Charge level jumps erratically

[IcemanND]

v0.8a
With or without upgrades installed in the panels the Charge field will jump from a high charge value down to a value under 1024 depending upon which panel it is.

[Nauktis]

Multiple things could explain this behaviour.
Could you describe your setup a bit more? Maybe provide a picture?

This behaviour is actually something that was made on purpose for performance reasons.

If you have multiple solar panels next to each other, they will share their energy. For performance reasons, they will do so every 5s (if I remember correctly) so you might indeed notice huge jumps in the energy level when this happens.

Also, the server sends the energy level of the solar panel to the client only now and then. I tried to minimise the amount of updates. This reduces the load as fewer packets are sent to the client with the consequence that the energy level might have such jumps when the update packet arrives.

But tell me more about your case and I'll investigate !

[IcemanND]

I'll try and capture a picture or short video clip of it tonight.

But it doesn't matter if I have them next to another panel, connected to a device directly or via cable, or just sitting on a block of sand or stone. The Charge value will climb as expected and periodically will drop to 1000 or less for a few seconds and then return to climbing. I have not noticed a timing pattern to the drop and then return, it does seem to cause strange issues when devices are connected and this is happening.

[IcemanND]

Level VI attached in a group of 16 at various different levels, had to break this one to lose the power to replicate. This array is powering various devices, the rest of the solar cells are all fully charged and no fluctuation.

[Tearlow]

Have the same thing on our end. But the block isn't dropping power (NBT wise). It's only the UI that sets the charge value to the generation value over and over agian. You don't actually lose it... Or at least that's what is going on on our end.

[Pontiac76]

Same here. The Generation value gets put into the Charge value. Seems to happen when the panel is getting power, as when it is night, the charge value stays.

Looks as though when the dialog information is being updated, the Charge RF value and Generation value are both being put into the Charge field and Generation field, then something comes along after and then repopulates the Charge field.

Edit: I'm using 0.7, so it looks like this has been around for a bit.

[Nauktis]

I finally have some time to look at it.
This seems to be a bug indeed and many of you seem to have it.

Though, I don't manage to reproduce it.
Could you describe the smallest setup that demonstrates this behaviour?
Number of panels, of upgrades, how they are laid out etc.

[Pontiac76]

My setup is basically a single VI panel sitting on top of either a capacitor or an energy cell (Don't remember at this moment). Whenever my tree farm is idle, the UI looks fine. When the farm starts kicking up chopping down trees, the UI goes nuts.

What would be nice is to have a block that'd just eat RF at a variable rate.

[IcemanND]

It happens with all levels of the solar panels, as soon as the charge level reaches 32768+ it starts.

The panel can be set on a piece of sand with no upgrades and nothing attached and it occurs.

[SeeJayEmm]

I am also experiencing this issue.

• It only happens on SMP.
• It happens regardless of whether it's a single panel or multiple attached panels.
• It seems to happen more when there is conduit attached to the panels although this is subjective.