The Electrical Grid

[Simking]

So, I've finally got all the energy my colony could ever want but it has come with a constant barrage of electrical overloads causing explosions and fires and general chaos every day. Im not too sure about the rules that govern the electrical systems. Is there any particular thing that causes the overloads or does each piece of electrical cable and equipment carry a certain risk of shorting out and exploding? I know the amount of stored electricity affects the size of the blast and getting things wet will cause a short as well. Does anyone have an electrical system plan that is relatively safe?

[Zarincos]

If you aren't already, having all your sensitive equipment like comms and batteries indoors will prevent them from spontaneously exploding, but yeah, from what I can tell every bit of exposed wiring has a risk associated with it.

[ofaplic]

There is also rain that cause batteries to explode on contact.

[Team Triss]

I'm pretty sure that short circuits are a result of having batteries in the circuit; sometimes your AI storyteller decides that any batteries still wired in blow up a random portion of your power grid.

It's recommended that you have switches on them so you can connect/reconnect them as needed. My first colony lasted for 12 RL hours and had a few shorts, but only wrecked wiring. My new colony has three batteries sealed inside a stone building and each is behind a switch. Once they're charged I'm planning on taking at least two out of the circuit until needed.

[ofaplic]

Even without batteries there is some chance of random surge. In alpha 13 there is a mod that has a circuit breaker. It prevent surge and fire but it will drain your battery to 0 regardless on how much charge it hold.

[RemingtonRyder]

That mod has actually been updated to A14.

According to the code though, overloads only happen if there are batteries connected to the network. I don't know how you could get an overload without them - if you did, 0W/d would get channeled into the blast.

You can mitigate the damage in vanilla RimWorld by:

1. Running conduits mostly under stone walls, which can both withstand the blast and are non-flammable.

2. Having as few batteries connected to a given network as possible.

3. Having separate power networks to further reduce disruption.