Can I use circuit network to force accumlators to give power only at certain condtion?

[Makadi]

accumlators only read charge levels and does not give me a number

[Peniilsed Privileegid]

Yes, you need to separate the accumulators to a different power network(not connected to the rest of the factory) and connect that power network via power switch, wire that up the way you want, and you should be good to go.

[Makadi]

ok now how I force the power switch to turn off or on when the charge level go below 50%?

[Makadi]

ok I think I got It I have to connect both the power switch and the accumulators to the electric pole and now the accoumulator will give the signal and the pole will read the charge number

[DCYW]

use the SR Latch method.

[impetus_maximus]

ShredGuy99 has a good video explaining how to build an SR latch.
he then explains how it works.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEOXGBYR6oM

he has it hooked to the offshore pump, but you can wire it to a switch etc.
he says you need two different color wires, but you can use all one color.

[CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate]

Originally posted by impetus maximus:

ShredGuy99 has a good video explaining how to build an SR latch.
he then explains how it works.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEOXGBYR6oM

he has it hooked to the offshore pump, but you can wire it to a switch etc.
he says you need two different color wires, but you can use all one color.

Classic example of someone over-complicating their solutions.

All I do to ensure that my steam power only turns on when I need it to is connect a single accumulator to all of the inserters that provide it fuel. When power in the accumulator dips below a certain amount they'll insert fuel into the boilers and produce power for a bit allowing some recharging of the accumulators. Once the charge level goes back up they simply finish their fuel and go dormant again.

S-R latch is a good method, but it's a solution that's better used for a harder problem, like nuclear power, or when you want to keep a steam reserve in storage.

[Makadi]

Originally posted by CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate:

All I do to ensure that my steam power only turns on when I need it to is connect a single accumulator to all of the inserters that provide it fuel. When power in the accumulator dips below a certain amount they'll insert fuel into the boilers and produce power for a bit allowing some recharging of the accumulators. Once the charge level goes back up they simply finish their fuel and go dormant again

I didn't understand, would you explain this again?

[Killcreek2]

Originally posted by impetus maximus:

ShredGuy99 has a good video explaining how to build an SR latch.
he then explains how it works.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEOXGBYR6oM

Hmmm, interesting way to do backup steam power[wiki.factorio.com], but with only 2 combis instead of 3.

Wiki version might be better for OP to learn the mechanics though (as the 1-combi RS latch can be used for many other purposes, not just a high/low trigger as in the vid).

[CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate]

Originally posted by Makadi:

Originally posted by CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate:

All I do to ensure that my steam power only turns on when I need it to is connect a single accumulator to all of the inserters that provide it fuel. When power in the accumulator dips below a certain amount they'll insert fuel into the boilers and produce power for a bit allowing some recharging of the accumulators. Once the charge level goes back up they simply finish their fuel and go dormant again

I didn't understand, would you explain this again?

Connect all of the inserters for your boilers to an accumulator on the network. When the charge level drops below X% they enable. No power switch or power disconnections required.

When they enable they insert fuel into your boilers turning on your steam power. This will charge the accumulators temporarily, and then they will stop when the charge level goes back above the appropriate level, leaving the fuel in the boilers to finish burning.

This also solves a flickering problem when you don't set a wide enough upper and lower boundary for your S-R latch (why some one might set the activation at 10% and deactivation at 35%) Flickering is where you have the power turn on and off repeatedly in fast succession. This can cause your CPU to chug, or risks a full blackout in the wrong situation. In fact this highlights the only reasonable situation to use a S-R latch instead of fuel control, where the fuel contributes more charge than your capacitance can hold. This only comes up for me in nuclear power.

There is an issue that you will have to work with using my method. If you are using powered inserters you will not want to set the power level threshold too low. How low depends on how many accumulators you have, but you would run risk of running out of power before they can put the fuel in. As such for smaller networks I use about 30% for my threshold, and if I have multiple steam systems I use a threshold gradient across them. E.g. 30% for the first bank, 25% for the second bank, 20% for the third bank...

There is one other addition you can do with a constant combinator if you wish. Using a constant combinator you can set the charge thresholds for each of your steam banks. Now instead of telling them "A < 30" you would be telling them "A < B" where the constant accumulator says "B = 30." What this allows you to do is change your power thresholds just by editing a single constant accumulator somewhere.

[AlexMBrennan]

All I do to ensure that my steam power only turns on when I need it to is connect a single accumulator to all of the inserters that provide it fuel.

Yes, why wire up one switch when it is obviously so much easier to wire up thousands of inserters? How silly of me to think that the cheaper option is cheaper.

[CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate]

Originally posted by AlexMBrennan:

All I do to ensure that my steam power only turns on when I need it to is connect a single accumulator to all of the inserters that provide it fuel.

Yes, why wire up one switch when it is obviously so much easier to wire up thousands of inserters? How silly of me to think that the cheaper option is cheaper.

A wire costs very little. One green circuit and half a copper plate. This is tiny, and is still comparable to a R-S Latch, which has 4 inserters, a power switch, and several boxes involved.

Also, if the gentleman asking this has thousands of fuel inserters for his steam power this implies that he has at least 50 * 36 MW or 1.8 GW of steam power. That's the equivalent of 386 square kilometers of solar panels (assuming that a tile is 1 metere squared), or 43,000 solar panels!

Frankly if the OP is asking this question he probably doesn't have that kind of power requirement or availability, and you're being silly. Plus, by this time, you have nuclear power which can provide that much more simply, so why with all the wasted space from steam power? Even more so, if you are worried about cost of the system, and not complexity which I'm arguing, and you have this much power, well frankly, you've moved well beyond thrifty and into maniacal.

Plus the circuit wires are free with a blueprint, where your R-S Latch is not. So right there your cost argument is invalid.

[Peter]

Originally posted by AlexMBrennan:

Yes, why wire up one switch when it is obviously so much easier to wire up thousands of inserters? How silly of me to think that the cheaper option is cheaper.

You're not using red/green wires. You're isolating the inserters power network to just the accumulator. No additional materials than the ones already needed.

[CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate]

Originally posted by Peter:

Originally posted by AlexMBrennan:

Yes, why wire up one switch when it is obviously so much easier to wire up thousands of inserters? How silly of me to think that the cheaper option is cheaper.

You're not using red/green wires. You're isolating the inserters power network to just the accumulator. No additional materials than the ones already needed.

He was responding to my post, and failed to note that in general, if you blueprint the wires that I put out, you never have to place them again.

[Killcreek2]

Originally posted by CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate:

This is tiny, and is still comparable to a R-S Latch, which has 4 inserters, a power switch, and several boxes involved.

Hold on just a second.
I'm concerned that you may have misunderstood the design shown the video linked by Impetus: the 4 inserters are just used to create a power demand to showcase the circuit - placing a radar would do the same job.
Inserters & boxes are not required ~ An RS latch needs only a single combinator, however 2 more combis are often needed to adjust the input signal(s) & set the high / low trigger thresholds (or combined together in a clever way to only use 2 combis total, as in the vid.)
An alternative zero-power SR latch can be built using 4 wired (blue) belts in a circle with 3 fish placed on the inside lane.

imho your design would function well enough, but does involove a lot more running about to wire stuff together (all the inserters), when compared to just placing & wiring a few combis to a switch in one single location.
In either design the construction cost is but a pittance of the overall factory output, so is largely irrelevant. (PS: try not to rise to Brennans rude "straw-man argument" -based sarcasm, it is often better to just ignore it.)

[CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate]

Originally posted by Killcreek2:

Originally posted by CPT Chthonbeard the Pirate:

This is tiny, and is still comparable to a R-S Latch, which has 4 inserters, a power switch, and several boxes involved.

Hold on just a second.
I'm concerned that you may have misunderstood the design shown the video linked by Impetus: the 4 inserters are just used to create a power demand to showcase the circuit - placing a radar would do the same job.
Inserters & boxes are not required ~ An RS latch needs only a single combinator, however 2 more combis are often needed to adjust the input signal(s) & set the high / low trigger thresholds (or combined together in a clever way to only use 2 combis total, as in the vid.)
An alternative zero-power SR latch can be built using 4 wired (blue) belts in a circle with 3 fish placed on the inside lane.

imho your design would function well enough, but does involove a lot more running about to wire stuff together (all the inserters), when compared to just placing & wiring a few combis to a switch in one single location.
In either design the construction cost is but a pittance of the overall factory output, so is largely irrelevant. (PS: try not to rise to Brennans rude "straw-man argument" -based sarcasm, it is often better to just ignore it.)

Fair enough, but as I said, once you blueprint it once, you don't actually have to run around and wire it all up as you said.

Anyways, to be fair, I didn't finish watching the video because the commentator's tone was very condescending, and I couldn't stand him. I've made R-S Latches before though using inserters myself, in my nuclear setup to limit the rate that fuel is burned to something reasonable.

I was just trying to propose something that might be easier to understand what is going on to the OP, in case he was also confused about the latch. Personally this physical implementation took me a bit to understand myself, as I'm used to assembly instructions as the lowest level language, so I felt maybe a simpler intro would be beneficial for him if he had issues.