Engineering Thrusters for Exploration: Thrusters and Supercruise

[Greasetrap42]

Question:
For deep space exploration whats best? Dirty, clean, or no engineering?
Does engineering thrusters have any affect in supercruise when star hopping? (ed: obviously not speed, what about temperature while scooping?)

Quick Answer: No. It doesn't matter
---------------------------------------------------
I have been wondering this for some time. Lots of contradictory information on forums and internet searches.
Thought I would share my results. This may seem obvious to some of you, but evidently lots of cmdrs don't know, or incorrectly think they know

Investigation:
Tried to get a numerical understanding from Coriolis and EDSY. Can't be certain how numbers are represented.
Decided to do a test to make a determination.

Test:

• Traveled to a heavily clustered region in galaxy.
• In navigation selected single star type. Starhop 20 stars in supercruise skimming as close to the star as possible, shortest distance around star to jump to next star. Record peak temperature.
• Repeated test with exact same ship and modules, changing only my 4D thrusters.
• tested M-type stars, then tested B-Type Stars.
• compared results.

Results:

• Average peak temperature exactly the same for star type. Engineering thrusters makes no difference to ship temperature in supercruise.
• I had no easy way to measure the rate of heat dissipation, but there seemed to be no noticeable difference between thrusters.
• Clean/Dirty Engineering has no effect on jump distance (and stripped is almost nothing) so choose based on desired activities outside of starhopping and supercruise.
• Clean takes a little bit more power, so if you ship's power plant is on the hairy edge then go with Dirty or None. Or upgrade your power plant, you might lose 1LY but gain decent thrusters

 

[SlickPBW]

Good info. I would add that being able to boost (more of a distributor thing) is desirable for convenience, and especially if you need to abort a landing; but also not required.

 

[marx]

Yeah, I tested supercruise handling on all ships, see this thread. It's also used on EDAstro. In this regard, there's no way of modifying your ship's supercruise handling: neither the FSD, nor the thrusters, nor anything else (total mass and such) matters. Best you can do is throttle down to 50% to turn faster.

 

[whothe]

Question:
For deep space exploration whats best? Dirty, clean, or no engineering?
Does engineering thrusters have any affect in supercruise when star hopping?

Quick Answer: No. It doesn't matter
---------------------------------------------------
I have been wondering this for some time. Lots of contradictory information on forums and internet searches.
Thought I would share my results. This may seem obvious to some of you, but evidently lots of cmdrs don't know, or incorrectly think they know

Investigation:
Tried to get a numerical understanding from Coriolis and EDSY. Can't be certain how numbers are represented.
Decided to do a test to make a determination.

Test:

• Traveled to a heavily clustered region in galaxy.
• In navigation selected single star type. Starhop 20 stars in supercruise skimming as close to the star as possible, shortest distance around star to jump to next star. Record peak temperature.
• Repeated test with exact same ship and modules, changing only my 4D thrusters.
• tested M-type stars, then tested B-Type Stars.
• compared results.

Results:

• Average peak temperature exactly the same for star type. Engineering makes no difference in supercruise.
• I had no easy way to measure the rate of heat dissipation, but there seemed to be no noticeable difference between thrusters.
• Clean/Dirty Engineering has no effect on jump distance (and stripped is almost nothing) so choose based on desired activities outside of starhopping and supercruise.
• Clean takes a little bit more power, so if you ship's power plant is on the hairy edge then go with Dirty or None. Or upgrade your power plant, you might lose 1LY but gain decent thrusters

For exploration: Dirty will produce less heat in SC, so better for fuel scooping. Clean produces less heat in normal flight, so better if you flub a scoop and hit the exclusion zone. But I have never had an issue with over heating in normal flight landing on a body, so I prefer dirty drives. Carry heat sinks for emergencies.

Thruster types and engineering have no effect on SC

 

[Greasetrap42]

For exploration: Dirty will produce less heat in SC

When scooping a star in SC there is no measurable difference in ship temperature when Dirty/Clean/Non Engineered thrusters are equipped. Its the same.
If there is a difference it's too small to notice using my Orca for testing.

If you have test results that show otherwise please share.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
M-Star Hopping
NonEng Peak Temp: 64, 64, 64, 65, 65, 65, 63, 64, 64, 64 ...
DirtyEng Peak Temp: 64, 65, 64, 64, 63, 63, 63, 65, 65, 65, 65 ...

B-Star Hopping
NonEng Peak Temp: 70, 75, 70, 70, 77, 66, 72, 72, 68 ...
DirtyEng Peak Temp: 69, 74, 71, 71, 76, 79, 69, 68, 79 ...

Over 20 scoops per star type the peak temperature averages out to be the same.

 

[whothe]

When scooping at a star in SC there is no measurable difference in ship temperature when Dirty/Clean/Non Engineered thrusters are equipped. Its the same.

If you have test results that show otherwise please share.

Not here to argue mate, I don't have test results.

Just drawing on discussions in the past with other people who had looked into it.
It was a minor difference, but had to do with the higher power consumption of clean drives, assuming equal levels of engineering, so there is plenty of room for 'but if' arguements there depending on what level of engineering you are talking about vs.
Is it incorrect that more power draw produces more running heat? I thought that was pretty much established? Module power draw is a complete non-issue in SC?

 

[CMDR Cknarf]

The only thing that could possibly affect your heat while in supecruise- in terms of drives- is the slightly higher power draw of clean drives. The difference is negligible, and you will not notice a difference while scooping.

Drive related heat mechanics don't affect anything while in supercruise, only in regular, sub-light space.

The heat generated from dirty drives, even in high G, is negligible vs Clean drives. If you're overheating with dirty drives for any reason, you will likely do the same with cleans in the same environment. Aggressive maneuvering in gravity, especially high gravity (why you would be doing this anyway?) will eventually cause you do get warm regardless of your drive choice. Your powerplant efficiency, as well as a ship's built-in characteristics will affect heat more than anything else. May as well take dirty for the significant speed bonus, since the drawbacks are minimal in comparison.

Good plant efficiency + Dirty drives is my go-to for exploration ships for the reasons above.

 

[Greasetrap42]

According to EDSY

4A Thruster Power Draw:
Non Eng: 3.69
Dirty Eng: 4.133
Clean Eng: 4.28

Traveling in SC far far away from anything in a steady state of travel my ship temperature is 14%, regardless.

 

[goemon]

When scooping a star in SC there is no measurable difference in ship temperature when Dirty/Clean/Non Engineered thrusters are equipped. Its the same.
If there is a difference it's too small to notice using my Orca for testing.

If you have test results that show otherwise please share.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
M-Star Hopping
NonEng Peak Temp: 64, 64, 64, 65, 65, 65, 63, 64, 64, 64 ...
DirtyEng Peak Temp: 64, 65, 64, 64, 63, 63, 63, 65, 65, 65, 65 ...

B-Star Hopping
NonEng Peak Temp: 70, 75, 70, 70, 77, 66, 72, 72, 68 ...
DirtyEng Peak Temp: 69, 74, 71, 71, 76, 79, 69, 68, 79 ...

Over 20 scoops per star type the peak temperature averages out to be the same.

you got the wrong ship for testing that.
too much heat dissipation and too much heat capacity, especially if running undersized thrusters.
basically you need a ship and a build (and use enough power), where thruster usage and type of engineering make a difference in the first place.
on the other hand, most exploration ships and builds are exactly like that.

i'll also add, that thrusters create heat by being powered, plus by being used. so for your testing you'd need a situation where your ship "accelerates" during supercruise. which it doesn't, if you orbit the sun.

that said - how about G1 clean drive tuning. no increased power usage

 

[Greasetrap42]

that said - how about G1 clean drive tuning. no increased power usage

Yea.... In my case the Orca was G1 Clean + Stripped but when I upgraded the FSD to the double engineered it became warm during scooping, requiring a wider path around the star (more time) or time to cool down (more time + annoying).

Soooo... I increased the size of the Power Plant 3A->4A so I could give it G5 Low Emmisions. Pretty good. But then I had more power available than necessary. Thought to myself, why not try G5 thrusters? But how much heat will that add to my scooping?... so I tried it. And to my surprise it didn't. Thought I was crazy so did a bunch of tests.

But yes, I only tested the Orca. Its a long way back to the bubble to test my other exploration ships.

 

[puca]

Clean thrusters are better in general for exploration.

It is true dirty drives take slightly less power than clean, and it is true that affects generated heat in supercruise. However, the difference is so small (for a Krait Phantom running class 4 D thrusters, for example, it is something like 4.28 MW for clean vs 4.13 MW for dirty) that it is meaningless in practice for the thing explorers care about: fuel scooping and FSD charging. Those sources of heat are like 2 orders of magnitude higher than thruster power draw differences. The amount of extra heat in a reasonable build (e.g. low emission power plant, even with monstered) will be something like (4.28-4.13)*0.14 = 0.021.

What's not meaningless, however, is that clean thrusters will have significantly reduced heat generation out of supercruise, compared to dirty thrusters. Why is that useful for explorers? Well, if you are landing on a planet near a star (because you are filling out the Codex, for example, or looking for a particular screenshot view), it matters a great deal. If you want to go Thargoid scanning, running in a stealthy way matters a great deal for staying safe.

 

[Rudi Raumkraut]

When scooping a star in SC there is no measurable difference in ship temperature when Dirty/Clean/Non Engineered thrusters are equipped. Its the same.
If there is a difference it's too small to notice using my Orca for testing.

If you have test results that show otherwise please share.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
M-Star Hopping
NonEng Peak Temp: 64, 64, 64, 65, 65, 65, 63, 64, 64, 64 ...
DirtyEng Peak Temp: 64, 65, 64, 64, 63, 63, 63, 65, 65, 65, 65 ...

B-Star Hopping
NonEng Peak Temp: 70, 75, 70, 70, 77, 66, 72, 72, 68 ...
DirtyEng Peak Temp: 69, 74, 71, 71, 76, 79, 69, 68, 79 ...

Over 20 scoops per star type the peak temperature averages out to be the same.

now do the same testrun in a T7
the most important part regarding heat in any ship is the PP , not the thrusters, there you are right,
but some ships show at least a more visible difference

and if you want to test for "exploration" you also should try this different thrusters in normal cruise on Skardee 1 or a similar environment,
as SC handling is testing for "travelling" not "exploring" (true exploring! *cheers )

 

[Greasetrap42]

now do the same testrun in a T7

Thanks for the feedback.

• I have not tested this using a T7, generally not an exploration ship. But I am curious, when I return I will test several different ships.
• My post is regarding engineered thrusters in Supercruise. My OP says choose engineering based on "activities outside of starhopping and supercruise."

The reason why I posted this is because I saw so much contradictory information for exploration ships, many saying engineered thrusters bad idea because of heat in supercruise & scooping. Quickly glancing at the power draw of thrusters can easily lead cmdrs to believe they should not engineer thrusters, or go with dirty instead of clean because of the power draw resulting in more heat while scooping.

My Cutter and AspX have G5 thrusters with no heat issues while scooping. Never tested because it wasn't an issue.

 

[Rudi Raumkraut]

Thanks for the feedback.

• I have not tested this using a T7, generally not an exploration ship. But I am curious, when I return I will test several different ships.
• My post is regarding engineered thrusters in Supercruise. My OP says choose engineering based on "activities outside of starhopping and supercruise."

The reason why I posted this is because I saw so much contradictory information for exploration ships, many saying engineered thrusters bad idea because of heat in supercruise & scooping. Quickly glancing at the power draw of thrusters can easily lead cmdrs to believe they should not engineer thrusters, or go with dirty instead of clean because of the power draw resulting in more heat while scooping.

My Cutter and AspX have G5 thrusters with no heat issues while scooping. Never tested because it wasn't an issue.

true, the answer you gave yourself in the OP isnt wrong of course, it doesnt really matter (much)

I put the T7 as example, as its afaik the worst example around heat generation,
and many will say an Orca isnt an exploration ship, too,
so I'd say any ship which can fit a fuel Scoop can be used for exploration

My guess why there are so many contradictory infos about the thrusters on explorers is because there are so many different approaches to exploration and therefore also to ship builds.

Some like to travel, so use most time scooping and jumping, others are "mapping enthusiasts" so use much of their time in SC, others like to survey planet surfaces, so are most time in normal cruise.
Some like to have their ship as cool as possible, so use a G5 Low Emi plant on their Dolphins and can fly straight through a star to scoop, others want max jump range, so they use a small PP which is armoured or even overcharged...

And all this different approaches may result in different "thruster philosophies"

I for myself go always G5 DirtyDragDrives for speed ( on light racers it might be G5 DirtyDriveDistributors ),
and build the ship around it