Yeah, so my question comes down to 'how much can we play around with weight efficiency?' For example, maybe I can drop a lot of solar cells in exchange for a sm

Yeah, so my question comes down to 'how much can we play around with weight efficiency?' For example, maybe I can drop a lot of solar cells in exchange for a small battery or capacitor capable of providing the needed power for the higher exhaust velocity, but in bursts. Then we change the firing pattern from a continuous burn to alternating between burning and recharging the batteries, and save a lot of solar panel weight. [on edit: the weight efficiency of the solar panels will also depend on where you are in the solar system...]