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Pretty much what the title says. I have my rail network setup so that it runs in a sort of circuit through my iron mines. Is there a simple (or not so simple) way for me to be able to get the train to load equally from each stop? I set all the stops to have the same name, however then the train just hits the first stop and skips the rest. Thanks

Loading equally is a bit difficult. Visiting every one when they have enough ore to fill it is easier.

Run red or green wire from your train station to each box in your loading station. You can go station-box-box-box-box-etc.
Open the station GUI and select the "enable" checkbox.
Click the empty square and select iron ore.
Click the middle box and select ">"
Click the right box and put in a number equal to the total your train can hold.

Now, the station will be disabled if it doesn't have enough ore to fill a train. Then, the train will go to another station instead of going to this one.

Similar can be done on dropoff stations, using "<"and "total the boxes can hold minus total the train can hold".

I do this all the time and it works great. I do it for ores, plates, and even subcomponents like gears and circuits. I heard there was a recent bug that caused it to be wonky, but never learned the details and never experienced it myself.

That works well if you only need one train picking up from a set of identically named stations. Once you want more than that one train, then doing that tends to result in multiple trains heading to the same outpost.

Zavian wrote:That works well if you only need one train picking up from a set of identically named stations. Once you want more than that one train, then doing that tends to result in multiple trains heading to the same outpost.

Yes, but if you have waiting areas they will happily move on to the next station when the current one becomes disabled, which you can do (but I haven't bothered to do) with another circuit to disable the station if a train is present.

It's a tradeoff of ease of use, comprehension, and expansion vs strict throughput and efficiency. I will almost always prefer the former to the latter, though I understand others will have other views.

Here's the basic idea, my current steel station. Each of the 3 stations (steel, coal, iron) disables itself if it's too empty (for steel) or full (for coal and iron).



(No I don't like 2 headed trains)

5thHorseman wrote:

Zavian wrote:That works well if you only need one train picking up from a set of identically named stations. Once you want more than that one train, then doing that tends to result in multiple trains heading to the same outpost.

Yes, but if you have waiting areas they will happily move on to the next station when the current one becomes disabled, which you can do (but I haven't bothered to do) with another circuit to disable the station if a train is present.

It's a tradeoff of ease of use, comprehension, and expansion vs strict throughput and efficiency. I will almost always prefer the former to the latter, though I understand others will have other views.

Here's the basic idea, my current steel station. Each of the 3 stations (steel, coal, iron) disables itself if it's too empty (for steel) or full (for coal and iron).

-snip-

(No I don't like 2 headed trains)

Thanks, exactly the answer I was looking for, and works perfectly