Factorio Forums

We have water temperature shown on all water-related components, but only plain, boring pipes show water pressure/volume.
I couldn't figure out why my engines aren't working (despite 100 degree temperature) and I'm not the first person who had this problem.

Are engines connected to energy distribution system? Energy is not produced if it isn't used by anything.

I think, we should make some new icon, something like unplugged electricity connection.
If the energy producer is not connected to any consumer, it would blink the same way when machine isn't connected to electricity.

kovarex wrote:I think, we should make some new icon, something like unplugged electricity connection.
If the energy producer is not connected to any consumer, it would blink the same way when machine isn't connected to electricity.

I am not sure how would that work.
Would an electric pole with a lamp turn that warning off?

MF- wrote:Would an electric pole with a lamp turn that warning off?

Yes.

kovarex wrote:I think, we should make some new icon, something like unplugged electricity connection.
If the energy producer is not connected to any consumer, it would blink the same way when machine isn't connected to electricity.

I have better idea. Why not make custom (sparks) animations for Steam generators similar to those on power acumulators?
You can quickly see if power acumulators energy is being drained or charged by its active animation. Implementing something similar to Steam engines would alow you to quickly see if they are in use or not.

They already animate and emit particles, both depends on the output power.

It tooks a while for me to recognize that animation, because it is - dark on darker? Sparks are a really good idea.

I miss also a sound, if something doesn't work, so that I hear that from far away. When I was young I worked in a factory and in the evening, when all was turned off, we had a machine, that made a very loneley "beeeeeeep" every 10 seconds to signal, that it is in "standby" (powered, but not working). Reminds me also to the Mac Donalds fryers.

ssilk wrote:It tooks a while for me to recognize that animation, because it is - dark on darker? Sparks are a really good idea.

Yeah, it's not really visible at the first glance. My point was, that the animation is already present and it could be simply tuned a bit.

I don't favour everything sparking in a lightshow, though. Sparking usually means something bad going on.

Current animation is fine, even if it looks wonky during power usage spikes (laser turrets firing).

I don't remember if tutorial even mentions water pressure. I assumed that 1 pump means "water is there, done". I got like 8 engines, 2 of which would work at 5% performance, even during blackouts due to lazers, despite having 100 temperature.

Coolthulhu wrote: I don't remember if tutorial even mentions water pressure. I assumed that 1 pump means "water is there, done". I got like 8 engines, 2 of which would work at 5% performance, even during blackouts due to lazers, despite having 100 temperature.

That is weird.
I had 12 engines using one pump just fine, then I expanded to 18 and started noticing trouble, so I added another pump next to the 1st one.
So far it confirms "pipes are pretty much unlimited in the flow"

^Similar issue here. I usually go with 6 engines per pump as going over that seemed to create an issue for me.

I'll have to try expanding some off of one pump and see if this continues.