Steam Turbine issue?

[Razzamatter]

So I think I'm having issues getting my steam turbines to work. I know that the heat exchangers won't work at all until they get to 500c, but they're all at that and producing steam. The turbines are working just barely in the picture below, but they only just turned on right before I screenshotted. The turbines worked for about a minute before shutting off. They turned on again right before I took the screen shot but they're still not producing at full capacity, and I'm not sure why they turned off earlier because everything seemed to be in order when they were off.

Looking at it more the "fluid consumption" keeps rapidly dropping despite steam being directly available. Am I doing anything wrong? It's looking like they're not taking in steam and not working at full capacity when they are. it's been running while I'm typing this and they keep starting and stopping. It has something to do with the "fluid consumption" I think but I just don't know what.

http://oi65.tinypic.com/29y1np2.jpg

[Killcreek2]

Looks like you just don't have much electrical demand. Turbines work same as the Steam Engines do: they only activate when power is needed, and only produce as much as is needed.
If your power demand is fluctuating up & down a lot (as you described), then the Turbine / Engine production output levels will fluctuate in a similar pattern to match the demand.


Your pic shows them to be working fine, as far as I can tell. The turbine is full of steam, & seems to be only using approx 25% of the available power production (so you have a nice amount of over-production, which is kinda good).

You can click on a power pole to bring up the main electricity network window. The coloured lines at top left indicate:

+Top bar = power "Satisfaction" (should be kept full, indicating enough supply with no shortfall); +Middle bar = for power "Production" levels (keeping this bar at about half-way is good rule of thumb, as it means you are using half of the available power generation, leaving the other half for peak usage / laser turrets firing / &etc);
+Lower bar = how much electricity stored in accumulators (if you have built any).


More info on the wiki page, here.[wiki.factorio.com]

[Razzamatter]

Originally posted by Killcreek2:

Looks like you just don't have much electrical demand. Turbines work same as the Steam Engines do: they only activate when power is needed, and only produce as much as is needed.
If your power demand is fluctuating up & down a lot (as you described), then the Turbine / Engine production output levels will fluctuate in a similar pattern to match the demand.


Your pic shows them to be working fine, as far as I can tell. The turbine is full of steam, & seems to be only using approx 25% of the available power production (so you have a nice amount of over-production, which is kinda good).

You can click on a power pole to bring up the main electricity network window. The coloured lines at top left indicate:

+Top bar = power "Satisfaction" (should be kept full, indicating enough supply with no shortfall); +Middle bar = for power "Production" levels (keeping this bar at about half-way is good rule of thumb, as it means you are using half of the available power generation, leaving the other half for peak usage / laser turrets firing / &etc);
+Lower bar = how much electricity stored in accumulators (if you have built any).


More info on the wiki page, here.[wiki.factorio.com]

OH! well good then! I thought I was doing something wrong here. I guess the best course of action for me then will be to take away the turbines and put in some tanks between them and the exchangers to store the steam so that the nuclear power doesn't go to waste. Thanks plenty! I wasn't aware that they only worked on-demand.

[Killcreek2]

You're welcome, glad to help clear up any confusion.

Originally posted by Razluna:

I guess the best course of action for me then will be to take away the turbines and put in some tanks between them and the exchangers to store the steam so that the nuclear power doesn't go to waste.

Good idea. One small tip: you can put the storage tanks after the turbines, rather than in between, and it works just as well (eg: Heat Exchanger - Turbine - Turbine - Storage Tank). The turbines will consume as much steam as they need to, with the leftover steam accumulating in the tank, and it can flow back into the turbines later when needed. (If you place extra turbines, this can function as a temporary over-charger or turbo, to help soak sudden spikes in electricity demand.)

You probably already noticed that the reactor cores will produce heat energy until their fuel cell is empty, regardless of actual demand. So what many players do (to reduce fuel cell "wastage") is to use a simple circuit that reads the steam levels in the storage tank(s), & send a signal to add another fuel cell only when the steam amount drops too low. This is often known as a "pulse reactor", & is a rather fuel-efficient design.