Mixed ore mining or Uranium processing: Ore separation strategies

[zOldBulldog]

WARNING: Complex/long topic.

Recent versions gave us ore patches that touch each other resulting in 2 ores on the same belt. Uranium processing and Kovarex centrifuges can do the same (especially in the limited space available when you are trying to fully surround them with beacons).

The devs gave us filtered splitters as way to separate the ores into their own belts. They work great... as long as the more frequent ore keeps being consumed, but if it stops... the less frequent (and often more needed) ore can't reach the splitter, so it can't be separated. The result is that you still have ore available but you cannot get it.

So, I dedicate this thread to all the clever design strategies you use to prevent backups/deadlocks of the less common ore.

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I will start with the only method I found:

- Use a filtered splitter, requesting the least common / least consumed ore on one side. This can also be done with filtered inserters, with the same resulting behavior.

- If this is the only source for those ores (I. E.: coming out of Uranium ore refining), if the more common ore backs up you are out of luck... The belt will stop.

- But if you have additional sources of the pure ore that have higher volume (I. E.: from a separate mining belt or during Kovarex enrichment) you can use a filtered splitter on the low volume mixed belt to send each ore to its own short low-volume pure ore branch.

- Merge the low volume pure ore belt with its corresponding high volume pure ore belt using a splitter with input priority given to the low volume belt.

Now as long as you have enough consumption of the more common ore to use up all of that ore from the mix belt... no backups/deadlocks.

It is not a perfect solution but it works for most situations.

So... How do you do it?

[leadraven]

Mixed areas are negligible small.

[Hannu]

It is not a perfect solution but it works for most situations.

So... How do you do it?

I have used exactly the same method. I have never encountered significant problems. Modern filter and priority splitters make it very easy, but it worked well also with filter inserters and side feed priority systems. Typically (at normal or rich settings) border area is quite small and affects only one belt (it may need curves) and there is several pure belts of both ores. If filtered ore is fed to main flow with priority, problems should occur only in some extreme situations.

Actually I prefer contacted ore patches because it gives reason to build more interesting filtering systems and also gives two ores from single train station.

[Pi-C]

The devs gave us filtered splitters as way to separate the ores into their own belts. They work great... as long as the more frequent ore keeps being consumed, but if it stops... the less frequent (and often more needed) ore can't reach the splitter, so it can't be separated. The result is that you still have ore available but you cannot get it.

Filtered splitters are good, I think. They should work even better if the two different ores are on separate tracks of the belt. Say you have coal and copper ore on one belt, but coal only on the left and copper only on the right side. If one side backs up, the other will still get through.

The problem is that miners on overlapping ore patches will output everything they mine on the same side of the belt. So I guess one way to solve the problem would be a pre-splitter sorting mechanism. It is cumbersome and rather ineffective, I believe, but will prevent that the rare resource gets stuck:

Leave a gap in the mixed-ore belt. Just before the gap, put down filter inserters on each side, left filtered for coal, right for copper. Make the inserters take from the mixed-ore belt and output to another belt behind them. Use these belts to bridge the gap and sideload the main belt. Now you exactly know what resource will be on what side, and filtered splitters down the line should work fine.

Throughput will be a problem, of course, but I guess it could help if you added some more inserters. Additional power consumption could be an issue, too. But if your aim is to always have access to the rarer resource, it should be an acceptable compromise.

That being said, I should mention that I've never started a rocket yet, so what could work on a smaller scale may be problematic in a megabase setup.

[astroshak]

Are we talking mining outposts, or are we talking local mines?

For local mines (mines I belt in from) splitters filtered before balancing the belts work rather well. Ideally, all the belts straight from the miners will split off the contaminant to a single belt, that goes into that other balancer. IE - if I’ve got a copper field touching an iron field, all iron miner belts will filter split the copper out, and all the copper miner belts will filter the iron out, and the resulting iron belt and copper belt from that filtering out will be one input into the belt balancer prior to the furnace arrays.

For distant mines, I’d simply set up a separate train station. All the mined material would be filtered into the appropriate train station for scheduled pickup.

Should you set up bot mining, the bots can act as natural filters in conjunction with the requests/filters you put onto your logistics chests.

[Hannu]

Are we talking mining outposts, or are we talking local mines?

I use it in both cases and it works equally well.

For distant mines, I’d simply set up a separate train station. All the mined material would be filtered into the appropriate train station for scheduled pickup.

I meant a complex with several tracks and train stops when I wrote "station". Of course I have separate stops and loading platforms for every ore and for work train I use for personal transport. And also for service train if outpost needs defense supplies.

Should you set up bot mining, the bots can act as natural filters in conjunction with the requests/filters you put onto your logistics chests.

This is true, bots are trivial solution to all sorting problems. However, in my opinion such an easy solution ruins one interesting function from the game. Therefore I never use bots for mining (or other high volume transports).

[zOldBulldog]

Are we talking mining outposts, or are we talking local mines?

Both, as well as Uranium processing and Kovarex. They all share the same basic issue.

I personally first encountered it when my Kovarex build froze up... due to an already fully backed up U-238 belt and a Kovarex centrifuge returning a U-238. The splitter that should have shunted the U-238 to the U-238 belt could not do it because of the backup... holding up all the U-235 that were behind it. I had to do some pretty creative design (based on the method I described on the OP) to make sure that the loops coming out of the centrifuges stayed nearly empty and did not back up even if the main U-235/U238 belts were fully backed up and frozen. If interested my solution is in https://factorioprints.com/view/-LbR6oDvcyQDLsSuyv_C and the discussion for that topic is in viewtopic.php?f=8&t=62778.

[jamiechi1]

Put everything in a warehouse or storage shed and sort it later.
If you don't have mods, stick a few pieces of track down, one or more railroad cars. Instant warehouse.

[Bauer]

Just to through it in: Bots are pretty good at sorting stuff.

[Bauer]

Nowadays, mixed ore fields are pretty rare.

However, ores need to mix again at some point for a balanced smelter. I assume a separate station for each type of ore. Then circuit logic is used to mix the ores in the desired ratio(s).

If you are using a belt based smelter, you don't want the belt to be too mixed because it will reduce the productivity of the furnaces (inserters waiting for the ore "their" furnace is processing). Static solutions won't work in this case. I have no neat solution (yet).

[MeduSalem]

Just to through it in: Bots are pretty good at sorting stuff.

The reason why I have been doing mining by bots ever since I can remember, apart of getting the ore more evenly balanced into the trains and saving UPS (on a 10 year old CPU the only way to play larger bases)

Nowadays, mixed ore fields are pretty rare.

In my recent game I have several fields overlapping in Vanilla and that even with the lowest frequency setting possible, though size turned up a bit.

[JimBarracus]

how I deal with mixed mining:
-keep the mixed area as small as possible
-priority feed to the backup chests/ train loaders
I usually start to mine only one ore on big scale
the other ore gets a station which gets activated when there is enough waiting to get picked up but leaves
enough space to store at least double the amount which triggers a train to show up.
usually handled by an existing train which gets an extra destination

when there is enough demand/ old mines depleting I start to use both ores.

[mrvn]

There is only one long term strategy: Consume the ore.

There usually is a region of pure ores and a small boundary of mixed ores. A good strategy is to put each pure region on a separate belts and the mixed ores on their own. Then filter the mixed belt and use it with priority. Weather you use filter inserters and side loading or splitters doesn't really change the concept. The idea is to minimize the throughput on the mixed ore belt and using that first. Thus insuring that it always gets consumed.

Other sorting mechanisms:

1) chest with multiple filter inserter. Adds some buffering so it handles short term imbalances in consumption.

2) provider/requester chests. Using logistic bots to sort.

3) chests with loaders. Just faster filter inserter.

4) trains. This should have a stacker with priorities so trains with mixed ores get empties first.

5) LTN. using a higher priority on the mixed ore stations.

[T-A-R]

It depends an the state of the game, early youvstart with filtser splitter, and upgrade to other solutions like cargo wagons or a botnet. Usually you want to split it at the mine, and buffer filtered ores to feed your smelters. I love the dangerores and diggy scenarios since mixed ore is everywhere. Challenge is to meet the demand with supply. Productivity modules help with this balancing. Also make sure you have a propper drain to waste your backlog as usefull as possible. (so better store circuits rather than opper ore). Try to keep your buffers as small as possible.