How to properly use splitters/mergers?

[WolfWhiteFire]

Hello, I am a new player and had a factory operating somewhat nicely early on, at least producing the basic stuff that takes too long to craft manually. One thing that I noticed what that my factory was *gasp* inefficient! With only single lines being possible, the ore and ingots weren't being consumed as fast as they were being produced, so of course as soon as I saw the milestone unlocking splitters/mergers I went for them immediately, in hopes of merging all my iron ore production into a single pool that could then be split evenly through the max number of smelters that could operate at optimal efficiency at once, followed by merging the ingots into one pool of resources again in order to be split evenly through the constructors.

Problem is, when I put my plan into action, I found that when I merged the lines the input lines were stopping and starting repeatedly, and unfortunately it seems to be impossible to have them immediately split again from there without going through even an extremely short conveyor belt that can't transport as much as is going in, resulting in build up and a slowed production overall. So, it seems no matter how I use the mergers, the single line formed by them won't be able to transport all the resources coming in, and with only being able to feed a single line into the splitters, they won't be able to fully supply all three lines coming from them.

As a result, I was wondering if I could get some advice about the proper use of mergers/splitters, in order to maintain optimum efficiency.

[xxCOOPSxx]

the whole line can only move as faster as the Mark belt you currently have unlocked. So this will need to be taken in consideration in the setup. You can split and merge all over the place but the belts control the rate at which materials can move. If your Miner and incoming belt cannot keep up with the machines required resource a minute they will need to wait until they get what they need. If your merge all the outputs and the totally output is higher than the belt can transport then it will stall waiting for space. You want to provide a bit more detail on your setup

[Bobucles]

Getting perfect ratios through mergers and splitters is cute, but it is more effort than any value it gives. The main reason is because you don't really gain on belt potential. There's always 1 main line and 3 branching lines, so no matter what you're throttled on the 1 main line. The end result is a spaghetti mess, and it doesn't matter if a machine buffer fills up anyway.

Set up a single line, and space out splitters to branch resources into your machines. Use mergers the opposite way, with a single belt merging in resources from all your machines. It's an easy setup and will serve you well.

[Mojo]

Mark 2 Belt carries 120 parts a minute. Place a splitter with just two outputs those outputs will only move 60 parts a mintue. If you had 3 lines off that splitter then 40 parts per minute on each split line.

Reverse that with mergers. 3 lines of 40 coming into one Merger, then the out going line you would want at least Mark 2 belt to carry the 120 items per minute it will have merged.

Hope that helped.
:)

[Bobucles]

MK2 belts are a terrible recipe to work with and players should use as few of them as possible. They still have some use for early game mine output. Use a tiny mk2 belt, throw it immediately into a splitter, and pump out 2x mk1 belts. It'll save resources and save headache.

Then skip to mk3 belts and be happy.

[Mojo]

@Bobucles - I was using MK2 belt as an example, easy math to work out for me while typing it out. :)

But the theory is the same. What ever the speed is of the line that goes in the splitter; divide it by how many lines you have coming out, that gives you the new speed you have of parts per minute of each line.

[WolfWhiteFire]

Thanks for the advice, so it sounds like the main problem is the belts capacity, and I need to work around that limit. So, until I unlock t2 belts, I can't merge my miners because each provides 60 and that would push the belt over capacity. However, I can divide each miner between two smelters that each consume 30 by using a splitter without losing efficiency, then I can merge two smelters to reach a total of 60 on the belt before splitting it between that 60 between constructors that add up to a consumption of 60 total, and so on.

Unfortunately that means merging all my pools of a resource into one to more easily split it isn't a possibility, but I can at least merge them into a few larger pools and I will just have to pay careful attention to the rates of everything in one pool/line in order to try to maximize efficiency.

Considering that, if I have a merged belt of 60 iron ingots go into three constructors with a splitter, one consuming 30, and two 15, would it automatically distribute that properly (aka 30 iron down the 30 line, 15 each down the two 15 lines), or would it overflow the two 15 lines before putting the rest down the 30 line? The game does seem to optimize some things automatically, like how excess power production will be reduced down to the amount needed to save on fuel, but I don't know if it applies there.

[Bobucles]

The outputs will equalize, eventually. What happens is the first machine gets 30, then the internal buffer maxes out. All the overflow spills to the next belt until that machine maxes out. The end result is everything gets their stuff sooner or later.

[AquaX]

Mergers/Splitters are place where you want all the resources made to converage/diverage to save space/time with respect to power consumption.

For example: you are using 5 smelters and 10 constructors further away. It might be better to have them all merge into 1 belt before dividing it up into the 10 constructors to save space from having to make 5 belts from smelters.

Efficiency will rise as you progress through the tech tree. Mk 3. is the easiest since you will mass produce steel. You will likely rebuild your base once when you enter the steel production and again when you enter aluminum sheet.

[xxCOOPSxx]

early game yes you will have issues merging large pools of materials simply because you don't have the tech to transport that many items on a belt at once. That will come later along with as others pointed out rebuilding your base so don't worry to much early on about the base itself, work more on constructing what you need to unlock the early tiers and also learning how everything works and once you get mk3 belts with steel production you can get well under way then to merge supply chains to feed multiple machines and merging outputs to take off to another part of your production chain

[Q]

my advice to you is do not stress. If you try to make all perfect from the tier 1 you will rebuild at list 2 times :D Get to tier 5-6 then think how to split (you will have access to MK 2 and allot of building blocks)

[witness1]

You actually have to rebuild everything once when you get Mk.3 Miners imho. Also, if you are already excited about mergers and splitters, there will be intelligent and programable splitters WAAAY down the line.

[witness1]

also, you can press n ingame, and enter basic calculations like 12*45. That helped me a lot!

[Seedling]

Publicado originalmente por WolfWhiteFire:

Considering that, if I have a merged belt of 60 iron ingots go into three constructors with a splitter, one consuming 30, and two 15, would it automatically distribute that properly (aka 30 iron down the 30 line, 15 each down the two 15 lines), or would it overflow the two 15 lines before putting the rest down the 30 line?

It will split it 20/20/20 until the 15 consumers are filled to max, which takes 40 minutes. 40 minutes where the 30 consumer is only working at 66% capacity due to being starved of input, which is likely going to starve further constructors down the line as well.
So use two splitters. First one splits 60 input into two 30 outputs, do not use the 3rd output. Second splitter takes the other 30 output and turns it into two 15 outputs. Then you have your ideal 30/15/15 split that keeps everything running at 100% efficiency.

[Maehlice]

Publicado originalmente por Seedling:

Publicado originalmente por WolfWhiteFire:

Considering that, if I have a merged belt of 60 iron ingots go into three constructors with a splitter, one consuming 30, and two 15, would it automatically distribute that properly (aka 30 iron down the 30 line, 15 each down the two 15 lines), or would it overflow the two 15 lines before putting the rest down the 30 line?

It will split it 20/20/20 until the 15 consumers are filled to max, which takes 40 minutes. 40 minutes where the 30 consumer is only working at 66% capacity due to being starved of input, which is likely going to starve further constructors down the line as well.
So use two splitters. First one splits 60 input into two 30 outputs, do not use the 3rd output. Second splitter takes the other 30 output and turns it into two 15 outputs. Then you have your ideal 30/15/15 split that keeps everything running at 100% efficiency.

I recommend against this. A "balancer" type system requires a lot more space, more math, and more time to build. It's also much more difficult to upgrade and repurpose later.

As long as a manifold is being fed the correct amount for its needs, and has adequate belt speeds throughout it (e.g., down the main "trunk"), it will eventually balance itself. Any downstream machine-starving is temporary.

[Jeslis]

The satisfactory wiki is an AMAZING place to learn compared to most other game wiki's Ive ever seen.

Highly recommend checking out their manifold page.