Filter Inserters Do Not Take From Assembly Machine's Ingredient Part

[Entropy]

Since yellow science packs require four ingredients, i thought i can feed batteries horizantally by filter inserters. Filter inserters would forward the batteries till the one that is at end of chain is full.
Doesn't it work like lab forwarding science packs?

[Teh Freek]

Correct. Assembly machines (and in fact *most* buildings) must be fed in parallel, not series.

[walter]

Originally posted by Sentinel:

Since yellow science packs require four ingredients, i thought i can feed batteries horizantally by filter inserters. Filter inserters would forward the batteries till the one that is at end of chain is full.
Doesn't it work like lab forwarding science packs?

Labs are an exception, no other machines get to do that.

[Entropy]

Thanks a lot of you

[Warlord]

Originally posted by walter:

Originally posted by Sentinel:

Since yellow science packs require four ingredients, i thought i can feed batteries horizantally by filter inserters. Filter inserters would forward the batteries till the one that is at end of chain is full.
Doesn't it work like lab forwarding science packs?

Labs are an exception, no other machines get to do that.

And boilers, but that isn't as useful nowadays. Come to think of it, burner mining drills might as well.

[GTX2GvO]

Wait! You can feed labs in a serial way? O.o
Meaning I can save on belts?! (and thus stuff on belts)

[Warlord]

Originally posted by GTX2GvO:

Wait! You can feed labs in a serial way? O.o
Meaning I can save on belts?! (and thus stuff on belts)

Yep. It was added in the .16 patch that overhauled science. I now have all packs feed into one lab, then daisy chain packs to the rest. So easy.

[Teh Freek]

Note that while it saves on belts, it slows research down since packs usually spend more time being carried in inserters than inside the actual labs.

[Killcreek2]

Point of note:
Daisy-chaining labs saves on belt feed space, but requires a few extra labs to offset the stoppage-time whenever the inserters remove packs to put into the next lab.

Test it out ingame: you will see the labs shutdown for a moment every time the "out" inserters activate, triggering the "in" inserters to refill that lab. Only the last lab in each chain will work flat-out.

Not really a big issue considering the ease of input feeds, but it certainly bugs me aesthetically...

[Warlord]

Originally posted by AlexMBrennan:

it slows research down since packs usually spend more time being carried in inserters than inside the actual labs.

That sounds incredibly unlikely - with max research speed you get about 400% research speed bonus, so when researching, say, infinite mining productivity research each lab will need 4x packs per minute which is negligible when compared to a stack inserters throughput of 744 items/minute.

It happens though. 4 packs per minute is 15 seconds between packs. If the packs in science labs are randomly damaged, you can have almost every lab pausing every few seconds as a lab beyond it demands a few more of pack "A" and takes if from the lab in front of it, who now has to take the pack from the lab in front of IT, which has to take packs from the lab in front of IT.

This results in a chain in which the labs at the end churn happily with minimal interruption, but the lab that all the packs feed into is almost always stopped as a large amount of packs are inserted then immediately removed.

I usually have an OCD about arrangements of buildings and belts, but I find the smooth flow of packs in labs almost soothing. At night, if there are no lamps messing it up, the internal glow of a working lab causes ripples of light as packs move along like waves along a shore.

Edit: I also tend to try to minimize flow. I have a main column of labs that feed from the primary source lab. Then there are 3 stack inserters that take from those labs feeding up the central column to ensure quick flow of packs. I then have linear branches of labs feeding off to the side of the column, but never too long that they are always starved of packs.

[astrosha]

I took this SS a few months back ...

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1396601109

It worked well enough, though I'm sure that a bot-based distribution system would be even better.

[AlexMBrennan]

f the packs in science labs are randomly damaged, you can have almost every lab pausing every few seconds as a lab beyond it demands a few more of pack "A"

I am sorry, but I am still not seeing it - with ten labs and 3x stack inserters, average science pack consumption doesn't fall below 34/minute (35/minute being the theoretical maximum).
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1523623633
You'd have to make ridiculously long chains to lose even 10% of the theoretical maximum throughput, never mind 50% ("science packs usually spend more time being carried in inserters than inside the actual labs")

[Warlord]

I'm not saying it's a big amount. Heck, I still daisy chain over 100 labs in an array normally.