

52 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

enabling/disabling resource flow on parts is one of the few things you can do when a probe core is offline.

AFAIK not any more. They fixed all the things that you used to be able to do with probes that don't have power. This includes turning on a spare battery. 

So now, the "safety feature" that many people used where you would disable a small battery as a backup no longer works, because a dead probe core can't do anything, not even turn on a (full) battery. 

[klesh]

1 hour ago, KerikBalm said:

enabling/disabling resource flow on parts is one of the few things you can do when a probe core is offline.

 

Have you checked lately on this?   The reason I ask is recently they changed the fact you cannot enable EC flow from a reserve battery when your craft is out of juice so I am going to presume you may not be able to enable/disable flow on tanks as well.

 

 

Edit:  Duh, the guy above me said the same thing, lol.

Edited May 14, 2016 by klesh

[Red Iron Crown]

Order of assembly of parts matters. The game cycles through the craft description in order of part placement, adding or subtracting resources as it processes each part. You can use this behavior to prioritize which parts receive EC first, by carefully placing the parts in order. So if you start with a probe core, and need panels and an ion engine, it can end up two ways depending on placement:

Probe Core -> Solar Panels -> Ion Engine = Engine gets EC before Probe Core

Probe Core -> Ion Engine -> Solar Panels = Probe Core gets EC before Engine

The rule of thumb for ion probes is: Place probe core first, place solar panels (or other EC generation) last. This ensures that the probe core is prioritized for getting EC.