Tutorial:Production line

This article describes the basics of setting up production lines, how to read the UI of buildings (such as input and output item rates), and how to calculate the buildings ratio.

TODO: more to be added

Reading building interface
A simple production line involves Miner -> Smelter -> Constructor -> Storage Container. In this example, all the buildings are in 1:1 ratio, as the item production and consumption rates are matched up perfectly (marked in red). Below each building is their UI, which can be accessed by standing near to a building then interact with it.

Miner
Miner extracts ores at a rate which depends on both the resource node's purity and the Miner's mark. The resource node's purity, either impure, normal or pure is fixed based on its location on the map. Higher marks of Miner can be unlocked at later Milestones which improve mining rate. In this example the Miner extracts 30 Iron Ores / min from the resource node below it.

Smelter
Smelter converts Ores into Ingots. In the above example, 30 Iron Ores are consumed every minute to produce 30 Iron Ingots every minute.

Constructor
Constructor crafts useful items out of Ingots. In the above example, every 3 Iron Ingots are consumed to craft 2 Iron Plates, notice the items after the Constructor are produced in groups of two. These numbers can be ignored in automated setups, as we should be looking for item consumption and production rates. The smaller numbers below the bold texts are the rates, which means 30 Iron Ingots are consumed per minute and 20 Iron Plates are consumed per minute.

Conveyor Belt
Conveyor Belts automatically transport items from one buildings to the next so you don't have to manually carry the items all the time. They have a rated item flow rate, so if higher item flow rate is required, consider using higher marks of Conveyor Belts, or by constructing multiple parallel belts. Else, the entire production line may get slowed down due to insufficient item flow.

Storage Container
The Storage Container in the above example is optional. Its purpose to store and buffer produced items so that the machines before it can run smoothly. Most of the production buildings can only store up to 1 stack of items at its output slot, and once it is full, the machine stops.

Overclocking
The speed of all the above machines can be altered with overclocking, which will be discussed at the section below.

Splitting and merging
Production chains rarely work in 1:1 building ratio; the example shown in the previous section is just a special case. If there is a mismatch in the buildings' ratio, the entire chain is slowed down proportionally to the slowest element in the chain. This reduces the efficiency and should be avoided.

To achieve 100% efficiency (as indicated by the '100%' at the lower right of each machine's UI), make sure the production rate from one machine matches the consumption rate of the next machine. And if they don't match, just build more machines until the numbers match.

Miner
A Miner Mk.1 on a normal Copper node extracts Copper Ores at 60/min.

Smelter
A Smelter consumes Copper Ores at only 30/min. To achieve 60/min consumption, build 2 of them. Use a Splitter to split the Conveyor Belt into two.

If only 1 Smelter is built, the Copper Ores produced by the Miner will not be consumed fast enough, and they will backlog into the Miner and causing it to run at only 50% of the time. This is equivalent to 50% efficiency.

Each Smelter produces Copper Ingots at 30/min.

Constructor (Wire)
Each Constructor consumes Copper Ingots at only 15/min. Similarly, split each of the Copper Ingot belt into two, this means 4 Constructors are required.

Each Constructor produces Wires at 30/min.

Constructor (Cable)
Each Constructor consumes Wires at 60/min. That means the Wires from a single Constructor will not be enough - we need two. To combine the output of two Constructors, use a Merger.

If only 1 Constructor crafting Wires is connected to the Constructor crafting Cable, the latter will only run at 50% of the time due insufficient input rate. This is equivalent to 50% efficiency.

Each Constructor produces Cables at 30/min.

Conveyor Belt
Conveyor Belt Mk.1 can only transport 60 items/min. In the above example, the belt carrying Copper Ores after the Miner, and the belt transporting Wires after the Mergers are operating at their maximum capacity.

Storage Container
A Storage Container is used to store each type of item. As a good practice, avoid mixing items in Storage Containers. A Merger is used to merge 2 Wire belts into 1 before the Container so that you don't have to build 2 Containers for Wires.