ranching hatches for coals, viable?

[kelmenwong]

i got 5 hatches stables, each room keep 5 to not have overcrowded debuff.
i have at least 7 active coal generators.

my coal stockpile still gradually dropping.

anyone have positive farming coals through hatches experience ?

[Retarded Crow]

Have they food are they groomed/happy
And how meany cycles are you on

[L37]

As byproduct coal is nice. Food from hatches is nice too. But as primary power source - too much hassle IMO, there are much easier and more effective ways.

[Retarded Crow]

Also try to make stone hatches they are better

[Strygald]

Your problem is a simple math issue.

Of course there are a lot of other variables involved such as:

- coal generators only active some of the time due to automation or slow refilling times
- hatches may be fed inconsistently
- are hatches groomed frequently enough?
- do baby hatches produce coal like adults? is the 5 per ranch including eggs
- what types of hatches?

But, mainly:

5 x 5 Hatches = 25 Hatches

and 25 Hatches x 70kg coal = 1750kg coal produced per cycle

7 x coal generator = 7 x 600kg coal = 4200kg coal burned per cycle

So, even with variances you are still burning much more coal than you are producing(since your stockpile is still dropping).

[FDru]

As mentioned... it takes excessive amounts of coal to keep the generators running. Coal is best used as a backup power source, and even then... not more than 2 or 3, as you WILL need coal for other things (and lots of it).

[Mykepatch]

With a power control station in a power plant, you can add 50% energy produced with your generators.
Plus 8/8 hatches in a 96tiles room... this can already help...
Power plant wont bring you more coal but will make you consume a lot less.

[SKull]

Mass ranching is the way. If you can count the hatches you're not doing it right.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1785591239

This is the basic concept. A single small ranch with the stations and an outdoor area where the feeders are. The hatches will be unhappy inside the ranch obviously, but very happy outside. The outdoors counts as hundreds of tiles, not sure how many. But it's enough that you never get any debuffs on them.
Of course this sort of a balcony leaks, which you have to deal with. If it's just PO2 like here it's easy enough. But you shouldn't open up the base like this into hydrogen or chlorine obviously. Pick your spot. But don't make this the exit/entrance to the base. Leave a gap so dupes can't use it for that. And make sure you can drain water/misc past it. Nothing should drip onto the balcony from above.
Doing it this way you can ranch hundreds of hatches of all kinds in just a single ranch, so it's easy for the dupes to focus on them. The better you can concentrate your ranching, the more efficient the dupes will be. The hatches are not all always happy in this ranch of course, but this setup can easily sustain four coal generators running at full clip. In fact I was doing that here, yet my stockpile of coal was sjyrocketing when I quit playing the base.

[Strygald]

That's a lot of feeders, wouldn't it be more efficient to have a small area where dupes can't go and have a conveyor chute dumping hatch food directly on the ground?

[cainboy]

Yes. Ranching Hatches for Coal can easily supply a fair bit of coal generators.
There are some questions about how you are doing things in general so here are some points;

1- A properly set up hatch Ranch will have 8 hatches at all times, all happy and groomed and fed. you only using 5 at max means you are producing coal at 62.5% effeciency. *(not taking into account free range stables)

2- You don't mention if your Generators are your primary power source, or how you are spending your power, or if you are using automation to save power. Unless I'm getting into space tech and heavy industry, 5 coal generators are usually enough. Cutting down on power needs cuts down on Coal needs.

3- If I'm going to be going heavy on Coal Generators, I like to have 4 or 6 max stables (32 or 48 hatches), + a free range stable.

Case in point: Get more hatches, be smart about energy spending,

[kelmenwong]

does it matter using 1 large/max room hosting all critters compare to split out to few smaller rooms?

[The Tempted Man]

If you dont have coal with hatches farms, then you simply have less hatches than you need.

[mac tonight kin]

someone might've already said this or i'm just rarted, but, if you use a combination of morbs, pufts, and hatches, you'll be able to make an alright source of coal.

[MAKAIROSI]

Originally posted by Modest Pile o' Doggo:

someone might've already said this or i'm just rarted, but, if you use a combination of morbs, pufts, and hatches, you'll be able to make an alright source of coal.

You can't capture morbs though, can you?

[cainboy]

Originally posted by MAKAIROSI:

Originally posted by Modest Pile o' Doggo:

someone might've already said this or i'm just rarted, but, if you use a combination of morbs, pufts, and hatches, you'll be able to make an alright source of coal.

You can't capture morbs though, can you?

Morbs can be caught latter with a critter trap. these are needed for the amorphous critters like morbs and slickster varieties.