Sub-part logistic balancing

Question

Some sub-parts are used and produced in such large quantities (I'm mainly thinking of screws, but later I'm sure there are others) that transporting these items over conveyor will always be a huge bottleneck for absolutely no reason since they're so small to begin with.  My suggestion is that small parts that are used in large quantities should transport more than one at a time on conveyors.  Maybe even be able to configure output stack size on constructors.

Answer 1

So, we still haven't seen the full tech tree as the game is still actively being developed. It is quite possible that compression will be available in future releases (friendly suggestion for any developers who may stumble into this post). Compression already exists within some context due to the nature of truck stops!

While it is impossible to give you a pure solution outside of faster belt speeds there is a service that I have stumbled into^[1] that may assist you in figuring out how best to balance your "ratios"!

That aside, there are two messy options.

1) Split the inputs over all of the input ports. It can be done... I just wouldn't suggest it. I go into more detail in my comment below.

2) Overclock the production line or underclock the troublesome assembler.

REFERENCES:

1: https://rblom9517.pythonanywhere.com/satisfactory

Comments

Another trick I've used is to split the input lines in such a way to attempt to balance the input rates of the required components. It's really time-consuming to make sure you get a balance to avoid overloading the machine with too many screws and stalling production, but it can be done... I just wouldn't suggest it.

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I like your answer, and that's a really cool tool, and will be very useful in setting up a production chain, so I voted it up.  I agree that it is possible to underclock the screw constructor to match conveyor speed, and then just add an additional throttled screw constructor in parallel to compensate for conveyor speed, you will still run into a bottleneck at the single import slot of the iron reinforced plate assembler.  Granted, this is no longer an issue once you upgrade your conveyors to the next tier, and I guess it's not a big deal.

Even though you answered my post, I still have some questions about how this was balanced during the test weekend:
1. I guess the thing that just doesn't make sense to me is that it just seems so very strange that they are using a part that in real life has proportionally far less volume and mass compared to other parts in just about any assembly you can think of, and yet when transported across a conveyor, it takes up 6 times as much space.  When was the last time you ordered something that required assembling (a common thing would be furniture), and the box it came in had like 85% of the space taken up by screws and 15% by metal/wood sheets?

2. Ratios are everything when optimizing efficiency in a game like this, and your answer sheds some light on creative ways in which you can optimize efficiency by underclocking constructors which is kind-of a new concept, but as you pointed out in your comment after, setting all of this up is really time consuming and since you are reducing the speed of your machines, you are effectively reducing efficiency.  This is mainly because the ratios of products using screws aren't aligned well at all with the components that they are made from.  

Take rotors for instance.   I used the tool you posted and incremented the quantity produced until I got whole numbers on each production machine.  The absolute smallest setup to accomplish this (ignoring conveyor bottlenecks) is the following (at 90 items a minute):  20 iron ore miners, 20 smelters, 40 iron rod constructors, 22 screw constructors, and 15 rotor assemblers.  Half of these numbers (at 45 items a minute) are possible to keep all sub-parts at 100% production, but the final rotor assembler would be operating at half speed.  Anything less and one or more of the machines in the production chain will under or over produce items.  Even with overclocking/underclocking, figuring out the exact clock settings you would need on each machine is not simple without a tool like the one you linked.  This could all be balanced by sticking to a specific ratio when setting production values of machines.  Having strange ratios like producing 6 screws each time but needing 22 screws for every 3 rods, it's just not balanced well.

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In my own game, I ended up running two constructors to machine rods into screws, giving me way more than the 120/min required and just ran a "mk2" belt into it to let the belt cap the production line. With two machines outputting, what 180/min (total) or 90/min x 2, I could split one of the lines. Giving 135/min, and 45/min. This could be bumped up to allow you to run two lines (@ 135/min) for reinforced iron plates.

I guess in my perspective, I'm trying to do a "best guess" approach. And I honestly think it's actually a good life lesson(!!!), even if -- as a game -- it can feel cumbersome: Things don't always line up nicely, and you just have to handle it however you feel is best.

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Your setup sounds pretty good and I've had to resort to the same level of "best guess" myself because being precise is just not practical, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't bother me. LOL.  
Yes I agree about life not always lining up nicely.  As for the game, once you finish up all of the content available, you start to set your own goals, and for me I usually turn to optimizing the efficiency of my factory.  I don't know why, but for some reason I enjoy it. lol.  I'm guessing that a lot of people drawn to games like this are the same way, so if there are ways to improve the game so that it maintains a balance between challenge and frustration, I think it's worth mentioning these improvements as suggestions to the devs.  I appreciate your contribution to the post though.

Answer 2

In T3 you get faster belts.

Comments

This isn't about belt speed, this is about ratios and efficiency.  No matter your belt speed, you can only export one item at a time right now, so upon delivery to assemblers making those hard iron plates for instance, it requires quite a LOT more screws vs the iron plates so in order to maximize efficiency it would take having like 5 machines making and exporting screws for every machine exporting plates, no matter how fast your conveyors.

But, logically if you are talking about volume and mass, screws will make up far less material vs plates in any final product.  Think about it like this: you are making a thick iron plate, so you screw together 3-5 iron plates into one.  What do you think took up more space and cost more iron to make, the screws or the iron plates?  Iron plates of course.   So why when you are transporting them from machine to machine, do the screws take up like 5 times more space and time to transport?  It logically doesn't make sense, and it's nearly impossible to match up the ratios on export either.  

Take a look at factorio, which this game is based on.  I don't remember coming across any sub-part production that was produced/consumed in a ratio greater than 3:1.  If it does exist, it's very rare.  That's because the logistics to set this up efficiently without belts being idle becomes a nightmare.