modular backup power

[NotABiter]

This backup power module is fairly compact (though I wish it were slightly more so), and comes in a convenient squarish shape so you can place them in a grid with walking/routing space in between.

It's a "coupled accumulators" design so it kicks in immediately (no moving parts) when it is needed, cuts out just as fast, and mostly stays off otherwise. (It will partially turn on each night, delivering about P*16/N watts of power, where P is the power draw on your main power grid and N is the number of accumulators attached to your main power grid. Add more accumulators to your main power grid to reduce this "leakage".)

This module has some extra robustness features, namely it has an internal solar cell and accumulator (2 of each actually, just because the space was there). The internal accumulators mean that even if the external grid (and all the accumulators attached to it) were pulled completely down (e.g., by lots of lasers being fired) this module will still maintain some power to keep the inserters functioning. The solar cells mean that the module is "self starting", and can automatically recover from a long-term loss of fuel (once fuel returns).

In the picture you can see one instance of the backup power module in the middle, and part of two more on either side (and in the minimap you can see there are three more below them). Notice the wiring in the picture -- the substation and two medium electric poles are on their own separate power circuit. (The substation couples to all 16 coupling accumulators.) The big electric pole connects to my main power grid, and also connects to the two medium electric poles which are used to couple to the 16 coupling accumulators.

Each module will deliver up to 4.8 MW. (It's 4.8 rather than 5.1 because there are only 16 coupling accumulators in this design and accumulators only transfer 300kW each. A 17th accumulator could be added to get the full 5.1 MW, but that would be a bit messy, requiring additional power poles. Worse yet, unless this design is modified fairly heavily you'd have to place the additional "internal" pole in a position where it's supply area would extend outside of the module's physical shape, making it more likely that you might accidentally end up powering something with backup power that shouldn't be.)

blueprint string (use with this or this):

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Note that if you use the above blueprint, the game will automatically wire all your poles together. You can't leave it that way or the module will act as primary power rather than backup power. You have to dewire/rewire the internal power points (the substation and the two medium electric poles) as needed such that they are wired to each other but to nothing else.

[MadZuri]

This is very clever, good going. There is absolutely no need for the internal power if you use burner inserters. People tend to forget those exist, but they are very useful for fail-safe backup power systems.

[NotABiter]

There is absolutely no need for the internal power if you use burner inserters.

But then it wouldn't exactly be "self starting" the first time -- if using burner inserters you can't just plop down another 2 or 4 backup power modules and (as long as the modules have a line of fuel and a pipe of water) have them "just work" (wiring issues aside which still remain even with burner inserters). Instead you have to manually put fuel into all 14 (or x2->28 or x4->56) burner inserters. A significant part of the reason for making this design (and blueprinting it for use in this and later games) is to take out as much of the tedium of setting these things up as possible. (Maybe it would work if you used 1 burner inserter and 13 fast inserters, then you'd only have to kick-start it by feeding the one burn inserter, but it might be a bit slow at getting up to speed. Anyways, if I removed the 2 solar cells and 2 accumulators, it would just leave a hole in my design because I haven't figured out how to take advantage of that space to make it smaller.)

Interestingly enough, for first time "self starting", the solar cells generally aren't even needed if using fast inserters, because when you plop the module down the wiring will (before you fix it) hook up to your main grid which will (if it has any power at the time) power the inserters right away. The solar is generally only needed for "self starting" after a long time of no fuel -- the internal accumulators can handle shorter periods of no fuel -- 2 accumulators (with no solar) should be good for more than one game day. They would last multiple game days if it weren't for the lamps, but I need my lamps. (It's just a theoretical issue anyways since there is solar in the design at present.)

I have reworked it a bit -- I managed to shrunk it both on the left side and on the right side by one tile each, so the whole thing now fits in a 19x18 rectangle (instead of 21x18). I also added in a 17th accumulator, so now the module can deliver a full 5.1MW. Unfortunately these changes add two poles, so there's potentially even more rewiring work once you plop it down. I also made both left and right versions of the blueprint which can be placed in an overlapped fashion such that they share a pair of medium electric poles. (You can walk through medium electric poles, and the big poles are moved out of the way now, so you can still walk between the modules when you do this.)

left blueprint string:

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right blueprint string:

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[MadZuri]

But then it wouldn't exactly be "self starting" the first time -- if using burner inserters you can't just plop down another 2 or 4 backup power modules and (as long as the modules have a line of fuel and a pipe of water) have them "just work" (wiring issues aside which still remain even with burner inserters). Instead you have to manually put fuel into all 14 (or x2->28 or x4->56) burner inserters.

I'll just leave this here for you. You can thank Rseding91 later. The mod makes it so that burner inserters are always placed with full energy, much like a roboport does when placed. I don't think it's listed anywhere else, it was pretty much encoded for a streamer on twitch during the stream, as he was complaining about spending so much time placing one coal in each one manually.