Help with Oil refinery

[Lifepath [CdE]]

Hello everyone. I'm starting to toy with oil and i have trouble with the refinery. My dupes sure use the wheel, especially my engineer who has top priority on operate. But whatever my settings for priority, the wheel is left unattended 75% of the time and petroleum is not flowing as it could. I read somewhere a refinery can fuel one generator + two polymer press but i can' even have my generator run all the time with my refinery. Any hint is most welcome !

[SamuraiJones]

Yea, oil refineries never run at 100%, but presses and petrol powerplants do, so the wiki is somewhat misleading when it says it can run that stuff.

This gets into some of the little details of how tasks work. When the dupe gets assigned to the refinery (when he needs a task and it's the highest priority), he runs down and starts spinning the wheel, and you get that delicious petrol. Then eventually he'll stop the task -- either he needs a bathroom break, or the gas builds up and he needs air or the refinery's pipe fills up. He might even have a time limit on the refinery job, although I'm not sure about that.

Anyway, once that happens, he'll run off to do whatever his new task is (eating, sleeping, catching breath, whatever). And while he's doing whatever he's doing, maybe another dupe needs a task and gets assigned to the refinery. Now he runs all the way down from wherever he is, and then the first guy runs all the way back. So the machine can sit idle while dupes run to it.

Then maybe the first dupe gets on a machine with a slightly lower priority, like say a treadmill, but then the refinery fills up. He's already on the treadmill, so he doesn't need a task, so keeps on the low-priority machine and ignore the refinery until he needs another bathroom break to trigger him to get a new task.

[SamuraiJones]

Anyway, that's the descriptive theory, you want to know how to work around it.

First suggestion: never assume the refineries are 100% active -- always have slightly higher production than consumption, because the refineries won't run all the time.

Which brings us to the second suggestion: Build extra refineries. You want to minimize the time engineers spend waiting for a refinery (especially cuz a guy can claim the refinery form across the map and take a half cycle to run there, but nobody else can use the refinery that whole time). One refinery per engineer is ideal -- for me, that's usually two. Make it highest priority for those two, and don't give anyone else access to the refineries (via door controls). They'll refine when needed, and do other tasks when it's not.

Third, put in storage between the refineries and what uses them. That can be a big resevoir, or just a bunch of zig-zaggy pipes. That way if your engineers can get ahead on petrol production in the morning, and the generators can run all day.

Lotsa words there... hope it helps.

[Lifepath [CdE]]

It does, thanks a lot !!

[Flamin'Phoenix]

maybe if you are using oilwells they might have gotten overpressurized?

[Lifepath [CdE]]

Originally posted by Flamin'Phoenix:

maybe if you are using oilwells they might have gotten overpressurized?

Sorry but i don't get what you talk about. I am just using a pump. There is plenty of oil in my pipes. Thanks for the idea though.

[SakuraKoi]

So, what does your engineer do instead?

The detailed answer (what prioerity it has for your dupe and which priority the refinery has) may show whether there is something wrong with your priorities or if perhaps there is a bug which prevents a duplicant to instantly do the same task again.

Heck, you can just test by setting another refinery next to it.

[Lifepath [CdE]]

I'm going to test with a second refinery but an engeneer dupe with Sole priority to engineer will not keep the wheel turning. He will actually climb a few stairs for no reason hesitate a wile and come back to the wheel with a lot of wasted time doing notthing usefull. Alos even with all 9 dupes set to operate max priority didn't make the wheel turn all the time. I guess it is not supposed to be rolling all the time !