Factorio Forums

In a world, I have an array of electric furnaces capable of smelting 4 full belts of iron ore into iron plates. But somehow, despite being fed 4 full belts of iron ore, the output belts are almost but not quite full. I figure that since the smelting recipe is 1 ore to 1 plate, I should be getting exactly as many items out as in.

The ore doesn't reach the last few furnaces as they should. The 4 input belts are moving ore at max speed. There are no visible bottlenecks. 4 full belts in, less than 4 full belts out.

Am I missing something obvious? A mechanic I don't know about? I can't find any mention of it.

This is not a bug.

You are not feeding full 4 belts of iron ore so you do not get full 4 belts of iron plates.

But I AM feeding in 4 full belts. The belts are moving at full speed, and I can't see a single gap in item input. Am I wrong about that? How can it be that I'm not feeding in 4 full belts?

Gaps in ore belts are harder to see, but yeah, these belts aren't completely full

If you want to be sure :
- connect a programmable speaker to 1 belt
- set the belt to "Read" only & "Hold" value
- set an alarm on the speaker with the condition : "iron ore < 8" -(8 is the amount of items on 1 fully compressed belt)

Thank you, it was a balancing issue