Mythbusters How Much Water Do You Really Need To Run A Power Generator Satisfactory Game

Hello Guys and welcome to a brand new Satisfactory Mythbusters guide, this time on how many water extractors are required for power generators. It sounds obvious but there have been a lot of numbers thrown about ranging from a couple of generators to 50?! from a single extractor - So it's time to set the game straight and find out how many we can really run on a single extractor.
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[@marshallc6215]

This is no longer accurate as of update 5, wherein coal plants always consume constant fuel and water, regardless of power usage. Same goes for nuclear, fuel, and geothermal. Only biomass ramps its fuel burn rate dynamically to match the load.

[@byLags]

What about now? I just started Satusfactory and am currently learning coal generation and other T2 and T3 workspace items.

[@marshallc6215]

@@byLags still true; gen is otherwise only "weird" when it comes to over/underclocking where the energy per item is constant but the power output seems to only be loosely correlated with OC %. Snutt (the bald media guy for coffee stain studios) described it once as "generators follow a linear formula in a stupid way"

[@ayote663]

@@marshallc6215 would you know how many would be able to run off of a single water extractor now?

[@marshallc6215]

@@ayote663 coal is 45 water per minute and a water extractor is 120 at 100% or 300 at 250% overclock. The normal ratios are 8 gens:3 extractors if not overclocked (you have to run two mk 1 pipes or a mk 2 cuz that's 360 water.) Most don't overclock water extractors for coal so the ratios aren't common but find the common multiples of 45 and 300 to get an idea of the ratio.

[@MsUltrafox]

Let's bust this myth fast. Yes, a coal generator can use up to 45 cubic meters of water a minute but only when it is running at full strength. If it is only running at half power it only uses 22,5 cubic meters a minute. So you can run 50 coal generators on a single water extractor but then they can not be running above 13,3% output.

[@TotalXclipse]

Yes but you should always run a generator grid so that it can run at full consumption. if you only ever run it at 13.3% it's hardly effective.

[@MsUltrafox]

@@TotalXclipse That is why it is NOT possible to run 50 coal generators off of just 1 water extractor. My setup is 1 water extractor per 3 coal generators and it runs fine. This game does kinda make the 3 setups kinda normal since all splitters/mergers use the 1/3 ratio.

[@TheStuntViking]

@@MsUltrafox Then you would have to overclock the water pump just a hair, to pump 135 cubicmeters. 1:3 was my ratio for my first coal power plant and it ran fine until I started pushing full capacity. As soon as you go above 88.89% (120/135) power consumption, they start shutting down. I spent a couple hours trying to figure it out and now I build 3 water pumps to 8 coal plants like he says in the end, except I use a manifold style setup; one straight pipe with 3 water pumps going in on one side and 8 coal plants going out on the other side. Like this: w w w | | | ================== | | | | | | | | c c c c c c c c

[@schroedingerscat2.054]

@@TheStuntViking I use a torus manifold ( ie a doughnut shape), with six extractors ( at 80 percent) and 14 coal power plants per manifold. One pipe just above the other connected at the ends. water extractors connect to the top pipe and power plants to the lower. Water flows in both directions to meet in the middle. Almost acts like a balancer and gets them online faster than one long pipe and it has never failed. I use this as a modular design and with 2 can generate nearly 4K MW, enough for early game. Ps I should note that I do this as water is only available at one end of the coal power station

[@richardruddy6341]

It's basically everything works to demand requirements. If there is no demand then 1 water pump will not have any demand for water except just filling the coal power plants initially. There will be no further demand on it til the power stations need to provide power and thus require more water. When building this setup, the pump will very likely take a good while to fill so many power plants.

[@starman4346]

These videos make my factories look unsatisfactory

[@resid3nt]

lmao

[@razorback0z]

I run the standard 3 pumps to 8 plants with the pumps in the centre, 2 facing one way, 1 the other. Thats 600mw easy, tidy, modular.

[@TotalXclipse]

Absolutely, and I think with it being so modular it's really useful for expansion

[@dananskidolf]

If you double up, pipelines have sufficient throughput that you can have two water extractors share one, so you do two water extractors on one pipe, goes to eight coal generators, then join the second pair of water extractors, on to another eight generators, then the last pair of extractors. And that uses one normal coal + one normal sulphur node worth of compacted coal (with mk2 miners), with a tiny bit left over to make some black powder. :)

[@UNSCPILOT]

Just finished a 24 coal plant, 12 extractor, 3 mk2 miner (120 per, so 360 coal a minute) mega power plant for the multiplayer server I'm on with some friends, lot of fun getting a pattern down. 12 plants in a row, with a second set of 12 mirrored behind them, each pair of plants fed be one underclocked water extractor each, all coal fed by a a simple line of splitters overflow filling the reactors, all laid out to keep the runs of pipe and conveyor simple and short for my dummy brain to keep track of and make it easier to troubleshoot. The fun part is going to be finding 100+ slugs to convert to power shards and turn a 1800 megawatt powerplant into a 4500 megawatt powerplant... only to probably blow a fuse and need to start all over when our next project probably blows through all of it XD

[@BeatstormX]

1 Pump 3 Powerplant is easier

[@patmalloy3569]

@@BeatstormX 3 generators 4 plants lol

[@IceGeck0]

1 power shard in a water extractor allows it to supply 4 coal gens perfectly, my fav setup

[@TotalXclipse]

yep thats a nice way of doing it :)

[@od1401]

Thanks, that sounds much simpler and plenty of power 🔋 to use to overclock

[@liesdamnlies3372]

How much efficiency do you lose overall with that? (Not that I care much. Less headache is it’s own reward.)

[@TheEvolNemesis]

@@liesdamnlies3372 the overclocked extractor makes 50% more water per extractor but uses a little under double the power per extractor. It's really not THAT bad.

[@ganjiblobflankis6581]

MW, not MWH. Electricity is measured in power, which already contains time. 1 MW = 1MJ/S 1MWH = 3600 MJ 1 MWH/min = 3600MJ/min = 60MW. Generators and demand are measured in multiples of Watts. Multiple-Watt Hours measure total energy consumption, normally for the purpose of billing. They take an energy/ time unit and multiply it by time, giving an energy unit. The game is all about throughput since there is an infinite amount of each resource given enough time.. So it is ore/minute m^3/minute and MW. If I am harsh on this issue, blame trauma from my maths teacher who would make your life a misery if you messed up on units.

[@Veklim]

You got harsh so I didn't have to, thankyou ;)

[@luftwolf7405]

Your teacher did a good job so you'll never 4get again! Sadly even basic math / physics knowledge is quite rare amongst adults these days... :-/

[@TotalXclipse]

hahah no worries you don't sound harsh. I wish I had a maths teacher like yours!

[@artemkortsev8279]

you guys studiyng phisycs measurments at math classes?

[@ganjiblobflankis6581]

@@artemkortsev8279 Whenever possible we would have real-world example problems to practice maths and show how it is applied. We would have Hire-purchase versus cash-down when buying a television to see how interest works. We even had a messy problem with thermal units, KWH and such to work out utility bills. They also served as lovely pitfall traps where you could spend ages working out the correct answer, but forget to put a "squared" by the units or answer in metres when the question asked for centimetres.

[@loeffel4144]

The capacity isn't the power that is produced. There is another line for this and that is called production. Consumption shows the needed power and if consumption goes above production, the power will fail. Problem in this system is repowering the network. the second a machine gets power it draws its full power it needs, even though it is not producing at the moment. That mean repowering is either only possible if you can support all needs or you need to disconnect part and reconnect them afterwards.

[@zordah]

I dedicate one out of the 8 stations for running the coal miner and water extractors for the power plant leaving the other 7 for factory power. No problems with having to repowering it if I accidentally draw too much from the factory network.

[@fatedunion1761]

@@zordah had to read this twice to realize just how significant of a statement this was, having a separate power network just for keeping the power running for the rest of your base... that is just... brilliant... essentually keeping all base power running with a fail safe always keeping your main base running for a quick restart no matter what... its so simple yet so perfect... kudos

[@gtskill268]

@@fatedunion1761 what I do is have a complete backup power plant that can add 50% to my max production it is never connected to the grid unless the power crashes also top fed coal generators with fluid buffers above to make it flow even without power and a large storage for coal so it hopefully can restart it self most of the time

[@Stoney3K]

I always keep a few biomass burners handy on standby just in case I ever need to bootstrap the system.

[@eudaimonistic]

On the other hand, there is some possibility this could be a valid startup method for a super factory. If it has it's own power source that needs a lot of MW to get going, you could set up a potentially infinite chain of coal generators and backed up resources to kick start it. While that scenario is unlikely necessary by the time you'd build a super factory, it's fun to look at the properties of this game and how flow rates are calculated. Maybe a stockpile of coal on the water is enough to get a multiple gigawatt power source going. I now know not to bother with this strategy unless that's specifically the need. Thanks for the awesome video!

[@rbruch98]

One of the epiphanies I had was that water is non-directional. It just seeks to fill open space (the pipe). So, in my current build, I've got all of my refining happening in...refineries. Wet Concrete, Pure Iron, Pure Copper, and my steel is using not only Pure Iron but the Hardened Steel recipe. I'm currently running 32 refineries (17 Iron, 11 Copper, 2 Concrete, 2 Biofuel) on 6 water extractors in a large loop. At major junctions, I'm using Industrial Buffers to supplement when segments aren't running full bore.

[@douglasfarris2553]

Thanks so much for this. Love your videos. Definitely helps me get some ideas to help with my game.

[@PjotrGiling]

TotalXclipse, in the configuration you use (3 extractors and 8 plants) in stead of using 2 pipelines running from the extractors to feed the plants, run a single pipeline along the plants and connect all plants to it. Then place the extractors on the other side of the pipeline and connect them to the pipeline as follows: The first extractor between plants 2 and 3, the second between plants 4 and 5 and the last one between plants 6 and 7. This is a better use of pipe and doesn't require that extra pipeline above the other and it works! Almost the same as your solution but with lesser pipes and space. ;-)

[@schroedingerscat2.054]

You cant always do that, depends on geography. I have twin coal stations side by side that only have access at one end to water. I use a doughnut shaped manifold to run six extractors, pushing the water both ways down the pipe to meet in the middle

[@benshaw255]

Thanks for the video - cleared up some things and i had only just started building some coal yesterday. :)

[@TotalXclipse]

Glad I could help you out! Now you've got coal unlocked the real fun is about to begin :)

[@laierr]

I love that "watt-hour per minute" metric!

[@RichardTruth123]

If your power demand was variable you could potentially use a series of fluid buffers and not need as manny water extractors. However to manage that and not get brown outs would require significant monitoring and management. Many things IRL are designed similar to reduce costs, where its more cost effective to implement constant monitoring than to design to the max necessity. However in this game its far more time effective to build things completely self sufficient.

[@Kishandreth]

3 water extractors for 8 coal generators is peak efficiency. The only draw back is the pipes restricting 300m^3/sec. The only perfect solution is a 32 Coal Generator plant, with 12 Water extractors. 5 rows of 6 coal generators and 2 on the end. Yes the piping is shared amongst them with multiple pipes. Doubling or tripling up on water pipes allows you to bypass the 300m^3/sec rule.

[@Taran72]

Thanks! This demo was very useful to me. :)

[@BryanSeegars]

I usually run 1 pump per 3 powerplants running at 100% I've found that adding a 4th may be fine when you add it, but under load, it starts to loose water as the other plants consume it.

[@garavonhoiwkenzoiber]

2:31 it literally says 0% efficiency, next to the 75MW and 4 second thing

[@TotalXclipse]

True, but I rarely trust that since the first released as it tends to fluxtuate When it has the odd amount of resources come through

[@donovandelozier7156]

@@TotalXclipse the efficiency on the machines is basically "how much am i producing compared to how much i should be based on clockspeed" and generators automatically reduce what they produce to match what the grid is using. So the efficiency is measuring this reduced power out to the max power it could be producing. So it's a bad measure for all generators because of that fact. Efficiency works perfectly well for other machines to determine whether or not there's down time (and if you reduced the clocks speed down to match the efficiency you'd end up with 100 percent efficiency measured based on that; example if you're feeding a smelter 15 iron ore per minute and it's set to 100 percent it is expecting to consume 30 per minure to produce 30 iron ingots, it is only being suppliex enough for 15 so will show 50 percent efficiency, but if you underclock it to 50 percent, it'll run continuously at 15 per minute and show 100 percent efficiency)

[@Bondubras]

In my current factory, I have a coal plant running at a 2:1 Plant/Extractor ratio, with 8 extractors and 16 plants.Right now, my biggest bottleneck is actually in the coal supply. I have 3 normal nodes feeding the plant, with 1 line to 8 plants, and the third line being split in half and injected halfway through. I currently have to have the plant 50% disabled, but as soon as I get my Steel production up and running, I'll be able to get Mk. 2 miners and Mk. 3 belts, which will make things much easier for me.

[@rottis5042]

i have a 3/8 in my factory with one pipe, it's a weird system but 1 water - 4 gen - long cable - 4 gen - 2 water... it works, and i think it can run at full cap

[@patrikjelinek3214]

its not that hard to count like 120 * 3 = 360 water and 8generators = 8* 45 = 360 so yes it will work at 100%capacity but only if u use mk2 pipes

[@gettps]

Yea, It took me a while after water first started being used for me to figure out. My plants kept turning off after a long while. I ended up playing with it and figured exactly this out. I now always fully overclock all water pumps and coal generators, which consume 91cm each. So, I use 1 water pump for every 3 generators all fully overclocked. I have 2 sets of 3 generators and 2 pumps in each plant and I have 2 plants. All this has been running for months and never lost power no matter how much I consume... as long as I don't go over the total power generated.

[@MarcioHuser]

I always plan for maximum consumption. So, I use one extractor for every two coal generators, downclocked to 75%. To save pipes, I group three sets, so, 270 m3 per pipe, feeding six generators

[@kadboodle]

Same

[@TotalXclipse]

Yes always plan for max consumption. 1 extractor to two generators works fine, but surely 3 extractors between 8 generators (other than the pipe cost and the extra consumption of coal is better than paying for 25% more extractors?

[@MarcioHuser]

@@TotalXclipse Oh, I go simple. Because that surpass the 300 m³/min for the pipes, and I would have to balance and stuff... I really don't want to hassle that much XD

[@SirHackaL0t.]

I have 3 extractors for 8 generators split into 2 pipes (the 3rd extractor is split into the two lines). This means two pipes carry 180 water each feeding 2 sets of 4 generators. It keeps the pipe numbers down. I always distribute the water by splitting into two and two again. Elegant and quite space friendly.

[@zeepysea]

I always plan to have 125% production capacity to maximum. But I run 8 coal generators per pipe. 2 extractors per pipe with 1 being overclocked to 125% for max of 300. Since I have unlocked fuel generators I make sure my power consumption is at least 50% off coal and 50% on fuel. Fixing to unlock geyser power and that will power only what is required to maintain my power generators. So all pumps, extractors and such such.

[@lukeday87]

Capacity basically means potential not the actual amount of power being produced at that time.

[@re4lize]

To "answer" the question of the video in short: 8 coalgenerators + 3 pumps =perfect ratio (consider your max pipecapacity of 300m³/min-> merge the third pipe after the 3rd coal generator) stoned engineering stuff for more detail: So heres the thing. People (and you did also in the video :P) are confusing (or are at least are not precice enough) capacity and production/comsumption and do not consider, that not the coal generators only are the system but the coal generators + the waterextractors. In addition to that, satisfactory is simulating correct here which means it is a dynamic system which also matters. So I go with the "perfect ratio" - example which is 3 pipes for 8 coal generators. Your pumps need a total 60MW of capacity available to operate at 100%. Output is 120m³ of water/min. Your generators serve a capacity of 750MW. If you set it up as a closed system (after kickstart with external power supply, to get the pumps running) they server the pumps so max. capacity is 750MW-60MW = 690MW. So still this all is just capacity which means its static so far. This is just your capacity. To get your actual electrical consumption you need to add the timeaxis. consumption = capacity x time. Our little 690MW capacity grid can serve 690MW x 8760hrs (1year) = 6GWhrs. Which is huge btw :D. So since most of you are lazy overflowusers ( :P ) and do not proper load balance you production lines, your machines are not stable in consumption. That causes instability in production (of power) aswell over time, which is why a lot of people get confused in the midterm of the game when they first scale up and get a blackout, even they checked their capacity before. So yeah basically: Just go fucking huge with your powersetups to always have a buffer of capacity and startup your coalsystem in steps. First pumps, then coal to get it running at 100% fast. OR if you like the challnge: load balance EVERYTHING to get stable consumption and measure the needed capacity to have the 100% efficient power grid. If you read this I hope you get my point and it makes sense. I'm high so no hate please. Have a nice day :D

[@TotalXclipse]

I appreciate the time you put into the message! The perfect ratio was not the objective of the video but I give out the easy solution. The point I was trying to make (albeit not as efficiently put :p) is that resource consumption scales with energy consumption. Which is why you should prep your powerplants to run at full capacity. I do disagree with your statement on the overflow, providing you calculate the ratio of coal and water into your build like you would a load balance then it does not matter what technique you go down. The problem is people often don't calculate this. If you go down the root of using huge buffers, you're prolonging the inevitable and causing more problems in the long run

[@re4lize]

@@TotalXclipse Thanks for the answer. With "overflow" i meant to overflow your whole power grid with capacity. In other words: just don't try to measure the consumption you will have but just build e.g. double the amount of powerr plants. Because you will end up needing more and more anyway when you get bigger and bigger. Of course of you should load balance the "minisystems" in your power grid like my example system consisting of 3 extractorsand 8 coal generators. P.S. my biuld just need another 2 months and then i will be proud to send it in;) spoiler: perfect case study to show that you do not need any pump if you consider potential energy :) ah yeah: if you need some engineering input or review for an upcomping script i'm your man (actual environmental engineer lolz)

[@mickdejong]

I don't think you really understood how coal power worked in update 3 and before.. production was based on consumption of power, which in turn also affected resource consumption. Just like with biogeni's

[@nexii1479]

You need to make this into a mini series where you test different methods for efficiency and stuff

[@TotalXclipse]

That would be cool, unfortunately I don't know where I'd find the time... perhaps if someone could do a video guide on how to manage time better :D - that's what I need hahaha I'm useless

[@od1401]

Ah that's why my 3-8 setup worked without any pipe splitting, I haven't gone past the power consumption granted by one pipe yet. I need to get off my ass and figure out the relatively simple pipe splitting method to get 3 120 m3 💧 delivered equally to 8 45mw coal burners via 300 m3 💧 pipes

[@TotalXclipse]

The simplest way I've found is to the have one extractor split water from middle, and the two other extractors connect to the outside powerplants, one at the front and one at the back, link them all together and it should work :)

[@robinchwan]

piping might be the answer, split in the pipes and meet again at the destination means more than the amount it says it can run. 300 in one pipe and 300 in another means 600 at end location right ? so if you split the pipe it will double the water pressure. if you put a pipe at the beginning of the intake and at the end of the line intake ( perhaps middle) it will and connect all right infront of said power generators you should be able to keep things running no ? ( key locations)

[@Iwillpwn2]

thats only possible if you arent using any of the power produced. Generators in this game reduce resource consumption based on how much power is needed to run machines that are connected to the power grid.

[@TheEvolNemesis]

Yup, those same 50 generators they had 'running' on one extractor also would have kept 'running' on a single mark 1 belt of coal split between all of them. That's what happens when you aren't actually putting even a single generator's capacity of load on them.

[@ZIMsar10]

Thanks again for the great video! Can you please advise how to run power to the Water Extractor? I have tried directly off the Coal Generator via direct Pylon connection, but it wouldn’t connect. I have a far from ideal setup at the moment, whereby I am using BioMass Generators to provide power to the Water Extractors. I would really appreciate some help with this, thanks in advance.

[@TotalXclipse]

Each pilon has 4 connections early game. If your biomass generator is connected to a pilon, then you should have 3 points free, one for the extractor, one for the coal miner and one for a power generator. If they are too far away from one another you may need to run more pilons between them but they should connect fine

[@ZIMsar10]

@@TotalXclipse Thanks for the reply. This is hard to explain via typing. What I want, is no Biomass Generators being used at all, they are a pain for RSS collection. How can I set it up, so I don't use these at all, like you have in your video. As mentioned, I have tried running a direct line from a Coal Generator, but the Water Extractor would not allow me to connect it. The were only two connections that ran from the initial Pylon off the Coal Generator. Sorry to be a pain, I'm just trying to streamline things & it's hard to get reliable information on this game.

[@TotalXclipse]

@@ZIMsar10 I understand and don't worry once you've got the generator running, connect it to the same grid as the Biomass burners, make it so that you're able to run a few coal powerplants and providing those powerplants are connected to the same grid as the biomas burners (and providing more than the total consumption of energy your factory has) then you should be able to delete the biomass burners and from there The coal generators will be self sustaining :)

[@ZIMsar10]

@@TotalXclipse Well my friend, after listening to your WONDERFUL! advise you have solved this problem for me & I am tremendously happy about that! It was doing my head in, having to use Biomass Generators & it took a lot of my time having to hunt for RSS for them, which is best spent elsewhere. I really cannot thank you enough mate, you just made my day!

[@rocket2739]

Does the coal consumption go down with water consumption when the generators aren't running at full load ??

[@ooglek]

I had this problem and couldn't figure out why. Now I know! Time to build more water extractors. Whee!

[@brianmcgill1290]

I got 6 water extractor feeding 20 coal power plants.

[@ooglek]

@@brianmcgill1290 Yep, you can do that. As long as you aren't using full power for all 20 plants. 45 water per minute at full production at 20 plants equals 900 water per minute. That's 3 lines of 300 water per minute, since pipes can only hold 300 each, which you'd have to split up to feed one or two of your plants, since 20 is not evenly divisible by 3. However, 6 water extractors gives you 720 water per minute. If all of your plants were operating at full power production, you'd burn through your 720 and your plants, eventually, would start falling offline, until you were down to 16 plants. Now, if you aren't using more than 1.2 MW of power right now, you may think everything is fine and you can handle it with this setup. Once you go over 1.2 MW, your grid WILL fail, though it may take a bit of time after you start using that much for it to fail. If you are producing the full 1.5 MW with 6 extractors, make a video and post it! It shouldn't be possible, but I'll believe it if you show me.

[@brianmcgill1290]

Did you think I'm not using fluid buffers to balance the load.

[@ooglek]

Brian Mcgill fluid buffers only delay the outage you will have when using full power. If you aren’t at full power yet you won’t see the impending doom! The maths don’t lie.

[@ManualdeSobrevivencia]

The bottom slider is where you select the efficiency, so when it tells 100% it means it is going to reach that threshold. However, the current efficiency is shown on the top left corner of the machine screen. So if all of them 10 generators are running at 10% that means it is equivalent to 1 generator at 100%. So that's why they'll consume more water as energy is required. They don't overproduce energy, so their consumption is proportional to their % efficiency. That also applies their coal needs.

[@TotalXclipse]

You’re absolutely right but the videos not about efficiency it’s about how many coal generators can run off a single water extractor hence why I go on to talk about how fuel consumption scales with energy consumption of your factory which I think is much more important in this equation ☺️

[@everquestfan]

Great video ive got three charcoal power on one water pump and the third shuts off randomly and can pop the fuse when with the unstable supply even though overall MW would suggest otherwise. The power spike kicks the breaker before it can smooth power flow. I solved this with the battery storage. They can compensate the low power spike and keep the grid up.

[@TheEvolNemesis]

Yeah, if you have 3 on one water pump that will happen, the water pump makes 120 cubic meters/min and 3 generators need a total of 45 * 3 = 135. So you'd need to use a power shard to overclock the water extractor a little bit if you want to avoid that, make it so it outputs 135 to match the generators, or else it's going to be doing that toggling one of the plants on and off so you'll just be averaging 8/9ths of maximum production... but if you are going to use a shard anyway, you might as well just clock the extractors to 50% extra, so each puts out 180 cubic meters/min, then you can run 4 generators on each extractor (4*45=180), which I find makes it very simple to make nice clean setups.

[@Gundamgeo]

The 0.1 draw on the power graph is the Idle WaterPump

[@josephrittenhouse5839]

You can run your three water extractors by splitting from the middle to the outside two extractors with pumps pointing away from the center. Each side will supply four coal generators evenly. Load balance the water just like you would a conveyor belt, using a t junction like a belt splitter, two into two for four pipes. I raise my generators by one foundation, split the pipes once on the dock, then once again under the plants.

[@LiLBitsDK]

old post but you do NOT need any pumps AT ALL unless you need to LIFT the water... flat water lines like he uses = no pumps needed

[@SeedlingNL]

I think it says 750.1MW at the start because of rounding due to the 0.1MW idle load. That rounding can also prevent a 30MW/60MW crash site from being powered due to it consuming 30.1/60.1MW as soon as you fire the single biogenerator.

[@101Crock]

I did the math, and if they are all running at full capacity, one water extractor can run around 2.6 coal plants.

[@astrid2432]

a small thing, I'm not sure if it helps by that, but your conveyor and pipes are a bit wrong maybe if you get like 120 coal per minute, your first one gets like 60, as you split it there, then the next one gets one 30, the next one only 15 and so one. as it's the same with the water. idk if it would change if all generators get the same amount, but just wand to mention it. my set up have like 9 generators for now and my only issue is like to seperate my water pipes

[@TotalXclipse]

They're not wrong :) This is the overflow method. You can split pipes and conveyors evenly but it works exactly the same. Take for example a factory running at 50% of the power produced and we have 4 power generators on a mk1 belt. You're right in that the first generator will take 50% of the resources, so for this example 30 coal per minute and at 50% consumption the generator will consume 7.5 coal per minute. so within 3 minutes the power plant will be fully backed up and once that happens only 7.5 coal will be split per minute to the generator. The second split will now send 26.25 coal per minute to that generator until full and after a total of 47 coal will be sent on to the last split. (also bear in mind that they will still be filling up whilst the other generators are in use.) It'll take longer for them to get up and running, but doing it this way you'll find that the system is quicker and easier to scale and also has less down time, as if you're constantly splitting perfectly any minor hicup will effect later down the line where as with a manifold / over flow system there's a backup supply. I cover it in a video if you'd like me to link you to it. If you have 1 extractor to 9 generators I promise you once your factory power consuption goes up, you'll quickly run out of water in your power plants

[@astrid2432]

@@TotalXclipse I mean sure, both things work and I use a combination from both, splitting so all get the same amount, but not carrying how much I get. I have like two groups. one is full have like 6 coal generator and the second have 3. I have 3 or 4 water pumps and 1 mk2 miner on a pure coal I don't use the improved coal for now (but I could do it). I mean yeah. the only overflow is easy to make and takes less space. but by a power plant, it's quite risky as like when the last one gets barely supplied as you advance further and not thinking at the power. normally you could supply your base with it, but if one generator gets down, your whole base gets it too. I mean sure, the other one doesn't pretent it too completly, but there is a higher chance that it will keep going. I already saw your manifold system and got a bit confused as I know the first one with splitting (who uses imkibitz I think) is like splitting it up and uses the right number for the stuff and even merging the stuff together, but I mostly look at the numbers and if I produce enough, then I will just let it. sure your technic works too, but idk, it looks abit better if it's splitted at least,so you could look at one pipe or conveyor and if you see, it gets less you know you need to stuff to it

[@TotalXclipse]

I agree it looks better if load balanced perfectly and I use both methods, and as far as I know Imkibitz uses both ways as well. But I’m not pushing any amount on my manifolds. Like you would the perfect split I put the exact needed ratio of items. The last splitter on the manifold will always continue running splitting 50/50 between the two last generators and only when I exceed the power I produce will the system all shut off. ☺️

[@ghostofviper4205]

Damn ur setup is so clean, mine is a total mess

[@l337h4cker]

Usage for machines is in MW, not MWh. If they used energy for one hour, that would be in MWh

[@tailsonrails]

accurate.

[@Jason-xb2qf]

It's 3 water extractors into 8 power plants. Why do I use multiples of 8? Because it divides into multiples of 60 (coal), because you are not limited to water but you are limited to coal. Just make a pipe junction on all 3 extractors, connect them all together and pull a pipe from each junction, one into each side of the system and one in the middleish, the 300 per minute will not be a problem because it's 360/3 more or less. 120 in each pipe.

[@skyrose6816]

I did this before, it took close to an hour for the water to start completely draining out and shutting off power

[@TotalXclipse]

yep, that's the frustrating thing as you might go off and work on something else and then realise you have to return and redo the setup

[@skyrose6816]

@@TotalXclipse fortunately i figure out some quick maths and stuck to it, also endcap fluid buffers are just sweet

[@patmalloy3569]

I feel like one overclocked pump or the standard way with 3 pumps and 8 coal generators is a matter of taste.

[@blen983]

I’ve learned the hard way both in this game and in real life. Have planned redundancy for when disaster strikes. It will strike. It always does.

[@aatsiii]

It's probably a left over bug from a time when coal plants only ate coal when there was load on the power system. They are hungry now constantly but they forgot to add thirst.

[@wcg66]

Does anyone know if there is a mod that acts like an artificial load? It would be handy to test the real capacity of your grid.

[@oryanmackie-smith2423]

I'm currently running 4 Water to 9 Generators and that seems like a good system at the moment. I haven't had my power consumption up to maximum yet, so maybe when/if that happens I may have issues, but by then I should be onto other means of power production... Im happy to screenshot if you would like to see... 🙄🙄

[@TotalXclipse]

You're welcome to send screenshots in our discord :) But you'll be fine with 4 extractors between 9 as the perfect combination is 3 between 8. the extra extractor will easily provide for the single generator, infact you can add another generator if you wish :)

[@oryanmackie-smith2423]

@@TotalXclipse I run the nine gens to a belt split 3x3 for coal... (easy splits) - that was my setup before water update... so when water was introduced, I reworked my system to accomodate the water, and factored 2 water extractors for 4.5 gens seemed a good ratio... anyway... I'll have upload a screenshot to your discord... :)

[@ignoringya9000]

pipes capacity = 300. 300/45=6.6(6) so u can provide 6 power plants (270 water consumption) with 1 pipe line. You need 3 pumps working on 75% of efficiency to provide 6 power plants (wothout boosts) and 90 coal per min

[@JD_Mortal]

The problem is that the water system is borked, as well as power plants that use water. I often start a game and my pipes and power plants seem to forget that they were full. In that instance, they start to pulse on and off, if you set-up the "exact" consumed water. Same if you setup an abundance, as the pumps will cycle on and off, which takes time, and you end-up with pulsing power. (If you are borderline on power, the start-up spikes will trip breakers and lead you into an unresolvable issue with starting-up. Liquid takes FOREVER to get into the giant lines. Apparently each segment of line is connected by a soda straw, used to fill it, piece by piece, instead of all at once.) When that happens, the only solution is to manually shut down all power, until the water catches-up... Then cross your fingers and HOPE it stays that way. (45*10 = 450, but when your game randomly decides your water volume is 0, or a pump turns-off and doesn't start in time to refill the missing volume... It's back to running around and messing with water again.) This game is just getting more and more horrible with things that just don't make sense... Belts go from 60 to 120 to 270 to 480??? Why the random 270, which is divisible by NOTHING within the game production. Yet miners go from 60, 120, 240, 480, 960... To add insult to injury, you don't even get the MK3 miner, until the end, when it's not even needed at that point... You are done... Unless you want to rebuild EVERYTHING within the entire game, for the new miners speeds. Liquids don't actually obey "physics", or even logical, reasonable, flow code. The biggest issue is the fact that the pumps will "suck water out of your pumps, leaving all reserves empty, except the last reserve. Water will not obey reality "head"... It will take forever to fill to the ends, because each segment is like a cup that has to be filled, before the next can fill. When being consumed, the last cup always empties 100% first, which can leave your machines empty, even if you have enough volume that should be flowing. (In an ironic twist, if you loop your water, it just confuses the game and it's about a 50/50 chance of working or the pipes think they are head-to-head, and water just stops flowing in both directions, or simply refuses to fill from both sides, making the problem even worse. Oddly, pipes seem to have a "direction", and the way you connect them will determine the direction, which seems to add flow resistance or act like a conveyor placed the wrong way. Purging the whole line will TRY to reset all the connections in the line, but that is about a 50/50 shot too.) Why they added such pointless detail to the game, which could have been simplified to "volume in = volume out"... It is beyond my grasp. We are forced to battle it, when it fails to work right, not due to any of our own setups, but simply due to the games borked code failing to work as they think it should be working. Messing with pipes, which literally only has to be done once, in theory, if the code worked... Is like forcing someone to assemble furniture that they will never use, but they are forced to constantly rebuild it, and tighten the bolts, because it just randomly begins to fall apart, even though it was assembled exactly as outlined in the directions. (The water systems and other fluids, all seem to need some kind of constant and random attendance, though they should not need any at all, once setup correctly.) Their solution for bad code... Liquid buffers, which just delay the enviable and add more buggy code to the formula that is already anti-logic and anti-physics and anti-fluid-dynamic.

[@LiLBitsDK]

use the batteries to handle spikes, they do 100MW spikes each, so 4 of em = spikes up to 400MW is soaked up... if you are running on battery power to keep the grid afloat... upgrade your powerplants before you run out of stored power, running out will then trip your fuses.

[@BenieTheDragon]

I have 8 extractors with 32 coal gens, and that's probably overkill (with the extractors). Each extractor handles four coal gens, the reasoning is my friend sees it as "it looks better", and I kept that theme since.

[@rottis5042]

to run at full cap you need 12 extractors

[@tomniklas394]

Thats not possible, you need to use the whole power of the cole Power plants to get them off idle.

[@gearturner9307]

The amount of water needed is completely dependant on the power used. More power used= coal burned faster + water used faster. Therefore if u have a 1,500mW mega power plant (like I do) but only use 600mW then I've experienced only using 3-4 water extractors at most. But as I use more and more power, resources get burned faster from the coal factory. So at some point I'll have to have faster coal and water to keep everything trucking along

[@TotalXclipse]

Exactly and at full fuel consumption each extractor will need 15 coal per minute and 45m water

[@anderstermansen130]

you can connect a maximum of two point five coal generators to one water extractor. The extractor pulls 120 cubic meteres a minute, and coal plants uses 45. 45*2+22,5 is 112,5 cubicmeter of water pr minute for 2 point 5 coal plants,

[@TotalXclipse]

You can clock the extractor higher should you wish though to allow you to add 6, but yes a single extractor at normal clock speed can provide for just over 2.5 generators

[@fabschi7513]

How much coal do you need for the 8 generator setup ?

[@TotalXclipse]

at full energy production a single generator uses 1 coal per 4 seconds, so 15 per minute. 8 x 15 is 120 per minute. So a single full mk2 belt - but you'll rarely be running at 100% capacity.

[@beritait2971]

Hey i just wanna asking, is it my game buggy or else, water tank on coal generator always 10/50

[@TotalXclipse]

If it doesn't move then it sounds bugged try replacing the coal generator or flushing the pipe network to see if it fixes it

[@beritait2971]

@@TotalXclipse but the coal just woring, just like nothing happen, the coal producing energy, only water not working other fluids is filling

[@TotalXclipse]

Bondan Dimasanto that’s really odd, I’ve no idea what could be causing that

[@scheballs7]

Great Stuff! I'd love to see the max of one overclocked Water Extractor. Especially when in some areas of the map your water spots are the limiting factor.

[@Veklim]

max OC water extractor does 300m3/minute, i.e. one full pipe. Since coal generators use 45/min you can power 6.66666666 generators for every one 250% water extractor. This is easiest done by building 3 extractors at 250% and plugging in 20 generators, water goes in at start, second at the 7th generator pipe junction and again at the 14th junction. This works because pipes will back-fill, meaning none of the water gets 'stuck' anywhere.

[@t3hpwninat0r]

In the second array of coal generators, those extra pipes are completely unnecessary. You can have 1 long pipe going across all the generators with a junction for each generator, then have the 3 extractors connected to any of those junctions. Each generator taking 45 water out of the system ensures you will never get above 300 water per sec at any point in the whole pipe system. The simple explanation why it works is that at each junction you have 120 water in, 45 water out, that's 75 water. 3 of those is 225. So with the first 3 generators' junctions connected to water extractors, there is 225 water left over for the other 5 generators on the rest of the pipe. If you really want to push it, you can put 2 extractors on the first junction and another extractor on the second junction to have 270 water left for the remaining 6 generators along the pipe. Everything still works at 100% efficiency with no extra copper sheets spent on pipes. This is actually MORE efficient because the extractors will shut down more often when the power draw is below maximum since the generators will go through less than 45 water and the pipes will begin to bottleneck and you can do something else with the overflow of coal. However, power spikes caused by extractors spinning up could cause a fuse to break when you are adding machines to the grid too quickly (never had this issue, so can't confirm, but the amount of water remaining in the generator and nearby pipes should be enough to make up for the extractors' spin-up lag), but this is easily remedied by moving one extractor to the opposite end of the main pipe or putting a fluid buffer there (finally a use for fluid buffers!)

[@TotalXclipse]

Yep, you're right, and in our recent playthroughs (on the twitch multiplayer save) I actually changed it around so that we had one extractor in the middle and the other two feeding from the outside :)

[@dananskidolf]

Anyone know why the graph units change from MW to MWh when you move the mouse over it? Seems like it must be a bug?

[@MichaelPohoreski]

Believe it is a feature not a bug. Time is on the top 90%.

[@dananskidolf]

@@MichaelPohoreski Sorry, I don't follow. Top 90% of what? Looks to me like you get the readout at the particular timepoint you're hovering on. The number displayed seems to be the MW produced on average through that thin slice of time, but the units present it as if it produced that many MWh in that time, which would only be the case if the thin slice were 1 hour long, which it's not.

[@MichaelPohoreski]

dananskidolf Let me see if this helps: @6:03 see the white box that has the **Consumption Production Capacity?** When your mouse pointer is above the horizontal line the units change from MW to MWh. I believe that graph is showing the power usage over an hour. The problem is that the graph axis aren't labeled. :-/

[@dananskidolf]

@@MichaelPohoreski I don't think so - the graph doesn't change shape at all and keeps moving at the same speed, so it's showing the exact same data, just at the particular time slice you hover on, whereas without hovering on it, the numbers shown are for the current MW. If it were total MWh produced in the last hour (equivalent to the average power out in the last hour), it would be effectively a moving average over a very long period, so the bumps in the line would be smoothed out. And I don't think he's had it running for an hour yet, so it would still be going up over time. To me it looks like someone confused MW with MWh (which is a really common mistake for some reason - one made by the narrator too) and somehow both units ended up in different versions of the labels here.

[@DiGGi-PRiME]

Hi! How you be enable to fly? I did't find any consiole comand :(

[@Veklim]

He's using a mod for it, possibly the Area Actions mod (which is quite popular and rather useful)

[@Daschizznitt]

hey DiGGi if you grab the Satisfactory Mod Launcher, you can grab a mod called "Paks utility mod" which adds some useful single player commands such as flying, giving items, teleporting, etc.

[@TotalXclipse]

Yep I'm using the Pak Utility mod for flying :)

[@SilionVD]

Moar mod has the function to fly as well now (can be found in your Moar tablet). So you have 3 options actually :)

[@TheKarolans]

Changed in latest patch, they now produce at 100% even if there is no consumption - to simplify things...

[@ThyTrueNightmare]

this test will be better in update 4 where all generators output 100% of the time regardless of connected buildings

[@redpanda7071]

300/45 is 6.66 so can you run 6 generators with the last one at 66%?

[@AtroFear]

You could've easily tested this by simply adding a fluid buffer and see if the water gradually decreases or stays at the maximum amount. If it decreases, you know you're consuming more water than you're producing. You can also semi guess this by looking at the pump and see if it's constantly working. Another sign of the water being sufficient is to look for the power spikes in the grid. If there is spikes, it means the water pump is activating and deactivating, which suggests the water is sufficient. If you see no power spike, then you may have a problem with the water supply. Point being, there is alot of ways to tell if you are running out of water.

[@TotalXclipse]

You're absolutely right, and running two industrial fluid containers would have been a great way to review the situation, if ever I do a repeat video I might use that option, although the power spikes could also suggest coal running out.

[@AtroFear]

@@TotalXclipse While I haven't thoroughly thought about specifically that coal part, it wouldn't make sense spontaneously seeing as you can treat it just like water. What you could do if you are unsure about coal is to do exactly the same as with the water, build a storage container and see if the amount gradually decreases. You can apply the same logic to coal in the sense that the coal miner should turn on and off, so if you do indeed see a power spike, albeit it will be smaller than a water pump iirc, it would suggest the coal is NOT running out as it is currently producing more than necessary but can't fit it anywhere, so it shuts off only to be turned on moments later. The reason we can apply the exact same logic is because the game treats both resources in this case exactly the same. This is also a good tip for anyone, basically to ALWAYS build buffers. Buffers can be considered as an extremely convenient safety net. This I learned from modded factorio and fuck me do you need buffers in all their forms.

[@TotalXclipse]

@@AtroFear I see your point but disagree with buffers, they offer a safety net but actually just masks a problem and just prolongs the shutdown. Sure it has it's uses, such as during a shutdown you wouldn't need to restart the miners and pumps once you've reset the power but a big buffer would only be needed if you had an extremely large setup. In my opinion it's much better to make sure that you have the correct ratio of fuel provided at max production/capacity. That way you know when you're reaching the top of your power production you need to add a new powerplant. With buffers you think you're fine until it's too late... As for the power spikes I wasn't referring to miners shutting off due to oversaturation but rather the opposite, when you are not providing enough to your system like a water extractor, you wouldn't see power spikes from a miner turning off as the whole system would shut down at the spike of power. That's why implementing logic in game would be so useful. On a power graph, like we would when a power plant doesn't receive enough water, it would drop down the capacity of the power as a station shuts down to lack of water the same would apply for if coal were to run out on a power plant.

[@TheEvolNemesis]

@@TotalXclipse Yeah, along with logic, I'd love to see some way to make a one-way power flow. Like a battery system you could set up to be getting power from the excess of your power network, but that sit in between it and a separate grid with your miners and extractors on it set up so they will only send or route power to that side and not the rest of your network. You can accomplish something like this manually with a little network of power switches between all 3, but it's kind of inconvenient, and really setting up an automatic failsafe or at least something that acts like a diode to only let power flow one way through it, should be something that could be done.

[@kadachiman7234]

I use 1 water pump at 250% (300 then matches 50 per power plant) for every 6 coal generators as a modular group......seems to work great, but perhaps others can point out flaw(s) in this approach?

[@Gsichtshorst]

Well yes it works, BUT.. overclocked buildings consume more energy per product (1 Pump at 200% consumes more than 2 Pumps at 100%). And you're wasting Power shards for something simple like a waterpump instead of just building a second one. Those could be better used in e.g. a Quartz node or what ever you are lacking in your current stage of the game. (Ignore that second part of you have excess of shards and dont know what to do with them :) ) But yes, its compact and Handy if you're limited in space!

[@kadachiman7234]

@@Gsichtshorst thank you for the clarification, appreciated

[@guidemonkey6407]

If you use 1 water extractor BUT a pump after every coal generator can you power up more than 2.66 generators?

[@LiLBitsDK]

no, pumps are ONLY used to LIFT water up, not making water run faster

[@QuestionDeca]

A more recent update increased Coal Powerplant water draw at 250% to 93.6 m^3 of water... This video is obsolete at this time.

[@-Lazy]

I'm sure you could run hundreds or thousands of coal generator with one water extractor if you set every single one to 0.1%

[@embersworkshop]

The second biggest thing I learned in this video is that you can slide under pipes :OOO 2:59

[@gabrielstrong2186]

Can’t be Mythbusters without explosions TM

[@TotalXclipse]

:D

[@hilinux5828]

Unfortunately, on a larger scale it is not profitable to build so much, although it's cool and I recommend it to start with

[@luftwolf7405]

Coal power is early mid-game. With oil power water gets unnecessary for power production... at least for a while. When the nukes are coming water will be essential again and as the startup of the system is quite "expensive" nobody would take a risk and add too many plants to the water network. ;-)

[@TotalXclipse]

Yeh you're right, unless people use factory switches...

[@SirHackaL0t.]

Luftwolf Unless you have the watered down fuel recipe, then you need bottled water,

[@luftwolf7405]

@@SirHackaL0t. : Yes, that being an exception of course. Interestingly I don't know of many people who went that way. Most focused on getting to Nukes as fast as possible instead...

[@SirHackaL0t.]

Luftwolf why rush the game? Half the fun is building up to the end game. Going straight there spoils the journey

[@alexmaccity]

One pump will do 3.2mgd or like 2200gpm I think the impellers are a bit exaggerated

[@cryptearth]

On this episode of Mythbusters [some stuff about the episode]. Who are the Mythbusters? Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman. Between them more than 30 years of special effects experience. Joining them: Grant Imahara, Tory Belleci and Kari Byron. They don't just tell the myths - they put them to the test. ~scnr you got some of the units wrong: it's not "meters cubed" but rather "cubic meters" - also: the current energy production/usage is only megawatts - not megawatthours - as MWh is a function of energy MW and time h - or if you right it the long way: MW x h - so a megawatt is 1 million watts - a MWh are 1 million watts over the time of 1 hour also also: don'T make the same mistake as anyone since pretty much forever: begging for likes and subs - if someone likes your stuff you will get a like - and if someone wants to see more you get a sub - don'T beg for them as this earns you thumbs down (as from me) and people not subscribing ... don't say it in some other way - just don't say it at all ...

[@TotalXclipse]

Hey thanks for dropping by the channel, try not to confuse this series with the tv series, here we're just busting myths within the game :D Thanks for correcting me, I realised I had the megawatts wrong but as for the cubic meters I appreciate that and I'm always striving to improve the video content I provide. As for begging for likes and subs. I wouldn't say mentioning if you like the series and found the video helpful to like and sub, begging. I understand why people say that but equally people just don't always think to drop a like or to subscribe - I can confirm this as I've done videos where I've excluded this and on average got less likes and subs and it's not just me, every larger channel I know that I watch does this. If unfortunately it means that you dislike the video, that sucks as I'd like to think (despite the mistakes made, that there is some quality behind the content) but I understand. - but I do agree that begging for subs, for example commenting on other videos saying "please sub me" is wrong, but each to our own. Still thank you for checking out the video and despite the asking for likes and subscribes I hope that you drop by to my other content at some point :)

[@cryptearth]

​@@TotalXclipse as for the "this is not to be confused with the tv series": I'm well aware that all those "game mythbuster videos" are not related to the tv series (I'm around YT since mid 2000s - I've seen many come and gone) - hence I added the "SCNR" - which, in case you don't know, is short for "sorry, could not resist" and means some along those lines: "yea, just droped the for no reason" - it can be compared to adding KAPPA when something said/writtenis meant ironically as for your reply about the begging: my point is this: if someone likes a video s/he may or may not give a thumbs up - and if s/he wants to see more and likes to get her/his inbox spammed s/he may subscribe to get informed - but asking a viewer to do so within this video is very wrong - and if you experienced lower rates on videos where didn't said it at least I would worry about my audience and what's wrong with them if I had to tell them "hey viewer - please hit the like and sub" I also do know that about every idiot does this - from small sub-100 channels all the way up to the all-mighty-pewDpie - and I hate ALL of them - and in contrast: there're in fact some channels I watch in the range around a few 100k which keep growing without it - some even have already 1.500 videos up and never said it once in any of them - and still got past the 500k subs there's a lot wrong with YT and how some of the functions are abused and misused - and maybe it would be a whole different story if google had not bought them (or maybe some else big company like amazon did with twitch) also just "like" - "none" - "dislike" is very different from what I was used to back in the days of the 5 star rating system - you only could chose between 1 up to 5 stars - but no 0 stars (unless you didn't voted at all) - so I have no realy choice to judge on differnt aspects of the video was it informative? sure - did it took time? I guess so - was it overall ok? well, aside from the small issues with the correct units - yes - do I "like" it? can'T tell as I like the game but don'T own a copy of it yet - so never played it myself - are there other criteria for me to decide if and how to vote? unfrotunate for you and this video: your begging for likes and subs - which resulted in the exact opposite - I disliked and will not sub you - if you didn't had it in I may had considered to either not rate at all or maybe give it a "small" like for the effort you put into it - but you denied it yourself ... think about it

[@TotalXclipse]

@@cryptearth I didn't know what SCNR meant, so again thanks, we all learn something new every day :) Again, we have different views and I won't argue about it, I appreciate your views and am appreciative of both the likes and dislikes if it was due to the overall quality and information of the video as it helps me better the videos. I still have a lot to learn about creating content but appreciate you putting your opinions across. Have a good afternoon :)

[@cryptearth]

@@TotalXclipse I honestly don'T really want to tip it over - but "I didn't know what SCNR meant" - you could had at least asked google? duh

[@xaiano794]

Just think of coal power plants as working just like biomass burners, they only use fuel when power is needed, so if you are using 50% of the power they will only consume 50% of their maximum coal rate. Likewise they will consume 50% of the rate of water too. This does mean if you run your power plants at 100%, they would use 100% of the water, so they would run dry pretty fast if you didn't have enough water inputs.

[@serdaraytemiz]

You need to use buffers. I use one extractor for 5 generators 2 of them are overclocked. but all generators have 2 buffers on each stacked. Because my factory never consumes full power. but I am experimenting wth different ideas. But I noticed pipes do not work like conveyors.

[@TotalXclipse]

I've never used buffers on my power generators, as I always plan the max amount of generators to the amount of resources I have available, if I only have 60 coal produced per minute, I'll only build a maximum of 4 generators.

[@serdaraytemiz]

@@TotalXclipse You made me paranoid so I am using 1 extractor per 3 generators right now. and I have one feeding 2 generators that are over clocked... but it is a spagetti mess of horrors really. since I just started the game I really do not care about neatness really :)

[@spenzakwsx4430]

how do you enter god mode in this game. i mean how can you fly around with your camera like this?

[@TotalXclipse]

You need to download mods, like Pak Utility, Area Actions or Moar Factory :)

[@mre4u422]

my pipes are never full but my coal plants all have enough water so i guess it works 3 water extractors to 8 coal plants with a pipe connected at each end and one in the middle

[@patrikjelinek3214]

if u stop generators and let pipes fill tehy will be full after all the time you propably just conected it too fast before they had chance to fill and since you produce 360 water and comsume 360 water there is nothing that stays in pipes thats why they are not full but your setup works good :) but this could be problem if u were building for example nuclear power plants where you also need to care about pressure when you consume and produce same ammount :)

[@iordanbaltaliiski2882]

3 works just fine for me

[@generalagondray]

Adding more power plants isnt the issue, the second you online something that pushes the power grid enough to use that 120m3 of water the whole system will die.

[@TotalXclipse]

exactly

[@williamrousseaugarfat6218]

Can you power a coal miner with the coal generator it is feeding?

[@TotalXclipse]

Definitely you just need to use a biomass generator to kickstart the system but once it’s running you should be fine ☺️

[@jeankristein3238]

My question is 1 coal miner for how many coal power? If set up right, 1 miner can make all power plant belts stuck in traffic cause all generatir full Miner not even oc

[@fabschi7513]

You can definitely use a single water extractor for an endless amount of power plants. It's just not efficient lol. xD

[@TotalXclipse]

:D exactly!

[@Stoney3K]

The same with using an impure coal node. As long as you're not using any energy, the power plants will happily idle along.

[@kar351]

I use 8 coal power plants with 3 water generators. Similar of what u have here. But, I do not use pumps, I build at level. I split the 8 coal plants in 3-2-3 Center water generator feeds 2 coal power plants plus the pipes from the other 2 generators. Something like this: PP PP PP PP PP PP PP PP |---|-----|------------|-----------|-----|----| W W W since there will be excess water at some pipes and low water at others, the system complement each other by spreading pressure and water. So u feed 320 water the exact amount that the power plants need. 45*8=360 360/3=120 PP: coal power plant -|- : pipes and spliters W: Water generators

[@TotalXclipse]

Yep this is another great way to do it, with the middle extractor branching out the water to the other two :) bet it looks sweet as well!

[@aens00]

So you can run as many as you want but water consumption goes up when its under load.

[@TotalXclipse]

yes water and fuel consumption scales with load

[@kasman9347]

it's worth it to stack so many coal power than fuel power?

[@5353Jumper]

All depends on your late game balance, do you need the coal for steel, the oil for plastic and rubber, the coke for aluminum? Also late game nuclear power takes a lot of copper and caterium which you would rather use for other production. I have never really seen any content that identifies which power source is most resource efficient for the end game...balancing which resources are used for maximum production vs which resources are used for power.

[@kasman9347]

Thank for the enlightenment!

[@Random_Gamer]

69 liters per minute @TotalXclipse

[@TotalXclipse]

:D

[@gtskill268]

Somehow I can use one single water extractor+ a couple pumps to generate 300m3/min no overclocks

[@TotalXclipse]

Hmmm sounds like a bug, unless you're not using a 100% of the water/fuel consumption then perhaps it's back logging so it shows the pipes are full?

[@Zlorfikable]

I am afraid you made this way more complicated than it really is. A power producer will consume as much % of displayed resources per minute as the ratio of used power to power capacity is. --> A usage of 60% power will mean 60% of 15 coal & 45m^3 water per minute (9 coal & 27 water per minute) Since one should always construct for 100% usage, it really is simple maths.

[@TotalXclipse]

I know. But I've explained that prior to people and sometimes people don't accept that. Which is why I've done this setup to show them :) afterall for some, seeing is believing

[@Zlorfikable]

@@TotalXclipse oh yeah definitely. But for those people a demonstration wont change their attitude either. They do what works for them until it doesnt and then complain about a broken system, bugs and whatnot. Those that do not acknowledge a calculation are a lost cause imho.

[@thezimra9429]

feel this video should be 2mins tops...

[@munch15a]

I think that is because many power systems dont run near capacity

[@TotalXclipse]

exactly.

[@latentgamer5762]

Capacity isn't usage. it's saying you COULD make 750, not that you ARE making. What you ARE making is your "usage".

[@TotalXclipse]

Yep, you're right I think my wording was pretty terrible but it's how much all your powerplants on the grid could produce at max production/consumption, but despite that bad wording I do go on to explain that we're not using any power

[@SnapeMaster]

you have the best videos around IMO

[@pimpslayer9109]

Is it wrong that im running 1 extractor to 1 gen?

[@TotalXclipse]

It's overkill but it's not wrong :D

[@pimpslayer9109]

I appreciate the quick response, thanks for the information. Im gunna mess around with the 3-8 ratio, NEED MO POWA

[@Xtreme_Motorsports]

I have a coal setup with 6 water pumps and 24 generators

[@101m4n]

Excuse me for being a pedant, but you are confusing megawatts and megawatt hours! Megawatts are a measure of power (1 million joules per second), megawatt hours are a measure of energy (1 million joules per second for one hour). They aren’t interchangeable! On the graph, the level of the line is the power and the energy is the volume of the area under the graph over the duration of an hour (which I presume to be the whole graph). In almost every case in this video, you say MWh instead of MW and as an engineer this irritates me more than it probably should :S

[@komasdfg]

Numbers are the one true God. Can't bypass the number.

[@jeffreybomford5328]

Not fully myth busted as he hasnt used a pump pipe attach ment half way to end even tho its not going up hill i found it boosted flow . Maybe im wrong but i was running six easy enough off one pump. With all power being used too.

[@TotalXclipse]

You don’t need to boost the flow, at least not at this distance, and you can actually use gravity to stop needing pumps at all if you should really do so. I’m pretty certain that unless you’ve overclocked your extractor you won’t be able to run 6 coal generators once you’ve got your power consumption for your factory above 60%

[@ixermen]

There is no point to this test. You are only using 0.1 mw of power, so your coal generators are not using any water nor coal in the proces. If they where running at a 100% capacity you wouldn't be able to mantain the circuit because of the lack of water.

[@gavincification]

Well, the point of the test is was to bust the myth, and did it really well.

[@DoriKei]

I suggest to name such a videos as "Satisfaketory". ))

[@TotalXclipse]

:D

[@12321dantheman]

megawatt hours per minute??