So I wanted to make a 1k spm base (marathon/expensive/no biters) with the following design principles:
1) science outposts turn raw resources (ore/crude/water) into 60/min science, fully beaconed
2) each resource has a dedicated 'warehouse' where the outposts trains unload and the science trains load
I wanted to put some pressure on the rail designs, so I set everything up to work with LCC trains. This was a mistake, I think, as even with 4 lane rail the rail system is definitely the bottleneck. I could have calculated this beforehand, as 60s/min requires about 20k ore and 40k fluid per minute, or about 5 cargo trains and <1 fluid train per minute. For 1k spm, this comes at about 80 cargo trains per minute and 10 (.15) fluid trains, which is more than a 4 lane junction can handle. Also, I built way too compact (my perennial problem), so it's hard to increase capacity now without building more warehouses, which defeats the point of the setup.
So, I'm giving up at a sustained 400-500 spm (which I guess is not bad for marathon ) out of a current max of 600 spm (10x 60 spm plants) since it just doesn't help to add more outposts or plants as the bottleneck is rail. I will try this same idea again with more planning but first I will play around with artillery turrets a bit on a new map, so I wanted to share this base and get it out of my system.
I would welcome any hints for improving train throughput as I will revisit this design pattern somewhere in the future for .17. Below I share the general setup, if anybody wants more detail or blueprints of any part let me know.
production stats for burst output
production stats for sustained output
base overview
zoom in on rail junction and problems