Space Haulers

[Jelly]

Anyone have tips for creating space haulers that can reliably make trips between planets like trains? The ones I’ve made all run out of juice after a bit of being run constantly and I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong.

Would love to see other ppl’s designs for some inspiration

[Paveway]

You can regulate the amount of fuel you put into the engines using pumps. A simple circuit that reads the velocity of the platform and only turns the engines on if V < 140 should be good between planets.

That will help ensure you don't run out of fuel. If you're running out of ammo it means you just need to make more ammo. Try moving the guns closer to the center of the platform so they aren't wasting ammo on asteroids that aren't a danger.

[oyssoyss]

place a pump before thruster fuel pipes and wire it to hub and read velocity. once it come to a certain speed(depending on how fast your ship can go) setting auto disable the pump to save fuel and get better thruster fuel efficiency.

and trying to make fuel from space more efficiently. from collector to crusher to factories. a lot can be improved.

[Universalgenie]

There is no need for any pump on an inner-planet space platform. Simply read the needed amount of fuel/oxidizer from the thrusters once (120/s per thruster in normal quality), multiply it with 0.75 for better efficiency and build enough chemical plants to create this value of fuel per second. Than everything you need are enough asteroid collectors and crushers to constantly supply those plants.

[GAMING_Alligator]

Build more juice.

It's the Factorio way.

[Ryuukaze]

I just had one of each fuel plant and a tank for each, and I slowed the engines down (with pumps) to compensate. Then I made sure I had enough ammo before each leg of the trip.

It really doesn't take much at all for the inner system. For the further stuff, you just need to add the new kind of gun (and restructure everything to fit)... And again, for the really outer stuff.

[kremlin]

Have a circuit wire leading from your fuel and oxidizer tanks to the platform hub, then set circuit conditions in the schedule that make it wait for them to fill up enough to make it to the next planet. Can be made more 'generic' in the sense of a pre-flight checklist by using a decider combinator between the tanks and the hub that outputs a checkmark signal when all conditions are met, then you just have the schedule check for the checkmark signal.

[Jelly]

This has been plenty insightful, thank you!

Is nuclear power basically required for Aquilo’s ships? Even my epic quality solar panels barely work in orbit

[GAMING_Alligator]

Originally posted by Jelly:

This has been plenty insightful, thank you!

Is nuclear power basically required for Aquilo’s ships? Even my epic quality solar panels barely work in orbit

Technically, not strictly"required". I mean you could always do the math and work out how many 1000s of solar panels you need to supply the necessary amount of electricity, and build an absolutely massive platform with that many. It won't be fast, but it'll get there.

But yeah, nuclear certainly seems like the path of least resistance. Without giving spoilers, it will be more future proof for the sort of build you'll need for the endgame too.

[god bless you]

Originally posted by Jelly:

This has been plenty insightful, thank you!

Is nuclear power basically required for Aquilo’s ships? Even my epic quality solar panels barely work in orbit

No. I have a 5k tons solar only ships.
https://i.imgur.com/t0B0lLU.jpeg

[Ghevd]

I have 2 asteroid collectors for each asteroid type for a total of 6 and 1 grinder for each, totalling 3. Each collector only grabs one specific asteroid assigned to it.

2 chem plants to turn water into ice.

2 for fuel and 2 for oxidizer. Each chem plant leads to 2 tanks. 3 thrusters on the back but recently upgraded to 5 for a bit more speed.

The front has a small loop of belts carrying yellow ammo and iron plates with 6 to 8 gun turrets.

1 assembly machine makes the ammo for the guns putting it on the loop. 3 smelters make iron plates. Then some solar panels and a few capacitors sprinkled where I can fit them.

The trick comes down to circuit conditions. Before I leave one planet for the next the conditions are ammo has to be greater than or equal to 225. I got this number by first making ammo have to be greater than or equal to the iron plates. Just wire one conveyor to the ship storage to get the whole loops info.

Next condition is 10k fuel. The fuel and oxidizer is always equal so I only check one.

The final condition is science packps. If it's the drop point they have to equal 0 while the pickup point is greater than or equal to 1000.

I have a few more conditions on inserters for iron ore and carbon that I store in the main hull. They turn off if either of those components are greater than or equal to 200. This way I maintain space inside for my science packs.

That's pretty much my Fulgora ship. Vulcanus ship is identical but a few more conditions to have a stack of big miners and a stack of foundries.

I'll get a screenshot later. Stuck at work atm.

Here is my humble little ship for Vulcanus:
https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/1786409463854190/30CAB70418821844392EA8408C59754B0D0253D4/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false

[argrond]

https://steamcommunity.com/app/427520/discussions/0/4631482382562656318/
There are various designs there for you to get inspired by.
Mine is also there, the first one was built almost at the start of the 2.0 game and, with slight improvements, it still flies (6 of the kind actually, 2 for each planet) between all planets except Aquilo at avg speed of 70(nonstop)-100(with slight recharge) km/s. 170 km/s top.

[Analbumcover]

The main suggestion I would give is research up to advanced asteroid crushing so you get the high yield fuel recipes.

[Hurkyl]

Originally posted by GAMING_Alligator:

Originally posted by Jelly:

This has been plenty insightful, thank you!

Is nuclear power basically required for Aquilo’s ships? Even my epic quality solar panels barely work in orbit

Technically, not strictly"required". I mean you could always do the math and work out how many 1000s of solar panels you need to supply the necessary amount of electricity, and build an absolutely massive platform with that many. It won't be fast, but it'll get there.

Well, accumulators work just fine. With enough daring you could design a ship that charges around the inner planets (fastest over Vulcanus) and runs on the stored charge for a trip out to Aquilo and back.

But you'd better be confident in your preparations, since you'd be basically dead in the water if you run out of charge near Aquilo.

[knighttemplar1960]

The space platform design that I used to go from Nauvis to Vulcanus ran out of power on a trip from Nauvis to Fulgora. Once I was on Fulgora I started making quality items up to rare and I replaced solar panels and accumulators one for one with rare quality solar panels and accumulators. The platform had no problems at Fulgora after that.

Quality grabbers also help pull in more asteroid bits so you always have sufficient materials to work with.

[The Black Baron]

Originally posted by Paveway:

You can regulate the amount of fuel you put into the engines using pumps. A simple circuit that reads the velocity of the platform and only turns the engines on if V < 140 should be good between planets.

That will help ensure you don't run out of fuel. If you're running out of ammo it means you just need to make more ammo. Try moving the guns closer to the center of the platform so they aren't wasting ammo on asteroids that aren't a danger.

Also a good tip for saving ammo. Side sentry guns can be just set to not recieve ammo as long as V > 0.
So if you're moving you won't shoot asteroids that would pass your ship anyways. :)