Any sense in using Ion engines?

[UmbralRaptor]

Within a certain high ÃŽâ€V low TWR design space, the ions outperform everything. But there are only a few cases that need that much ÃŽâ€V, the engines require building smaller than most people are used to, and the solar panels are not well scaled to the size of the engines (even after the electricity requirement was reduced)

Though if you're feeling silly, ion craft work as landers on lower gravity worlds.

[Dazpoet]

Though if you're feeling silly, ion craft work as landers on lower gravity worlds.

As someone who has landed ion stuff on low gravity worlds I would only recommend this if you have lots of spare time because it takes quite a while. It's a fun project though and the landers are rather easy to put ontop of other ships since their weight is low. But yeah it takes a while to land.

[The Yellow Dart]

I use them as a very last stage for probes that don't have a definite "end of mission" condition. So if you are sending a probe to the Jool system just to get some general science from what ever moons you are able to encounter, an ion engine and 2 xenon tanks adds a lot of delta-V to your craft to keep trying for more and more intercepts, and ions are even strong enough to land on some planets/moons, even if you didn't plan to at the start, a la NEAR Shoemaker

[Yukon0009]

A Trans-Dressian burn took me 1 hour, for scale

[SaturnV]

I seldom found the use of it, too. Even if ion engine in game is already overpowered. They have 2kN thrust, while real ion engine have only about 250 mN thrust, that is 0.00025kN!

[Moonfrog]

I had a theory about using ion engines, mainly with how i design my rocket ships. I use very small thrust engines on very low gravity worlds, on higher gravity worlds or in orbit of high gravity worlds i use stronger thrust engines. I go on teh assumption, that higher the gravity of the planet or moon, the more delta v u need to move around, so more thrust to do it in same amount of time. Bit like u need something like 160 delta v on minmus and 4500 on kerbin. Ion engine in kerbins orbit may be preetty harash or useless in time. It works just fine on minmus, cos the gravity is so low. I also like to use batteries, i plan on doing 2 minute burn, i make sure i have 2 minutes worth of electricity for the burn so i don't have to use 5 solar powers or more. Treat it like any other low thrust engine. Never use it for high delta v burns.

that was just my theory, never got around to trying it out, cos i use the ant engine alot. I have alot of ants that need tranasporting.

[Dispatcher]

I've used ion engines on rovers and boats and I've had some success with planes. They certainly fill certain niches; try experimenting with them.

[moogoob]

Here's what I do with 'em - small moon landers: