How many heaters do I friggin need

[Jarl Ballin]

https://gyazo.com/8ee60f84d3a92c8b0b6d640907f0e8d5
Relevant heatmap image for what my problem is
https://www.reddit.com/r/RimWorld/comments/bbcxpf/how_many_heaters_do_i_friggin_need/
x-posted discussion

I have eight heaters and two geothermal power generators all vented up to a few large rooms, double insulated with granite walls in a boreal forest in winter (its about 5F outside), and I cant seem to get ANY room to a reasonable temperature.

I used the heatmap mod to monitor the temperatures for a few days, the geothermal rooms spike up to about 95F during venting and then fall back down to 78F (where the heaters are set) without much change in any of the interior rooms.

The heaters are inside the geothermal rooms just to simulate having constant temperature flow from the geothermal vents instead of just every time they were venting.

I have no experience in giant bases as most of the time I play more town-like so if anyone with experience could help me set this up I would appreciate it

[Vintorez]

Trying to heat up one room and then having it bleed to others isn't very efficient. Air vents basically try to equalize the temperature between rooms so having them chain causes that problem you have. Not realistic, but that's how it works.

Just put 1 heater in your lab or comms console room and one in one of the storage rooms, maybe two though heating up storage areas isn't as important. They may not hit 70 but it should put them to normal work speed temp range with the double thick walls.

Oh and close the vents to the rooms you're not heating when you try this.

[Monoxide]

Originally posted by Vintorez:

Trying to heat up one room and then having it bleed to others isn't very efficient.

My typical setup includes putting heaters in my "hallways", big rooms, and medical center. I use vents only to move heat from where its generated to a max of 1 room away (IE - the hallways have heaters and a vent leading to each bedroom).

I often have a heater block in a single, big room (and I do this with coolers as well), where I will set heaters to staggered temps. Ill have 2 set to 70, 2 set to 68, 2 set to 66, and so on. This way, you only truly utilize heat from the necessary heaters. This isnt a perfect process since even an unused heater still uses 10% power.

[martindirt]

Hmmm...
I'm shocked....
1: Why don't you put those heaters to the rooms, you want to be heated? They work more effectively...

If u want to use less heaters with vents use the like this:

Room - vent - Heated room - vent - room

2: Geothermal reactor for heating? Hmmm... Once im tried this but... Use them as power generators, and forget the heat output.

[Jarl Ballin]

Originally posted by Vintorez:

Trying to heat up one room and then having it bleed to others isn't very efficient. Air vents basically try to equalize the temperature between rooms so having them chain causes that problem you have. Not realistic, but that's how it works.

Hm. I read about them equalizing temperature but I hadn't thought it would have... "diminishing returns" as they got further from the source vent, but I guess that lines up with what I'm looking at.

Originally posted by martindirt:

Hmmm...
I'm shocked....
1: Why don't you put those heaters to the rooms, you want to be heated? They work more effectively...

I guess I had incorrectly thought that the vents would equalize the temperature among ALL connected rooms. I wanted to have dedicated heating rooms so I could have space for other things.

Originally posted by Monoxide:

My typical setup includes putting heaters in my "hallways", big rooms, and medical center. I use vents only to move heat from where its generated to a max of 1 room away (IE - the hallways have heaters and a vent leading to each bedroom).

I did this and it worked perfectly with what I was trying to do, thank you. :) https://gyazo.com/f538a1b42845122aad0852ca7adeebdf

[martindirt]

Originally posted by Angry Scandinavian:

Originally posted by Vintorez:

Trying to heat up one room and then having it bleed to others isn't very efficient. Air vents basically try to equalize the temperature between rooms so having them chain causes that problem you have. Not realistic, but that's how it works.

Hm. I read about them equalizing temperature but I hadn't thought it would have... "diminishing returns" as they got further from the source vent, but I guess that lines up with what I'm looking at.

Originally posted by martindirt:

Hmmm...
I'm shocked....
1: Why don't you put those heaters to the rooms, you want to be heated? They work more effectively...

I guess I had incorrectly thought that the vents would equalize the temperature among ALL connected rooms. I wanted to have dedicated heating rooms so I could have space for other things.

Originally posted by Monoxide:

My typical setup includes putting heaters in my "hallways", big rooms, and medical center. I use vents only to move heat from where its generated to a max of 1 room away (IE - the hallways have heaters and a vent leading to each bedroom).

I did this and it worked perfectly with what I was trying to do, thank you. :) https://gyazo.com/f538a1b42845122aad0852ca7adeebdf

Looks better.
If you want use centralized climatization (or how English call it), there is a mod for that. I'm tried to find it for you, but can't remember the name, and unfortunately my break is almost over.
Never tried that mod, but its works like IRL heater/cooler systems. (AFAIK. )

[martindirt]

Centralized climate control.

Can't link it from my tablet, but that's the name of the mod

[Jarl Ballin]

Yeah I've tried Centralized Climate Control but the Air Vents and Air Intake requiring open space around them feels like more of a pain in the butt than the vanilla temperature controls.

Theres also RedistHeat which used to be the only other temperature mod awhile back but man that mod is buggy and confusing. Way more prep work for what feels like less effective temperature management. Its a shame because I love the idea and the graphics work there.

Both of them also balance something like thermal and flow efficiency on top of already not being user friendly enough to be a complete substitute in their current state, at least for me.

[Thor]

I recommend that you put at least one heater in each room. That would be much more efficient at maintaining a good temperature. You have 4 (now 8) in the same room, that really is very unefficient and potentially a waste of power.
Reinstall them somewhere else, you won't regret it.
And generally I don't rely much on vents. I mostly only use them for when I can't afford to make another heater.

[Grimelord82]

Dub's Hygiene is focused mostly on taking care of bodily needs, but also includes a neat set of heating options centered around making hot water/using radiators. Everything also said still applies.

I too nearly always park my base on top of a Geothermal vent. Great for random power outages/not letting your greenhouse freeze

[Jarl Ballin]

Oh I'm definitely gonna have to give that mod a shot now. The mod conflict with Prisoner Labor has been the only thing stopping me thus far but I've been looking for more reasons to take that risk.

On the topic of Geothermal vents actually, did the graphic get changed at some point / is there a way to get the old Generator back? I liked the other one better but mine looks all funky.

[M.K.]

On your original layout, at WHAT TEMPERATURE did you have those heaters set?
The room immediately surrounding a geothermal generator like that is *already* above the default seek-temperaturre of an electric heater.

I bet if you selected those heaters in the generator rooms, you would see their power consumption at the low state , not drawing full power!