How can I derive the value of the energy produced?

[cantonsilver]

Hello everybody.

I have looked at many YT-Tuts, but unfortunately found nothing suitable.

I am looking for a way to deduct the energy produced by the steam engine as a value.

Scenario:
I have 2 electrical circuits in my base. A circuit ONLY supplies the defense belt, consisting of massively lasers, radars, roboports, lamps. These are fed on the one hand by solar and buffered with accumulators. A steam engine cluster provides energy when it is night and the batteries run idle. Battery state is tapped and evaluated by means of constant combinators. With a charge level of less than 5%, the steam engines start up and switch off again at 99% (as long as it is night, during the day the batteries charge by solar.

Circuit 2 supplies my base with a very large steam engine cluster ... currently here energy rich.

Now I have both circuits connected to a power switch. Now, if an attack wave should occur, and the output of the steam engine cluster for the defensive belt should go to its knees, this power switch should automate the power connection to the power base of the base and the large steam engine cluster provides the additional necessary energy.

However, I have not yet found a way, as I deduce the produced energy amounts of a steam engine as value. In the battery is not a problem: network cable, battery clicked and it is there that the charge state is to be read out.

I hope you can help me.

Best regards, Andy

[looney]

One trick I've seen is to compare the amount of charge in your batteries to some ideal power network

eg; https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comme ... kup_power/

Then you can tell if your power grid will survive the night, and connect more backup generation.

[whynotboth]

Couldn't you just activate the backup once your batteries drop to say 2%?

[cantonsilver]

Hello everybody!

The problem seems also with the value 2% for the battery is not solvable. The reason for this is that the game has a sequence of energy extraction. As a first step, energy is always taken from existing batteries. If these are not sufficient, the solar fields are second and only when this is not sufficient is other energy used, such as steam engines, steam turbines and so on.
What happens in the game: The batteries are charged by the steam engine cluster.
If the charge level of the batteries falls below 5%, the cluster for the defensive belt will switch. The amount of energy is not sufficient and the battery charge drops further, for example, below 2%, then the switch switches to the second circuit.
The remaining amount of the batteries is then discharged there until they are zero.
However, since the rest of the base is also buffered by solar cells and accumulators, the charge state of these batteries is different from that of the defensive belt. The pumps of the large base steam engine cluster have received to turn on the pumps other signals.
Since the batteries of the defense belt are empty, but the base is still half full, the large cluster does not increase. And if so, the power switch will not turn off. Unfortunately, most controlled devices can only evaluate one network signal. I have found a mod with controllers, which also allows OR circuits. Maybe I'll get something.

Greeting, Andy

[Bauer]

Hi Andy,

first of all, I think you got the energy usage priorities wrong. Solar is first, then Steam (turbines and engines), accumulators last.

Hence, if you put a single accumulator close to the power switch and connected to the defense network side, it will indicate a power shortage if it drops below 5%. Why? At 5% the steam power kicks in and all excess power will charge the accumulators, i.e. the power level increases. Only if the steam power does not suffice to fulfill the power demand, further accumulator power will be used. This will drain the accumulators. You probably also want an SR-latch here to avoid flickering.

As a side remark: The easiest way to implement "or"-logic is to add two signals (boolean type). If this signal is > 0 then the "or"-condition is true. Example: You have a wire with iron and copper ore counts. Conntect it to two decider combinators which are set to "iron ore > 0" output 1 "A" and "copper ore > 0" output 1 "A". The two outputs are connected to a device of your choice set to the condiction "A>0".

[joonnnyy]

to diferentiate any amount of inputsources, in yur case accumulator charges of different powerlines you could use 1 decider per source
in your example just hook 1 decider up to the base and say A<20 output B as 1 and hook the second up to the defence grid saying A<2 output B as 1
then put all outputs together and activate as much steampower as needed when b>0
now if any of the conditions is made the power will increase as you need

or go with nuclear and have some GW with room to spare

[bobucles]

As a first step, energy is always taken from existing batteries...

But this is wrong. Energy priority works in this order:

- Solar power is always used.
- Steam power (engines AND turbines) is used when solar isn't enough.
- Battery power is used when power generators aren't enough.

I'm not really sure what the OP is asking. There's no circuit connections for power generators that I know of. The only way to know how much energy is being used is to count the fuel before it goes in.

[Termak]

Why you even need separate power circuits if you will feed power from mainline anyway, also the way to do this is to have accumulator, just one is enough, on the "low power" side of the powerswitch. Your circuits need to be fed from mainpower side though.