Factorio Forums

Hi Everyone,

I have done some searching and can't find any guidance for my current issue.

I like to build output specific factories. I currently have 3 sub-factories, one called RP=research park which produces all of my science packs, MP=make park which produces all of my player materials for building and RP=rocket park which is my first factory dedicated to launching rockets.

I also do not train around raw ore but setup dedicated smelters at the source where the ore is. So I have a few ore generating sites and multiple factories. I don't want to assign certain trains to go from specific factories to specific ore sites. Rather what I think I would like is a central location in which all of my ore sites group together to create an ore warehouse where all factories trains can go for ore. Hopefully that makes sense, I am at work and don't have access to my save file.

I attempted to make a warehouse but for various reasons didn't do to well as it was immediately throughput limiting my factories. I imagine this will need to be something pretty large but lack the creativity to envision it.

Has anyone out there already solved this problem and are they willing to share their result?

I actually did a very similar idea in one of my latest games. I had railwords style settings and I used regional ore depots. All ore from mining in an area went to a station. This station allowed transfer from 1-2 trains to much larger trains which trafficed it to smelting. In essence Only very large trains occupied the core of my network.

The storage depot itself isn't complicated in essence but some of my lessons learned where this.

• Don't mix trains for drop off and pickup -Seperate the loading and unloading areas as much as possible. In my game I didn't even mix the rail networks. The mining depots had their own smaller local network.
• Look up some methods of balanced unloading.
• 4 stack inserters to a blue belt makes it easier to just limit each car to two blue belts which helps with balancing as even numbers are typically simpler balances.
• For actual storage, a network of stack inserters and steal chests worked for me but of course a warehouse mod would work as well.
• You are going to want to have capacity for waiting trains and pickup/drop off so plan BIG. This was one of my stations. I think this was Science Towns drop off but the basic design is used everywhere I had a lot of trains converging. I built multiple in places of Pickup and drop off to separate the trains.

  

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Thank you so much for your feedback!

Your advice is well taken and I will see what I can do when I get home tonight.

The 4 stack inserters to blue belts is something I totally never thought of.
I also never thought of having a seperate rail network for my ore trains. I was already seeing some congestion on my 2-rail setup near my attempt at a warehouse.

I don't think I properly imagined the scope of the size I will need to properly achieve this, but now I am thinking of something that is much larger. After I figure this out I will post my result.

Ok so I created a working warehouse that is not bottle necking anymore for those who are interested.

My incoming ore trains are 4-cars long and split into 3 drop off bays that each use 2 blue belts for unloading each train car. The three drop offs end up totaling 24 lanes going into steel chests for the actual warehouse of the material.

On the output there are 6:2 splitters that funnel all 24 lanes down into an 8:8 balancer. This is then split so that 4 belts go to each pickup station.

All of my outgoing trains are either 1 or 2 car trains.

Now at the moment this seems to be working and I added waiting bays (although they aren't really in use yet) to helpfully allow for this to scale as my factories grow, but we will see.

Awesome work!