How many prod modules can you stack?

[mrvn]

Adding productivity 3 modules to a miner gives 120% ore. Those 120% can be smelted by an electric furnace giving 120% more plates. Combined that's 144% more plates from the same ore patch.

Lets keep going using 4 PM3 modules in Assembler3's:

Copper cables = 2.016x
Electronic circuits = 2.822x
Advanced circuits = 3.951x
Processing units = 5.532x

How far can you stack productivity modules?

1) What's the longest chain you can think of?
2) What's the chain with the most gain for one resource?
3) What's the chain with the most gain for all resources (the resource with the least gain counts)?

[SoShootMe]

Adding productivity 3 modules to a miner gives 120% ore. [...]

Adding two does, but the electric mining drill has three slots .

How far can you stack productivity modules?

1) What's the longest chain you can think of?
2) What's the chain with the most gain for one resource?
3) What's the chain with the most gain for all resources (the resource with the least gain counts)?

For vanilla, I think the longest chain of items where each step allows productivity modules is 8 (a continuation of your example): copper ore -> copper plate -> copper cable -> electronic circuit -> advanced circuit -> processing unit -> rocket control unit -> rocket part. Including fluids, there is a chain of 9: crude oil -> heavy oil -> light oil -> petroleum gas -> plastic bar -> advanced circuit -> processing unit -> rocket control unit -> rocket part.

With maximum productivity modules, I think producing rocket parts has the most gain for a single resource, copper ore, although a lot of it doesn't follow the chain above (eg copper ore -> copper plate -> low density structure -> rocket part, copper ore -> ... -> electronic circuit -> speed module 1 -> rocket control unit -> rocket part) so the overall gain is less. One rocket part needs ~158 copper ore with productivity modules compared to 925 without, ~5.85 times as much.

Rocket parts probably also gives the greatest minimum gain, with factors of ~5.21 for crude oil and ~5.23 for iron ore.

See:
https://kirkmcdonald.github.io/calc.htm ... :null:null. Note the raw resource numbers include electric mining drill and pumpjack productivity.
https://kirkmcdonald.github.io/calc.htm ... t-part:r:1

[blazespinnaker]

White science in the lab to take a step further.

[mrvn]

White science in the lab to take a step further.

Copper Miner (3) -> Copper Plate (2) -> Copper Wire (4) -> Electronic Circuit (4) -> Advanced Circuit (4) -> Processing Unit (4) -> Rocket Control Unit (4) -> Rocket (4) -> White Science (2)
1.3 * 1.2 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.2 = 19.733

That's some saving of copper, although there are some other paths in that chain using copper that have less modules stacked.

[SoShootMe]

White science in the lab to take a step further.

Copper Miner (3) -> Copper Plate (2) -> Copper Wire (4) -> Electronic Circuit (4) -> Advanced Circuit (4) -> Processing Unit (4) -> Rocket Control Unit (4) -> Rocket (4) -> White Science (2)
1.3 * 1.2 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.2 = 19.733

That's some saving of copper, although there are some other paths in that chain using copper that have less modules stacked.

Silly me, I dismissed science output because I was focused on the second question and assumed it couldn't be better due to many other less-beneficial chains needed to make use of the science in the labs and get that final +20%. Not only is that obviously a longer chain but, for all sciences except military, I make the overall copper ore gain ~5.94, slightly better than for rocket parts (~5.85). Though of course still far less than the above suggests.

[mrvn]

White science in the lab to take a step further.

Copper Miner (3) -> Copper Plate (2) -> Copper Wire (4) -> Electronic Circuit (4) -> Advanced Circuit (4) -> Processing Unit (4) -> Rocket Control Unit (4) -> Rocket (4) -> White Science (2)
1.3 * 1.2 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.4 * 1.2 = 19.733

That's some saving of copper, although there are some other paths in that chain using copper that have less modules stacked.

Silly me, I dismissed science output because I was focused on the second question and assumed it couldn't be better due to many other less-beneficial chains needed to make use of the science in the labs and get that final +20%. Not only is that obviously a longer chain but, for all sciences except military, I make the overall copper ore gain ~5.94, slightly better than for rocket parts (~5.85). Though of course still far less than the above suggests.

Oh yeah, the 19.733 is totally blown out of proportions for just that path along the whole complex graph of recipes. The average even for just copper is far less. A nearly 6 fold increase is still major though.