Seperatrons damaging everything

[mellojoe]

Is there a way to put seperatrons on dropped stages that DON'T damage the main fuel tanks as they fire?

Use a "standard asparagus" launcher, I've been wanting to add seperatrons to push the empty boosters away from the main craft. Doing so, though, always triggers an event log "sepratron exhaust damaged Rockomax jumbo-64". Is there a way to mount them so that this doesn't happen? I know that the damage is minimal and most of the time never causes any actual problems. When problems DO happen though, hitting F3 to bring up the event log becomes useless. You have to sift through so many instances of "sepratron exhaust damaged Rockomax jumbo-64" that you can't find what ACTUALLY broke.

Is there a way to use seperatrons and not trigger this damage?

[KatzOhki]

Yeah, but what are you using the seperatrons to do? I had put them on the top outside of an outer stage and angle them up to avoid engine being destroyed, but at the moment damage message doesn't actually do anything.

[Specialist290]

One solution I've tried is putting Sepratrons offset from the line of symmetry and slightly rotated so that the tanks fall to the side and a little forward. Sometimes they've crashed into one another as the rocket pulls ahead in ways that seem slightly worrisome, but I haven't seen any damage reports.

I'll have to dig through my screenshots and see if there are any practical examples I can show you.

EDIT: Ah, here we go:

(Technically from two separate vehicles, but they share a common launcher.)

Edited October 4, 2013 by Specialist290

[Gus]

A good place for a separatron is at the top of the fuel tank on the inner side, mounted to fire (push) upwards. When it fires, it ROTATES the top of the fuel tank away from the ship as the ship passes by. The bottom of the fuel tank rotates safely underneath the ship.

Edited October 5, 2013 by Gus

[arq]

I tend to put separatrons on the outside top of the each radial stack, pointed down. This means that the stacks spin outward (away) and go backward. They tend to hit each other a few seconds later, but I'm 200m away by then.

[numerobis]

The few times I've used them for their intended purpose, I put in two sepratrons on the top of the offending stack, aimed so that they are pointing on either side of my precious rocket.

[Galane]

I often put two on the outer side of each piece that needs pushed away, rotated 90 degrees and aimed so their exhaust won't hit any of the rest of the rocket that needs to keep going up.

Some of my rockets use tanks that stage off the top, so they need a bit of kick up and out. To do that requires a placement for deliberately imbalanced thrust so they arc up and out and won't strike any of the rest of the rocket.

If you want a rocket to deliberately fail, perhaps to simulate a historic rocket launch failure, place a seperatron so its exhaust is aimed at a fuel tank and staged to trigger at the right time.