Is there a knack to get pistons to convey items?

[Jaz]

I've tried this both in Creative mode SP and Survival MP on dedicated server.

I'm attemmpting to make a small modular workship where I have a base control ship and can then attach different tools to the front of it. (I also intend to add modules to the back to attach additional cargo and/or an ejector bay, but I digress).

The problem I am having is that no matter what I try I cannot get items (in this particular case ores) to pass through the piston. The way I'm setup at the moment is I attach my ship to a drilling tool via merge block and connectors and that all attaches fine. I then have a conveyor block to which I attach a piston. From there I've tried attaching a drill both directly to the piston and placing a conveyor in between but still nothing passes from the drill through the piston where it is supposed to go to a medium cargo container i have on the ship section. The materials do however pass through fine to the conttainer if I remove the piston from the equation.

So my question... Is there a bug or am I doing something wrong?

[Archie]

Pistons do not transfer items, they don't have the required ports either.

[Raszagal]

@ArchXDiablo no they do transfer items

I can have a look at your build to see what is wrong since the piston act as a conveyor tube for things attached to its front and back (not for the sides).

Upload it to the workshop and post the link here so I can have a look at it or invite me when I'm playing into your game

[Raszagal]

also the block highlighted in red where you connect to must be the piston for it to transfer items, otherwise the moving hatch will be sealed

[Archie]

*facepalm* I was thinking about rotors for some reason (since they have been asked to be conveyor-compatible since forever). My bet goes that something's going wrong when using the merge block to lock them in, a pic or link to the world would help.

[Jaz]

Thanks for offering to take a look, the link is Garie's Test Realm or if you prefer http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=329117920

To clarify I am indeed only connecting to the ends of the piston where the hatches are.

It could well be some poor interaction on the merge blocks part so in the meantime i'll have a look at hard wiring it directly onto my ship to see if that's the issue.

[Dixon Ticonderoga #2]

Originally posted by Garie:

Thanks for offering to take a look, the link is Garie's Test Realm or if you prefer http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=329117920

To clarify I am indeed only connecting to the ends of the piston where the hatches are.

It could well be some poor interaction on the merge blocks part so in the meantime i'll have a look at hard wiring it directly onto my ship to see if that's the issue.

As far as I know Merge Blocks cannot ransfer items themselves. Though connectors can connect and transfer items so you could use that as well as merge blocks.

[Jaz]

I do, the merge blocks i only really use to establish a perfect lock and i have a connector pairing on either side for the transfer of goods. This system works fine when the drill is attached to the ships drilling tool attachment as items are passed to the medium container in the back of the ship. The only trouble in the system comes when I introduce a piston into the mix for me to extend the drilling gear into the asteroids.

On further testing it does appear that this issue only affects small ship versions of pistons. The platform one i tried could pass items from drill through piston to a container.

I've also tested now with building a very very basic small ship and trying a drill on a piston in a very barebones system and the problem persists even then. In conclusion I think it may well be a bug

[Dixon Ticonderoga #2]

Originally posted by Garie:

I do, the merge blocks i only really use to establish a perfect lock and i have a connector pairing on either side for the transfer of goods. This system works fine when the drill is attached to the ships drilling tool attachment as items are passed to the medium container in the back of the ship. The only trouble in the system comes when I introduce a piston into the mix for me to extend the drilling gear into the asteroids.

On further testing it does appear that this issue only affects small ship versions of pistons. The platform one i tried could pass items from drill through piston to a container.

I've also tested now with building a very very basic small ship and trying a drill on a piston in a very barebones system and the problem persists even then. In conclusion I think it may well be a bug

Well I'm not sure what's causing it then.

[Kinthamen]

For some reason pistons only seem to be transferring in one direction, the wrong direction. If you place a piston backwards and start attaching conveyor pieces from the head to storage, it works. So if you want to use a drill, you have to make the piston push up instead of down. It’s really tricky though because the physics will go crazy if you do it wrong and things will go flying in the air. Note, even though the piston is only two blocks, the head takes up another block which causes collision issues. Hope it makes sense.

[krzosu18]

Originally posted by YT_Archieonic:

Pistons do not transfer items, they don't have the required ports either.

um they do - ive been using extendable docking ports for quite some time and they worked fine. except for some periodic woobling glitches that plagued pistons from time to time.

[Karmaterrorᵁᴷ]

Originally posted by Kinthamen:

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Originally posted by krzosu18:

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Holy necro batman...
Its 4 year old post guys ;)