Simple modular reactor control circuit.

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milo christiansen
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Simple modular reactor control circuit.

Post by milo christiansen »

Reactor.png
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I have designed and built a simple modular reactor control circuit that accounts for variable demand via buffer tanks and switching the reactor state.

This system has two parts:
* A cutoff circuit (one and only one for the entire complex)
* The reactor control circuits (one for each reactor)

In the above image you can see both, the cutoff is the small block of combinators above the reactors and the controllers are the blocks just below each reactor.

Setup:

To use this controller you need to have buffer tanks connected between your heat exchangers and your turbines. I suggest one or two tanks per exchanger.

1. Build your reactor, heat exchangers, tanks, turbines, etc.
2. Place the cutoff blueprint nearby and connect the power pole to the tanks with red wire.
3. Set the constant combinator in the cutoff to the total number of buffer tanks that are connected.
4. Place one controler beside each reactor.
5. Connect the cutoff's power pole to each controller power pole with green wire.
6. Either fill the fuel chests with fuel cells, run belts, or add requester chests. However you want to run fuel will surely be fine...
7. Add a single fuel cell to each reactor.

After this the system should be up and running. Once the reactor builds up steam it will shut down, then restart automatically when the steam gets low. How often it cycles will be determined by how many tanks you have and how much load the system has.

Configuration:

Some reactor systems will need to have the cutoff adjusted for optimal performance. The default settings are for a single reactor system with ~60% load and two tanks per exchanger, in my new reactor complex (two reactors, 1 tank per exchanger, ~40% load) I needed to set the thresholds to 1K/8K (instead of 5K/15K). Keep an eye on your system for a little while, if the tanks fill too full before the reactor shuts down then lower the thresholds, if the tanks stay too empty then raise them. Keep in mind that under normal conditions you don't want the tanks to fill all the way, and the reactor will continue to run for some time after the cutoff triggers.

Blueprint:

Code: Select all

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