Big problem on how to load ovens with coal

[factoriobiker]

I setuo several iron ovens in rown, I feed them iron and I get iron in cubes. But they want coal all the time. So it is hard to keep them full of coal, cause I use one belt to deliver coal and then iron too to get iron cubes.....
Maybe I should use separate belt just for loading them with coal, but there is no space, on left I have a belt with coal and iron and on the right i have iron cubes.....but there must be a better solution

[Bauer]

Google is your friend:
"factorio furnace setup"

[Amarula]

You can put coal on one side of a belt, and iron ore on the other side of the belt. The inserter will feed both to the furnace as needed.

[factoriobiker]

but where to put the finished iron cubes?
i managed to do two lines on left and one line on right
i used red long dispensers

[Koub]

You can have :
- a single belt, coal on one lane, iron on the other, fed into your furnaces with a single inserter
- One full belt (both lines) of iron, next to a full belt (both lines) of coal, one normal inserter (yellow) that takes from the closest belt to the furnace, and a long inserter (the red one) that take from the furthest belt to the furnace.

And for the output, you can do it on the other side of the furnace.

There are many more options, but these are the most intuitive.

https://lmgtfy.com/?q=factorio+smelting+line

[factoriobiker]

yes i tried one belt for both but it got messed up sooner or later...so i started with long inserter so i have belt for each one

[mrvn]

yes i tried one belt for both but it got messed up sooner or later...so i started with long inserter so i have belt for each one

You can also put one belt to the left, one to the right and one above or below. Such a setup then needs underground belts. The advantage is that you can use burner inserters and fuel them from the coal belt as well. Works for steel with burner inserters too.

[Serenity]

The standard is this:

Furnaces1.jpg (177.85 KiB) Viewed 3831 times

Use splitters to get a half belt of each. Then 24 furnaces on each side to consume a full belt of ore and output a full belt of plates. Yellow belt + stone furnances. Or red belt + steel furnaces

The coal belt keeps getting undergrounded along all the smelting columns

Stone brick works the same, but it needs 2 stone per craft. So you need a red belt (or two yellow belts) of stone and stone furnaces to output a yellow belt of bricks (which is a lot. You can usually get by with less)


Steel can be done in several ways. For example:

Furnaces2.jpg (168.51 KiB) Viewed 3831 times

• Direct insertion works well here because one steel requires 5 iron plates but takes exactly 5 times as long to smelt
• Of course you can also take a normal iron plate smelter and then belt iron plates into another column

[Amarula]

Another very simple steel column for a starter base...

Simple starter steel.png (837.72 KiB) Viewed 3771 times

[disentius]

Another simple one.

steel smelting early game.png (1.08 MiB) Viewed 3746 times

[SoShootMe]

Another simple one.

steel smelting early game.png

Better to filter iron ore to the left side of the splitter in the middle, instead of coal to the right, so it still works if you change fuel.

[mrvn]

Another simple one.

steel smelting early game.png

Better to filter iron ore to the left side of the splitter in the middle, instead of coal to the right, so it still works if you change fuel.

Why use an expensive splitter when the (already existing) underground belt will do? Just move the underground entry one tile down so it gets side loaded and will only take the coal side of the belt.

By the way for steel it might be useful to put the coal on the output belt so you have a full belt of iron plates going to a half steel, half coal belt.

[Serenity]

By the way for steel it might be useful to put the coal on the output belt so you have a full belt of iron plates going to a half steel, half coal belt.

If you're eventually going for two furnace rows (and you usually do) it doesn't really make a difference in the long run. For a single row you save a belt though

[SoShootMe]

Better to filter iron ore to the left side of the splitter in the middle, instead of coal to the right, so it still works if you change fuel.

Why use an expensive splitter when the (already existing) underground belt will do? Just move the underground entry one tile down so it gets side loaded and will only take the coal side of the belt.

Yeah, that's an even better idea in this case. Although a splitter is a small fraction of the overall cost of the pictured setup (even smaller if you consider that feeding it needs a dozen or so miners, a boiler and a couple of steam engines).

[starlinvf]

Another very simple steel column for a starter base...
Simple starter steel.png

Protip for anyone who doesn't know this yet....... Splitters can act as filters. As shown in the picture by Amarula.

Click on it, set ouput priority to right or left, and select an item for the filter. This will filter the selected item to the chosen side, and everything else gets sent out the other side.

Really good for early game when your ore patches are all on top of each other.

[mrvn]

Another very simple steel column for a starter base...
Simple starter steel.png

Protip for anyone who doesn't know this yet....... Splitters can act as filters. As shown in the picture by Amarula.

Click on it, set ouput priority to right or left, and select an item for the filter. This will filter the selected item to the chosen side, and everything else gets sent out the other side.

Really good for early game when your ore patches are all on top of each other.

And again a underground belt would have done the same.

[astroshak]

An underground, or a splitter, both work well. One costs 17.5 Iron Plate, the other 16 Iron Plate and 7.5 Copper Plate. Pick which is more valuable to you at that point in time

That said, I’d filter the iron ore to the side; if you upgrade the fuel and have coal filtered to continue on, your steel making furnaces get denied fuel.

[Khagan]

An underground, or a splitter, both work well. One costs 17.5 Iron Plate, the other 16 Iron Plate and 7.5 Copper Plate.

Underground belts are 17.5 iron for a pair, so only 8.75 for a single used to block a lane, and clearly cheaper than the splitter.

[5thHorseman]

Underground belts are 17.5 iron for a pair, so only 8.75 for a single used to block a lane, and clearly cheaper than the splitter.

They are both infinitesimal in comparison to an entire factory. If you're playing on some crazy limited resource game sure it could matter I suppose, but in a typical game of Factorio you should never even notice the difference.

Players should choose what they prefer, or that makes their intent clearer. I personally use splitters because when I come back 20 hours later it's instantly obvious what I was doing. With undergrounds, it's frequently not obvious what I was doing.

[Hannu]

They are both infinitesimal in comparison to an entire factory. If you're playing on some crazy limited resource game sure it could matter I suppose, but in a typical game of Factorio you should never even notice the difference.

Exactly this. Typical starting smelting column has 48 furnaces and products 15 iron plates per second. You talk about saving production of less than a second. Sometimes perfectionism of Factorio players goes a bit foo far, in my opinion.