800MW Steam Power Plant - Adjustable Performance

[lotzik]

Hi, I came up with this idea today and it was basically a way to solve a problem but turned out to make a cool setup after all.

Let's take a look, it was made with several blueprints, it uses a landfilled lake and the count is 2 Columns, 39 Rows of 28 Boilers and 20 Steam Engines. That makes 2.184 Boilers and 1.560 Engines, the ratios are ideal to the pumps too.

The whole thing

A closer look, this is the layout, I used a water tank for every 28 Boilers and 20 Steam Engines as water temperature buffer.

A closer look

The system I used for feeding it uses two 4wagon trains of coal from very big, very rich mines. The 4 wagons empty to 6 chests each. 6to1 Balancer to get 4 full belts of coal, then 4 to 4 balancer, and then 2x 2to7 balancers to fill the 14 rows that it needs. I will also upgrade to 6 to 2 balancers from the chests to get a bigger throughput

Input

I powered it up and and filled the coal buffers, so when I plugged in the production it managed to deliver the almost promised 800MW (actually it's 795) but then I had a slight drop as the last 6 rows seemed like overburn of the coal. (Numbers I saw was 10k/m coal consumption) So at first I decided to block the last rows by wiring belts, to see where the buffer would start shaping. (6 to 2 balancers wouldn't have a problem with the last 6 rows but this wouldn't get me to the idea)

So I was like: what if I made a system to adjust the coal feed, by wiring the belts. First it was 33% - 66% - 99% + overburn adjustment but then I decided to go all the way and make incriments of 3 up to 99% and an overburn mode. Let's go to the control panel. I made a lamp fill meter and used the Smart Display mod to get the numbers. Inputs on the left costant combinator of the power percent.

10 percent power

60 percent

100 percent

Actual effect without overburn

Overburn mode on the control panel

The other smart display that says C2 is actually another idea I had in mind, to split my power network in priority channels. Input 1 gives power access to channel 1 and input 2 gives access to both channels 1 and 2. Channel 1 is the laser defenses and channel 2 is the plant. So if I am receiving heavy attacking, I could close the production to give all the power to lasers f.ex.

Channels

I hope you enjoyed! Ideas welcome

[PanTobi]

2k boilers... srsl ?...
Bad idea xD u will use too many coal ;x...

i have only 150 Steam Engines and 11k Solar panels ;x...
They need to add GeoThermal Engine !... WTF this will be so great

or Wind Engine ;x...
or Water Engine ( but factorio dont have Rivers xD )



but this idea with 2k boilers is bad ...

[lotzik]

hahahah well brace yourserf as I'm actually using two of these setups m8. But they are actually my backup power to a 16k solar panel setup delivering 1GW. The base is energy optimized, everything on circuits switching the different parts on and off, so 90% of the time, base runs under 1GW. But if things get hot, too many alien attacks, an empty production buffer needs to refill or I need to setup a new resource input or beaconize a depleted oil patch, I have a spare 1,6GW powerhouse to back me up until everything gets fine tuned again. Yes if I need I will burn up to 20k coal / m, but it's only temporary. Currently I have them both at the option of 50% max power and idle without spending any coal at all, as all production buffers are full.

[DrBladeSTEEL]

Could you explain what you mean by overburn? I understand you have limited your setup to allow for a kind of emergency overdrive, but I dont think that system is what you meant. You said that you had issues with the last 6 rows overburning, does that mean that they were not being supplied by coal or that they were burning coal sub-optimally?

[Nich]

My guess was overburn burns more coal then his logistics network can provide to the generator.

[jordan5223gaming]

Can you make this for 0.15?

[MeduSalem]

Can you make this for 0.15?

Wouldn't it be better to build a Nuclear Power plant instead of this coal wasting monstrosity?

[Jap2.0]

Can you make this for 0.15?

Wouldn't it be better to build a Nuclear Power plant instead of this coal wasting monstrosity?

Also, it would have to be entirely redisigned due to the size changes in boilers.

[Cribbit]

Can you make this for 0.15?

Wouldn't it be better to build a Nuclear Power plant instead of this coal wasting monstrosity?

Also, it would have to be entirely redisigned due to the size changes in boilers.

This is really easy in .15 since it's now a simple 2:1. Need more power? Plop down a boiler and 2 steam engines. No need to plan complex ratios. (just don't overextend your water pump!)

[patrick12222010]

Can you make this for 0.15?

Wouldn't it be better to build a Nuclear Power plant instead of this coal wasting monstrosity?

Also, it would have to be entirely redisigned due to the size changes in boilers.

This is really easy in .15 since it's now a simple 2:1. Need more power? Plop down a boiler and 2 steam engines. No need to plan complex ratios. (just don't overextend your water pump!)

I am currently trying to make a version of this in 0.17. I am using rocket fuel from beaconed coal liquefaction. I'll post future progress.