How to create seperate ETCD and Controlplane nodes in RKE2

This document (000020771) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

RKE2 1.21.2 and higher

Situation

As part of a HA set-up, it may be required to run RKE2 with the ETCD database split from the Control plane nodes.

Resolution

1. On the desired ETCD node, create `/etc/rancher/rke2/config.yaml` with the following contents:

   disable-apiserver: true
   disable-controller-manager: true
   disable-kube-proxy: false
   disable-scheduler: true

2. On the etcd node, install RKE2 using: `curl -sfL https://get.rke2.io | INSTALL_RKE2_VERSION="<required version of RKE2>" INSTALL_RKE2_TYPE="server" sh -` and start it `systemctl start rke2-server`

3. On the controlplane node, create `/etc/rancher/rke2/config.yaml` with the following contents:

   server: https://<ip of the etcd node>:9345
   token: <token string from /var/lib/rancher/rke2/server/node-token on the etcd node>
   disable-etcd: true
   disable-kube-proxy: false
   etcd-expose-metrics: false

4. On the controlplane node, install RKE2 `curl -sfL https://get.rke2.io | INSTALL_RKE2_VERSION="<required version of RKE2>" INSTALL_RKE2_TYPE="server" sh -` and start it `systemctl start rke2-server`

5. Add agent nodes (https://docs.rke2.io/install/ha/#5-optional-join-agent-nodes).

Additional Information

This is only an example to show this configuration in a working state. In a prod environment, you should configure a fixed registration address per the documentation at https://docs.rke2.io/install/ha/#1-configure-the-fixed-registration-address.

Disclaimer

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