Buffer chest problem

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Skeletpiece
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Buffer chest problem

Post by Skeletpiece »

Hello everyone,
Yesterday I noticed a problem with some buffer chests and I need some tips to solve this
Case:
BufferChest.PNG
BufferChest.PNG (63.76 KiB) Viewed 4022 times
As you can see the picture, I am near a passive provider chest with pipes. There is a buffer chest far also with pipes (Same logistic network).
If I do a pipe request, logistics robots will pick items from buffer instead of this passive chest near me (And it will take forever)
Is there anything I am missing to change this behavior ?
Using vanilla game
Thanks

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disentius
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by disentius »

Buffer chest have priority over passive provider chests when requesting items from the same network, this is independent of distance.
See:
https://wiki.factorio.com/Logistic_network

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dog80
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by dog80 »

tbh this makes the whole system some kind of obsolete - because placing bufferchests with the aim to have shorter distances of building / delivering items to you - creates on the other hand longer distances -- ,, so 1 solution would be to ALWAYS place a bufferchest to every passive provider with a minimum amount of items...

Mr. Tact
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by Mr. Tact »

Buffer chests were created to address a specific problem, which frankly I wouldn't be able to describe. I have never used them.
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dog80
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by dog80 »

any item that is placed as a blueprint by bots or is going to be delivered to the player in ANY WAY should ALWAYS be in bufferchests in the end...

so passive provider => goes to buffer-chests => go to player/construction

- though the priorization of buffer-chests that are further away than a passive provider chest - is just stupid and i think it is some kind of programmatical unchangable "feature" of factorio...

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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by Zavian »

Mr. Tact wrote:
Sat Nov 17, 2018 7:27 pm
Buffer chests were created to address a specific problem, which frankly I wouldn't be able to describe. I have never used them.
I agree. I have roughly 1000 hours in 0.16 (and over a 1000 more hours in earlier versions), and I have also never used a buffer chest. (But I don't build huge sprawling bot networks).

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Oktokolo
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by Oktokolo »

I solved the problem in my malls by using buffer chests as replacement for passive providers.

astroshak
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by astroshak »

Drawing upon buffer chests before Passive Providers lets you reuse buildings and building supplies rather than having the old torn down ones clutter chests and constantly using brand new ones to build with.

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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by Mr. Tact »

astroshak wrote:
Sun Nov 18, 2018 2:50 pm
Drawing upon buffer chests before Passive Providers lets you reuse buildings and building supplies rather than having the old torn down ones clutter chests and constantly using brand new ones to build with.
In what way are buffer chests better at this than storage chests?
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JimBarracus
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by JimBarracus »

Mr. Tact wrote:
Sun Nov 18, 2018 3:30 pm
In what way are buffer chests better at this than storage chests?
assumption: you have a bot-based mall
you put a bufferchest as the output storage for an assembler
you limit the production with a limit for the output inserter
you set the request for the produced item to a higher number
disasembled/ collected items are brought back to the output chest
you don't end up with a full storage chest cluster and full passive provider chests
because you only produce more items when you used up all your items in stock

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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by BenSeidel »

Skeletpiece wrote:
Fri Nov 16, 2018 3:43 pm
Is there anything I am missing to change this behavior ?
No, buffer chests are fatally flawed in their priority assignments, meaning that they will never really fill the niche they should have (being a buffer).
I don't know this for certain, but I think it's due to the way the game engine is written. Buffer chests can't have the same pickup priority as passive providers (which is the case most people want) because that will mean that buffer chests could request from other buffer chests, thereby making it cyclical, eg two buffer chests both requesting pipes, so the robots go back and forth moving pipes from one chest to the other.

The only time I have ever found buffer chests useful is in place of passive provider chests where I want deconstructed/trashed items to return to the output of the assembler that is making them.

mrvn
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by mrvn »

I would like to set a priority for chests. That way you could also have buffer chests request from other buffer chest to make a chain.

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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by ColonelSandersLite »

JimBarracus wrote:
Thu Nov 22, 2018 7:24 am
Mr. Tact wrote:
Sun Nov 18, 2018 3:30 pm
In what way are buffer chests better at this than storage chests?
assumption: you have a bot-based mall
you put a bufferchest as the output storage for an assembler
you limit the production with a limit for the output inserter
you set the request for the produced item to a higher number
disasembled/ collected items are brought back to the output chest
you don't end up with a full storage chest cluster and full passive provider chests
because you only produce more items when you used up all your items in stock
This is how I use them. They're also useful for controlling how certain things are recycled back into the assemblers too.

Suppose -
You're tearing out red belts and replacing them with blues. You want to keep a certain amount of reds on hand and recycle the rest into blue belts.

The red belt assembler puts red belts into a buffer chest, limited via inserter condition to the desired amount to have on hand.
The red belt buffer chest requests also requests the desired amount to have on hand.
A requester chest feeding the blue belt machine requests 99999999 red belts and is set to *not* request items from buffer chests.

Attempting to do this with a passive provider instead of a buffer chest would result in an infinite loop.

I use this in my mall for recycling the various items that can get turned into other items. Belts, inserters, ammo, etc.

mrvn
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Re: Buffer chest problem

Post by mrvn »

A simpler way is to program the output inserter to the count in the logistic network instead of adding a circuit connection to the provider chest.

That way it considers all provider, storage and buffer chests before producing new entities.

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