Having trouble with smelter and hoppers.

[paladinee]

O.K im new to the game but im getting frustrated. After building 2 very large conveyor systems to the smelter I´ve got:
1 hopper on each side of the smelter. I can get 1 hopper to give the ore to the smelter while I put the other one on stop/block. Then I switch the first hopper onto stop/block empty the slot in the smelter of any bars and then turn the second hopper into remove only but nothing happens. I then do the inverse action (put on stop the second and start the first hopper) and it works.
Can only one hopper be attached in remove only mode to the smelter.
The hoppers the green one with 10 cap.
With copper and tin.

[Cheezeman]

I *think* everything that takes/receives something (ore, components, energy, etc) has a preferred search order, meaning if you have two hoppers hooked up, it's always going to try to pull from one of them first. If that first hopper has something in it for the smelter to grab, it will always pull from that one until its empty.

[Cheezeman]

What you can do instead is put a hopper at the end of each of the conveyors one space away from the input hopper for the smelter, then just place (or take away) a single piece of conveyor belt to allow the ore from one of them to enter the smelter at a time. Things will get much easier once you are able to build additional smelters.

[Demerzel]

Hopper 1 - remove only - this is the ore copper
Hopper 2 - add only - this will take all the bars.
No need to 3 - hopper.
Instead do a line.
Make more smelters with an output and filter the bars with conveyor advanced filter.

so


You can do it like this:
H - hoppers
S - smelters
^ > < - conveyor directions (better if the faster tube ones).
+ - turnables
. - empty space

H H H H H H H - set to add only
S S S S S S S
H H H H H H H - set to remove only
^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
+ ^ ^ + ^ ^ +
^ . . ^ . . ^
^ < < + > > ^
. . . ^ . . .
. . H ^ . . . - buffer hoppers set to add/remove
. . H ^ . . .
. . H ^ . . .
. . ^ . . . .

Or you can do like this:
<<<<<<<<<<< output. You only need to filter these if you want to sort it in hoppers.
H H H H H H H - set to add only
S S S S S S S
H H H H H H H - set to remove only
H H H H H H H - set to add&remove. -so this line will evenly distribute the the ores.
^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ - input

[paladinee]

Originally posted by Cheezeman:

I *think* everything that takes/receives something (ore, components, energy, etc) has a preferred search order, meaning if you have two hoppers hooked up, it's always going to try to pull from one of them first. If that first hopper has something in it for the smelter to grab, it will always pull from that one until its empty.

Even if that hopper is blocked?

[paladinee]

Solved it by having 2 hoppers feed 1 hopper next to the smellter. I just block the one i dont want and empty the smelter hopper of any ore remaining before opening the other one.

>>H>HS
.........^
.........H
.........^
.........^
That way I dont have to be adding or removing the belts.

[HDL_CinC_Dragon]

Paladinee, I'm not quite sure what you're trying to accomplish or why you need three hoppers in the mix. I'm assuming all you're trying to do is have one hopper that you can put ores in and one hopper that will collect the bars? If that's the case, you don't need any belts at all unless you have a line of belts coming from an ore mine that you've automated already
All you need is:

[H][S][H]

Then, all you do is set one hopper to "RemoveOnly" and this will be the hopper you put your ores in. The other hopper you set to "AddOnly" and this will be the hopper that the smelter automatically fills with bars when it is done smelting. Also, conveyor belts ignore the Add/Remove rules and will put ores in or take ores out of hoppers regardless of their rules which is something that can be confusing at first (If no one tells you about it).

Hopefully that simplified whatever issue it was that you're having

[paladinee]

ARGHHHHHHH OK I´m an idiot.
Didnt realise that the belts and hoppers could carry/hold more than one ore type, I know its logical but I dont know why I presumed they couldnt. Now I´ve got +300 basic belts in my inventory :D

[HDL_CinC_Dragon]

Glad it's all worked out now!