Improve recycler belt stacking

[lvl5hm]

TL;DR

Recycler should output the item that is closest to its stack limit from its internal storage first to reduce stalling and utilise stacked belts better.

What?

With high crafting speed and recycling productivity recyclers outputting on a belt quickly becomes a bottleneck. The belt isn't being used fully because the recycler outputs the items from its internal storage in the order they are shown in the GUI, wasting belt space with mostly unstacked items.


While the belt is filled with unstacked items, the recycler reaches the storage limit on one of its outputs and stalls.


I propose the recycler output from its internal storage the item that is closest to reaching stack limit (and thus stalling the recycler). This will reduce stalling because the recycler can still work on increasing the items with lower counts in its internal storage while outputting full stacks of the highest count item on the belt.

Why?

This should improve recycler belt stacking behaviour, pretty much guaranteeing that it's using stacked belts to their full potential.

[Boltlord]

Fully agree. Sorting scrap with belts becomes really annoying when you start doing it at a larger scale and this would make it much more viable. Maybe there could also be an option to force it to only output a certain stack size like with inserters.

[Stargateur]

stacking is a nerf of sushi belt

[hengecobdig]

100% agree, i have a line of recyclers and only like half of them are running even though barely anything is stacked on the belt. Belt sorting already has to compete with just recycling directly into active providers, and this would at least help with that. Trying to wait until the recycler can drop a full stack of something before doing so would also help, similar to how (non-stack)inserters try to pick up a full hand of something before they swing.

[Orum]

My understanding is the "intended" way to deal with this is like this:

recycler.jpg (42.41 KiB) Viewed 174 times

The decider combinator is set to:

Code: Select all

if each > 15 send 1 of each

...which is then linked to "Set filters" on the inserter.

[kitters]

My understanding is the "intended" way to deal with this is like this:
recycler.jpg

The decider combinator is set to:

Code: Select all

if each > 15 send 1 of each

...which is then linked to "Set filters" on the inserter.

Good one, but this is just a good hack. This doesn't mean the problem shouldn't be fixed.

[evandy]

Concur on this suggestion... obvious improvement & streamlining.

[spacedog]

+1

I assumed they did it this way to add a "puzzle element" to recyclers -- i.e. pay attention to your design so it doesn't lock up, especially if it loops.

But the behavior is inconsistent with the other entities that output directly to belts/chests (mining drills), and frankly it's more annoying than fun to deal with. Once you understand the problem, it's trivial to solve in a number of ways. But every solution is just unnecessary extra entities that add to the UPS load.

[Muche]

But the behavior is inconsistent with the other entities that output directly to belts/chests (mining drills) [...]

As far as I know, miners behave exactly the same - if the belt is too slow for miner's speed+prodbonus (i.e. their internal storage fills up), miners stop working.

But it's true I haven't tried to put a big mining drill on a patch of 12 different ores.

[PureTilt]

But the behavior is inconsistent with the other entities that output directly to belts/chests (mining drills) [...]

As far as I know, miners behave exactly the same - if the belt is too slow for miner's speed+prodbonus (i.e. their internal storage fills up), miners stop working.

But it's true I haven't tried to put a big mining drill on a patch of 12 different ores.

Big drills always output in max stack size even on mixed patches even with quality

tho i can see issue with recyclers holding to 1 legendary blue circuit for several hours or getting clogged up with a bunch of rare items of different qualities

[Romayne]

Agree, I'd rather have this over needing to deal with the cost (performance) of adding a combinator and inserter to make up for an issue that every recycler has by defailt -- I thought the whole point of it outputting contents directly was to use that, not just slap on an inserter and treat it like any other building!

[spacedog]

tho i can see issue with recyclers holding to 1 legendary blue circuit for several hours or getting clogged up with a bunch of rare items of different qualities

You can just pull it out sooner with an inserter if that kind of latency is an issue.

It's actually weird to me that recyclers have tons of output slots, but they completely fall over if you put quality modules in them to e.g. upcycle ore or plates. They should just buffer each quality separately, then output stacks of a given quality once a full stack is ready.

[Tinyboss]

tho i can see issue with recyclers holding to 1 legendary blue circuit for several hours or getting clogged up with a bunch of rare items of different qualities

Clogging up wouldn't be a problem with OP's suggestion, which isn't to wait for full stacks, but just to output the thing that's closest to a full stack.

Good point about legendary items, though. It could take *forever* for that to be the item closest to a full stack.