How to manage a hydrogen loop

[Cat]

So I have a line of storage tanks, hydrogen input goes in, and comes out the other end to go into fractionators or x-ray cracking. If there is too much hydrogen it just builds up in the line of tanks and X-ray cracking can still work without clogging it up (as it returns more hydrogen back to the tank).

Simple and effective. The problem arises when I see that spare hydrogen build up and want to take that excess and use it for other production (that does not give back hydrogen) or send off to another planet, eventually this might dry my storage up and the whole fractionator and xray cracking set up dies.

Is there a smarty way to split it in a way that only the excess gets moved? I would like to have 2 loops - first the important for fractinators and xray cracking, then 2nd for shipping etc. and only when the 1st loop is overflowing i want it to feed the 2nd loop.

Surprised there is a way to connect a conveyor belt to a stacked tank, but it doesn't do anything. Whats up with that???

[Dirkels]

X-ray cracking is great in early game for producing red cubes as it produces the 2 resources you need without any by products. Just supplement with graphite from coal to keep things balanced and not over produce hydrogen.

[josmith7]

Splitters (those 4-way belt buildings) can be used as an overflow valve. If you have 1 input and multiple outputs you can designate one as priority and output will only occur on the non-priority belt(s) when the primary one is totally full and input into the splitter would otherwise jam.

You designate one as primary by clicking on the splitter structure to bring up it's little pop-up, then clicking once on the brown output dot you want to prioritize (it'll change from a dot to a circle)


(However, last time I tried having 2 inputs led to items coming out both outputs even when the priority output belt was far from full; presumably because 2 items arrived simultaneously and rather than momentarily jam to put them both on the primary belt it just kicked the 2nd out the non-primary output. I don't know if the recent belt usage optimization updates have helped with that or not)

[Dirkels]

Originally posted by josmith7:

However, last time I tried having 2 inputs led to items coming out both outputs even when the priority output belt was far from full; presumably because 2 items arrived simultaneously and rather than momentarily jam to put them both on the primary belt it just kicked the 2nd out the non-primary output. I don't know if the recent belt usage optimization updates have helped with that or not

This still happens, noticed it in one of my setups this morning. Would sworn it did work when I first set it up, but I could be wrong, or was just lucky the resources never came in at the same time.

PS: could be solved by giving splitters a small internal buffer which only outputs to non prio outputs when it is full.

[Swat__Raptor]

1 lots of storage tanks,
2 remember the filter & priority settings on tanks and spliters you can make priority lanes & secondary lanes by using them
3 hydrogen is a unlimited resource unlike say Iron or Copper, if you have too much just dump it, the cntrl key can be used pick up all of one resource from a inventory, and the delete key drops whats in your hand. then just remove all trash.

[Dirkels]

With shift-delete you directly delete resources forever without dumping them on the planet first.

[pat]

Originally posted by Dirkels:

With shift-delete you directly delete resources forever without dumping them on the planet first.

I don't suppose there's something similar for storage units? Some way to destroy the storage tank and vaporize the contents rather then filling my inventory and tossing them on the ground?

[cripto130]

a good trick is to take out your fractornators and instead create a loop with like 9 of them running the hydrogen in a closed circle, eventually 100% of the hydrogen will get changed to deuterium

[Cat]

Originally posted by josmith7:

Splitters (those 4-way belt buildings) can be used as an overflow valve. If you have 1 input and multiple outputs you can designate one as priority and output will only occur on the non-priority belt(s) when the primary one is totally full and input into the splitter would otherwise jam.

You designate one as primary by clicking on the splitter structure to bring up it's little pop-up, then clicking once on the brown output dot you want to prioritize (it'll change from a dot to a circle)


(However, last time I tried having 2 inputs led to items coming out both outputs even when the priority output belt was far from full; presumably because 2 items arrived simultaneously and rather than momentarily jam to put them both on the primary belt it just kicked the 2nd out the non-primary output. I don't know if the recent belt usage optimization updates have helped with that or not)

I completely missed the trick there, being able to designate a priority on a splitter.

Game changer.

[Cat]

Thank you all so much info here, so much for me to learn :)

[Timi]

For x-ray cracking, simply just have a conveyor go along two of the ports on the refinery, one to pull out out the hydrogen, and a sorter to immediately pull the hydrogen back in, with the conveyor continuing to where you need it next. It doesn't really need any other hydrogen input, just put some in manually to start it, and it'll use up the hydrogen it creates, with the 3rd hydrogen just rolling out.

This way the refinery will output 1 graphite + 1 hydrogen for every cycle, which works just perfect for red science, and all you need to input is fuel (past the manual hydrogen insertion to start the process up). No need for loops and tanks.

[Kyrros]

Originally posted by pat:

I don't suppose there's something similar for storage units? Some way to destroy the storage tank and vaporize the contents rather then filling my inventory and tossing them on the ground?

Deleting storage crates does indeed tend to fill your inventory, BUT if you delete a storage TANK, any fluid in it is also destroyed as it does not get moved to your inventory. That's the other big difference between storage boxes and storage tanks.

[WootHoop]

It's almost impossible to have too much hydrogen late in the game. You should collect/produce as much as you can and switch to hydro power from coal and oil as soon as you can. If you somehow produce too much of it you can burn it raw in the generators or simply delete it.

[Timi]

Originally posted by Kyrros:

Deleting storage crates does indeed tend to fill your inventory, BUT if you delete a storage TANK, any fluid in it is also destroyed as it does not get moved to your inventory. That's the other big difference between storage boxes and storage tanks.

Not in the current version, unless you mean something entirely by "destroying". Normally dismantling a tank just causes it to scatter whatever doesn't fit into your inventory onto the ground, which for a full tank is a huge mess.

[Dirkels]

Originally posted by Kyrros:

Originally posted by pat:

I don't suppose there's something similar for storage units? Some way to destroy the storage tank and vaporize the contents rather then filling my inventory and tossing them on the ground?

Deleting storage crates does indeed tend to fill your inventory, BUT if you delete a storage TANK, any fluid in it is also destroyed as it does not get moved to your inventory. That's the other big difference between storage boxes and storage tanks.

:sphere:

Last few times I deleted a storage tank it did fill up my inventory and spilled the rest on the floor.

[Xilo The Odd]

Originally posted by Dirkels:

Originally posted by Kyrros:

Deleting storage crates does indeed tend to fill your inventory, BUT if you delete a storage TANK, any fluid in it is also destroyed as it does not get moved to your inventory. That's the other big difference between storage boxes and storage tanks.

:sphere:

Last few times I deleted a storage tank it did fill up my inventory and spilled the rest on the floor.

yeah it used to delete it, but with the loose objects feature they added, stuff you dont have space for doesnt get wasted! is very nice if not a pain in the butt sometimes when stuff meshes into buildings and you cant find it. or your in space.