Basic Guide 2 Engines and Power TL;DR Edition

[Bronimin]

Because the wiki only tells you how to do it and doesn't tell you why you do it and it's also completely wrong.

Engine Setup
Weld the cracked ones, wirecut the ones with wires exposed, then wrench the ones with the covers off. Click with empty hand to turn on, then crowbar to remove low fuel cells. Engines break when the cell empties, so it is recommended to remove any cells below 2/3 and to chuck them straight into the regenerator or else it's more work for you. A full cell will take about one hour to completely run dry, so check back.

You can fix multiple engines at a time as long as they are on the same stage and you don't have to move to reach all of them. Just click all in range and wait for them all to complete.

SMES Setup
Wait a little bit while the reactors get up to speed,
Turn on T-scanner to find wire from engine room to SMES units (it's grey) then crowbar to uncover it,
Click wire with multitool to get a watt reading,
Divide watt reading by three to determine what you set each SMES to on the lower deck and divide by two to determine what you set on the upper deck (number of SMES units). Add a little bit if the engines are still spinning up (should be around 400k for lower deck and 700k for upper deck)
To determine output required, max out the output on one SMES unit to see what is actually drawn from the APC units (it'll be around 200-300k), then divide by three and set each SMES unit to that, plus a little extra just in case.

If you do not set inputs correctly, you will waste power if too low (overcharge is dissipated) or charge the SMES unevenly if too high.
If you do not set outputs correctly, the same thing will happen. SMES will discharge unevenly. This will result in a brief power cut if a SMES unit runs out of charge and it was the only one discharging. Usually not noticeable since APCs will cover for the blackout.
If outputs are even slightly too low, Medbay will run out of power in approximately 10-30 minutes. This is because their APC has the same charge as the Piot's Office APC battery but while the pilot's office consumes about 500-1000W, the medical bay consumes 20,000-30,000W out of that one APC because there is only one area in lower medical and it is fucking huge.

Set the RO SMES unit to take half of the engine output once all APC units are charged. This is your back up power in case the main SMES get taken out. How do you know that the APCs are charged?

Go to core monitoring room, find engine monitor. Screwdrive the screen then crowbar the tiles underneath the computer. Cut the wire underneath it, then find a wire from the main network and run it to the computer. Screwdrive the screen again. You can now see all of the APC units across the station lower deck and their charge and their status.

APCs and You
Coming Soon (tm)

[Blade2000Br]

I didn't understood shit.

I just max input and put 200kw on output and bang, it works.

[TheDonkified]

Max input is bad, because you are draining a lot of energy.