Factorio Forums

TL;DR

Decrease centrifuge stack size to 10.

What?

Make the centrifuge stack size smaller. The current stack size is 50. Which, when limiting a chest to a single slot, is far too high. Machines like electric furnaces/mining drills/assemblers are used in bulk. So stacks of 50 make sense to not clog up inventories, plus they're cheap (relative to centrifuges). If centrifuges are automated, a single assembler creating these now represents a minimum 5,000+ red circuit sink on a base before it backs up. Oil refineries and chemical plants have stack size of 10, those machines are (arguably) used more. A stack size of 10 would bring the machine stack in line with these machines and allow for more fine tuning in buffer amounts.

+1 to this

I usually limit chemical plant chests to around 3-4 slots because they're relatively cheap and needed in many common cases, but when automating centrifuges I've always had to use circuit conditions (ex. assembler only works if there are <10 centrifuges in the chest)

+1

I don't think this is really necessary. Because unlike ammo or many intermediate material, they are not transported a lot, nor do they need a large buffer. The impact on game balance woule be rather limited, but this would just cause a frustrating side effect. When the stack size is reduced and players open their save, their stacks of centrifuges would be reduced from 50 to 10 or even 1.(I don't know the exact number because I don't know how the game exactly works, but anyway this is definitely a huge "loss".)

fpx007 wrote: Wed May 20, 2026 9:07 am I don't think this is really necessary. Because unlike ammo or many intermediate material, they are not transported a lot, nor do they need a large buffer. The impact on game balance woule be rather limited, but this would just cause a frustrating side effect. When the stack size is reduced and players open their save, their stacks of centrifuges would be reduced from 50 to 10 or even 1.(I don't know the exact number because I don't know how the game exactly works, but anyway this is definitely a huge "loss".)

Only situation when count of items in a stack is altered when loading a save is when item was requested to be non-stackable, in this scenario a stack's count would have to be reset to 1. As long as it would not be made non-stackable, then there would be no item loss, you would just get inventories with stacks that contain more items than you would usually expect, similar to assembler's ingredient inventory where you may usually see more than a full stack in one slot.

boskid wrote: Wed May 20, 2026 9:13 am

fpx007 wrote: Wed May 20, 2026 9:07 am I don't think this is really necessary. Because unlike ammo or many intermediate material, they are not transported a lot, nor do they need a large buffer. The impact on game balance woule be rather limited, but this would just cause a frustrating side effect. When the stack size is reduced and players open their save, their stacks of centrifuges would be reduced from 50 to 10 or even 1.(I don't know the exact number because I don't know how the game exactly works, but anyway this is definitely a huge "loss".)

Only situation when count of items in a stack is altered when loading a save is when item was requested to be non-stackable, in this scenario a stack's count would have to be reset to 1. As long as it would not be made non-stackable, then there would be no item loss, you would just get inventories with stacks that contain more items than you would usually expect, similar to assembler's ingredient inventory where you may usually see more than a full stack in one slot.

I see. If so, the consequence would not be so big as I guessed. I have such concern because I've experienced similar situations in other games, either due to a mod or a official update.

By the way, how do the game resolves when trying to sorting "overstacking" items especially when reverting to normal stack size would cause them occuping more slots than the container provides. Because items in assemblers don't need to be sorted, but items in containers need, especially space platforms cargo which always sort.

game could remove all my legendary centrifuge I wouldn't care anyway

fpx007 wrote: Wed May 20, 2026 9:07 am I don't think this is really necessary. Because unlike ammo or many intermediate material, they are not transported a lot, nor do they need a large buffer.

If I understand this correctly, isn't the "nor do they need a large buffer" part the point of OP's suggestion? I've never needed a buffer of 50 centrifuges when automating them, 10 should be more than enough. With a cost of 100 advanced circuits (not to mention the concrete, gears, and steel), it's pretty expensive to stock up 50 of these.

atarihomestar1 wrote: Fri May 22, 2026 3:00 pm

fpx007 wrote: Wed May 20, 2026 9:07 am I don't think this is really necessary. Because unlike ammo or many intermediate material, they are not transported a lot, nor do they need a large buffer.

If I understand this correctly, isn't the "nor do they need a large buffer" part the point of OP's suggestion? I've never needed a buffer of 50 centrifuges when automating them, 10 should be more than enough. With a cost of 100 advanced circuits (not to mention the concrete, gears, and steel), it's pretty expensive to stock up 50 of these.

Same here. Even with pretty big base, I was still only using a handful of centrifuges.
Current stack of 50 is very excessive.

This makes sense. I agree.

+

centrifuge stack size of 10 looks reasonable for 2.1.

boskid wrote: Tue May 26, 2026 12:56 pm centrifuge stack size of 10 looks reasonable for 2.1.

Amazing, thank you!

I guess this is why you should just always circuit disable the inserter between the assembler and chest based on if the chest has more than x amount of item in it...

Khaylain wrote: Wed Jun 24, 2026 11:03 pm I guess this is why you should just always circuit disable the inserter between the assembler and chest based on if the chest has more than x amount of item in it...

I always do so. The stack size nerf is annoying, as annoying as chem plant / refinery stack size, takes too much character inventory space. I want them all to be at least 20 like all Space Age machinery.

You should limit with circuit conditions if you're using bots. Link up the assembler(s) making the centrifuges to the chest holding them and have the assembler turn off when the chest hits a certain number. Using circuits instead of the X means that if you ever take down a centrifuge with bots, they'll deliver it to the location it originated from.

But ya, 50 is kind of a large stack size for a 2x2 building. 50 should be reserved for 1x1 buildings (inserters, chests), 20 for 2x2 buildings, 10 for 3x3 buildings (refinery), and 1 for anything larger (like a rocket silo).

DisRuptive1 wrote: Thu Jul 16, 2026 11:04 pm You should limit with circuit conditions if you're using bots. Link up the assembler(s) making the centrifuges to the chest holding them and have the assembler turn off when the chest hits a certain number. Using circuits instead of the X means that if you ever take down a centrifuge with bots, they'll deliver it to the location it originated from.

But ya, 50 is kind of a large stack size for a 2x2 building. 50 should be reserved for 1x1 buildings (inserters, chests), 20 for 2x2 buildings, 10 for 3x3 buildings (refinery), and 1 for anything larger (like a rocket silo).

If you already have bots, just use the logistic connection. I find wire limits too tedious to set up early game, stack size limits are perfectly fine.

... the centrifuge is 3x3 like an assembler and the only 2x2 buildings in game are furnaces, burner miners, power poles, and accumulators. The refinery is 5x5.
Tile size is a bad metric to use. Stack sizes being based on resource cost and relative amount of use works fine. Larger building tend to cost more, so there is a loose correlation to size.