Official Factorio Wiki - User contributions [en]

Asteroids

2025-01-10T15:16:58Z

Alanur99: /* Asteroid Types */

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{{Stub}}
{{About/Space age}}
[[File:asteroids_anim.gif|right]]'''Asteroids''' are floating minerals found in space. There are four types of asteroids in [[Space Age]]: metallic, carbon, oxide and promethium. Promethium asteroids are only encountered at the [[Shattered planet|Shattered Planet]]. Asteroids are immediately seen when the [[player]] is present at a [[space platform]]. If a space station is being boosted through space with a [[thruster]], asteroids are encountered much faster. When an [[asteroid collector]] is present at a space station, small [[Asteroids#Asteroid Chunks|asteroid chunks]] can be collected for its chunks of resources. The resources collected from asteroid chunks can be fed into a [[crusher]], grinding the chunks into useful resources.

When traveling through space, the space platform can enter a dangerous asteroid field, where many asteroids can hit the player's platform and destroy it. This means that [[turret]]s with well-stocked ammunition and asteroid collectors should be properly placed around a platform to ward off the asteroids.

The density of asteroids can be seen by going to the [[Remote view]] > '''Surfaces''' > '''Space Map''' and alt-clicking on the interplanetary route to bring up the route in Factoriopedia, or by searching "route". The graph will show a white vertical line overlay on the asteroid graph corresponding to the ship's position when underway.

== Asteroid Types ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Name !! Description !! Health !! [[Damage#Resistance|Resistances]] !! Worst enemy
|-
| Asteroid Chunks
| Harmless.

Do not have health and are instantly destroyed on contact with the space platform.

| N/A
| N/A
| [[Asteroid collector]]
|-
| Small Asteroids
| Do not spawn naturally. Produce chunks on destruction.

Does small damage on contact with the space platform.

| 100

|
*Electric: 100%
*Explosion: 50%
*Fire: 100%
*Laser: 20%

| [[Laser turret]]
|-
| Medium Asteroids
| Spawn in space and in orbit of planets other than [[Nauvis]]. Split into small asteroids when destroyed.

Does medium damage. Can destroy several foundations before expiring. Heavily resistant to laser damage.

| 400

|
*Electric: 100%
*Explosion: 30%
*Fire: 100%
*Laser: 90%
*Physical: 10%

| [[Gun turret]]
|-
| Big Asteroids
| Spawn in space beyond [[Fulgora]] and [[Gleba]]. Split into medium asteroids when destroyed.
Practically immune to physical and laser damage

Does large amount of damage. Can go right through the space platform destroying everything on its path. <br>Because of the high flat physical resistance, [[gun turret]]s are ineffective against them, and has an even higher laser resistance than it's medium counterpart.

| 2000

|
*Electric: 100%
*Explosion: 10%
*Fire: 100%
*Laser: 95%
*Physical: 2000/10%

| [[Rocket turret]]
|-
| Huge Asteroids
| Spawn in space beyond [[Aquilo]]. Split into large asteroids when destroyed.

Will absolutely destroy the space platform.

| 5000

|
*Electric: 100%
*Explosion: 99%
*Fire: 100%
*Laser: 99%
*Physical: 3000/10%
| [[Railgun turret]]

|}
'''Note:''' Promethium Asteroids have twice the health of the three standard asteroid types (200/800/4000/10000)

== Asteroid Chunks ==
'''Asteroid chunks''' are the smallest asteroids in the game, serving as the sole resource source in space. Due to their size and low mass, these small chunks will not damage the player's space platform when colliding with it, as larger asteroids do. They will also slowly gravity to the space platform, as if the platform has a gravitational pull, making it easier to collect them. To maintain sustainability, space platforms should be equipped with both [[asteroid collector]] and [[crusher]]. These chunks come in four distinct varieties, each of which can be processed into valuable materials using crushers. [[Advanced_asteroid_processing_(research)|Advanced asteroid processing research]] unlocks the ability to extract additional materials from these chunks.

{| class="wikitable"
|+ Asteroid Processing
|-
! [[Asteroids]] !! Processed Into !! Advanced Processing
|-
| {{IconLink|Metallic asteroid chunk}} {{SA}}|| {{IconLink|Iron ore}}|| {{IconLink|Copper ore}}
|-
| {{IconLink|Carbonic asteroid chunk}} {{SA}}|| {{IconLink|Carbon}} {{SA}}|| {{IconLink|Sulfur}}
|-
| {{IconLink|Oxide asteroid chunk}} {{SA}}|| {{IconLink|Ice}} {{SA}}|| {{IconLink|Calcite}} {{SA}}
|-
| {{IconLink|Promethium asteroid chunk}} {{SA}}|| cannot be processed, is a component to the [[promethium science pack]] {{SA}}. || -
|}

== Gallery ==
<gallery>
File:metallic_asteroid_entity.png|Metallic asteroids.
File:carbonic_asteroid_entity.png|Carbonic asteroids.
File:oxide_asteroid_entity.png|Oxide asteroids.
File:promethium_asteroid_entity.png|Promethium asteroids.
</gallery>

{{SpaceNav}}
{{C|Resource extraction}}

Rocket turret

2025-01-08T22:03:25Z

Alanur99: did not take into account the 10% resist

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{{:Infobox:Rocket turret}}
{{Stub}}
{{About/Space age}}

The '''rocket turret''' is a powerful defensive building capable of firing [[rocket]]s and [[explosive rocket]]s at high range. It is unlocked with [[agricultural science pack]]s{{SA}} which can be crafted on [[Gleba]]{{SA}}. The rocket turret has a minimum range, so it is best paired with other turrets that can pick off enemies who get too close. Its high range and damage make it particularly effective against large [[asteroids]]{{SA}} in space and stompers on Gleba. To maximize the turrets effectiveness the player should ensure the turret is facing the general direction you wish for it to fire once placed, as its rotational speed is fairly slow.

== Notes ==
* Rocket turrets can fire all kinds of rocket ammo, including [[atomic bomb]]s and [[capture bot rocket]]s{{SA}}. However, when firing atomic bombs, rocket turrets do ''not'' get the usual range increase that the hand-held rocket launcher or Spidertrons get. This means the turret will be very close to or inside of the blast radius.
* When firing capture bot rockets, a rocket turret will exclusively target biter and spitter [[spawners]], overriding any target priorities it may have.
** If a rocket turret empty on ammo is targeting a non-spawner enemy when it is loaded with capture rockets, then its first shot will fire on that enemy, wasting the rocket.
* When having a line of rocket turrets, weak spots are covered by other rocket turrets.
* To one-shot big [[asteroids]] (except for promethium asteroids) using standard [[rocket]]s, [[Stronger explosives (research)]] level 23 is required.

== History ==
{{history|2.0.7|
* Introduced in [[Space Age]]{{SA}} expansion.
}}

== See also ==
* [[Gleba]]{{SA}}
* [[Rocket]]

{{CombatNav}}
{{C|Defense}}

Tutorial:Transport use cases

2025-01-08T22:01:35Z

Alanur99: /* Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots */

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{{DISPLAYTITLE:What Transport for which case?|noerror}}
This page compares the three main [[transport]] methods: [[Belt transport system]] (conveyor belts), [[railway]] (trains) and [[Logistic robot|logistic robots]]. There are two more useful methods to transport items: the character's inventory and the [[car]]. (Especially the car has an extremely high capacity and can be used instead of trains. Of course you need to drive everything yourself; see the chapter about the car).

The best choice depends on the context in which they are used. For example on the amount of resources you need to transport, or how far away they are.

== Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width=10% |
! width=30% | Belts
! width=30% | Trains
! width=30% | Logistic Robots
|-
| Throughput
| Constant, low for one belt, precisely calculable, limited
| Extremely high, fast, not easily calculable but constant, nearly unlimited if enough space,
| High in small areas, not calculable/chaotic, unlimited if enough bots, cannot be optimized, terrible over long distances and bulk goods
|-
| Extensibility
| Low. It is impossible to use existing belts lines - it is necessary to build a completely new belt from A to B.
| Medium. Stations A and B can be connected to any place of the existing railway line. There is no need to pull a separate line - trains will go along the existing one. Also, by loading trains with better fuel or making them longer, it is possible to improve throughput without building new lines.
| High. Chests A and B can be placed anywhere on the network, including using existing ones.
|-
| Flexibility
| High. Small size and underground belts let to transport items from almost anywhere to anywhere, except in the most densely built areas. Bellissimo.
| Moderate. On main line you can transport every item you need from anywhere to anywhere. However, require lot of space for stations, intersections and turnarounds. The possibilities to build a line over existing buildings without major remodeling are extremely limited.
| Close to infinity. To deliver an item, a minimum of 2 cells are required (chest and inserter). As a bonus, there are no restrictions on the variety of items carried - you can request as many types as you need in one chest.
|-
| Space required
| Small for simple products, large for complicated product chains
| Large due to train stations and bends. There is a difference in using [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35806 roll-on-roll-off stations (lot of space) or termini (much smaller)].
| Small for complex products.
|-
| Optimization
| Highly optimizable. Source of never ending fun.
| Seldom really needed – better rebuild or build more tracks. For larger networks you can get some trouble with deadlocks/gridlocks, if not optimized, using chain signals. Optimize train stations: connect either with belts (complex) or with logistic bots (recommended).
| Optimize placing of roboports (for charging) and used number of ports vs. number of bots in the air.
|-
| Parallelization
| High. Two parallel belts have the doubled throughput as one. Cost is also only double. On the other hand: Effort to build that doubles.
| Extreme. Two parallel tracks with one-head trains can transport 5–10 times more trains than one with two-head, because if a track is blocked the trains can choose the other free track and so they don't need to stop. The effort to build two tracks in parallel is lower than double.
| Not so good. Doubling the amount of bots from one to two surely doubles the throughput, but doubling robots from 500 to 1000 can result in complete chaos.
|-
| Initial costs
| Very small as long as conveyor belts are short. Still good with parallel belts. Larger when making fast transport belts. Expensive with express; which should be used for special cases only.
| Considerable amount of material is needed for locomotive at early game. Pennies for mid and late game. Small costs (when compared to the increase of transport) for making rails.
| Roboports and especially bots require a lot of resources to make. Logistic bot upgrades are very expensive, but needed and must be calculated into the total costs. Maintenance costs a lot of time.
|-
| Use of energy
| Gratis. Free. Always an object of discussion. ;)
| Low. The usage of fuel is currently very affordable.
| High. The roboports need a lot of energy and the bots take even more energy, as more are in the air. This can be a big problem, but is normally not an issue.
|-
| Items in transit vs. duration of transport
| Bad. 100 tiles of belts stores about 700 items if fully loaded, but takes with basic belts 56 seconds for transport. With express belt, this is only 3 times faster.
| Very good. Lot of items transported in very short time.
| Chaotic. When jammed it can happen that the most important items are unreachable in the air.
|-
| Maintenance costs
| None
| Some fuel needed
| Considerable amount of electricity needed
|-
| Pollution
| None
| Some
| None, indirectly caused by use of electricity.
|-
| Best used for
| High throughput, bulk-goods (ores, some intermediates), small to medium distance. Examples include raw materials and simple products.
| High throughput, long distance, one type of cargo. Examples include transporting ores or plates from resource fields to main factory area. Supply of outposts (train with drones, repair packs, diesel and ammo).
| Extremely high throughput over very short distances (< 50 tiles), low to medium throughput over medium distance (50–500), rare transportation over long distance. Products needed in smaller quantities but many types like placeable structures (mall), or fuel for locomotives (if refueling is not done at a separate station). Unbeatable for train station (loading/unloading chests).
|-
| Most annoying problems
| Left/right lane problems (part of the game), splitting off the right amount of items.
| Deadlock situations (in complicated crossings), complex train-station and signal setup, traffic jams (especially when train was partially eaten by biters and remaining wagons block the whole line)
| Blocking of roboports by waiting for charging, "stupid" behavior like far away bots are used, instead of near and vice versa, Robots that take a "shortcut" through [[Enemies|Biter]]-infested territory.
|-
| UPS eaten per transported item (relevant only for weak hardware or when science per minute is measured in five-digit numbers)
| Varies. Long, partially loaded lines and large number of inserters and balancers on line eat more. Short, fully loaded lines with the minimum required number of balancers and small number of inserters on line eat less.
| Low.
| High.

|}

== Experts ==

=== Belts ===

* Practical up to distances of 500 tiles (to compare: a radar station watches up to 200 tiles, with a 100-tile "radius").
* Useful for connecting small resource-fields to the factory area, as the throughput of a belt is limited to 900 items per minute on a fully-compressed basic belt. With fast or express belt, this is higher (up to 2700) but the price is gigantic. Using multiple parallel belts is costly, but with basic belts still affordable over long distances.
* Best for working within an automated facility for '''bulk goods''', e.g. transporting ore, plates, circuit boards, etc. over short or medium distances.
* Store, over long distances, a not to be underestimated number of items (8 per tile, with two lanes, fills 500 tiles with 4000 items!). This storage is out of reach and could be counted as wasted, until it is transported.

Note: the length of 500 tiles is just a "rule of thumb", and comes from these facts:
* It takes nearly 5 minutes (4.44) for an item to run from one end to the other on 500 tiles of [[transport belt]]s.
* A belt with 500 tiles stores 4000 items (a [[cargo wagon]] of resources).
* The fact that after about this length it makes sense to use a train.

The advantages of belts are:
* Belts have a constant throughput rate.
* Calculations are easily possible (such as "Do I need more belts to transport items from the mines?")
* Basic belts are cheap compared with tracks and and are easier to build
* You can easily see how many items are on the belt, which makes it easier to assess if you need more throughput.
* You can use the belt as an open storage: you can store 80 items in a length of 10 belts, when using both lanes (but for long belts this is a big disadvantage!)

Disadvantages:
* Limited transport capacity, due to the limited throughput.
* Slow. This is a problem with very long belts because it takes a while to fill the belt. The items on the belt cannot be used. A belt with length of 100 holds 714 items for 56 seconds. With trains this is much lower (10 seconds) and as long as they are not loaded into a wagon, they still can be used.
* Items on the belts are "lost items" until they are transported.

Belts have the best short-distance throughput for continuous, direct-to-factory transportation. '''This is especially true, if you use basic belts in parallel, because this combination has an incredibly high throughput at low costs.

=== Trains ===

* Trains should be used to transport items from big and distant resource fields. No other means of long distance transport is as fast as trains. A single train line can easily be built; however, planning an extensive railway setup can be difficult and time consuming. One clever way of placing rails is entering a locomotive and placing the rails in front of it using the [[rail planner]].
* Trains can be used to connect separate factories together over long distances. This additionally lets you 'take a ride' out to outposts that require attention.

By smelting ore locally and shipping the plates via train, you can double your wagon capacity and route directly to a storage yard or factory.

=== Logistic robots ===

* Logistic robots should be used in a limited area with dense building placement. In most cases this is the main factory area. With some updates the logistic bots can handle enormous amounts of items.
* Bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods: It's not a good idea use bots for ore-transport or from/to furnaces. It is possible to use them for this task, but don't hold your breath for this to work perfectly; there are several issues with the AI that cause them to work inefficiently more often than not. Some players take that problem as a challenge.
* They do a perfect job on bulk-goods, if they can charge between their jobs, which is the case on train-stations: Train comes in, train is unloaded, bots transports to the target chests, bots charge. Next train comes in.
* Bots do a perfect job if you use them for random transport of expensive products; transport intermediate products to where they're needed within the local network, especially if it's completely impractical to route a belt for the job.

Bots, while great at moving sparse items with slow production speeds, are a very costly thing to integrate with high-volume affairs like mining/smelting because they need frequent breaks to recharge.

The exception is the incredible benefit they offer to train stations because of the space-logistical challenge of routing and load-balancing belts around the train tracks, especially since it isn't necessarily 'constant flow', offering them time to recharge.

== Seeing from throughput side ==

A (basic, yellow) [[transport belt]] cannot transport more than 900 items per minute and an [[express transport belt]] (the fastest) not more than 2700 (see above). Now compare that with a locomotive: a [[cargo wagon]] can deliver 2000 items (ores) '''per wagon'''! And if you smelt the resources at your outpost and transport intermediate plates (copper, iron) you can transport 4000 per wagon. So when speaking in terms of throughput, you need to swap to trains or make multiple parallel belts.

One might think this picture would change when you develop [[logistic robot]]s. But that is not true! They can't be beaten for relatively small areas, especially with their researched bonuses, and they have some kind of intelligence; they try to deliver all requests as equally as possible. But bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods. Here are some calculations, which explain the problem (all calculations are assumed with full upgrade for the logistic bots!):

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 50 tiles you need:
Robot speed: 3 tiles/sec (basic speed) × 1.4 (logistic speed bonus) = 4.2 tiles/sec
Needed time for one transport: 100 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 24 secs
Need robots per minute: 24 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 0.4 bots to transport one item per minute over 50 tiles.
Because of Logistic robot cargo: 0.4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 0.1 bots to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 0.1 bots/per item = 300 bots
300 is a high, but still very realistic number for a logistic network with 4-5 roboports.

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 500 tiles you need:
Needed time for one transport: 1000 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 240 secs
Need robots per minute: 240 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 4 bots to transport one item per minute over 500 tiles.
Because of logistic robot cargo: 4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 1 bot to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 1 bots/per item = 3000 bots

3000 bots need a quite big amount of resources to produce, not accounting for the needed research (for bots, speed/stack size bonuses), number of roboports and the needed energy.

That leaves belts and trains.

Trains are faster than belts and offer better logistic control as you go between logistic networks.

Belts simply take forever, and you may wind up with a lot of asset tied up with simply being 'in transit'. You should see items sitting on a belt as "non-useable storage". Backed up belts can be a good thing for buffer space, but long belts are just inefficient, or better: You lose the control over the other end, due to the long gap; the resources on the other side could be long depleted, but you see it only five minutes later.

The effort to squeeze out the last 20% of belt performance increases depending on distance and total amount and at some point the train will win. But in your central factory area the bots will never be beaten. On the other hand: in small areas, and for simple throughput of one type of item (iron ore to iron-plates for example) we can place some belts in parallel, which is cheap and efficient (uses no energy) and when using parallel belts can achieve enormous throughput. For later game, the [[fast transport belt]] is a good compromise between cost and efficiency, and the [[Express transport belt]]s should be use only for short sections.

The amount of robots you need is directly dependent on the density you build. The central part of your factory should be dense, because not only throughput is important here, but also speed: How fast can an item be produced in total (including the transportation time).

== See also ==

* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3948 Discussion about using conveyor belts vs. trains]. There are some interesting tips in this thread.
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5478 More trains vs. longer trains]
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5715 Deciding which items to re-make and which to keep on belts?]
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Tutorial:Scrap recycling strategies

2025-01-06T04:09:52Z

Alanur99:

Unlike with most other resources, processing [[scrap]] yields a variety of items, which is the most reliable source of obtaining most resources on [[Fulgora]] (aside from importing goods from other planets via the [[space platform]]). So it is important to understand how to use [[scrap]] on [[Fulgora]] to build a factory capable of crafting [[Electromagnetic science pack]]s and launching them into space.

= Recycling Fundamentals =
[[Scrap]] can be gathered from [[Fulgoran ruin]]s or by mining patches of scrap scattered throughout [[Fulgora]]. Scrap can be recycled by hand or with the [[Recycler]]. But before this can be done, the player will need to mine a [[Fulgoran vault ruin]] by hand to unlock the recycling recipe and the Recycler. Mining scrap with mining drills and recycling them with the Recycler is the most effective means of building a factory on Fulgora. The Recycler has an output; it can output its products directly onto a belt or into other entities, like the [[Active provider chest]] or even other Recyclers. Strategies for dealing with excess products is discussed later in this tutorial.

== What is each recycled product used for? ==
Recycling scrap produces 12 different items, with [[Holmium ore]] and [[Low density structure]] being the most rare product, and [[Iron gear wheel]] being the most common. Of the 12 different items, three of them serve a singular purpose:
* [[Ice]] is melted into [[water]]
* [[Solid fuel]] is combined with [[light oil]] to make [[rocket fuel]].
* [[Holmium ore]] is combined with water and [[stone]] to make [[holmium solution]].

Water has various uses but it should be relatively easy to move around with [[pipe]]s. Rocket Fuel is mainly used to craft [[Rocket part]]s, but it can be used as fuel for your trains on Fulgora or burnt to provide power. Light oil is needed to produce rocket fuel, which is cracked from [[heavy oil]] and water. Heavy oil is a limitless resource on Fulgora and it is pumped from the [[Oil ocean]] by using an [[offshore pump]].

The remaining 9 items produced by scrap recycling are used as ingredients for other products, as crafting components for rocket parts, or further recycled into their respective ingredients; some items can only be obtained this way. While each item can be recycled, only the necessary recyclable items for building a factory capable of crafting science packs on Fulgora are mentioned below.
* [[Processing unit]]s are used as rocket parts, as ingredients for the Recycler and [[Electromagnetic plant]], and it can be recycled into [[electronic circuit]]s.
* [[Advanced circuit]]s can be recycled for [[electronic circuit]]s and [[plastic bar]]s.
* [[Low density structure]]s are used as rocket parts and can be recycled for [[copper plate]]s and [[plastic bar]]s.
* [[Concrete]] is mostly used to craft [[Refined concrete]], but it is also used to craft the Recycler. Concrete can be recycled into [[stone brick]]s. The only purpose of stone bricks is to craft the [[Lightning rod]].
* [[Battery|Batteries]] are used to craft [[Accumulator]]s and [[Supercapacitor]]s. It can be recycled down to copper plates and [[iron plate]]s.
* [[Copper cable]] can be recycled for [[copper plate]]s.
* [[Iron gear wheel]]s can be recycled for [[iron plate]]s.
* [[Steel]] is mostly used to craft [[Refined concrete]], but it is also used to craft the Recycler and Electromagnetic plant.
* [[Stone]] is used to craft [[holmium solution]] and [[Electrolyte]].

=== Other necessary ingredients ===
Electronic circuits, plastic bars, copper plates, iron plates, and stone bricks are are only obtained by recycling a recycled scrap.
* [[Electronic circuit]]s are most easily obtained from processing units, but obtaining them from advance circuits is also a viable way since advance circuits are slightly more common and don't serve any purpose other than to being recycled. Electronic circuits are mainly used for crafting [[Supercapacitor]]s.
* [[Plastic bar]]s are most easily obtained from low density structures, but advance circuits is also a good source for the same reasons listed in the above point. Plastic bars are mainly used to craft [[Superconductor]]s.
* [[Copper plate]]s are most easily obtained from low density structures, but being one of the most rare scrap product, it may be better to recycle any of the three circuits down to copper plates (with electronic circuits having the best yields), or by recycling batteries or copper cable.
* [[Iron plate]]s are best obtained from recycling iron gear wheels simply because iron gear wheels are so abundant.
* [[Stone brick]]s are only obtained from concrete and only are needed for crafting lightning rods.

With these items, the player has everything needed to craft all the necessary intermediate products in order to craft Fulgora's science pack and launch it into space!

= Getting rid of excess ingredients =
Scrap recycling will never yield the exact distribution of items that players might need. With scrap recycling, this is a problem; unlike on Nauvis, where having enough iron will simply pause iron production and nothing else, to pause production of one scrap recycling product is to pause scrap recycling altogether. In other words, if not every item produced by scrap recycling is consumed, then the belts will backup, and scrap recycling is stopped from producing any items at all.

Unfortunately, it is not always possible to use every item that scrap recycling produces. Some items have a limited set of applications that are not always relevant. Other times, you will need more of one item than another, causing an imbalance in what items are consumed.

When an item has no other uses, it may therefore be necessary to destroy it outright. There is a way to do this: When trying to recycle an item that has no recyclable recipe, a Recycler will output the item itself with a 25% probability, leaving a 75% probability of destroying it. By looping the output of such a Recycler back into itself, it is possible to completely destroy these items.

Be warned that scrap, while bountiful on some islands, is still a finite resource that can run out if wasted carelessly. And if all items produced by recycling have drains that simply destroy the items, it is possible to consume scrap even when the factory does not need it.

== Efficiently trashing excess ==

Some items produced directly or indirectly from scrap recycling have long crafting times. Especially bad is steel, which in an unmoduled recycler takes 2 seconds to recycle one steel, or 2.66 seconds in total considering the 25% chance of not destroying it.

Some of these slow-to-recycle products can be crafted into other items at higher rates than they can be recycled. Steel can be turned into steel chests at 20 steel per second inside an unmoduled normal yellow assembler. This can then in-turn be recycled back down to steel even more quickly due to the 16x recycling speedup. Considering the recycling yield, a yellow assembler without modules can handle 15 steel per second, and a recycler 96, compared to a recycler for steel which handles 0.375 steel per second.

Some such shortcuts are (speed comparison assuming one assembler and recycler at crafting speeds 1.25 and 0.5):
* [[Steel plate|Steel]] to [[steel chest]] (40x speedup)
* [[Iron plate|Iron]] to [[iron chest]] (8x speedup)
* [[Concrete]] to [[hazard concrete]] (6.25x speedup)
* [[Stone]] to [[landfill]] (10.42x speedup), note that landfill is unrecyclable so needs to be looped back into the recycler not the assembler
* [[Stone brick|Bricks]] to [[wall]]s (5x speedup)

[[Copper plate|Copper]] to [[copper cable]] is the same speed as direct recycling. Mixing in copper with steel at 2:1 to make [[heat pipe]]s is a 10x speedup, as long as enough steel is trashed together with the copper.

== Low-priority production ==
As an alternative to outright destroying the excess items, it may be possible to turn them into something that might be useful later, so that the items are not completely wasted. For example, instead of recycling all excess steel, the player could instead craft steel chests for additional storage, or [[Substation]]s to expand the electric grid at a later point. The point is not to make something that the player will need right away, as that is the job of the main production lines. Rather, it is to be seen as a bonus that players might want but do not need.

It should be noted that even these products will eventually fill up all storage and cause backups in the production line, meaning that destroying items might still become necessary in the long term.

Inserting [[quality module]]s into Recyclers is another way to manage excess ingredients while also obtaining higher quality items without simply recycling items to destruction. Producing higher quality items can consume a lot of ingredients and are often nice to have without being outright necessary.

= Other tips and tricks =

== Recycling with quality modules ==
The recycler does not accept [[productivity module]]s. This is to prevent a net positive of items from being created when crafting and recycling items in a loop. However, this rejection of productivity modules in Recyclers also applies to scrap recycling, even though there is no way to re-craft scrap from the results of recycling. In exchange, the game offers infinite research for increasing the productivity of scrap recycling, specifically. This all means that players are free to use a different kind of module, such as quality modules, without worrying about the loss of productivity.

Players may chose to place quality modules in their scrap Recyclers and sort the items by quality, sending [[File:Quality normal.png|15px|link=]]normal items to the main factory and using higher-quality items for a head start in quality manufacturing.

However, players should keep in mind that, much like productivity, quality modules benefit from long production chains, as it increases the number of chances for item quality to be increased. Even after sorting away all [[File:Quality normal.png|15px|link=]]normal items, only 10% of the remaining items will be [[File:Quality rare.png|15px|link=]]rare or higher, as the probability of skipping a quality tier will always be 10% regardless of modules.

It should also be noted that [[File:Quality uncommon.png|15px|link=]]uncommon or higher [[holmium ore]] is not actually better than [[File:Quality normal.png|15px|link=]]normal holmium ore, because its sole use is to be used as an ingredient for [[holmium solution]], which is a fluid and therefore ignore the quality of the holmium ore.

Rocket turret

2025-01-03T15:21:58Z

Alanur99: /* Notes */

{{Languages}}
{{:Infobox:Rocket turret}}
{{Stub}}
{{About/Space age}}

The '''rocket turret''' is a powerful defensive building capable of firing [[rocket]]s and [[explosive rocket]]s at high range. It is unlocked with [[agricultural science pack]]s{{SA}} which can be crafted on [[Gleba]]{{SA}}. The rocket turret has a minimum range, so it is best paired with other turrets that can pick off enemies who get too close. Its high range and damage make it particularly effective against large [[asteroids]]{{SA}} in space and stompers on Gleba. To maximize the turrets effectiveness the player should ensure the turret is facing the general direction you wish for it to fire once placed, as its rotational speed is fairly slow.

== Notes ==
* Rocket turrets can fire all kinds of rocket ammo, including [[atomic bomb]]s and [[capture bot rocket]]s{{SA}}. However, when firing atomic bombs, rocket turrets do ''not'' get the usual range increase that the hand-held rocket launcher or Spidertrons get. This means the turret will be very close to or inside of the blast radius.
* When firing capture bot rockets, a rocket turret will exclusively target biter and spitter [[spawners]], overriding any target priorities it may have.
** If a rocket turret empty on ammo is targeting a non-spawner enemy when it is loaded with capture rockets, then its first shot will fire on that enemy, wasting the rocket.
* When having a line of rocket turrets, weak spots are covered by other rocket turrets.
* Rocket turret with yellow missiles and stronger explosives 20 researched results in one-shot of large asteroids (except promethium ones).

== History ==
{{history|2.0.7|
* Introduced in [[Space Age]]{{SA}} expansion.
}}

== See also ==
* [[Gleba]]{{SA}}
* [[Rocket]]

{{CombatNav}}
{{C|Defense}}

Rocket turret

2025-01-03T15:15:20Z

Alanur99: /* Notes */

{{Languages}}
{{:Infobox:Rocket turret}}
{{Stub}}
{{About/Space age}}

The '''rocket turret''' is a powerful defensive building capable of firing [[rocket]]s and [[explosive rocket]]s at high range. It is unlocked with [[agricultural science pack]]s{{SA}} which can be crafted on [[Gleba]]{{SA}}. The rocket turret has a minimum range, so it is best paired with other turrets that can pick off enemies who get too close. Its high range and damage make it particularly effective against large [[asteroids]]{{SA}} in space and stompers on Gleba. To maximize the turrets effectiveness the player should ensure the turret is facing the general direction you wish for it to fire once placed, as its rotational speed is fairly slow.

== Notes ==
* Rocket turrets can fire all kinds of rocket ammo, including [[atomic bomb]]s and [[capture bot rocket]]s{{SA}}. However, when firing atomic bombs, rocket turrets do ''not'' get the usual range increase that the hand-held rocket launcher or Spidertrons get. This means the turret will be very close to or inside of the blast radius.
* When firing capture bot rockets, a rocket turret will exclusively target biter and spitter [[spawners]], overriding any target priorities it may have.
** If a rocket turret empty on ammo is targeting a non-spawner enemy when it is loaded with capture rockets, then its first shot will fire on that enemy, wasting the rocket.
* When having a line of rocket turrets, weak spots are covered by other rocket turrets.
* Rocket turret with yellow missiles and stronger explosives 19 researched results in one-shot of large asteroids (except promethium ones).

== History ==
{{history|2.0.7|
* Introduced in [[Space Age]]{{SA}} expansion.
}}

== See also ==
* [[Gleba]]{{SA}}
* [[Rocket]]

{{CombatNav}}
{{C|Defense}}

Flamethrower turret

2024-11-15T07:34:39Z

Alanur99:

{{Languages}}
{{:Infobox:Flamethrower turret}}
'''Flamethrower turrets''' work similarly to the [[flamethrower]], setting [[enemies]] and the ground on fire and doing damage over time. Unlike gun and laser turrets, they have a limited firing arc, and should therefore be placed at choke points or behind walls. They can use crude, heavy, or light oil as ammunition, which must be provided via a pipe connected to the turret. Flamethrower turrets gain a damage bonus depending on the type of oil supplied to them. This bonus is multiplicative, it stacks with the bonus damage from research.

{| class="wikitable"
! Ammunition !! Effect
|-
|{{IconLink|Crude oil}} ||100% Damage
|-
|{{IconLink|Heavy oil}} ||105% Damage
|-
|{{IconLink|Light oil}} ||110% Damage
|}

Unlike the laser and gun turrets, flamethrower turrets do not have a instantaneously hitting projectile, instead firing a stream of flame directly at where the target was at the time of firing. This means that they have a tendency to miss the targeted biter in an attacking group, instead hitting the ones behind.

Flamethrower turrets are very powerful because biters and spitters do not have fire resistance and the total 3000 damage dealt to ignited enemies is a guaranteed death sentence for almost anything in the game. An enemy unit is ignited if it is hit directly by a flame stream. Flamethrower turrets will target the closest non ignited enemy and then once all enemies within range are ignited they will target the closest enemy.

The bonus technologies and fuel damage bonus for the flamethrower turret improve the contact damage and damage dealt by fire on the ground. The bonus technologies also affect the damage dealt to ignited enemies, which lasts 30 seconds and deals 100 damage per second without upgrades.

While it is not apparent from the damage bonus descriptions, the flamethrower turret benefits from the damage bonus for the flamethrower turret and the damage bonus for flamethrower ammo, applied multiplicatively, e.g. with the first level of refined flammables it receives a +44% bonus, not +20%, with all pre-space upgrades it receives +576% damage, not +160%. This is because the flamethrower turret is defined as using "flamethrower" type ammo and it allows the damage output of the flamethrower turret to keep up with laser and gun turrets, which also benefit from two or more separate upgrades.

Flamethrower turrets create fire on the ground which lasts 2 seconds by default. If the turret keeps firing at that spot, the size of the fire increases, it will last up to 30 seconds and its damage is increased up to 6 times, depending on how long the turret keeps firing at that spot. Multiple flamethrower turrets firing at the same location do not cause the fire to intensify faster as there is a 4 tick cooldown between intensity increases, while even a single flamethrower turret fires every 2 ticks.

=== Gleba ===

[[Gleba]] does not provide access to crude oil, light oil, or heavy oil. However, flamethrower turrets can still be used - either by importing barrels of oil directly, or by importing a small amount of heavy oil and using [[Coal liquefaction]].

=== Vulcanus ===

Using flamethrower turrets is pointless - local fauna has 100% fire resistance.

== History ==
{{History|2.0.7|
* All turrets (except for artillery) can now be configured individually to prioritize certain types of enemies when looking for targets.
}}

{{history|0.17.33|
* Added out of fuel alert icon to flamethrower turrets.}}

{{history|0.13.0|
*Introduced.
*Damage upgrade technology introduced.}}

== See also ==
* [[Gun turret]]
* [[Laser turret]]

{{CombatNav}}
{{C|Defense}}

Rocket turret

2024-11-13T20:52:25Z

Alanur99:

Tutorial:Transport use cases

2024-11-13T14:45:40Z

Alanur99: /* Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots */

{{Languages}}
{{DISPLAYTITLE:What Transport for which case?|noerror}}
This page compares the three main [[transport]] methods: [[Belt transport system]] (conveyor belts), [[railway]] (trains) and [[Logistic robot|logistic robots]]. There are two more useful methods to transport items: the character's inventory and the [[car]]. (Especially the car has an extremely high capacity and can be used instead of trains. Of course you need to drive everything yourself; see the chapter about the car).

The best choice depends on the context in which they are used. For example on the amount of resources you need to transport, or how far away they are.

== Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width=10% |
! width=30% | Belts
! width=30% | Trains
! width=30% | Logistic Robots
|-
| Throughput
| Constant, low for one belt, precisely calculable, limited
| Extremely high, fast, not easily calculable but constant, nearly unlimited if enough space,
| High in small areas, not calculable/chaotic, unlimited if enough bots, cannot be optimized, terrible over long distances and bulk goods
|-
| Extensibility
| Low. It is impossible to use existing belts lines - it is necessary to build a completely new belt from A to B.
| Medium. Stations A and B can be connected to any place of the existing railway line. There is no need to pull a separate line - trains will go along the existing one. Also, by loading trains with better fuel or making them longer, it is possible to improve throughput without building new lines.
| High. Chests A and B can be placed anywhere on the network, including using existing ones.
|-
| Flexibility
| High. Small size and underground belts let to transport items from almost anywhere to anywhere, except in the most densely built areas. Bellissimo.
| Moderate. On main line you can transport every item you need from anywhere to anywhere. However, require lot of space for stations, intersections and turnarounds. The possibilities to build a line over existing buildings without major remodeling are extremely limited.
| Close to infinity. To deliver an item, a minimum of 2 cells are required (chest and inserter). As a bonus, there are no restrictions on the variety of items carried - you can request as many types as you need in one chest.
|-
| Space required
| Small for simple products, large for complicated product chains
| Large due to train stations and bends. There is a difference in using [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35806 roll-on-roll-off stations (lot of space) or termini (much smaller)].
| Small for complex products.
|-
| Optimization
| Highly optimizable. Source of never ending fun.
| Seldom really needed – better rebuild or build more tracks. For larger networks you can get some trouble with deadlocks/gridlocks, if not optimized, using chain signals. Optimize train stations: connect either with belts (complex) or with logistic bots (recommended).
| Optimize placing of roboports (for charging) and used number of ports vs. number of bots in the air.
|-
| Parallelization
| High. Two parallel belts have the doubled throughput as one. Cost is also only double. On the other hand: Effort to build that doubles.
| Extreme. Two parallel tracks with one-head trains can transport 5–10 times more trains than one with two-head, because if a track is blocked the trains can choose the other free track and so they don't need to stop. The effort to build two tracks in parallel is lower than double.
| Not so good. Doubling the amount of bots from one to two surely doubles the throughput, but doubling robots from 500 to 1000 can result in complete chaos.
|-
| Initial costs
| Very small as long as conveyor belts are short. Still good with parallel belts. Larger when making fast transport belts. Expensive with express; which should be used for special cases only.
| Considerable amount of material is needed for initial locomotive. Small costs (when compared to the increase of transport) for making rails.
| Roboports and especially bots require a lot of resources to make. Logistic bot upgrades are very expensive, but needed and must be calculated into the total costs. Maintenance costs a lot of time.
|-
| Use of energy
| Gratis. Free. Always an object of discussion. ;)
| Low. The usage of fuel is currently very affordable.
| High. The roboports need a lot of energy and the bots take even more energy, as more are in the air. This can be a big problem, but is normally not an issue.
|-
| Items in transit vs. duration of transport
| Bad. 100 tiles of belts stores about 700 items if fully loaded, but takes with basic belts 56 seconds for transport. With express belt, this is only 3 times faster.
| Very good. Lot of items transported in very short time.
| Chaotic. When jammed it can happen that the most important items are unreachable in the air.
|-
| Maintenance costs
| None
| Some fuel needed
| Considerable amount of electricity needed
|-
| Pollution
| None
| Some
| None, indirectly caused by use of electricity.
|-
| Best used for
| High throughput, bulk-goods (ores, some intermediates), small to medium distance. Examples include raw materials and simple products.
| High throughput, long distance. Examples include transporting ores or plates from resource fields to main factory area.
| Extremely high throughput over very short distances (< 50 tiles), low to medium throughput over medium distance (50–500), catastrophic over long distance. Best used in main factory area for complex products like modules and advanced circuits. Also best used for products needed in smaller quantities like placeable structures and ammunition. Unbeatable for train station (loading/unloading chests).
|-
| Most annoying problems
| Left/right lane problems (part of the game), splitting off the right amount of items.
| Deadlock situations (in complicated crossings), complex train-station and signal setup, traffic jams (especially when train was partially eaten by biters and remaining wagons block the whole line)
| Blocking of roboports by waiting for charging, "stupid" behavior like far away bots are used, instead of near and vice versa, Robots that take a "shortcut" through [[Enemies|Biter]]-infested territory.
|-
| UPS eaten per transported item (relevant only for weak hardware or when science per minute is measured in five-digit numbers)
| Varies. Long, partially loaded lines and large number of inserters and balancers on line eat more. Short, fully loaded lines with the minimum required number of balancers and small number of inserters on line eat less.
| Low.
| High.

|}

== Experts ==

=== Belts ===

* Practical up to distances of 500 tiles (to compare: a radar station watches up to 200 tiles, with a 100-tile "radius").
* Useful for connecting small resource-fields to the factory area, as the throughput of a belt is limited to 900 items per minute on a fully-compressed basic belt. With fast or express belt, this is higher (up to 2700) but the price is gigantic. Using multiple parallel belts is costly, but with basic belts still affordable over long distances.
* Best for working within an automated facility for '''bulk goods''', e.g. transporting ore, plates, circuit boards, etc. over short or medium distances.
* Store, over long distances, a not to be underestimated number of items (8 per tile, with two lanes, fills 500 tiles with 4000 items!). This storage is out of reach and could be counted as wasted, until it is transported.

Note: the length of 500 tiles is just a "rule of thumb", and comes from these facts:
* It takes nearly 5 minutes (4.44) for an item to run from one end to the other on 500 tiles of [[transport belt]]s.
* A belt with 500 tiles stores 4000 items (a [[cargo wagon]] of resources).
* The fact that after about this length it makes sense to use a train.

The advantages of belts are:
* Belts have a constant throughput rate.
* Calculations are easily possible (such as "Do I need more belts to transport items from the mines?")
* Basic belts are cheap compared with tracks and and are easier to build
* You can easily see how many items are on the belt, which makes it easier to assess if you need more throughput.
* You can use the belt as an open storage: you can store 80 items in a length of 10 belts, when using both lanes (but for long belts this is a big disadvantage!)

Disadvantages:
* Limited transport capacity, due to the limited throughput.
* Slow. This is a problem with very long belts because it takes a while to fill the belt. The items on the belt cannot be used. A belt with length of 100 holds 714 items for 56 seconds. With trains this is much lower (10 seconds) and as long as they are not loaded into a wagon, they still can be used.
* Items on the belts are "lost items" until they are transported.

Belts have the best short-distance throughput for continuous, direct-to-factory transportation. '''This is especially true, if you use basic belts in parallel, because this combination has an incredibly high throughput at low costs.

=== Trains ===

* Trains should be used to transport items from big and distant resource fields. No other means of long distance transport is as fast as trains. A single train line can easily be built; however, planning an extensive railway setup can be difficult and time consuming. One clever way of placing rails is entering a locomotive and placing the rails in front of it using the [[rail planner]].
* Trains can be used to connect separate factories together over long distances. This additionally lets you 'take a ride' out to outposts that require attention.

By smelting ore locally and shipping the plates via train, you can double your wagon capacity and route directly to a storage yard or factory.

=== Logistic robots ===

* Logistic robots should be used in a limited area with dense building placement. In most cases this is the main factory area. With some updates the logistic bots can handle enormous amounts of items.
* Bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods: It's not a good idea use bots for ore-transport or from/to furnaces. It is possible to use them for this task, but don't hold your breath for this to work perfectly; there are several issues with the AI that cause them to work inefficiently more often than not. Some players take that problem as a challenge.
* They do a perfect job on bulk-goods, if they can charge between their jobs, which is the case on train-stations: Train comes in, train is unloaded, bots transports to the target chests, bots charge. Next train comes in.
* Bots do a perfect job if you use them for random transport of expensive products; transport intermediate products to where they're needed within the local network, especially if it's completely impractical to route a belt for the job.

Bots, while great at moving sparse items with slow production speeds, are a very costly thing to integrate with high-volume affairs like mining/smelting because they need frequent breaks to recharge.

The exception is the incredible benefit they offer to train stations because of the space-logistical challenge of routing and load-balancing belts around the train tracks, especially since it isn't necessarily 'constant flow', offering them time to recharge.

== Seeing from throughput side ==

A (basic, yellow) [[transport belt]] cannot transport more than 900 items per minute and an [[express transport belt]] (the fastest) not more than 2700 (see above). Now compare that with a locomotive: a [[cargo wagon]] can deliver 2000 items (ores) '''per wagon'''! And if you smelt the resources at your outpost and transport intermediate plates (copper, iron) you can transport 4000 per wagon. So when speaking in terms of throughput, you need to swap to trains or make multiple parallel belts.

One might think this picture would change when you develop [[logistic robot]]s. But that is not true! They can't be beaten for relatively small areas, especially with their researched bonuses, and they have some kind of intelligence; they try to deliver all requests as equally as possible. But bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods. Here are some calculations, which explain the problem (all calculations are assumed with full upgrade for the logistic bots!):

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 50 tiles you need:
Robot speed: 3 tiles/sec (basic speed) × 1.4 (logistic speed bonus) = 4.2 tiles/sec
Needed time for one transport: 100 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 24 secs
Need robots per minute: 24 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 0.4 bots to transport one item per minute over 50 tiles.
Because of Logistic robot cargo: 0.4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 0.1 bots to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 0.1 bots/per item = 300 bots
300 is a high, but still very realistic number for a logistic network with 4-5 roboports.

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 500 tiles you need:
Needed time for one transport: 1000 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 240 secs
Need robots per minute: 240 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 4 bots to transport one item per minute over 500 tiles.
Because of logistic robot cargo: 4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 1 bot to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 1 bots/per item = 3000 bots

3000 bots need a quite big amount of resources to produce, not accounting for the needed research (for bots, speed/stack size bonuses), number of roboports and the needed energy.

That leaves belts and trains.

Trains are faster than belts and offer better logistic control as you go between logistic networks.

Belts simply take forever, and you may wind up with a lot of asset tied up with simply being 'in transit'. You should see items sitting on a belt as "non-useable storage". Backed up belts can be a good thing for buffer space, but long belts are just inefficient, or better: You lose the control over the other end, due to the long gap; the resources on the other side could be long depleted, but you see it only five minutes later.

The effort to squeeze out the last 20% of belt performance increases depending on distance and total amount and at some point the train will win. But in your central factory area the bots will never be beaten. On the other hand: in small areas, and for simple throughput of one type of item (iron ore to iron-plates for example) we can place some belts in parallel, which is cheap and efficient (uses no energy) and when using parallel belts can achieve enormous throughput. For later game, the [[fast transport belt]] is a good compromise between cost and efficiency, and the [[Express transport belt]]s should be use only for short sections.

The amount of robots you need is directly dependent on the density you build. The central part of your factory should be dense, because not only throughput is important here, but also speed: How fast can an item be produced in total (including the transportation time).

== See also ==

* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3948 Discussion about using conveyor belts vs. trains]. There are some interesting tips in this thread.
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5478 More trains vs. longer trains]
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5715 Deciding which items to re-make and which to keep on belts?]
{{Languages}}

Tutorial:Transport use cases

2024-11-13T14:39:04Z

Alanur99: /* Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots */

{{Languages}}
{{DISPLAYTITLE:What Transport for which case?|noerror}}
This page compares the three main [[transport]] methods: [[Belt transport system]] (conveyor belts), [[railway]] (trains) and [[Logistic robot|logistic robots]]. There are two more useful methods to transport items: the character's inventory and the [[car]]. (Especially the car has an extremely high capacity and can be used instead of trains. Of course you need to drive everything yourself; see the chapter about the car).

The best choice depends on the context in which they are used. For example on the amount of resources you need to transport, or how far away they are.

== Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width=10% |
! width=30% | Belts
! width=30% | Trains
! width=30% | Logistic Robots
|-
| Throughput
| Constant, low for one belt, precisely calculable, limited
| Extremely high, fast, not easily calculable but constant, nearly unlimited if enough space,
| High in small areas, not calculable/chaotic, unlimited if enough bots, cannot be optimized, terrible over long distances and bulk goods
|-
| Extensibility
| Low. It is impossible to use existing belts lines - it is necessary to build a completely new belt from A to B.
| Medium. Stations A and B can be connected to any place of the existing railway line. There is no need to pull a separate line - trains will go along the existing one. Also, by loading trains with better fuel or making them longer, it is possible to improve throughput without building new lines.
| High. Chests A and B can be placed anywhere on the network, including using existing ones.
|-
| Flexibility
| High. Small size and underground belts let to transport items from almost anywhere to anywhere, except in the most densely built areas. Bellissimo.
| Moderate. On main line you can transport every item you need from anywhere to anywhere. However, require lot of space for stations, intersections and turnarounds. The possibilities to build a line over existing buildings without major remodeling are extremely limited.
| Close to infinity. To deliver an item, a minimum of 2 cells are required.
|-
| Space required
| Small for simple products, large for complicated product chains
| Large due to train stations and bends. There is a difference in using [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35806 roll-on-roll-off stations (lot of space) or termini (much smaller)].
| Small for complex products.
|-
| Optimization
| Highly optimizable. Source of never ending fun.
| Seldom really needed – better rebuild or build more tracks. For larger networks you can get some trouble with deadlocks/gridlocks, if not optimized, using chain signals. Optimize train stations: connect either with belts (complex) or with logistic bots (recommended).
| Optimize placing of roboports (for charging) and used number of ports vs. number of bots in the air.
|-
| Parallelization
| High. Two parallel belts have the doubled throughput as one. Cost is also only double. On the other hand: Effort to build that doubles.
| Extreme. Two parallel tracks with one-head trains can transport 5–10 times more trains than one with two-head, because if a track is blocked the trains can choose the other free track and so they don't need to stop. The effort to build two tracks in parallel is lower than double.
| Not so good. Doubling the amount of bots from one to two surely doubles the throughput, but doubling robots from 500 to 1000 can result in complete chaos.
|-
| Initial costs
| Very small as long as conveyor belts are short. Still good with parallel belts. Larger when making fast transport belts. Expensive with express; which should be used for special cases only.
| Considerable amount of material is needed for initial locomotive. Small costs (when compared to the increase of transport) for making rails.
| Roboports and especially bots require a lot of resources to make. Logistic bot upgrades are very expensive, but needed and must be calculated into the total costs. Maintenance costs a lot of time.
|-
| Use of energy
| Gratis. Free. Always an object of discussion. ;)
| Low. The usage of fuel is currently very affordable.
| High. The roboports need a lot of energy and the bots take even more energy, as more are in the air. This can be a big problem, but is normally not an issue.
|-
| Items in transit vs. duration of transport
| Bad. 100 tiles of belts stores about 700 items if fully loaded, but takes with basic belts 56 seconds for transport. With express belt, this is only 3 times faster.
| Very good. Lot of items transported in very short time.
| Chaotic. When jammed it can happen that the most important items are unreachable in the air.
|-
| Maintenance costs
| None
| Some fuel needed
| Considerable amount of electricity needed
|-
| Pollution
| None
| Some
| None, indirectly caused by use of electricity.
|-
| Best used for
| High throughput, bulk-goods (ores, some intermediates), small to medium distance. Examples include raw materials and simple products.
| High throughput, long distance. Examples include transporting ores or plates from resource fields to main factory area.
| Extremely high throughput over very short distances (< 50 tiles), low to medium throughput over medium distance (50–500), catastrophic over long distance. Best used in main factory area for complex products like modules and advanced circuits. Also best used for products needed in smaller quantities like placeable structures and ammunition. Unbeatable for train station (loading/unloading chests).
|-
| Most annoying problems
| Left/right lane problems (part of the game), splitting off the right amount of items.
| Deadlock situations (in complicated crossings), complex train-station and signal setup, traffic jams (especially when train was partially eaten by biters and remaining wagons block the whole line)
| Blocking of roboports by waiting for charging, "stupid" behavior like far away bots are used, instead of near and vice versa, Robots that take a "shortcut" through [[Enemies|Biter]]-infested territory.
|-
| UPS eaten per transported item (relevant only for weak hardware or when science per minute is measured in five-digit numbers)
| Varies. Long, partially loaded lines and large number of inserters and balancers on line eat more. Short, fully loaded lines with the minimum required number of balancers and small number of inserters on line eat less.
| Low.
| High.

|}

== Experts ==

=== Belts ===

* Practical up to distances of 500 tiles (to compare: a radar station watches up to 200 tiles, with a 100-tile "radius").
* Useful for connecting small resource-fields to the factory area, as the throughput of a belt is limited to 900 items per minute on a fully-compressed basic belt. With fast or express belt, this is higher (up to 2700) but the price is gigantic. Using multiple parallel belts is costly, but with basic belts still affordable over long distances.
* Best for working within an automated facility for '''bulk goods''', e.g. transporting ore, plates, circuit boards, etc. over short or medium distances.
* Store, over long distances, a not to be underestimated number of items (8 per tile, with two lanes, fills 500 tiles with 4000 items!). This storage is out of reach and could be counted as wasted, until it is transported.

Note: the length of 500 tiles is just a "rule of thumb", and comes from these facts:
* It takes nearly 5 minutes (4.44) for an item to run from one end to the other on 500 tiles of [[transport belt]]s.
* A belt with 500 tiles stores 4000 items (a [[cargo wagon]] of resources).
* The fact that after about this length it makes sense to use a train.

The advantages of belts are:
* Belts have a constant throughput rate.
* Calculations are easily possible (such as "Do I need more belts to transport items from the mines?")
* Basic belts are cheap compared with tracks and and are easier to build
* You can easily see how many items are on the belt, which makes it easier to assess if you need more throughput.
* You can use the belt as an open storage: you can store 80 items in a length of 10 belts, when using both lanes (but for long belts this is a big disadvantage!)

Disadvantages:
* Limited transport capacity, due to the limited throughput.
* Slow. This is a problem with very long belts because it takes a while to fill the belt. The items on the belt cannot be used. A belt with length of 100 holds 714 items for 56 seconds. With trains this is much lower (10 seconds) and as long as they are not loaded into a wagon, they still can be used.
* Items on the belts are "lost items" until they are transported.

Belts have the best short-distance throughput for continuous, direct-to-factory transportation. '''This is especially true, if you use basic belts in parallel, because this combination has an incredibly high throughput at low costs.

=== Trains ===

* Trains should be used to transport items from big and distant resource fields. No other means of long distance transport is as fast as trains. A single train line can easily be built; however, planning an extensive railway setup can be difficult and time consuming. One clever way of placing rails is entering a locomotive and placing the rails in front of it using the [[rail planner]].
* Trains can be used to connect separate factories together over long distances. This additionally lets you 'take a ride' out to outposts that require attention.

By smelting ore locally and shipping the plates via train, you can double your wagon capacity and route directly to a storage yard or factory.

=== Logistic robots ===

* Logistic robots should be used in a limited area with dense building placement. In most cases this is the main factory area. With some updates the logistic bots can handle enormous amounts of items.
* Bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods: It's not a good idea use bots for ore-transport or from/to furnaces. It is possible to use them for this task, but don't hold your breath for this to work perfectly; there are several issues with the AI that cause them to work inefficiently more often than not. Some players take that problem as a challenge.
* They do a perfect job on bulk-goods, if they can charge between their jobs, which is the case on train-stations: Train comes in, train is unloaded, bots transports to the target chests, bots charge. Next train comes in.
* Bots do a perfect job if you use them for random transport of expensive products; transport intermediate products to where they're needed within the local network, especially if it's completely impractical to route a belt for the job.

Bots, while great at moving sparse items with slow production speeds, are a very costly thing to integrate with high-volume affairs like mining/smelting because they need frequent breaks to recharge.

The exception is the incredible benefit they offer to train stations because of the space-logistical challenge of routing and load-balancing belts around the train tracks, especially since it isn't necessarily 'constant flow', offering them time to recharge.

== Seeing from throughput side ==

A (basic, yellow) [[transport belt]] cannot transport more than 900 items per minute and an [[express transport belt]] (the fastest) not more than 2700 (see above). Now compare that with a locomotive: a [[cargo wagon]] can deliver 2000 items (ores) '''per wagon'''! And if you smelt the resources at your outpost and transport intermediate plates (copper, iron) you can transport 4000 per wagon. So when speaking in terms of throughput, you need to swap to trains or make multiple parallel belts.

One might think this picture would change when you develop [[logistic robot]]s. But that is not true! They can't be beaten for relatively small areas, especially with their researched bonuses, and they have some kind of intelligence; they try to deliver all requests as equally as possible. But bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods. Here are some calculations, which explain the problem (all calculations are assumed with full upgrade for the logistic bots!):

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 50 tiles you need:
Robot speed: 3 tiles/sec (basic speed) × 1.4 (logistic speed bonus) = 4.2 tiles/sec
Needed time for one transport: 100 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 24 secs
Need robots per minute: 24 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 0.4 bots to transport one item per minute over 50 tiles.
Because of Logistic robot cargo: 0.4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 0.1 bots to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 0.1 bots/per item = 300 bots
300 is a high, but still very realistic number for a logistic network with 4-5 roboports.

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 500 tiles you need:
Needed time for one transport: 1000 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 240 secs
Need robots per minute: 240 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 4 bots to transport one item per minute over 500 tiles.
Because of logistic robot cargo: 4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 1 bot to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 1 bots/per item = 3000 bots

3000 bots need a quite big amount of resources to produce, not accounting for the needed research (for bots, speed/stack size bonuses), number of roboports and the needed energy.

That leaves belts and trains.

Trains are faster than belts and offer better logistic control as you go between logistic networks.

Belts simply take forever, and you may wind up with a lot of asset tied up with simply being 'in transit'. You should see items sitting on a belt as "non-useable storage". Backed up belts can be a good thing for buffer space, but long belts are just inefficient, or better: You lose the control over the other end, due to the long gap; the resources on the other side could be long depleted, but you see it only five minutes later.

The effort to squeeze out the last 20% of belt performance increases depending on distance and total amount and at some point the train will win. But in your central factory area the bots will never be beaten. On the other hand: in small areas, and for simple throughput of one type of item (iron ore to iron-plates for example) we can place some belts in parallel, which is cheap and efficient (uses no energy) and when using parallel belts can achieve enormous throughput. For later game, the [[fast transport belt]] is a good compromise between cost and efficiency, and the [[Express transport belt]]s should be use only for short sections.

The amount of robots you need is directly dependent on the density you build. The central part of your factory should be dense, because not only throughput is important here, but also speed: How fast can an item be produced in total (including the transportation time).

== See also ==

* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3948 Discussion about using conveyor belts vs. trains]. There are some interesting tips in this thread.
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5478 More trains vs. longer trains]
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5715 Deciding which items to re-make and which to keep on belts?]
{{Languages}}

Tutorial:Transport use cases

2024-11-13T14:25:17Z

Alanur99: /* Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots */

{{Languages}}
{{DISPLAYTITLE:What Transport for which case?|noerror}}
This page compares the three main [[transport]] methods: [[Belt transport system]] (conveyor belts), [[railway]] (trains) and [[Logistic robot|logistic robots]]. There are two more useful methods to transport items: the character's inventory and the [[car]]. (Especially the car has an extremely high capacity and can be used instead of trains. Of course you need to drive everything yourself; see the chapter about the car).

The best choice depends on the context in which they are used. For example on the amount of resources you need to transport, or how far away they are.

== Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width=10% |
! width=30% | Belts
! width=30% | Trains
! width=30% | Logistic Robots
|-
| Throughput
| Constant, low for one belt, precisely calculable, limited
| Extremely high, fast, not easily calculable but constant, nearly unlimited if enough space,
| High in small areas, not calculable/chaotic, unlimited if enough bots, cannot be optimized, terrible over long distances and bulk goods
|-
| Extensibility
| Low. It is impossible to use existing belts lines - it is necessary to build a completely new belt from A to B.
| Medium. Stations A and B can be connected to any place of the existing railway line. There is no need to pull a separate line - trains will go along the existing one. Also, by loading trains with better fuel or making them longer, it is possible to improve throughput without building new lines.
| High. Chests A and B can be placed anywhere on the network, including using existing ones.
|-
| Space required
| Small for simple products, large for complicated product chains
| Large due to train stations and bends. There is a difference in using [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35806 roll-on-roll-off stations (lot of space) or termini (much smaller)].
| Small for complex products.
|-
| Optimization
| Highly optimizable. Source of never ending fun.
| Seldom really needed – better rebuild or build more tracks. For larger networks you can get some trouble with deadlocks/gridlocks, if not optimized, using chain signals. Optimize train stations: connect either with belts (complex) or with logistic bots (recommended).
| Optimize placing of roboports (for charging) and used number of ports vs. number of bots in the air.
|-
| Parallelization
| High. Two parallel belts have the doubled throughput as one. Cost is also only double. On the other hand: Effort to build that doubles.
| Extreme. Two parallel tracks with one-head trains can transport 5–10 times more trains than one with two-head, because if a track is blocked the trains can choose the other free track and so they don't need to stop. The effort to build two tracks in parallel is lower than double.
| Not so good. Doubling the amount of bots from one to two surely doubles the throughput, but doubling robots from 500 to 1000 can result in complete chaos.
|-
| Initial costs
| Very small as long as conveyor belts are short. Still good with parallel belts. Larger when making fast transport belts. Expensive with express; which should be used for special cases only.
| Considerable amount of material is needed for initial locomotive. Small costs (when compared to the increase of transport) for making rails.
| Roboports and especially bots require a lot of resources to make. Logistic bot upgrades are very expensive, but needed and must be calculated into the total costs. Maintenance costs a lot of time.
|-
| Use of energy
| Gratis. Free. Always an object of discussion. ;)
| Low. The usage of fuel is currently very affordable.
| High. The roboports need a lot of energy and the bots take even more energy, as more are in the air. This can be a big problem, but is normally not an issue.
|-
| Items in transit vs. duration of transport
| Bad. 100 tiles of belts stores about 700 items if fully loaded, but takes with basic belts 56 seconds for transport. With express belt, this is only 3 times faster.
| Very good. Lot of items transported in very short time.
| Chaotic. When jammed it can happen that the most important items are unreachable in the air.
|-
| Maintenance costs
| None
| Some fuel needed
| Considerable amount of electricity needed
|-
| Pollution
| None
| Some
| None, indirectly caused by use of electricity.
|-
| Best used for
| High throughput, bulk-goods (ores, some intermediates), small to medium distance. Examples include raw materials and simple products.
| High throughput, long distance. Examples include transporting ores or plates from resource fields to main factory area.
| Extremely high throughput over very short distances (< 50 tiles), low to medium throughput over medium distance (50–500), catastrophic over long distance. Best used in main factory area for complex products like modules and advanced circuits. Also best used for products needed in smaller quantities like placeable structures and ammunition. Unbeatable for train station (loading/unloading chests).
|-
| Most annoying problems
| Left/right lane problems (part of the game), splitting off the right amount of items.
| Deadlock situations (in complicated crossings), complex train-station and signal setup, traffic jams (especially when train was partially eaten by biters and remaining wagons block the whole line)
| Blocking of roboports by waiting for charging, "stupid" behavior like far away bots are used, instead of near and vice versa, Robots that take a "shortcut" through [[Enemies|Biter]]-infested territory.
|-
| UPS eaten per transported item (relevant only for weak hardware or when science per minute is measured in five-digit numbers)
| Varies. Long, partially loaded lines and large number of inserters and balancers on line eat more. Short, fully loaded lines with the minimum required number of balancers and small number of inserters on line eat less.
| Low.
| High.

|}

== Experts ==

=== Belts ===

* Practical up to distances of 500 tiles (to compare: a radar station watches up to 200 tiles, with a 100-tile "radius").
* Useful for connecting small resource-fields to the factory area, as the throughput of a belt is limited to 900 items per minute on a fully-compressed basic belt. With fast or express belt, this is higher (up to 2700) but the price is gigantic. Using multiple parallel belts is costly, but with basic belts still affordable over long distances.
* Best for working within an automated facility for '''bulk goods''', e.g. transporting ore, plates, circuit boards, etc. over short or medium distances.
* Store, over long distances, a not to be underestimated number of items (8 per tile, with two lanes, fills 500 tiles with 4000 items!). This storage is out of reach and could be counted as wasted, until it is transported.

Note: the length of 500 tiles is just a "rule of thumb", and comes from these facts:
* It takes nearly 5 minutes (4.44) for an item to run from one end to the other on 500 tiles of [[transport belt]]s.
* A belt with 500 tiles stores 4000 items (a [[cargo wagon]] of resources).
* The fact that after about this length it makes sense to use a train.

The advantages of belts are:
* Belts have a constant throughput rate.
* Calculations are easily possible (such as "Do I need more belts to transport items from the mines?")
* Basic belts are cheap compared with tracks and and are easier to build
* You can easily see how many items are on the belt, which makes it easier to assess if you need more throughput.
* You can use the belt as an open storage: you can store 80 items in a length of 10 belts, when using both lanes (but for long belts this is a big disadvantage!)

Disadvantages:
* Limited transport capacity, due to the limited throughput.
* Slow. This is a problem with very long belts because it takes a while to fill the belt. The items on the belt cannot be used. A belt with length of 100 holds 714 items for 56 seconds. With trains this is much lower (10 seconds) and as long as they are not loaded into a wagon, they still can be used.
* Items on the belts are "lost items" until they are transported.

Belts have the best short-distance throughput for continuous, direct-to-factory transportation. '''This is especially true, if you use basic belts in parallel, because this combination has an incredibly high throughput at low costs.

=== Trains ===

* Trains should be used to transport items from big and distant resource fields. No other means of long distance transport is as fast as trains. A single train line can easily be built; however, planning an extensive railway setup can be difficult and time consuming. One clever way of placing rails is entering a locomotive and placing the rails in front of it using the [[rail planner]].
* Trains can be used to connect separate factories together over long distances. This additionally lets you 'take a ride' out to outposts that require attention.

By smelting ore locally and shipping the plates via train, you can double your wagon capacity and route directly to a storage yard or factory.

=== Logistic robots ===

* Logistic robots should be used in a limited area with dense building placement. In most cases this is the main factory area. With some updates the logistic bots can handle enormous amounts of items.
* Bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods: It's not a good idea use bots for ore-transport or from/to furnaces. It is possible to use them for this task, but don't hold your breath for this to work perfectly; there are several issues with the AI that cause them to work inefficiently more often than not. Some players take that problem as a challenge.
* They do a perfect job on bulk-goods, if they can charge between their jobs, which is the case on train-stations: Train comes in, train is unloaded, bots transports to the target chests, bots charge. Next train comes in.
* Bots do a perfect job if you use them for random transport of expensive products; transport intermediate products to where they're needed within the local network, especially if it's completely impractical to route a belt for the job.

Bots, while great at moving sparse items with slow production speeds, are a very costly thing to integrate with high-volume affairs like mining/smelting because they need frequent breaks to recharge.

The exception is the incredible benefit they offer to train stations because of the space-logistical challenge of routing and load-balancing belts around the train tracks, especially since it isn't necessarily 'constant flow', offering them time to recharge.

== Seeing from throughput side ==

A (basic, yellow) [[transport belt]] cannot transport more than 900 items per minute and an [[express transport belt]] (the fastest) not more than 2700 (see above). Now compare that with a locomotive: a [[cargo wagon]] can deliver 2000 items (ores) '''per wagon'''! And if you smelt the resources at your outpost and transport intermediate plates (copper, iron) you can transport 4000 per wagon. So when speaking in terms of throughput, you need to swap to trains or make multiple parallel belts.

One might think this picture would change when you develop [[logistic robot]]s. But that is not true! They can't be beaten for relatively small areas, especially with their researched bonuses, and they have some kind of intelligence; they try to deliver all requests as equally as possible. But bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods. Here are some calculations, which explain the problem (all calculations are assumed with full upgrade for the logistic bots!):

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 50 tiles you need:
Robot speed: 3 tiles/sec (basic speed) × 1.4 (logistic speed bonus) = 4.2 tiles/sec
Needed time for one transport: 100 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 24 secs
Need robots per minute: 24 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 0.4 bots to transport one item per minute over 50 tiles.
Because of Logistic robot cargo: 0.4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 0.1 bots to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 0.1 bots/per item = 300 bots
300 is a high, but still very realistic number for a logistic network with 4-5 roboports.

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 500 tiles you need:
Needed time for one transport: 1000 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 240 secs
Need robots per minute: 240 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 4 bots to transport one item per minute over 500 tiles.
Because of logistic robot cargo: 4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 1 bot to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 1 bots/per item = 3000 bots

3000 bots need a quite big amount of resources to produce, not accounting for the needed research (for bots, speed/stack size bonuses), number of roboports and the needed energy.

That leaves belts and trains.

Trains are faster than belts and offer better logistic control as you go between logistic networks.

Belts simply take forever, and you may wind up with a lot of asset tied up with simply being 'in transit'. You should see items sitting on a belt as "non-useable storage". Backed up belts can be a good thing for buffer space, but long belts are just inefficient, or better: You lose the control over the other end, due to the long gap; the resources on the other side could be long depleted, but you see it only five minutes later.

The effort to squeeze out the last 20% of belt performance increases depending on distance and total amount and at some point the train will win. But in your central factory area the bots will never be beaten. On the other hand: in small areas, and for simple throughput of one type of item (iron ore to iron-plates for example) we can place some belts in parallel, which is cheap and efficient (uses no energy) and when using parallel belts can achieve enormous throughput. For later game, the [[fast transport belt]] is a good compromise between cost and efficiency, and the [[Express transport belt]]s should be use only for short sections.

The amount of robots you need is directly dependent on the density you build. The central part of your factory should be dense, because not only throughput is important here, but also speed: How fast can an item be produced in total (including the transportation time).

== See also ==

* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3948 Discussion about using conveyor belts vs. trains]. There are some interesting tips in this thread.
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5478 More trains vs. longer trains]
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5715 Deciding which items to re-make and which to keep on belts?]
{{Languages}}

Tutorial:Transport use cases

2024-11-13T14:17:38Z

Alanur99: /* Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots */

{{Languages}}
{{DISPLAYTITLE:What Transport for which case?|noerror}}
This page compares the three main [[transport]] methods: [[Belt transport system]] (conveyor belts), [[railway]] (trains) and [[Logistic robot|logistic robots]]. There are two more useful methods to transport items: the character's inventory and the [[car]]. (Especially the car has an extremely high capacity and can be used instead of trains. Of course you need to drive everything yourself; see the chapter about the car).

The best choice depends on the context in which they are used. For example on the amount of resources you need to transport, or how far away they are.

== Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width=10% |
! width=30% | Belts
! width=30% | Trains
! width=30% | Logistic Robots
|-
| Throughput
| Constant, low for one belt, precisely calculable, limited
| Extremely high, fast, not easily calculable but constant, nearly unlimited if enough space,
| High in small areas, not calculable/chaotic, unlimited if enough bots, cannot be optimized, terrible over long distances and bulk goods
|-
| Extensibility
| Low. It is impossible to use existing belts lines - it is necessary to build a completely new belt from A to B.
| Medium. Stations A and B can be connected to any place of the existing railway line. There is no need to pull a separate line - trains will go along the existing one. Also, by loading trains with better fuel, it is possible to improve throughput without building new lines.
| High. Chests A and B can be placed anywhere on the network, including using existing ones.
|-
| Space required
| Small for simple products, large for complicated product chains
| Large due to train stations and bends. There is a difference in using [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35806 roll-on-roll-off stations (lot of space) or termini (much smaller)].
| Small for complex products.
|-
| Optimization
| Highly optimizable. Source of never ending fun.
| Seldom really needed – better rebuild or build more tracks. For larger networks you can get some trouble with deadlocks/gridlocks, if not optimized, using chain signals. Optimize train stations: connect either with belts (complex) or with logistic bots (recommended).
| Optimize placing of roboports (for charging) and used number of ports vs. number of bots in the air.
|-
| Parallelization
| High. Two parallel belts have the doubled throughput as one. Cost is also only double. On the other hand: Effort to build that doubles.
| Extreme. Two parallel tracks with one-head trains can transport 5–10 times more trains than one with two-head, because if a track is blocked the trains can choose the other free track and so they don't need to stop. The effort to build two tracks in parallel is lower than double.
| Not so good. Doubling the amount of bots from one to two surely doubles the throughput, but doubling robots from 500 to 1000 can result in complete chaos.
|-
| Initial costs
| Very small as long as conveyor belts are short. Still good with parallel belts. Larger when making fast transport belts. Expensive with express; which should be used for special cases only.
| Considerable amount of material is needed for initial locomotive. Small costs (when compared to the increase of transport) for making rails.
| Roboports and especially bots require a lot of resources to make. Logistic bot upgrades are very expensive, but needed and must be calculated into the total costs. Maintenance costs a lot of time.
|-
| Use of energy
| Gratis. Free. Always an object of discussion. ;)
| Low. The usage of fuel is currently very affordable.
| High. The roboports need a lot of energy and the bots take even more energy, as more are in the air. This can be a big problem, but is normally not an issue.
|-
| Items in transit vs. duration of transport
| Bad. 100 tiles of belts stores about 700 items if fully loaded, but takes with basic belts 56 seconds for transport. With express belt, this is only 3 times faster.
| Very good. Lot of items transported in very short time.
| Chaotic. When jammed it can happen that the most important items are unreachable in the air.
|-
| Maintenance costs
| None
| Some fuel needed
| Considerable amount of electricity needed
|-
| Pollution
| None
| Some
| None, indirectly caused by use of electricity.
|-
| Best used for
| High throughput, bulk-goods (ores, some intermediates), small to medium distance. Examples include raw materials and simple products.
| High throughput, long distance. Examples include transporting ores or plates from resource fields to main factory area.
| Extremely high throughput over very short distances (< 50 tiles), low to medium throughput over medium distance (50–500), catastrophic over long distance. Best used in main factory area for complex products like modules and advanced circuits. Also best used for products needed in smaller quantities like placeable structures and ammunition. Unbeatable for train station (loading/unloading chests).
|-
| Most annoying problems
| Left/right lane problems (part of the game), splitting off the right amount of items.
| Deadlock situations (in complicated crossings), complex train-station and signal setup, traffic jams (especially when train was partially eaten by biters and remaining wagons block the whole line)
| Blocking of roboports by waiting for charging, "stupid" behavior like far away bots are used, instead of near and vice versa, Robots that take a "shortcut" through [[Enemies|Biter]]-infested territory.
|-
| UPS eaten per transported item (relevant only for weak hardware or when science per minute is measured in five-digit numbers)
| Varies. Long, partially loaded lines and large number of inserters and balancers on line eat more. Short, fully loaded lines with the minimum required number of balancers and small number of inserters on line eat less.
| Low.
| High.

|}

== Experts ==

=== Belts ===

* Practical up to distances of 500 tiles (to compare: a radar station watches up to 200 tiles, with a 100-tile "radius").
* Useful for connecting small resource-fields to the factory area, as the throughput of a belt is limited to 900 items per minute on a fully-compressed basic belt. With fast or express belt, this is higher (up to 2700) but the price is gigantic. Using multiple parallel belts is costly, but with basic belts still affordable over long distances.
* Best for working within an automated facility for '''bulk goods''', e.g. transporting ore, plates, circuit boards, etc. over short or medium distances.
* Store, over long distances, a not to be underestimated number of items (8 per tile, with two lanes, fills 500 tiles with 4000 items!). This storage is out of reach and could be counted as wasted, until it is transported.

Note: the length of 500 tiles is just a "rule of thumb", and comes from these facts:
* It takes nearly 5 minutes (4.44) for an item to run from one end to the other on 500 tiles of [[transport belt]]s.
* A belt with 500 tiles stores 4000 items (a [[cargo wagon]] of resources).
* The fact that after about this length it makes sense to use a train.

The advantages of belts are:
* Belts have a constant throughput rate.
* Calculations are easily possible (such as "Do I need more belts to transport items from the mines?")
* Basic belts are cheap compared with tracks and and are easier to build
* You can easily see how many items are on the belt, which makes it easier to assess if you need more throughput.
* You can use the belt as an open storage: you can store 80 items in a length of 10 belts, when using both lanes (but for long belts this is a big disadvantage!)

Disadvantages:
* Limited transport capacity, due to the limited throughput.
* Slow. This is a problem with very long belts because it takes a while to fill the belt. The items on the belt cannot be used. A belt with length of 100 holds 714 items for 56 seconds. With trains this is much lower (10 seconds) and as long as they are not loaded into a wagon, they still can be used.
* Items on the belts are "lost items" until they are transported.

Belts have the best short-distance throughput for continuous, direct-to-factory transportation. '''This is especially true, if you use basic belts in parallel, because this combination has an incredibly high throughput at low costs.

=== Trains ===

* Trains should be used to transport items from big and distant resource fields. No other means of long distance transport is as fast as trains. A single train line can easily be built; however, planning an extensive railway setup can be difficult and time consuming. One clever way of placing rails is entering a locomotive and placing the rails in front of it using the [[rail planner]].
* Trains can be used to connect separate factories together over long distances. This additionally lets you 'take a ride' out to outposts that require attention.

By smelting ore locally and shipping the plates via train, you can double your wagon capacity and route directly to a storage yard or factory.

=== Logistic robots ===

* Logistic robots should be used in a limited area with dense building placement. In most cases this is the main factory area. With some updates the logistic bots can handle enormous amounts of items.
* Bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods: It's not a good idea use bots for ore-transport or from/to furnaces. It is possible to use them for this task, but don't hold your breath for this to work perfectly; there are several issues with the AI that cause them to work inefficiently more often than not. Some players take that problem as a challenge.
* They do a perfect job on bulk-goods, if they can charge between their jobs, which is the case on train-stations: Train comes in, train is unloaded, bots transports to the target chests, bots charge. Next train comes in.
* Bots do a perfect job if you use them for random transport of expensive products; transport intermediate products to where they're needed within the local network, especially if it's completely impractical to route a belt for the job.

Bots, while great at moving sparse items with slow production speeds, are a very costly thing to integrate with high-volume affairs like mining/smelting because they need frequent breaks to recharge.

The exception is the incredible benefit they offer to train stations because of the space-logistical challenge of routing and load-balancing belts around the train tracks, especially since it isn't necessarily 'constant flow', offering them time to recharge.

== Seeing from throughput side ==

A (basic, yellow) [[transport belt]] cannot transport more than 900 items per minute and an [[express transport belt]] (the fastest) not more than 2700 (see above). Now compare that with a locomotive: a [[cargo wagon]] can deliver 2000 items (ores) '''per wagon'''! And if you smelt the resources at your outpost and transport intermediate plates (copper, iron) you can transport 4000 per wagon. So when speaking in terms of throughput, you need to swap to trains or make multiple parallel belts.

One might think this picture would change when you develop [[logistic robot]]s. But that is not true! They can't be beaten for relatively small areas, especially with their researched bonuses, and they have some kind of intelligence; they try to deliver all requests as equally as possible. But bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods. Here are some calculations, which explain the problem (all calculations are assumed with full upgrade for the logistic bots!):

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 50 tiles you need:
Robot speed: 3 tiles/sec (basic speed) × 1.4 (logistic speed bonus) = 4.2 tiles/sec
Needed time for one transport: 100 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 24 secs
Need robots per minute: 24 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 0.4 bots to transport one item per minute over 50 tiles.
Because of Logistic robot cargo: 0.4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 0.1 bots to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 0.1 bots/per item = 300 bots
300 is a high, but still very realistic number for a logistic network with 4-5 roboports.

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 500 tiles you need:
Needed time for one transport: 1000 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 240 secs
Need robots per minute: 240 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 4 bots to transport one item per minute over 500 tiles.
Because of logistic robot cargo: 4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 1 bot to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 1 bots/per item = 3000 bots

3000 bots need a quite big amount of resources to produce, not accounting for the needed research (for bots, speed/stack size bonuses), number of roboports and the needed energy.

That leaves belts and trains.

Trains are faster than belts and offer better logistic control as you go between logistic networks.

Belts simply take forever, and you may wind up with a lot of asset tied up with simply being 'in transit'. You should see items sitting on a belt as "non-useable storage". Backed up belts can be a good thing for buffer space, but long belts are just inefficient, or better: You lose the control over the other end, due to the long gap; the resources on the other side could be long depleted, but you see it only five minutes later.

The effort to squeeze out the last 20% of belt performance increases depending on distance and total amount and at some point the train will win. But in your central factory area the bots will never be beaten. On the other hand: in small areas, and for simple throughput of one type of item (iron ore to iron-plates for example) we can place some belts in parallel, which is cheap and efficient (uses no energy) and when using parallel belts can achieve enormous throughput. For later game, the [[fast transport belt]] is a good compromise between cost and efficiency, and the [[Express transport belt]]s should be use only for short sections.

The amount of robots you need is directly dependent on the density you build. The central part of your factory should be dense, because not only throughput is important here, but also speed: How fast can an item be produced in total (including the transportation time).

== See also ==

* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3948 Discussion about using conveyor belts vs. trains]. There are some interesting tips in this thread.
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5478 More trains vs. longer trains]
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5715 Deciding which items to re-make and which to keep on belts?]
{{Languages}}

Tutorial:Transport use cases

2024-11-13T13:46:02Z

Alanur99: /* Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots */

{{Languages}}
{{DISPLAYTITLE:What Transport for which case?|noerror}}
This page compares the three main [[transport]] methods: [[Belt transport system]] (conveyor belts), [[railway]] (trains) and [[Logistic robot|logistic robots]]. There are two more useful methods to transport items: the character's inventory and the [[car]]. (Especially the car has an extremely high capacity and can be used instead of trains. Of course you need to drive everything yourself; see the chapter about the car).

The best choice depends on the context in which they are used. For example on the amount of resources you need to transport, or how far away they are.

== Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width=10% |
! width=30% | Belts
! width=30% | Trains
! width=30% | Logistic Robots
|-
| Throughput
| Constant, low for one belt, precisely calculable, limited
| Extremely high, fast, not easily calculable but constant, nearly unlimited if enough space,
| High in small areas, not calculable/chaotic, unlimited if enough bots, cannot be optimized, terrible over long distances and bulk goods
|-
| Space required
| Small for simple products, large for complicated product chains
| Large due to train stations and bends. There is a difference in using [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35806 roll-on-roll-off stations (lot of space) or termini (much smaller)].
| Small for complex products.
|-
| Optimization
| Highly optimizable. Source of never ending fun.
| Seldom really needed – better rebuild or build more tracks. For larger networks you can get some trouble with deadlocks/gridlocks, if not optimized, using chain signals. Optimize train stations: connect either with belts (complex) or with logistic bots (recommended).
| Optimize placing of roboports (for charging) and used number of ports vs. number of bots in the air.
|-
| Parallelization
| High. Two parallel belts have the doubled throughput as one. Cost is also only double. On the other hand: Effort to build that doubles.
| Extreme. Two parallel tracks can transport 5–10 times more trains than one, because if a track is blocked the trains can choose the other free track and so they don't need to stop. The effort to build two tracks in parallel is lower than double.
| Not so good. Doubling the amount of bots from one to two surely doubles the throughput, but doubling robots from 500 to 1000 can result in complete chaos.
|-
| Initial costs
| Very small as long as conveyor belts are short. Still good with parallel belts. Larger when making fast transport belts. Expensive with express; which should be used for special cases only.
| Considerable amount of material is needed for initial locomotive. Small costs (when compared to the increase of transport) for making rails.
| Roboports and especially bots require a lot of resources to make. Logistic bot upgrades are very expensive, but needed and must be calculated into the total costs. Maintenance costs a lot of time.
|-
| Use of energy
| Gratis. Free. Always an object of discussion. ;)
| Low. The usage of fuel is currently very affordable.
| High. The roboports need a lot of energy and the bots take even more energy, as more are in the air. This can be a big problem, but is normally not an issue.
|-
| Items in transit vs. duration of transport
| Bad. 100 tiles of belts stores about 700 items if fully loaded, but takes with basic belts 56 seconds for transport. With express belt, this is only 3 times faster.
| Very good. Lot of items transported in very short time.
| Chaotic. When jammed it can happen that the most important items are unreachable in the air.
|-
| Maintenance costs
| None
| Some fuel needed
| Considerable amount of electricity needed
|-
| Pollution
| None
| Some
| None, indirectly caused by use of electricity.
|-
| Best used for
| High throughput, bulk-goods (ores, some intermediates), small to medium distance. Examples include raw materials and simple products.
| High throughput, long distance. Examples include transporting ores or plates from resource fields to main factory area.
| Extremely high throughput over very short distances (< 50 tiles), low to medium throughput over medium distance (50–500), catastrophic over long distance. Best used in main factory area for complex products like modules and advanced circuits. Also best used for products needed in smaller quantities like placeable structures and ammunition. Unbeatable for train station (loading/unloading chests).
|-
| Most annoying problems
| Left/right lane problems (part of the game), splitting off the right amount of items.
| Deadlock situations (in complicated crossings), complex train-station and signal setup, traffic jams (especially when train was partially eaten by biters and remaining wagons block the whole line)
| Blocking of roboports by waiting for charging, "stupid" behavior like far away bots are used, instead of near and vice versa, Robots that take a "shortcut" through [[Enemies|Biter]]-infested territory.
|}

== Experts ==

=== Belts ===

* Practical up to distances of 500 tiles (to compare: a radar station watches up to 200 tiles, with a 100-tile "radius").
* Useful for connecting small resource-fields to the factory area, as the throughput of a belt is limited to 900 items per minute on a fully-compressed basic belt. With fast or express belt, this is higher (up to 2700) but the price is gigantic. Using multiple parallel belts is costly, but with basic belts still affordable over long distances.
* Best for working within an automated facility for '''bulk goods''', e.g. transporting ore, plates, circuit boards, etc. over short or medium distances.
* Store, over long distances, a not to be underestimated number of items (8 per tile, with two lanes, fills 500 tiles with 4000 items!). This storage is out of reach and could be counted as wasted, until it is transported.

Note: the length of 500 tiles is just a "rule of thumb", and comes from these facts:
* It takes nearly 5 minutes (4.44) for an item to run from one end to the other on 500 tiles of [[transport belt]]s.
* A belt with 500 tiles stores 4000 items (a [[cargo wagon]] of resources).
* The fact that after about this length it makes sense to use a train.

The advantages of belts are:
* Belts have a constant throughput rate.
* Calculations are easily possible (such as "Do I need more belts to transport items from the mines?")
* Basic belts are cheap compared with tracks and and are easier to build
* You can easily see how many items are on the belt, which makes it easier to assess if you need more throughput.
* You can use the belt as an open storage: you can store 80 items in a length of 10 belts, when using both lanes (but for long belts this is a big disadvantage!)

Disadvantages:
* Limited transport capacity, due to the limited throughput.
* Slow. This is a problem with very long belts because it takes a while to fill the belt. The items on the belt cannot be used. A belt with length of 100 holds 714 items for 56 seconds. With trains this is much lower (10 seconds) and as long as they are not loaded into a wagon, they still can be used.
* Items on the belts are "lost items" until they are transported.

Belts have the best short-distance throughput for continuous, direct-to-factory transportation. '''This is especially true, if you use basic belts in parallel, because this combination has an incredibly high throughput at low costs.

=== Trains ===

* Trains should be used to transport items from big and distant resource fields. No other means of long distance transport is as fast as trains. A single train line can easily be built; however, planning an extensive railway setup can be difficult and time consuming. One clever way of placing rails is entering a locomotive and placing the rails in front of it using the [[rail planner]].
* Trains can be used to connect separate factories together over long distances. This additionally lets you 'take a ride' out to outposts that require attention.

By smelting ore locally and shipping the plates via train, you can double your wagon capacity and route directly to a storage yard or factory.

=== Logistic robots ===

* Logistic robots should be used in a limited area with dense building placement. In most cases this is the main factory area. With some updates the logistic bots can handle enormous amounts of items.
* Bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods: It's not a good idea use bots for ore-transport or from/to furnaces. It is possible to use them for this task, but don't hold your breath for this to work perfectly; there are several issues with the AI that cause them to work inefficiently more often than not. Some players take that problem as a challenge.
* They do a perfect job on bulk-goods, if they can charge between their jobs, which is the case on train-stations: Train comes in, train is unloaded, bots transports to the target chests, bots charge. Next train comes in.
* Bots do a perfect job if you use them for random transport of expensive products; transport intermediate products to where they're needed within the local network, especially if it's completely impractical to route a belt for the job.

Bots, while great at moving sparse items with slow production speeds, are a very costly thing to integrate with high-volume affairs like mining/smelting because they need frequent breaks to recharge.

The exception is the incredible benefit they offer to train stations because of the space-logistical challenge of routing and load-balancing belts around the train tracks, especially since it isn't necessarily 'constant flow', offering them time to recharge.

== Seeing from throughput side ==

A (basic, yellow) [[transport belt]] cannot transport more than 900 items per minute and an [[express transport belt]] (the fastest) not more than 2700 (see above). Now compare that with a locomotive: a [[cargo wagon]] can deliver 2000 items (ores) '''per wagon'''! And if you smelt the resources at your outpost and transport intermediate plates (copper, iron) you can transport 4000 per wagon. So when speaking in terms of throughput, you need to swap to trains or make multiple parallel belts.

One might think this picture would change when you develop [[logistic robot]]s. But that is not true! They can't be beaten for relatively small areas, especially with their researched bonuses, and they have some kind of intelligence; they try to deliver all requests as equally as possible. But bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods. Here are some calculations, which explain the problem (all calculations are assumed with full upgrade for the logistic bots!):

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 50 tiles you need:
Robot speed: 3 tiles/sec (basic speed) × 1.4 (logistic speed bonus) = 4.2 tiles/sec
Needed time for one transport: 100 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 24 secs
Need robots per minute: 24 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 0.4 bots to transport one item per minute over 50 tiles.
Because of Logistic robot cargo: 0.4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 0.1 bots to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 0.1 bots/per item = 300 bots
300 is a high, but still very realistic number for a logistic network with 4-5 roboports.

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 500 tiles you need:
Needed time for one transport: 1000 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 240 secs
Need robots per minute: 240 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 4 bots to transport one item per minute over 500 tiles.
Because of logistic robot cargo: 4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 1 bot to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 1 bots/per item = 3000 bots

3000 bots need a quite big amount of resources to produce, not accounting for the needed research (for bots, speed/stack size bonuses), number of roboports and the needed energy.

That leaves belts and trains.

Trains are faster than belts and offer better logistic control as you go between logistic networks.

Belts simply take forever, and you may wind up with a lot of asset tied up with simply being 'in transit'. You should see items sitting on a belt as "non-useable storage". Backed up belts can be a good thing for buffer space, but long belts are just inefficient, or better: You lose the control over the other end, due to the long gap; the resources on the other side could be long depleted, but you see it only five minutes later.

The effort to squeeze out the last 20% of belt performance increases depending on distance and total amount and at some point the train will win. But in your central factory area the bots will never be beaten. On the other hand: in small areas, and for simple throughput of one type of item (iron ore to iron-plates for example) we can place some belts in parallel, which is cheap and efficient (uses no energy) and when using parallel belts can achieve enormous throughput. For later game, the [[fast transport belt]] is a good compromise between cost and efficiency, and the [[Express transport belt]]s should be use only for short sections.

The amount of robots you need is directly dependent on the density you build. The central part of your factory should be dense, because not only throughput is important here, but also speed: How fast can an item be produced in total (including the transportation time).

== See also ==

* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3948 Discussion about using conveyor belts vs. trains]. There are some interesting tips in this thread.
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5478 More trains vs. longer trains]
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5715 Deciding which items to re-make and which to keep on belts?]
{{Languages}}

Tutorial:Transport use cases

2024-11-13T13:44:32Z

Alanur99: /* Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots */

{{Languages}}
{{DISPLAYTITLE:What Transport for which case?|noerror}}
This page compares the three main [[transport]] methods: [[Belt transport system]] (conveyor belts), [[railway]] (trains) and [[Logistic robot|logistic robots]]. There are two more useful methods to transport items: the character's inventory and the [[car]]. (Especially the car has an extremely high capacity and can be used instead of trains. Of course you need to drive everything yourself; see the chapter about the car).

The best choice depends on the context in which they are used. For example on the amount of resources you need to transport, or how far away they are.

== Comparison of belts, trains and logistic robots ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width=10% |
! width=30% | Belts
! width=30% | Trains
! width=30% | Logistic Robots
|-
| Throughput
| Constant, low for one belt, precisely calculable, limited
| Extremely high, fast, not easily calculable but constant, nearly unlimited if enough space,
| High in small areas, not calculable/chaotic, unlimited if enough bots, cannot be optimized, terrible over long distances and bulk goods
|-
| Space required
| Small for simple products, large for complicated product chains
| Large due to train stations and bends. There is a difference in using [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35806 roll-on-roll-off stations (lot of space) or termini (much smaller)].
| Small for complex products.
|-
| Optimization
| Highly optimizable. Source of never ending fun.
| Seldom really needed – better rebuild or build more tracks. For larger networks you can get some trouble with deadlocks/gridlocks, if not optimized, using chain signals. Optimize train stations: connect either with belts (complex) or with logistic bots (recommended).
| Optimize placing of roboports (for charging) and used number of ports vs. number of bots in the air.
|-
| Parallelization
| High. Two parallel belts have the doubled throughput as one. Cost is also only double. On the other hand: Effort to build that doubles.
| Extreme. Two parallel tracks can transport 5–10 times more trains than one, because if a track is blocked the trains can choose the other free track and so they don't need to stop. The effort to build two tracks in parallel is lower than double.
| Not so good. Doubling the amount of bots from one to two surely doubles the throughput, but doubling robots from 500 to 1000 can result in complete chaos.
|-
| Initial costs
| Very small as long as conveyor belts are short. Still good with parallel belts. Larger when making fast transport belts. Expensive with express; which should be used for special cases only.
| Considerable amount of material is needed for initial locomotive. Small costs (when compared to the increase of transport) for making rails.
| Roboports and especially bots require a lot of resources to make. Logistic bot upgrades are very expensive, but needed and must be calculated into the total costs. Maintenance costs a lot of time.
|-
| Use of energy
| Gratis. Free. Always an object of discussion. ;)
| Low. The usage of fuel is currently very affordable.
| High. The roboports need a lot of energy and the bots take even more energy, as more are in the air. This can be a big problem, but is normally not an issue.
|-
| Items in transit vs. duration of transport
| Bad. 100 tiles of belts stores about 700 items if fully loaded, but takes with basic belts 56 seconds for transport. With express belt, this is only 3 times faster.
| Very good. Lot of items transported in very short time.
| Chaotic. When jammed it can happen that the most important items are unreachable in the air.
|-
| Maintenance costs
| None
| Some fuel needed
| Considerable amount of electricity needed
|-
| Pollution
| None
| Some
| None, indirectly caused by use of electricity.
|-
| Best used for
| High throughput, bulk-goods (ores, some intermediates), small to medium distance. Examples include raw materials and simple products.
| High throughput, long distance. Examples include transporting ores or plates from resource fields to main factory area.
| Extremely high throughput over very short distances (< 50 tiles), low to medium throughput over medium distance (50–500), catastrophic over long distance. Best used in main factory area for complex products like modules and advanced circuits. Also best used for products needed in smaller quantities like placeable structures and ammunition. Unbeatable for train station (loading/unloading chests).
|-
| Most annoying problems
| Left/right lane problems (part of the game), splitting off the right amount of items.
| Deadlock situations (in complicated crossings), complex train-station and signal setup, traffic jams (especially when train was partially eaten by biters and block the whole line)
| Blocking of roboports by waiting for charging, "stupid" behavior like far away bots are used, instead of near and vice versa, Robots that take a "shortcut" through [[Enemies|Biter]]-infested territory.
|}

== Experts ==

=== Belts ===

* Practical up to distances of 500 tiles (to compare: a radar station watches up to 200 tiles, with a 100-tile "radius").
* Useful for connecting small resource-fields to the factory area, as the throughput of a belt is limited to 900 items per minute on a fully-compressed basic belt. With fast or express belt, this is higher (up to 2700) but the price is gigantic. Using multiple parallel belts is costly, but with basic belts still affordable over long distances.
* Best for working within an automated facility for '''bulk goods''', e.g. transporting ore, plates, circuit boards, etc. over short or medium distances.
* Store, over long distances, a not to be underestimated number of items (8 per tile, with two lanes, fills 500 tiles with 4000 items!). This storage is out of reach and could be counted as wasted, until it is transported.

Note: the length of 500 tiles is just a "rule of thumb", and comes from these facts:
* It takes nearly 5 minutes (4.44) for an item to run from one end to the other on 500 tiles of [[transport belt]]s.
* A belt with 500 tiles stores 4000 items (a [[cargo wagon]] of resources).
* The fact that after about this length it makes sense to use a train.

The advantages of belts are:
* Belts have a constant throughput rate.
* Calculations are easily possible (such as "Do I need more belts to transport items from the mines?")
* Basic belts are cheap compared with tracks and and are easier to build
* You can easily see how many items are on the belt, which makes it easier to assess if you need more throughput.
* You can use the belt as an open storage: you can store 80 items in a length of 10 belts, when using both lanes (but for long belts this is a big disadvantage!)

Disadvantages:
* Limited transport capacity, due to the limited throughput.
* Slow. This is a problem with very long belts because it takes a while to fill the belt. The items on the belt cannot be used. A belt with length of 100 holds 714 items for 56 seconds. With trains this is much lower (10 seconds) and as long as they are not loaded into a wagon, they still can be used.
* Items on the belts are "lost items" until they are transported.

Belts have the best short-distance throughput for continuous, direct-to-factory transportation. '''This is especially true, if you use basic belts in parallel, because this combination has an incredibly high throughput at low costs.

=== Trains ===

* Trains should be used to transport items from big and distant resource fields. No other means of long distance transport is as fast as trains. A single train line can easily be built; however, planning an extensive railway setup can be difficult and time consuming. One clever way of placing rails is entering a locomotive and placing the rails in front of it using the [[rail planner]].
* Trains can be used to connect separate factories together over long distances. This additionally lets you 'take a ride' out to outposts that require attention.

By smelting ore locally and shipping the plates via train, you can double your wagon capacity and route directly to a storage yard or factory.

=== Logistic robots ===

* Logistic robots should be used in a limited area with dense building placement. In most cases this is the main factory area. With some updates the logistic bots can handle enormous amounts of items.
* Bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods: It's not a good idea use bots for ore-transport or from/to furnaces. It is possible to use them for this task, but don't hold your breath for this to work perfectly; there are several issues with the AI that cause them to work inefficiently more often than not. Some players take that problem as a challenge.
* They do a perfect job on bulk-goods, if they can charge between their jobs, which is the case on train-stations: Train comes in, train is unloaded, bots transports to the target chests, bots charge. Next train comes in.
* Bots do a perfect job if you use them for random transport of expensive products; transport intermediate products to where they're needed within the local network, especially if it's completely impractical to route a belt for the job.

Bots, while great at moving sparse items with slow production speeds, are a very costly thing to integrate with high-volume affairs like mining/smelting because they need frequent breaks to recharge.

The exception is the incredible benefit they offer to train stations because of the space-logistical challenge of routing and load-balancing belts around the train tracks, especially since it isn't necessarily 'constant flow', offering them time to recharge.

== Seeing from throughput side ==

A (basic, yellow) [[transport belt]] cannot transport more than 900 items per minute and an [[express transport belt]] (the fastest) not more than 2700 (see above). Now compare that with a locomotive: a [[cargo wagon]] can deliver 2000 items (ores) '''per wagon'''! And if you smelt the resources at your outpost and transport intermediate plates (copper, iron) you can transport 4000 per wagon. So when speaking in terms of throughput, you need to swap to trains or make multiple parallel belts.

One might think this picture would change when you develop [[logistic robot]]s. But that is not true! They can't be beaten for relatively small areas, especially with their researched bonuses, and they have some kind of intelligence; they try to deliver all requests as equally as possible. But bots are terrible at long distances and bulk goods. Here are some calculations, which explain the problem (all calculations are assumed with full upgrade for the logistic bots!):

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 50 tiles you need:
Robot speed: 3 tiles/sec (basic speed) × 1.4 (logistic speed bonus) = 4.2 tiles/sec
Needed time for one transport: 100 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 24 secs
Need robots per minute: 24 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 0.4 bots to transport one item per minute over 50 tiles.
Because of Logistic robot cargo: 0.4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 0.1 bots to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 0.1 bots/per item = 300 bots
300 is a high, but still very realistic number for a logistic network with 4-5 roboports.

Needed robots to transport 3000 items per minute over a distance of 500 tiles you need:
Needed time for one transport: 1000 tiles ÷ 4.2 tiles/sec = 240 secs
Need robots per minute: 240 secs ÷ 60 secs = you need 4 bots to transport one item per minute over 500 tiles.
Because of logistic robot cargo: 4 bots ÷ 4 items per transport = 1 bot to transport one item per minute
Total: 3000 items × 1 bots/per item = 3000 bots

3000 bots need a quite big amount of resources to produce, not accounting for the needed research (for bots, speed/stack size bonuses), number of roboports and the needed energy.

That leaves belts and trains.

Trains are faster than belts and offer better logistic control as you go between logistic networks.

Belts simply take forever, and you may wind up with a lot of asset tied up with simply being 'in transit'. You should see items sitting on a belt as "non-useable storage". Backed up belts can be a good thing for buffer space, but long belts are just inefficient, or better: You lose the control over the other end, due to the long gap; the resources on the other side could be long depleted, but you see it only five minutes later.

The effort to squeeze out the last 20% of belt performance increases depending on distance and total amount and at some point the train will win. But in your central factory area the bots will never be beaten. On the other hand: in small areas, and for simple throughput of one type of item (iron ore to iron-plates for example) we can place some belts in parallel, which is cheap and efficient (uses no energy) and when using parallel belts can achieve enormous throughput. For later game, the [[fast transport belt]] is a good compromise between cost and efficiency, and the [[Express transport belt]]s should be use only for short sections.

The amount of robots you need is directly dependent on the density you build. The central part of your factory should be dense, because not only throughput is important here, but also speed: How fast can an item be produced in total (including the transportation time).

== See also ==

* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3948 Discussion about using conveyor belts vs. trains]. There are some interesting tips in this thread.
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5478 More trains vs. longer trains]
* [http://www.factorioforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5715 Deciding which items to re-make and which to keep on belts?]
{{Languages}}