That problem was the motivation to get rid of my old Furnace Stack and to a lesser extent also my old Steam Power Setup.
The Furnace Stack became a problem because it wouldn't produce Quality Stuff, so if i kept using it, procrastinating Electric Furnaces in the process, I would lose out on Quality Ingredients I could produce. So I needed some motivation to get rid of the thing instead of feeling the urge to keep using it.
At the same time, this very same Issue also applies to my Steam Setup, where I feel the urge to just keep it around, instead of upgrading to Solar, Oil or Nuclear, and then just routing another Coal Belt from some other Ore Patch into the Steam Setup and calling it a day, resulting in my Power supply simply becoming insufficient over time, having my base run at half power until i finally decide to... wait why the heck am i doubling the existing steam setup to fix this, NO I DON'T WANT THAT, I WANT TO UPGRADE DARNIT!!!
But how can we fix this Issue? I'll tell you how, by putting an expiration date on both of those things, so they cant be used again!
This artificial deadline will be supplied by the starter ore patches and their low yield. We will just build something that is only useful for those Ore Patches, and once they run out of Ore, good luck using that again without tearing it all apart!
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Therefore I present you, the very simple and basic On-Patch Mining-Furnace Array (remember to upgrade to Steel Furnaces once you get em)
- on-patch-smelting.png (1.29 MiB) Viewed 153 times
The singular piece of Coal every now and then blocking a spot on the belt CAN reduce Iron Plate throughput yes, but if you deploy this Setup you almost never get a full belt per row anyways (I had to U-turn the belt to check basic throughput), so it is fine earlygame.
The Coal is also flowing back into the spot where the inserter grabs it, in a way that cannot be blocked by coal overflow, resulting in a nice simple sushi. Just make sure the piece of coal enters on the side of the belt that is closer to the Inserter, otherwise it will pick up from the other side of the belt and it will get stuck horrendously.
It is easy to build too, and may even feel better to build than a boring Mining Belt with a separate Furnace Stack.
This Setup works just fine for Iron, Copper and Stone Patches, and leaves next to no desire of wanting to somehow reuse it, which is perfect!
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And now for the Power Station!
- on-patch-power.png (1.54 MiB) Viewed 153 times
Then we have the middle-right, which is just a bunch of Drills along a single Belt, covering the juicy center of the Ore Patch. This is where you get the Fuel for your Furnaces from along with enough Coal to get some Plastic and Grenades later on.
And the setup on the left two-thirds, which is Mining Drills direct inserting into Boilers, no Inserters necessary, and the Steam Engines can be placed anywhere reasonable since the 2.0 Fluid improvements fix throughput. Just make sure to keep them disconnected from the Coal Patch Setup.
What I like about this Setup is that the part of the Patch that is used for Boilers is not shared with the part that is used for Coal Output, and that it is a quite simple repeatable pattern you can easily build manually, since you usually wont have Bots at this point.
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And there we have it, Setups that will definitely expire once their Ore Patch runs out without any temptation to reuse their corpses whatsoever, therefore giving you a little bit more motivation to build proper new Setups right away instead of upgrading the old earlygame trash, while also being a less monotonous and refreshing experience to build.
I would love feedback on this, and more Ideas on how to have well done single-use Setups that will eventually force you upgrade your Base, without making you feel like doing the lazy solution instead.