take ShipComponentDefs.xml and strip all the components out paste in yours, make sure you leave the header alone and keep the closing tag so it looks like this.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<ShipComponentList
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="../Schema/ShipComponentDefs.xsd">
<!-- Created with the Gal Civ 3 Editor -->
<!-- ShipComponentDefs.xml -->
Paste your code in here
</ShipComponentList>
Then save that in your mod directory with a prepend to the name like RDS_ShipComponentdefs.xml
Do the same with ShipComponentText.xml just change one entry to match your <DisplayName>RepairDronesStrategic_Name</DisplayName> and <Description>RepairDronesStrategic_Dec</Description> and dump the rest and save it just like the previous file.
The files should go in “//MyDocuments/My Games/GalCiv3/Mods” create your own directory here and then add a Game and Text directory inside it. The RDS_ShipComponentDefs.xml will go in the Game directory and the RDS_ShipComponentText.xml will go in the Text Directory.
Walla you have created your first mod and its append style so it shouldnt interfere with other mods or any patches.