Mixer (sequencer) inserter

[DailyFrankPeter]

TL;DR: A piece of machinery able to pull items in certain order (e.g. 2x iron then 2x electronic circuit, then 1x yellow inserter).

Hi,

I have a suggestion as in the title. Or perhaps a question if anything like this already exist, but I haven't seen it.

Why would I need this? For cases when I have a single belt servicing a factory with multiple materials requirements (say, more than 2). Such a situation usually causes the belt to become clogged up with one material which is in oversupply and not receiving others. Solving this problem by having only 1 component type per belt size becomes very space-consuming if you count 3+ materials... as well as having to carry away the product.

[ssilk]

I think I cannot imagine how this works.
Can you make a screenshot of the situation you want to improve with this.

[sillyfly]

I think a more generic approach would be to allow circuit network to change the filter of a smart inserter, and not just an overall condition for it's activity.

This would allow you to make a simple timer that changed between the items you want, but would also have a lot more possibilities. It will also mean there are no new entities needed.

[ssilk]

Ah! AFAIK something similar is planned for v0.13. Kovarex spoke of this:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=21928&p=138660#p138660

With 0.13 there will be very handy (!and simple!) setups with combinators, that will allow things not possible without them.

For example the supply train + smart inserter configured to filter items that are missing in that expansion.
That was only solvable smart inserter + chest per every item type you wanted to supply, and you had to manually setup it. Now it will be possible to do it with single inserter and chest.

This is just an example, there will be more things obviously.

[sillyfly]

Good to know!
It gets really hard to follow all the planned features when they are spread in the forums, what with all the new mass of traffic in the last month or so

[ssilk]

Yeah, true, so it took now half of my evening/night to reread all the proposed stuff about endgame. See
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=21923&p=140044#p140044

[DailyFrankPeter]

I think a more generic approach would be to allow circuit network to change the filter of a smart inserter, and not just an overall condition for it's activity.

This would allow you to make a simple timer that changed between the items you want, but would also have a lot more possibilities. It will also mean there are no new entities needed.

What you are describing sounds very useful.

But to be honest, I don't get the wire/logic system. If something like that was already there I wouldn't know - e.g. I know logic in Factorio can return a numeric value or can return a type of item. What is that for then? Isn't it a filter parameter that you can pass to something?

[DailyFrankPeter]

Good to know!
It gets really hard to follow all the planned features when they are spread in the forums, what with all the new mass of traffic in the last month or so

Mass of traffic is good!

[DailyFrankPeter]

I think I cannot imagine how this works.
Can you make a screenshot of the situation you want to improve with this.

Here you are. In this example you can see (horizontally) a belt with coal AND iron on the same side (the other side of the belt is for the product). The furnace doesn't get the coal because there has been too much iron coming in, and since the belt is full it will not get it for a while.

If the green inserter was able to do a sequence of: coal - iron - coal - iron - etc, there would be less clog-up.

Generally, I was experimenting with a 'universal bus' setup - just to do things differently. You can see the bus to the right hand side (vertically). The individual assemblers would then use a single belt to pull what they need off the bus. During this project I have definitely felt I am going against the grain of the game (not giving each item type its own belt, but trying to move them together and then re-sort them). I challenge someone to try this too. But it's a topic for another post....

[sillyfly]

Current circuit systems have values, which are "tagged" with item names. Think of it like a shopping list -
Iron plate: 280.
Copper plate: 129.
Assembling Machine 1: 54.
...

What you do with this data is something else altogether. You can tell a smart inserter to only work if "Iron Plate">200. If the wire is only connected to a smart chest, this would indeed mean only work if this chest has more than 200 iron plates. But combinators can emit or manipulate these signals, so, for example, a combinator can take the value of copper plates in a chest and emit it as iron plates, so your inserter which is configured to work if "Iron Plate">200 would work when the chest has more than 200 Copper plates (because the signal it sees is Iron Plate: ..., because that's what the combinator put on the wire).

But currently that is all you can do with this info - turn things on or off. You can't _change_ conditions or parameters of entities (what an assembling machine produces, what is the filter of a smart inserter etc.)

[Ghoulish]

I think I cannot imagine how this works.
Can you make a screenshot of the situation you want to improve with this.

Here you are. In this example you can see (horizontally) a belt with coal AND iron on the same side (the other side of the belt is for the product). The furnace doesn't get the coal because there has been too much iron coming in, and since the belt is full it will not get it for a while.

If the green inserter was able to do a sequence of: coal - iron - coal - iron - etc, there would be less clog-up.

Generally, I was experimenting with a 'universal bus' setup - just to do things differently. You can see the bus to the right hand side (vertically). The individual assemblers would then use a single belt to pull what they need off the bus. During this project I have definitely felt I am going against the grain of the game (not giving each item type its own belt, but trying to move them together and then re-sort them). I challenge someone to try this too. But it's a topic for another post....

Therein lies the problem, you're looking for a solution to a problem that shouldn't be an issue in the first place!

[DailyFrankPeter]

Current circuit systems have values, which are "tagged" with item names. Think of it like a shopping list -
Iron plate: 280.[...]

Thanks that sheds some light on it.

[DailyFrankPeter]

During this project I have definitely felt I am going against the grain of the game (not giving each item type its own belt, but trying to move them together and then re-sort them). I challenge someone to try this too. But it's a topic for another post....

Therein lies the problem, you're looking for a solution to a problem that shouldn't be an issue in the first place!

What you just said sounds like: "Stop experimenting and start playing this game like everyone else".

I don't think I'm creating the problem. I think having only one way to build something is a problem.

[ssilk]

Well, this kind of problem you describe here is well known. There where really several of tries of players, to have a "multibus" or "mixed belt" design (also known with other names). Some where successful, you can have a look into the Show your creations board or in the Gameplay help, maybe you find also some on reddit.
If I have time I can search for some posts.

In my eyes the mixed belt factory is a possible way to built things, but it's currently much too complex to do it right. And much too slow to use it in general. But it's quite interesting, so it exists as an option to built things differently.

But as a suggestion this is in my eyes not usable, cause it's still not clear what you want/need and so cannot be discussed. That shown design will not work stable. As you already see above, that fact will distract from what you want to suggest, cause all will understand only parts of the picture. I can currently only recommend to look deeper into this subject and make a new try later.

I think with 0.13 it will be much easier to built such stuff and so it will automatically be more discussed.

[DailyFrankPeter]

But as a suggestion this is in my eyes not usable, cause it's still not clear what you want/need and so cannot be discussed. That shown design will not work stable. As you already see above, that fact will distract from what you want to suggest, cause all will understand only parts of the picture. I can currently only recommend to look deeper into this subject and make a new try later.

I found some bus designs from other players already, so I know what you're talking about.

OK, so let's forget this suggestion for now (I don' know... can you close it?). I will keep brainstorming and try to think of a single item that would be best suited to making a mixed-use 'bus' more feasible.

It seems at least that a common bus is a well recognized problem to which many people are looking for solutions (and may welcome new ones).

[ssilk]

No, I won't close this, there is no reason.
And I remembered back to some post I made long time ago:
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=918

[DailyFrankPeter]

No, I won't close this, there is no reason.
And I remembered back to some post I made long time ago:
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=918

Well, I don't mind speaking beside the topic, if you don't mind.

I actually started this thread, too, to talk multi-material loops specifically:
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=22231

About your link: Wow, has the game come along way since back then! It took me a while to read what is what One question: in your loop design, what is the "first sensor (green wire)" you are referring to? It looks like a chest is connected to the green wire and a signal is triggered when chest is full. Correct? You also have green wires for copper and red wires for coal?

I actually had another go at this pattern today, where I put ~10 different materials on the loop, using just one red wire system for everything. Kinda like your link but scaled up for 10 materials. It works better than everything I've had previously. This combines with the 'surplus' removal method (each factory type is responsible for removing surplus of its own product from the loop before adding more).

The only thing I can think of that would feel more natural is being able to hook it all up without the chests. Connecting only smart inserters (which would count items added and taken away).

E.g. let's imagine there are 2 places that 'consume' copper and 1 mine that 'produces' copper. Now, without chests, each Smart Inserter set to take Copper from the Loop would apply -1 Copper to the wire system on each arm swing. The Smart Inserter set to Produce Copper would then load Copper onto Loop, and send +1 to the wire system each time, until the balance is 0. This way the exact amount of Copper is added to the system as is taken away and used up.

[DailyFrankPeter]

Current circuit systems have values, which are "tagged" with item names. Think of it like a shopping list -
Iron plate: 280.
Copper plate: 129.
Assembling Machine 1: 54.
...

What you do with this data is something else altogether. You can tell a smart inserter to only work if "Iron Plate">200. If the wire is only connected to a smart chest, this would indeed mean only work if this chest has more than 200 iron plates. But combinators can emit or manipulate these signals, so, for example, a combinator can take the value of copper plates in a chest and emit it as iron plates, so your inserter which is configured to work if "Iron Plate">200 would work when the chest has more than 200 Copper plates (because the signal it sees is Iron Plate: ..., because that's what the combinator put on the wire).

But currently that is all you can do with this info - turn things on or off. You can't _change_ conditions or parameters of entities (what an assembling machine produces, what is the filter of a smart inserter etc.)

Mate, you solved the problem for me!
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=22231