Help me understand clean drive thrusters

After doing some exploring with an anaconda, i m trying an Asp Explorer this time. I 've read about dirty drives being more heat efficient cause of less power consumption, and true, on my conda this was the case, i went with them over clean drives. On the Asp explorer though, cause of a really small power plant, there is a great difference in heating while scooping/jumping and clean drives do MUCH better.

So my question is, any advantage on going with clean 3 or 4 over clean 5? I 've noticed a number of explorers use clean 3 thrusters, is it a well working comprimise? Also i m not yet sure i understand which stat to go for while rolling. Thanks for any suggestions!!

These are the ships by the way

https://coriolis.edcd.io/outfit/asp...EAAA==.EweloBhBmSQUwIYHMA28QgIwV0A=&bn=Buddha

https://coriolis.edcd.io/outfit/ana...AQAA.EweloBhBmSQUwIYHMA28QgIwV0A=&bn=Explorer
 
That comparison is however a low extreme, using a 5D thruster on an Asp Explorer at 76-83% power usage.
The difference would most likely be a lot more noticeable on something like a PA spamming Federal Gunship with an overcharged power plant at 115% usage. :)
(edit)
That said, for explorers, there are no reasons to use any other thruster mod than dirty tuned. We rarely fly around in min-max power configured combat ships. In super cruise the thing that you can tweak temperatures with are power plant mods and unused percentage on power draw.
 
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I ve read the above thread, but people there are discussing more the applications in silent running than scooping/jumping while exploring. After flying both clean 3 and dirty 5 on my explorer, the clean drive version can scoop and jump almost from the beginning, the dirty 5 version needs to wait almost until scooping ends to frame jump. The clean version is clearly better for what i want my ship to do, just trying to figure out what mods/ranks would be optimal
 
I ve read the above thread, but people there are discussing more the applications in silent running than scooping/jumping while exploring. After flying both clean 3 and dirty 5 on my explorer, the clean drive version can scoop and jump almost from the beginning, the dirty 5 version needs to wait almost until scooping ends to frame jump. The clean version is clearly better for what i want my ship to do, just trying to figure out what mods/ranks would be optimal

the main difference between clean and dirty drives is above higher g surfaces and/or high ambient temperature, and i invite anyone to test that with dirty drives at skardee 1 (high ambient temperatur) or achenar 3/ wasp-77 (high g).

anyway, powerusage adds to heat generated per MW - whether your ship runs hotter or cooler before thruster usage with G5 clean drive tuning depends to some extend on its heatcapacity (8% of than is the max cooling rate) as well as your powerplants heatefficiency. in most cases an exploration set up will generated far less heat than is vented.
 
No, theres no any valid reasons for using CDT. There was this good and extensive thread where someone did good tests between DDT and CDT but i cant find it anymore.

EDIT: found it:

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/354115-Clean-Drive-Tuning-is-Pointless?highlight=cdt

yeah, that thread. it was several times brought up in there, that the tests missed both high g surfaces and ambient temperature, which is imho critical for exploration.

alas, op liked people jumping to the wrong conclusions, in the hope of getting the mod changed (he has started several on the same subject)
 
It's really quite simple.

Clean drives v standard :- Slightly better performance for similar or less heat management
Dirty drives v standard :- Much better performance but with worse heat management

The crux however is a lot of people don't think the lesser performance boost of Clean drives is worth it over the boost you get with dirty. Even if they clean drives offer same/better heat management than standard. Most people are all about MOAR!!!

I personally plug in clean drive first and see how they go before plugging in dirty drives if I think I need more performance. I have often found clean drive to me more than sufficient for my needs and have sometimes swapped back from dirty to clean if I get heat issues when changing to them.
 
the main difference between clean and dirty drives is above higher g surfaces and/or high ambient temperature, and i invite anyone to test that with dirty drives at skardee 1 (high ambient temperatur) or achenar 3/ wasp-77 (high g).

so which ones would you advocate? I have no experience with either situation i think
 
I have used both grade 3 CD and grade 3 DD on my full exploration loaded AspX with 4D thrusters. With the engine focused PD, both can boost no problems. While I did not actively record actual numbers, I can tell you for certain that when it comes to scooping while jumping, and landing on high G worlds, the grade 3 CD thrusters performed better with regards to heat management. That said, with my other engineered modules, and my power management, my deep space base cruising temp is 17%.
 
so which ones would you advocate? I have no experience with either situation i think

well, quite simple: no drive tuning or G1 clean drive tuning for an explorer i don't intend to land, G5 clean drive tuning for planetary explorers. my general purpose/i don't know what to expect explorers have all G5 clean drive tuning, with a range of base moduls (enhanced performance drives, undersized a-class thrusters, standard size d-class thrusters etc.).

what you sinply can do (and i'd suggest doing so) is buying several thrusters, and transfer them to palin. engineer them all with different blueprints, fit them on your explorer, and test them at skardee 1 and wasp-77/achenar 3 to find out which is best to you.

in that way you get a range of thrusters, and have only to treck out to palin ones.

and when you have a build you generally like, you can spend the rest of your rolls to make it better, before setting out.

some people fly their explondas with dirty drive 5D thrusters. i fly mine with 6A clean drive thrusters. is my build better? no, but it is better for my usage of my conda. 6A dirty drive would be a no go with high ambient temperature or high G, while the handling of a conda with 5D in real space is too painfull for me.
 
I've landed a T9 with grade 5 dirty-tuned D-rated drives on the 9.90G planet. It is not a problem. I boosted around on the planet all day long without heat issues. Just make sure you're not running anywhere near 100% power, which is very unlikely as the main power consumer on an exploration ship usually is the FSD.
 
Explorers doesn't fly in min-maxed power draw ships at 115+%. That only makes sense on combat ships. So, there really is no reason to use clean drives.
The only "exploration" ship I have a heat issue on is my badly configured souped up explorer-Eagle with an enhanced thruster using a terrible engineer roll and a too small power plant running at over 100% draw. It can boost around 700 m/s, but it melts if I look at the FSD engage button. :D
With all other ships I've no heat problems on any planetary surface. I think I've tried exploring in almost every ship out there except for the Dropsh*t and the two smaller Fed ships. That includes a Beluga with an extremely engineered thruster and full prismatic shields and weaponry. Also a Type 9 with a grade 5 dirty tuned thruster and leftover engineered parts from other ship moddings.
 
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Chiming in here: my explorer Eagle also melts if you look at it funny.

My general approach is that for those of my ships where speed is essential (i.e. most of them) I fit G5 DDT, and anything where speed is not essential (Anaconda, AspX, DBX) I fit G5 CDT. It doesn't make too much difference for most ships in my experience.
 
For thrusters I went for MOAR, so biggest A and DD5. I want to go fast ouside SC. I too landed on 9,77G without any heat problems, but perhaps my other components were compensating. Edit: FA on.
 
For thrusters I went for MOAR, so biggest A and DD5. I want to go fast ouside SC. I too landed on 9,77G without any heat problems, but perhaps my other components were compensating. Edit: FA on.

Yeah the ship and what other modded stuff you have will affect it a great deal.
 
I'm flying an Annie explorer with grade 5D drives. Should I go with CDT or DDT then? Bit confused on this subject to be totally honest. I have access to the Prof.
 
I'm flying an Annie explorer with grade 5D drives. Should I go with CDT or DDT then? Bit confused on this subject to be totally honest. I have access to the Prof.

have a second set of thrusters transferred to palin, do both, fly to skardee 1, have thrusters transferred, test landing on it with clean drive and dirty drive (and share your findings) :)
 
I always go with dirty drive tuning. I have more than 50 ships. 5 of them are Annies. I`ve travelled more than 1 million lightyears. I have 1 CDT thruster and I tested it against DDT on an ASP. In supercruise there is NO difference (using a sufficient Power Plant of course).

o7
 
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