How do you use EA's? As automation for most things in your trading style, or as a full "don't touch it, run it while I sleep" kind of thing?

I've been looking at several of the systems here, and forward testing a few EA's that go with them, and there are really great systems here.

But, its hard to watch an EA that is 50-60 pips in profit ultimately close out with at 20 pip loss. As I've watched the EA's (its paper trade, so it doesn't really matter), I've been so tempted to manually close orders when they are big into profits and most signals (but not ALL according to EA) are ripe for a closed position.

So, how do you use these things?

I know a lot of folks like EA's for the "discipline" that it gives them to be faithful to a system, which usually makes sense in the long run.

Yet, some manual intervention doesn't seem like such a bad idea either.

Thoughts?

Thanks,
Cubesteak

Most people may have a great idea when they write an ea, but thier money mangement is lacking. An ideal trade is not 100 pip stop with an 100 pip profit level. If you cannot get at least 2:1 then start over.

larry Williams states exit at the first sign of profit. That does not mean exit with 1 pip, just get out while you are ahead.Lock in your 60 pips manualy and turn the ea off

Yes, I've noticed that some EA's are very poor with money management... Can you think of any off hand that use good management? I'd like to look at the code and see if the framework that I'm putting together makes sense compared to what's out there...

Thanks for your input!

Best regards,
Cubesteak