High volume of bots is making my factory enter in Low Power.

[Dark_Wynd]

Hello,

I have noticed that whenever I have a big number of bots performing tasks, my factory is automatically entering low-power mode. And that's even though I have the capacity to generate enough power to meet the satisfaction needs.

I have a nuclear reactor setup with 200 steam turbines, at a max output of 1.164 GW. (And that's excluding Solar panels)

Whenever, I have a lot of bots performing tasks, the satisfaction requirement can rise up to 1.2 GW, but my turbines will only produce enough power to power all roboports charging demands and all other machines. (Averaged currently at 350 MW).

Because the "satisfaction" requirement rises up, this effectively puts all my machine in a low-power mode and therefore, reduces their efficiency.
It seems to me that my steam turbines should at least rise up production to meet the "satisfaction" requirements, or the satisfaction requirements formula should be reviewed to reflect the true value of the electrical demand.

Note : I'm playing 1.1.27
I have over 20000 logistic bots & over 20000 construction bots in my network.

Screen Shot 2021-03-15 at 15.45.00 .png (1.33 MiB) Viewed 3301 times

[Loewchen]

If you don't produce the power to support your bots then obviously you will have low satisfaction, nothing about that suggests a bug.

[orzelek]

Satisfaction graph is trying to tell you it has 343MW and needs 802MW.
If you have so much nuclear power - go and check on the map with electric networks enabled where is the gap in connections.

[torne]

Since it says you have 200 steam turbines connected but can't make any more power that suggests they are using up 100% of the available steam, but that's not enough steam. Do you have the right ratio of heat exchangers? Are all the heat exchangers actually at 500C or higher? Do they all have enough water? I'd go around and mouse over all the heat exchangers that are most distant from the water sources/reactors to make sure they aren't experiencing low throughput..

Or just post a screenshot/blueprint of your reactor and someone can probably guess..

[Zanthra]

I would recommend posing the save file, it will make it much easier to identify the problem.

[Dark_Wynd]

As recommended, I'm attaching my save game for more information.

[torne]

You're pushing the steam through way too many tanks and pipes. There's only enough steam making it through all your fluidboxes to power a small proportion of your steam turbines; the rest are empty. Look at the fill levels of your steam tanks for example: the ones nearest the heat exchangers are nearly full (and so the heat exchangers can't pump out any more steam) and the ones nearest the steam turbines are nearly empty (and so the pumps can't pull out any more steam).

You probably need to drastically simplify and shrink this for it to work. At minimum you need pumps between all the tanks to get reasonable throughput; a long row of directly connected tanks does not flow well.

[Dark_Wynd]

You're pushing the steam through way too many tanks and pipes. There's only enough steam making it through all your fluidboxes to power a small proportion of your steam turbines; the rest are empty. Look at the fill levels of your steam tanks for example: the ones nearest the heat exchangers are nearly full (and so the heat exchangers can't pump out any more steam) and the ones nearest the steam turbines are nearly empty (and so the pumps can't pull out any more steam).

You probably need to drastically simplify and shrink this for it to work. At minimum you need pumps between all the tanks to get reasonable throughput; a long row of directly connected tanks does not flow well.

Thank you, that seem to have been my problem! I never realized that flow was not great in a long chain of storage tanks.

[astroshak]

Tanks, and pipes, seem to operate on a percentage basis. Since pipe volume is so low, it’s not that obvious. Tank volume though, is much larger making it much more obvious. Despite having such a greater volume, a tank at 50% capacity will try to fill its adjacent pipes to about 50% capacity as well, barring any effect from pumps. Put a pump on the outlet of a tank, and the pump forces as much as possible into the following pipe bringing it to full capacity rather than whatever percentage the tank is at.

The same holds true for chains of tanks. This is why you should use a pump after every tank, even when pushing fluid through a series of tanks. Tank, pump, tank, pump, tank, pump, etc.

[torne]

Yeah, pipes and tanks behave like they're separate containers and the flow rate from one to the next depends on the difference in fluid level. The more of these in a row there are, the greater the difference in fluid level between the first and last will be as a result, and once it gets long enough that the first can be full and the last can be empty, things stop working.

https://wiki.factorio.com/Fluid_system#Pipelines has a table listing the effective flow rate you get between two pumps depending on what is between them.