Grinding Batterys: Power Cells not returned ?

[nottrusted]

Hi there,

Opposite to what the WIKI says about grinding blocks

All Components used in the construction of a block will be returned by the Grinder.

it turns out that the Power Cells, that are a component of Batterys, are not returned. Instead they turn into Srap Metal when grinded.
Seems to be the only component that doesn't return properly.

So, question is: Is that by intent, or an oversight (bug) ?

I personaly can't see a reason why Power Cells should give a different result, then all other components

[PenolAkushari]

I think it's intentional. When you weld up a battery, it starts off with some power charge. Perhaps such thing was made so players won't grind down and weld back up depleted batteries so they'd have energy again.

[Botji]

Its by design, probably because batteries come with some power already charged so if you could grind them down and get everything back it could be exploited for UNLIMITED POWER!

It probably wouldnt be worth it but I can still see some people who would build large sections of batteries + welders + grinders and scrip that to constantly grind and weld them back and never have to care about energy again.

The reason batteries come with energy is probably just so you can put them on grids and be able to move them to a connector or something to recharge without having to use a reactor or other power generating block if the vehicle was only meant to be battery powered.

[nottrusted]

Ah okay, that makes sense in that context.
Didn't spend much attention to how much energy is preloaded in batterys yet...
Thanks for the replys !

[Annonymous]

I'm of mixed feelings on this, too. I mean, all the effort that goes into crafting Power Cells, but you get NOTHING when grinding them down, except a little scrap metal?
Would be nice to get a return on components of some type when recycling these, like you do in all other parts. At a minimum, return the ingot types used to craft the Power Cell. Even if it's SOME of it.....

[Psojed]

All the effort = clicking a button.

If you ask me, there is no reason for battery to have initial charge, it can start empty when built and then you can get the cells back aswell.

There are multiple feedback threads over at the support page where people have suggested other improvements too.

[ancienthighway]

Power cells not being recovered has been effect for several patches now. Stick the scrap in the refinery to recover it and make the rest for a new power source.

[Annonymous]

"Clicking a button"???

Are you referring to Creative Mode, 'cause that's the only time it's just "a button click".

Otherwise, it's mining resources. (Iron, Nickel, Silicon)
Refining resources (Iron, Nickel, Silicon)
Assembling into 20 or 80 Power Cells (Small & Large block batteries)

And then we have the joy of transporting those.... at something like 9 cells per trip (if playing 'vanilla' with no extra carry capacity)

That's considerably more than just 'clicking a button'

I get it that when using the rules where a battery has a charge when built, it's not really fair to be able to grind it back down and then re-assemble it back into another newly charged battery. Although, that seems a fair amount of work just to have some energy, when you can do a little extra work once to make and build some Solar Panels and keep said battery charged...

It's the idea that every other block in the game can be fully recovered - EXCEPT batteries. And that very heavy Power Cell is somewhat tedious to craft from scratch. You get some Scrap Metal, but not having done the calculations, I'm not sure how you come out in terms of recovery of the Iron component (I doubt you get a full recovery, though)
The Nickel and Silicon are just GONE.

Yeah... have seen a few of those suggestions. Some of those might be mine. I'm not sure which would be 'best' in terms of gameplay balance, but losing all that effort seems 'unbalanced', as well.


BTW....

Wouldn't Magnesium be a smarter choice for battery construction? It has a theoretical capacity of 5x current Lithium in terms of storage.... (likely 3x at best in real world application). And I'm not sure how that stacks up compared to using Nickel as a base part....

[ShadedMJ]

Also, read up on batteries from that same wiki:
"However, it is now no longer possible to salvage Power Cells from a battery, any power cells will be recovered as Scrap Metal, losing a significant amount of Nickel and Silicon."

[Psojed]

No, it's a click of a button in survival to build them.
Mining has to be done for anything you want to build, it's not any different from any other parts. All required resources come from stone. Which may also be the reason for nickel instead of magnesium.
Refining is automatic, with a click of a button.
If you're transporting them somewhere, that's your fight, not mine. You don't need to transport them anywhere to use them.

It seems to me that you oldschool players are stuck with the mindset that ore deposits are the only way. A stone quarry acts as three distinct ore types, ANYWHERE, and I'm pretty sure it's a much better alternative to transporting power cells in your inventory

[nottrusted]

Wow, didn't foresee that asking a rather simple question (with a little personal opinion) could send some people on a crusade ^^

Originally posted by Psojed:

No, it's a click of a button in survival to build them. ...
It seems to me that you oldschool players are stuck with the mindset that ore deposits are the only way. A stone quarry acts as three distinct ore types, ANYWHERE, and I'm pretty sure it's a much better alternative to transporting power cells in your inventory :skyelaugh:

Even though I'm an "oldschool player" in general, I'm complete new to SE and stumbled over the issue while trying to build a clean base, fighting the weird position of conveyor connections on blocks. So I had to "move" a battery 3 tiles away, thinking "hey, I just stand in between, grind left and weld right a new one"
To my surprise that didn't work and I had to run back and forth to the assembler to transport the powercells again. So Annonymous has a point, stating that it isn't just pushing a button.
And if you know a better way then carrying the power cells (or other components) from the assembler to the new battery, then please let me know, would save me a lot of walking in general in the future.
no offense... ;)

[Ame]

An idea I saw in a youtube video: if you have a coveyor port nearby, you can put a welder next to the block with bulky/inconvenient components and pipe it up to the nearby conveyor port. Conveyors and welders are easier to carry around in component form than power cells for batteries, and they'll move all of those components directly from connected inventory.

[Tsubasa]

Originally posted by Psojed:

All the effort = clicking a button.

If you ask me, there is no reason for battery to have initial charge, it can start empty when built and then you can get the cells back aswell.

There are multiple feedback threads over at the support page where people have suggested other improvements too.

It's really just a realism thing - real life batteries, when freshly assembled, do have about 30% charge inside them. Then again you can say gameplay doesn't have to hook with realism (just like most realism-breaking stuff like hydrogen engines) but well there's that.
To be honest just make batteries lengthy to refine, or gives out "exhausted battery cells" that cannot be welded back into the cell directly" will be good enough of a workaround that is semi-plausible but they chose the current system instead.

[Psojed]

Ame has an interesting idea, but I'm not sure how well would that work.

As for transporting heavy items or large quantities in general, obviously it's better to haul them in a cargo container, not in your inventory. Especially if you play with 1x inventory size.

Yeah, it's probably a realism thing, but I'm not really looking for realism in SE. We have machine guns in space...
I'd prefer having a good gameplay standpoint rather than realism.

[Smokey]

you know that scrap metal you get, that's them power cells ground down.

[Eskidead]

Batteries should just have NO power when built.
It's f**king lame that you can't get the power cells back when grinding down a battery.
Does a reactor come with uranium in it when built?

End of story.