Factorio Forums

Something that I came across is that when a belt is entirely full, and items keep coming, you need a large amount of inserters, additional chests and it simply takes a lot of space!
Other times you can have assembly machines that need a lot of items, which you either bring with bots through requester chests (that also need to be filled), or have a long line of items that aren't inserted fast enough by your inserters.

The solution I have is a belt funnel. It's a very simple 1 by 1 tile that simply takes the items on the belts and immediately puts them into the container adjacent to it. Be it a chest, an assembly machine or anything else.

Silly mockup picture: The mechanics would most likely work the same as the underground belt, mostly as shown in the picture, half a tile of belt, the other half would insert them into the object. If there is no object next to it, it'll act like any other miner, and just put down a single item, perhaps 2 side by side, and stop moving the rest. Of course it could also be powered (If technically possible to stop a belt, or the mechanic of the item), this could link to the power grid and perhaps even to the logistics network.
Obviously this would be a very late-game item.

I am in fact quite sure that this could easily be made by creating a new inserter, making it super quick and hiding the arms. Perhaps someone has already done this in a mod?
I hadn't found anything like this by using search and searching manually, my apologies if it has been thought of before.

Do let me know what you think about it, if you can think of improvements, and if you would use it in any of your complex builds.

Well, we had such thoughts so far. I won't merge that.

But you should also read at the other threads:
https://forums.factorio.com/forum/sea ... =%2BHopper
https://forums.factorio.com/forum/sea ... rds=Funnel

Ahh, I had searched for funnel, but not for hopper, I feel silly.

Sorry to double post, but I felt like I had to share this.
I had some spare time and mutilated some inserter code, modded some sprites and came up with this silly thing:
It actually works as quickly as the belt goes, and it already filled up what you see in the screenshot within mere seconds.
Adding to that, it'll only grab things that are being pushed off the belt instead of sneaking it off the side somewhere. Sadly it also works sideways, so a moderate success I'd say.

I wish I could show it as an animated gif, but my past video escapades have been underwhelming.

If you're interested, I'd be happy to share the mod, but I doubt it hasn't been made before.


P.S: I'm curious as to why it's being overlapped by everything, but I suppose it's because I simply replaced inserter base, which is supposed to be below everything else.

Alphasoldier wrote:If you're interested, I'd be happy to share the mod, but I doubt it hasn't been made before.

Yes please! Also, does it come in normal and fast? (Yellow & Red) Or is it express conveyors only? (Blue)

CreeperDaReeper wrote:
Yes please! Also, does it come in normal and fast? (Yellow & Red) Or is it express conveyors only? (Blue)

There's no normal or fast, the entire point of this item is that it'll instantaneously put items into a chest (or elsewhere). I just picked blue as color because blue means fast in Factorio, and it doesn't get faster than that.
So far it ONLY works when it's placed at the END of a belt. It does go in all directions however.

As I said before, this is a very dirty mod. It's simply a really fast reskinned inserter that only grabs things from the end of belts.

Here you go though:
There's a hopper technology that'll take like 10 science packs and takes a really short time to finish. After that you can find it in crafting behind all the inserters.


I would love to get more involved in the mod creating business, but the documentation on everything is very slim. At least the debugger is really handy.

P.S: I suppose at this point this topic should be moved to mods?

I think you can just create a new topic in the mod forum and link it here.

Yes, please, this is suggestions, not modding board.

Hi,

I was thinking why dont you make something that items can land in that will then be placed in a chest or something next to.

cc
cc
cc
cc
DD-S

c=conveyor
D=Drop pit
S=Storage

Thanks

You mean something like a hopper or a funnel?
Try searching those two terms, I think there is also a mod that has them.

yea exactly hopper type

What's the point of that? We have inserters to do that…
Factorio isn't Minecraft. ;D

Gandalf wrote:What's the point of that? We have inserters to do that…
Factorio isn't Minecraft. ;D

Could save power, could also be faster than base inserter as well