Ionizer same as three evaporators?

[valenti_scott]

Hello-
I have a line producing a drug, and the line includes three dissolvers in a row, in order to reduce the concentration by three, followed by another dissolver, which upgrades the drug. It works great.

I thought I would duplicate this line, but in a smaller space, so I really need to use an ionizer instead of the first three dissolvers. However, when the drug passes through the ionizer and into the dissolver, it does not get upgraded like I was expecting. Does anyone have any idea what might be wrong here? Thanks,
-Scott

[Scifiwriterguy]

Assuming that the concentration needs to be dropped by three, then there should be no difference between using three dissolvers versus one ionizer. Provided that the drug is at the target concentration when it passes through the necessary ugprade machine, how you got to that concentration should make no difference. (Realistically, both setups do the same thing - drop concentration by three - but the ioniser is more expensive to operate; that's the trade off for using less space.)

However, if the upgrade requires a catalyst, the most common cause of a working process failing like this is that the ionizer is eliminating your catalyst before it can do its job. Check and make sure your catalyst isn't disappearing in your ionizer.

If that's not the case, double-check the necessary upgrade concentration - sooner or later, everybody makes the mistake of misremembering the concentration and missing the target. I know I've done it more than I'd like to admit to.

And if it's still not working...post an update. We're a helpful bunch here. :)

[valenti_scott]

Hi, thanks for the reply, I replaced the ionizer with three dissolvers, and now it's working fine. I'm puzzled as to why it didn't work with the ionizer.

[valenti_scott]

Just to keep the thread updated, I believe at this point that I inadvertently removed a catalyst with the ionizer, which kept the drug from upgrading. Thanks,
-Scott

[Scifiwriterguy]

That's the usual chain of events. I can't count how many times I've done that to myself.