Problem with Power management

[VoidByte]

Hello,

I try since almost 2 Hours to bring my base in a solid state in terms of power management.
I can't figure out what I am doing wrong.

So the problem is simple: My conduits overload all time on random spots.

I know the basic's -> Use bigger wires to transfer bigger power.
But that is no solution. I mean, I can't plant a High Voltage Cable in every single room I have. (The base is very compact builded)
So I pitched it down with a transformator. Now, the wires are stable. But there is not enough power to provide enough energy to all buildings. Full batteries but flickering lights.

Can someone tell me what I have to do, that every room (I have a lot, every bedroom has its own ceiling light and so on) can use as much energy as it needs as long the batteries are charged?

I have no choice, I need to transfer Power through tiles. There is no way to clutter the whole base with billions of High-Voltage-Cables.

(I am using 8 big (not intelligent) batteries with 3 Coal generators)

Thanks in advanced

[mute.]

Build more circuits. Plain and simple.

[Tarshaid]

Providing a screenshot might help, I'll try to answer a bit blindly, but I won't get far; on your circuits initially overloading, did you just link regular wires to your heavy watt wires without putting a (small) transformer in between? That would easily cause overloads. And on the subject of having full batteries but flickering lights, I'm not even sure how this can be.

[Nellvan]

^This.

Have a backbone made of high-voltage wire that connects the generators and batteries and that runs through a shaft or floor alongside the base; ideally in a way that the dupes don't use it for traveling all the time, due to the heavy decor penalty. Then use as much transformers as you need to keep each circuit within the safe load.

More batteries = more heat and more loss of power to battery runn-off.
Switch to smart batteries as soon as possible to fine-control the generators, making them run on deamnd rather than storing all that much power. Basically you pretty much only need more than one of them if you want to have different trigger-values for different generators.

[everyJonny]

Yeah smart batteries are very importent. If you waste to much energy you willl run fast out of resurces. I think you build to much power consumers. ceiling lights are actually rly useless (only needed for plants) the microbecrusher is rly bad and only usefull in the first days. Pumps should not pump in drains etc

[identifiedasbeingdisrespectful]

overload is occurring because you have too much wattage being used on a single wire, or you used a regular wire bridge with a heavi watt wire. You can see the max potential power consumption of each circuit by hovering over any wire in that circuit in the power view. note that you can certainly have more than 1KW worth of machines connected to a single wire, you just can't consume more than 1KW at any given time or it overloads.3 coal generators make more than 1KW, you're probably already overloaded at the generators if you're not using heavi watt there already.

You can:
Use conductive wires to double the possible wattage per circuit from 1Kw to 2Kw.
use conductive wires in conjuction with the larger transformers to allow even more wattage per circuit (it's very weird that the small one meets the max demand of a regular wire but large one is twice that of conductive wire)

Typically people use heavi watt in their power generation rooms where dupes won't be very much and then build a bank of transformers to separate cricuits after that. You'd be hard pressed to exceed 20KW of power generation on a smaller base.
You actually *can* run heavi watt everywhere with the joint plates, but it's hell on decor and you shouldn't. just use it to connect power generators, top end of transformers, and your smart batteries to the generators. Don't forget to run automation wire between all the generators and smart batteries too or you'll still waste power. Coal generators waste way too much without smart batteries. Natural gas is a better alternative if you find the gyeser or produce it in combination with petroleum based power as a byproduct as you get germ free pwater as a byproduct and the CO2 output is piped instead of free like coal.unless you've got a big hatch ranch, coal is limited. You should be saving it for steel imo.

automation in this game is powerful if you learn how to use it and the signal states of machines. For example, you can run refrigerators through a NOT gate and then connect them to your cooking stations, and then people won't cook unless the fridge isn't full.

[Hedning]

The most important things have already been said, but to add:

-You can run heavi watt in a utility tunnel below or above your corridors and to one side of your shafts. Regular blocks block the negative decor.

-Small transformers can protect your wires. A temporary load of eg 2kW will not damage regular wire if it is short enough. The small transforme will cut power once its 1kJ battery is depleted, resetting the overload timer and thus protecting the wire.

[identifiedasbeingdisrespectful]

Originally posted by Hedning:

The most important things have already been said, but to add:

-Small transformers can protect your wires. A temporary load of eg 2kW will not damage regular wire if it is short enough. The small transforme will cut power once its 1kJ battery is depleted, resetting the overload timer and thus protecting the wire.

Ah, now I understand why the big transformers are twice the conductive wire then. Punished more for overloading.