Factorio Forums

I would like to see a sunlight detector for circuit networks. Easiest might be to have a circuit network output from the solar panels, that provides its energy output as a percentage. That way you could use it to detect whether the sun is up. Perhaps better is a dedicated component, incase you think the solar panel is too large, if all you want is a detector. Either way it can't be a difficult thing to add.

The reason that I want this is so that I can control coal and nuclear plant to turn on and off at different accumulator charge depending on if it is day or night. I already base an S/R latch on accumulator charge, but I also want a sunlight condition as I don't want coal and nuclear to recharge the accumulators during the day, the solar panels can do that then. Perhaps other people can think of other uses as well.

maybe this will work for you. place it at night when solar is producing 0 power, and don't connect the pole to the electric network.
when the sun comes up it will start to charge the accumulator, which will trigger the 25000 count (ticks in a day) timer.
T signal at dawn will be 0ish on the timer, then around 18,000(?) when it starts to get dark. adjust your numbers as needed.
https://wiki.factorio.com/Game-day

keep this accumulator separate from your electric network, so it will keep time even in a brown/black out.

hope this helps.

Maybe combinator clock would be better. Something that would read the current game time and send it to circuit network. It may have broader usage.

impetus maximus wrote:maybe this will work for you.

Day_Timer.png

place it at night when solar is producing 0 power, and don't connect the pole to the electric network.
when the sun comes up it will start to charge the accumulator, which will trigger the 25000 count (ticks in a day) timer.
T signal at dawn will be 0ish on the timer, then around 18,000(?) when it starts to get dark. adjust your numbers as needed.
https://wiki.factorio.com/Game-day

keep this accumulator separate from your electric network, so it will keep time even in a brown/black out.

hope this helps.

Guess it could work, it would work for my purposes, but not really a sunlight detector, but rather a clock. It would have a lot more uses as well, as a clock. But for certain purposes a straight up sunlight detector would still be simpler, and a more obvious solution. And how hard would it be to put an output to the circuit network for the solar panel.