Fuel Harvesting

[Meridian (OP)]

Hey.


I have a fuel harvester

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Latvia class Fuel Harvester 15800 tons     223 Crew     285 BP      TCS 316  TH 248  EM 0
784 km/s     Armour 1-56     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control 1     PPV 0
Maintenance Capacity 11 MSP
Fuel Harvester: 2 modules producing 48000 litres per annum

Nuclear Thermal Engine C1 (4)    Power 62    Fuel Use 10%    Armour 0    Exp 1%
Fuel Capacity 50,000 Litres    Range 56.9 billion km   (840 days at full power)


This ship is classed as a commercial vessel for maintenance purposes

and it can harvest fuel ok but dropping the fuel off is a problem. I give it conditional orders to drop off 90% fuel at the nearest colony. I heads off to the nearest colony when it has got to this stage but it does not deposit the fuel and it does not head back to the gas giant after this. Why have I got this problem?

[Erik L]

You might want to increase the number of fuel tanks.

Not sure why it's not dropping the fuel. But it won't automatically head back to the harvest site. I usually mark my harvesters as tankers also. Maybe try that and see if it starts behaving.

[jRides]

Sorry to necro an old thread but I have a fuel question somewhat related:

I have built a number of FHBs and they are happy harvesting away around a gas giant - when they are full up I need to manually transfer fuel from each harvester to a waiting tanker. Is there a way to set up a fleet to do this automagically or is it only achieved manually?

Maybe I'm missing an option somewhere; I wonder, can I make the gas giant a colony and transfer fuel to the planet and use the tankers to collect it from there? Or, some order for the tanker to join the harvesting fleet giving an option to transfer fuel across that way?

EDIT: Would marking the FHBs as tankers give me more options when ordering via taskforce control window?

Actually, along the same lines I have a further question about tugs; Is there a better less micro intensive way to move stuff with tugs? I am looking for a way I can set up an order for a tug to take its attached item to a location, then break connection and return to starting location leaving the towed thing behind. I achieved it all manually, doing each part of the orders, time increment till that's done, do next part of the orders and time increment till that's done and so on, but I will have to move these FHBs again eventually so just being able to order a couple tugs to take care of it would be handy.

[Charlie Beeler]

You can't make colonies on gas giants. 

Thier are issues with using the conitional orders for transfering the fuel from harvesters to colonies.

This is the best, read reliable for me, option for automated fuel delivery.  Make the harvester class a tanker.  The  tanker task group you want in transfer duty is assigned orders to "refuel from target fleet" with the harvester task group selected and "unload 90% fuel at colony" with the intended colony selected.  Don't forget to check the "cycle moves" box if you wish this too be a continuing task. 

For the forseeable future tugs are micro-managed as you've already discovered. 

[jRides]

Thanks Charlie, that sorted me out perfectly. 

[Vanigo]

For the forseeable future tugs are micro-managed as you've already discovered. 

Although, come to think of it, isn't there a detach tankers order? Fuel harvesters are best marked as tankers anyway, so you could have the tug fleet absorb the fuel harvester fleet, then detach tankers and go back to earth. Of course, then your fuel harvester fleet would be called "Tug fleet #2" or "Tug fleet tankers" or something, so it's hardly a perfect solution.

[Charlie Beeler]

Although, come to think of it, isn't there a detach tankers order? Fuel harvesters are best marked as tankers anyway, so you could have the tug fleet absorb the fuel harvester fleet, then detach tankers and go back to earth. Of course, then your fuel harvester fleet would be called "Tug fleet #2" or "Tug fleet tankers" or something, so it's hardly a perfect solution.

I don't believe that will work....completely.  As far as I know, tractors are not cross controlled by fleet orders.

[Vanigo]

I don't believe that will work....completely.  As far as I know, tractors are not cross controlled by fleet orders.

What do you mean? Removing a tractored fuel harvester from the tug's fleet does disconnect them, if that's what you mean. If you do it manually, anyway; I haven't tried the detach tankers order.