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Hi folks! I'm trying to figure out what I think should be a simple circuit condition. I'd like to use a constant combinator to control whether a belt allows throughput of, say, copper. Basically, I want to be able to control whether the copper passes through or is blocked by the "belt gate." See picture.

I've tried setting the constant combinator to -1 copper ore, and then the circuit condition on the belts to hold, disable/enable, and circuit condition "red star" < 1-- this was explained in another forum post viewtopic.php?t=54547.

I think I'm messing up because of the number I'm choosing. Anyway, I've fiddled with it for a while now, and I was wondering if someone can help. Cheers!

mathguru wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 1:02 am I'd like to use a constant combinator to control whether a belt allows throughput of, say, copper. Basically, I want to be able to control whether the copper passes through or is blocked by the "belt gate." See picture.

If you really just want to be able to use a constant combinator as a switch, then set all the wired belts to enable on a chosen symbol (symbol != 0) and set the symbol to non-zero in the constant combinator for starting the belts or to 0 for stopping them.

If you want to have the belts run whenever there is a demand for copper signalled by a negative number for copper on the green wire, you may set the belts to enable when copper < 0. No constant combinator needed in that case.

And if you want extra control, you can use the previous suggestion using a constant combinator but place a power switch between the constant combinator and the rest of electric network.

This means you can turn on/off the power switch instead of a constant combinator, and power switch are available from radar/map view.

mmmPI wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 10:03 am And if you want extra control, you can use the previous suggestion using a constant combinator but place a power switch between the constant combinator and the rest of electric network. This means you can turn on/off the power switch instead of a constant combinator, and power switch are available from radar/map view.

A constant combinator does not need power, and will still emit the signals. Arithmetic and decider combinators tend to just freeze up, and keep whatever state they had including emitting signals when short on power. If you just imagine them doing the most annoying thing, you probably on the money, based on my testing.

Oktokolo wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 2:42 am If you really just want to be able to use a constant combinator as a switch, then set all the wired belts to enable on a chosen symbol (symbol != 0) and set the symbol to non-zero in the constant combinator for starting the belts or to 0 for stopping them.

There is an "on/off" switch in the constant combinator UI, which can also achieve this without having to edit the signals. I use that for switching. Should be at the top-right of the signal panel. When "off" the CC emits nothing, when on it emits the configured signals. You cannot control the on/off state from the circuit network.

slippycheeze wrote: ↑Thu Aug 29, 2019 9:09 pm

mmmPI wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 10:03 am And if you want extra control, you can use the previous suggestion using a constant combinator but place a power switch between the constant combinator and the rest of electric network. This means you can turn on/off the power switch instead of a constant combinator, and power switch are available from radar/map view.

A constant combinator does not need power, and will still emit the signals. Arithmetic and decider combinators tend to just freeze up, and keep whatever state they had including emitting signals when short on power. If you just imagine them doing the most annoying thing, you probably on the money, based on my testing.

I thought about this one a bit more, what i said is wrong it's not that simple.

After some testings i did a thing that look like this There are 4 different power switch, one allow the control of the inserters that fill in the buffer, one allow the control of the inserters that empty the buffer, one control a speaker that ring when buffer is low, one control another speaker that ring when buffer is high. And the lamps turn red or green to tell what's going on.

In this case you power/unpower the inserter loop on the right side, this makes the chest emiting signal 1 yellow belt, then 0 yellow belt, then 1 yellow belt then 0 yellow turning the lamp red/green/red/green . You let the system in the position that fits the need of the factory, either buffering, or emptying the buffer both can be turned on/off with their own loop controlled by their own power switch.

I used it to control the energy load, depending on the research that is done, a low tech allow for more production of red circuits. And when it is emptying the buffer it stops the belt before the blue inserter.

Using the same idea, you could turn on/off the copper lanes in the picture from anywhere on the map.( with extra bit of fiddling ! )

The behavior of unpowered combinator is as described by slippycheeze, i did find them annoying too during the testings, but i consider this is an edge case, vast majority of other time you don't want power supply variation to impact the signal/logic at all and i'm fine with the behavior that they have those times. It wasn't a good suggestion overall from me last time.

mmmPI wrote: ↑Tue Aug 27, 2019 10:03 am And if you want extra control, you can use the previous suggestion using a constant combinator but place a power switch between the constant combinator and the rest of electric network.

This means you can turn on/off the power switch instead of a constant combinator, and power switch are available from radar/map view.

But constant combinators may be available from the GUI, so radar/map view wouldn't even be needed.

This is easy enough, just chain all the belts together with wire to a constant combinator. Set the combinator to output 1 copper symbol or pretty much anything else. Set each wired belt to enable if that symbol is greater than 0. Turn the "belt gate" on and off by turning the constant combinator on or off.

I think what OP is trying to do is turn off each belt if it has something other than copper.
If that's the case, have your CC output copper -8 (or further negative).
Then wire up two belt segments, first one reads contents with hold, second disable if anything is > 0.