[MOD] Deadlock's Stacking Beltboxes & Compact Loaders

[eduran]

As the subject says, is it possible to make a inv<->inv (1x1) loader?

Already exists in the form of inserters. There are a couple of mods that provide faster inserters, if that is what you are looking for.

[Deadlock989]

As the subject says, is it possible to make a inv<->inv (1x1) loader?

It's not possible. You can fake it with runtime scripting and shenanigans, but the point of loaders was that they operate at belt speeds. They are a belt item and were never intended to be anything else.

[Zavian]

As the subject says, is it possible to make a inv<->inv (1x1) loader?

I think https://mods.factorio.com/mod/miniloader will do what you want. (Technically they are very fast inserters rather than loaders, but they function like loaders).

[slippycheeze]

As the subject says, is it possible to make a inv<->inv (1x1) loader?

I think https://mods.factorio.com/mod/miniloader will do what you want. (Technically they are very fast inserters rather than loaders, but they function like loaders).

They are very fast inserters exactly because of what they want, if the developer comments are to be believed.

[dorthak]

Not sure if this was mentioned already, but I've noticed a bug with Deadlock's loaders: when upgrading using the upgrade tool and bots (not sure if it matters if it's regular bots or minibots), some loaders get turned around. Not the flow direction, but the side that the belt is attached too.

I have a number of places where I have belt-loader-box-loader-belt, and after upgrading from yellow to red belts/loaders, both loaders will face the same way.

[mrvn]

Not sure if this was mentioned already, but I've noticed a bug with Deadlock's loaders: when upgrading using the upgrade tool and bots (not sure if it matters if it's regular bots or minibots), some loaders get turned around. Not the flow direction, but the side that the belt is attached too.

I have a number of places where I have belt-loader-box-loader-belt, and after upgrading from yellow to red belts/loaders, both loaders will face the same way.

Have you enabled snapping of loaders to belts or inventories? Try disabling both.

[shanemadden]

I've been unable to track down exactly what conditions cause the loaders to flip during upgrade, but that's been one I've been chasing a while - if you can get it to happen reliably, would you mind posting a simple example save with a structure layout that reproduces the issue, so that I can sync to your mods and startup settings? Thanks a lot!

[billbo99]

As the subject says, is it possible to make a inv<->inv (1x1) loader?

What are you trying to do with a "inv<->inv (1x1) loader" ? Pass from one assembly machine to another at belt speed ?

This mod .. https://mods.factorio.com/mod/belt_buffer_up .. creates a chest 1by2 in size that has 2x loader hidden under the hood. Maybe you could ask the owner to make a 1by1 version that does what you want.

[dorthak]

I've been unable to track down exactly what conditions cause the loaders to flip during upgrade, but that's been one I've been chasing a while - if you can get it to happen reliably, would you mind posting a simple example save with a structure layout that reproduces the issue, so that I can sync to your mods and startup settings? Thanks a lot!

I'll give it a try.

[Pi-C]

Think I found a bug:

Your mod is active and ore can go through all belts.

with_stacking.png (1.68 MiB) Viewed 4370 times

Your mod isn't active and ore is blocked in front of where the loader used to be.

stacking_removed.png (1.45 MiB) Viewed 4370 times

[Deadlock989]

Think I found a bug:
with_stacking.png
stacking_removed.png

I wasn't able to reproduce this exactly but I did reproduce oddly blocked belts at random points along their length. Movement was restored as soon as the belt lines were altered in any way.

To be honest I wouldn't even class this as a bug - you removed a mod from a saved game and then tried to play it, and that's rarely going to be pretty. There is nothing a mod can do about being removed because when the save is loaded the mod isn't there to do anything.

I would expect to see similar results if you deleted vanilla loaders or any other kind of belt entity from data.raw and then tried to play a game that had them placed in the middle of active belt segments.

[Pi-C]

I wasn't able to reproduce this exactly but I did reproduce oddly blocked belts at random points along their length. Movement was restored as soon as the belt lines were altered in any way.

I noticed that too, but you have to see that they are broken before you can fix that.

To be honest I wouldn't even class this as a bug - you removed a mod from a saved game and then tried to play it, and that's rarely going to be pretty. There is nothing a mod can do about being removed because when the save is loaded the mod isn't there to do anything.

I thought somehow that migration scripts could be used, but you're right: it doesn't make sense that a mod could do anything once it has been removed. Guess I need to read up on that migrating stuff again …

BTW: No real game was harmed by removing your mod! It was just a testing setup I used when I fixed another mod that depends on yours; I re-used this setup when I played with dependencies to enforce removal of my mod (original has been restored to working condition, so my mod isn't needed anymore).

[Deadlock989]

I thought somehow that migration scripts could be used, but you're right: it doesn't make sense that a mod could do anything once it has been removed. Guess I need to read up on that migrating stuff again …

Migration is run on saved game load if a mod version change is detected and it matches the version name of the migration script. No mod, no script.

[Pi-C]

Thanks for the explanation!

[Deadlock989]

The back_patch that I added to the loaders in this mod five months ago was activated by today's game patch, 0.17.65.

It's incredibly subtle because I was trying to work around it not working at the time, but it's there.

I may do a general graphics refresh for this mod once the full set of high res icons for vanilla is released.

[Zyrconia]

Hi!

Just stared using stacking beltboxes!

But I have a question. Why is the default stack set to 5? Is there some good throughput reason or otherwise? It is a bit awkward to feed 5 belts in.

If there is no good reason I might change it to 4 or 8.

Thank you!

[Deadlock989]

Hi!

Just stared using stacking beltboxes!

But I have a question. Why is the default stack set to 5? Is there some good throughput reason or otherwise? It is a bit awkward to feed 5 belts in.

If there is no good reason I might change it to 4 or 8.

Thank you!

Common factor of all vanilla stack sizes. Anything that isn't a multiple of 5 results in some subset of items losing overall inventory density when stacked.

What is the problem with feeding 5 belts in? Beltboxes work with one full belt of the same tier. Are you talking about the Crating mod instead?

5belts.png (1.21 MiB) Viewed 4251 times

[Zyrconia]

Hi!

Just stared using stacking beltboxes!

But I have a question. Why is the default stack set to 5? Is there some good throughput reason or otherwise? It is a bit awkward to feed 5 belts in.

If there is no good reason I might change it to 4 or 8.

Thank you!

Common factor of all vanilla stack sizes. Anything that isn't a multiple of 5 results in some subset of items losing overall inventory density when stacked.

What is the problem with feeding 5 belts in? Beltboxes work with one full belt of the same tier. Are you talking about the Crating mod instead?


5belts.png

Thanks for the answer. That setup should work!

I mean feeding 5 belts in like this was awkward: https://i.imgur.com/ZihiJBS.gif

[Deadlock989]

Thanks for the answer. That setup should work!

I mean feeding 5 belts in like this was awkward: https://i.imgur.com/ZihiJBS.gif

It would be - 5-way balancers aren't ever going to win any beauty contests.

But there's no reason you have to feed in 5 belts unless you are going for complete maximal efficiency at all costs and you want that fully compressed fully stacked belt. I've built a megabase that used buses with 4 lanes of belts, each fed by 4 sources, using the 5x stack setting, and there were no issues at all with running that. It just means there are some gaps on the bus when it's running at full speed, which is basically never. It's still a 16x bus that looks like a 4x bus.

Alternatively, use the 4x setting. The mod was originally set to 4x but because vanilla ores stack to 50 and 50 isn't divisible by 4, the default was made 5x.

Or use 4x and install some other mod that changes ore stacks to 100.

[slippycheeze]

Thanks for the answer. That setup should work!

I mean feeding 5 belts in like this was awkward: https://i.imgur.com/ZihiJBS.gif

It would be - 5-way balancers aren't ever going to win any beauty contests.

But there's no reason you have to feed in 5 belts unless you are going for complete maximal efficiency at all costs and you want that fully compressed fully stacked belt. I've built a megabase that used buses with 4 lanes of belts, each fed by 4 sources, using the 5x stack setting, and there were no issues at all with running that. It just means there are some gaps on the bus when it's running at full speed, which is basically never. It's still a 16x bus that looks like a 4x bus.

Alternatively, use the 4x setting. The mod was originally set to 4x but because vanilla ores stack to 50 and 50 isn't divisible by 4, the default was made 5x.

Or use 4x and install some other mod that changes ore stacks to 100.

...or or, just feed them in sequentially so that you gradually increase density as you move along, rather than having all the compression devices horizontally aligned. The inverse of your output filters, even.