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i was playing on a server where the factory was using a lot of one side of a belt.
the other side was creeping along. it was affecting the trains being unloaded.

so i sat down and thought...
how can i get the standing material onto the side that is flowing, while allowing it to flow the other way if needed?

this is what i came up with.
after the first splitter, each side is forced to the oposite side, then the next two splitters allow each half to merge to 1 "full" belt.
finally, the last splitter alternates between each full belt. you can now take from one half the belt, and the intake will pull from both sides.

note, the one on the left was filled with hazard concrete beforehand to show what parts aren't moving.
i prefer this one even though it is one block longer than the one on the right.

all the über smart people around here probably came up with this already, or something better.
still very happy to have figured this out on my own.

The left is basically identical to a backlog safe lane balancer.

More variants here: http://imgur.com/a/6yddZ

The right version will spit out mixed lanes once the bottom feed is not compressed.

What exactly does backlog safe mean?
How is it different from the first one here (https://imgur.com/a/sgAsj) other than using more splitters?

Optera wrote:The left is basically identical to a backlog safe lane balancer.

More variants here: http://imgur.com/a/6yddZ

The right version will spit out mixed lanes once the bottom feed is not compressed.

that's clever. didn't think of using the exit like that.

hansinator wrote:What exactly does backlog safe mean?
How is it different from the first one here (https://imgur.com/a/sgAsj) other than using more splitters?

This version only works when the belt flows. If there's extreme one sided load it will simply switch lanes.
See this thread: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=15366

PS: all lane balancer designs will become obsolete with loaders. Loader>Chest>Loader perfectly balances any input to both lanes and it only has a 5x1 footprint where the simple design has 3x3.

The version from the link I posted does the same while using less parts:


Loaders are not enabled in vanilla Factorio so I wouldn't use them to balance lanes.. Or do you mean something different?

hansinator wrote:The version from the link I posted does the same while using less parts:

You are right, after some testing this version seems to do behave like my favored symmetrical version.

hansinator wrote: Loaders are not enabled in vanilla Factorio so I wouldn't use them to balance lanes.. Or do you mean something different?

When I said they will replace those designs I was apparently out of scope of the circuit-free subforum. Loaders prefer one lane over the other when filling chests.
To make them balance input lanes requires circuit network. PS: in my factories I'm already using these loader solutions since they have a small footprint and seem more runtime friendly when balancing 32belts.

Optera wrote:

hansinator wrote:The version from the link I posted does the same while using less parts:

You are right, after some testing this version seems to do behave like my favored symmetrical version.

hansinator wrote: Loaders are not enabled in vanilla Factorio so I wouldn't use them to balance lanes.. Or do you mean something different?

When I said they will replace those designs I was apparently out of scope of the circuit-free subforum. Loaders prefer one lane over the other when filling chests.
To make them balance input lanes requires circuit network.

2016-10-13-16-06-33-2450002.jpg

PS: in my factories I'm already using these loader solutions since they have a small footprint and seem more runtime friendly when balancing 32belts.

Just a quick question, what is that thing that outputs iron ore?

hansinator wrote:The version from the link I posted does the same while using less parts:

didn't think this would work like mine but it does. well done.

Masterfox wrote: Just a quick question, what is that thing that outputs iron ore?

it's called an 'item source' from the mod 'Creative Mode'. you can set it to put out an infinite amount of any item in the game.
can put items on belts, into chest and trains. each lane can have a dif item.

the two blue chests in my image above are 'Void requester chests'.
anything that gets put in them vanishes.

there are providers/voids for fluids, and electricity as well.

creative mode mod is awesome for testing layouts.

impetus maximus wrote:

hansinator wrote:The version from the link I posted does the same while using less parts:

didn't think this would work like mine but it does. well done.

I didn't do it, it's from reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comme ... balancers/