Send train straight back to the unloading station?

[Monskiller]

In my current setup, I have two trains that travel between two mining outposts and unload at stations with the same name, all of this on the same railway network.
The two outposts are fairly big and usually trains get fully loaded by visiting just one. Is it possible to send the train straight back to the unloading stations once it's full rather than passing by the second outposts?
I've been thinking about disabling outposts stations when train is full, but that might conflict with the second train.

[ftbreizhbugs]

Hi,
Keep yourself to one train per outpost: wait until full, go to unload, wait until empty ?

[mrvn]

You should have them always visit just one outpost and then unload. In your case a dedicated train for each outpost seems like the right solution but doesn't scale well.

So there a few things you can do to improve:

1) Wait for trains to be fully loaded/unloaded to reduce the number of trips.

2) For high throughput have 2/3/4 trains per mine. One loading, one unloading, one/two driving from A to B or waiting to be next. This needs enough waiting bays.

3) For lower throughput (my mines are usually slower than a train with the limit being how fast you can fill the buffer chests) you can name them all the same instead of using dedicated trains and only enable the station if it has a wagon load ready. For example I have 5 oil pump stations that enable only when they have 10000l oil. And one train with fluid wagon goes from "Oil Pump" to "Refinery". Usually all pumping stations are disabled and the train stays at the refinery. Every now and then one gets enabled and then the train goes at fetches the oil.

It works less well with multiple trains since then multiple trains will drive to the nearest station. One arrives first and wins. Since I disable the station when a train is present the rest will repath and potentially just go home empty again. If you have one station way up north and one way down south both going active that can mean two trains drive all the way up north and then one turns around and drives all the way back and then south. At least I haven't gotten it to work as I wish with multiple trains and multiple outpost. As said above they all go to the nearest outpost, one wins, the rest go to the nearest outpost again and so on. Imagine that with 20 trains.

But I recommend just having dedicated trains that wait to be fully loaded/unloaded unless one train is enough. Meaning do the station deactivating trick for oil and coal where a single train services the whole world. At least I haven't gotten it to work as I wish with multiple trains and multiple outpost. As said above they all go to the nearest outpost, one wins, the rest go to the nearest outpost again and so on. While

[Deadly-Bagel]

Hasn't 0.15 implemented disabling train stops? I haven't played with it as to me it's not a complete solution for the problem it was trying to solve but should work for what you want. Just disable the outpost until it needs resources, the train will either skip it to go to the other outpost or both outposts are disabled so it doesn't leave the loading area.

[twepy]

Hasn't 0.15 implemented disabling train stops? I haven't played with it as to me it's not a complete solution for the problem it was trying to solve but should work for what you want. Just disable the outpost until it needs resources, the train will either skip it to go to the other outpost or both outposts are disabled so it doesn't leave the loading area.

That doenst solve the question of the TS, lets say he implements conditions thats enable/disable stations on demand. When outpost 1 enables train 1 goes to outpost A and when its arrives you set the signal on red and disabled the station to prevent more trains going there. In the mean time outpost B enables to request a train, while train 2 moves towards it, train 1 has a full load and start moving moving towards outpost B because thats the next destination and its enabled. You cant disable the station on outpost B because it will send both trains back to station at the base. Factorio has no simple way to telling a train to skip a destination based on a certain condition like full inventory. My estimation would be that you can design and build a system that comes close, but it certainly not a easy one.

An easier solution like mrvn said is giving a train only two destinations, an outpost and base station.

[Distelzombie]

Isnt it possible to do this? Here:
In the outposts read the train contents and decide if is too full or not. If too full disable other outpost. Seems easy.
But i didnt knew you could disable train stations. Good to know.

[twepy]

That will work if you have only one train running around, if a second train is already moving towards the second outpost that train will return to base because the destination is disabled.

[Distelzombie]

I did understand it thusly (hehe) that he just uses one train for two outposts.

[Deadly-Bagel]

Ah, I misunderstood the first time. I thought he was delivering to two places but each train is collecting from two places and delivering to one. Therefore no, that wouldn't work, as I said it's an incomplete solution...

[Cyborg3201]

you can wire a signal in front of the train stop , so pathing won't go to that one , if there is a one available

make it so , to set to allow , if "item needed" is less then X

so it wont even go from its unloading / wait station if the resource is not needed

setup needs lots of red/green wire ,and some combinators with logic , and a hook up to either logistic network or "train unload / hold" chest , to check the need for resources
have not played with 0.15 train stop signals

but this worked fine for 0.14. (~20 trains, 5 to 20 outpost i think it was)
but i kept the full loaded train in the wait area, so less time was needed when the resources where needed at the main factory

[mrvn]

you can wire a signal in front of the train stop , so pathing won't go to that one , if there is a one available

make it so , to set to allow , if "item needed" is less then X

so it wont even go from its unloading / wait station if the resource is not needed

setup needs lots of red/green wire ,and some combinators with logic , and a hook up to either logistic network or "train unload / hold" chest , to check the need for resources
have not played with 0.15 train stop signals

but this worked fine for 0.14. (~20 trains, 5 to 20 outpost i think it was)
but i kept the full loaded train in the wait area, so less time was needed when the resources where needed at the main factory

In my experience that just increases the cost of the train stop. If the way to the other stop also has a red signal or maybe is just too far away then trains still choose the train stop. And then they are blocked at the signal before the train stop and block everything else.

[SpeedDaemon]

Since you only have two trains running, you could maybe improve things a little bit, anyway...

If your schedule is OutpostA, OutpostB, Base:

Set it up so that when a train at OutpostA becomes full, disable OutpostB for 2 seconds only if there is also a train unloading at Base (since you know it's not currently heading to OutpostB). That should get the train at OutpostA to skip B and go straight home.

This sort of scheme could probably be made to work for more than two outposts, and maybe even more than two trains, as long as you can account for the whereabouts of all the trains somehow.

[mrvn]

Since you only have two trains running, you could maybe improve things a little bit, anyway...

If your schedule is OutpostA, OutpostB, Base:

Set it up so that when a train at OutpostA becomes full, disable OutpostB for 2 seconds only if there is also a train unloading at Base (since you know it's not currently heading to OutpostB). That should get the train at OutpostA to skip B and go straight home.

This sort of scheme could probably be made to work for more than two outposts, and maybe even more than two trains, as long as you can account for the whereabouts of all the trains somehow.

The "only if there is also a train unloading at Base" part is the problem, doesn't scale. See viewtopic.php?f=194&t=48180 for a better solution to specifically direct trains when you have more trains.

[Monskiller]

Thank you everyone for the replies!

I've looked more into the situation and there doesn't seem to be an easy solution. Disabling stations would mess up the other trains that's en-route and any complications to workaround don't feel worthwhile.
Hopefully with patches we'll be allowed to send trains to specific stops with circuits.