Questions on the Fluid Reactor

1st Official Post

    Hey Everyone,


    Seems like this is the best way to do it, thanks for the hint ;). This is going to be long and detailed.


    IC used: industrialcraft-2-2.6.188-ex110


    Some background on why I'm asking some of those questions:
    I'm building a large scale nuclear power plant complete with 50x50 wide cooling towers (filled with solar distillers), 2 or more fluid reactor blocks, uranium enrichment and mox refill stations and so on. In short a massive project. I'm trying to keep everything as realistic as possible. All is built in survival and I am not scared of crafting 4000 solar distillers for example :D


    The server I play on with my friends is using the FTB Infinity Lite pack. That means no GregTech (seems out of date), no worldcontrol (the current versions seems to be more or less broken for 1.10.2), no Thermal Expansion. All the mods including IC2 ofc are on 1.10.2.


    I want to use the Fluid reactor from IC but will use the Turbines from the Extreme Reactors mod. the Steam-repressurizer block from IC transforms the steam to be compatible (awesome). I also want to use Immersive Engineering for tanks and pipes (if possible but that might not be, or too much hustle in the end and I think the cables from the industrial era are not thematically fitting in a modern nuclear power plant). Only requirements: I want to use the IC coolant system (most realistic and very cool!) and Extreme Reactors turbines.

    I am not quite sure yet how many reactors I will have and how exactly they will be set up but I am not afraid of going very complicated and large scale! Probably one breeder for plutonium or just several MOX reactors as they have the highest heat output. In the later case I'll just make some plutonium to start with and have Thermal Centrifuges contribute the Uranium 238.


    This is the chain so far:

    5x5 Fluid reactor > Hot Coolant (HC) > Liquid Heat Exchanger (LHE) > Steam Boilers (SB) > Steam-Repressurizer (SRP) > Extreme Reactors Turbine (which one is to be determined as soon as I find out how much steam I will produce).


    Since I'm investing so much time and effort into this I want the returns to be nice of course, that's why I went through the reactor design thread in search of the best fluid reactor in terms of Heat output (keep in mind: NO GregTech), and I found this one posted by Shananiganeer:


    Now the questions:


    1. This reactor states 7500 Heat, is that HU/t or HU/s ?


    2. I ran this one in creative mode and got a weird reading of 20000-24000 HU/t (I read somewhere that in 1.10.2 the reading is off and I should divide it by 20, but I can't find that thread anymore). Is this because I have not heated up the reactor to >51% Heat?


    3. Currently I am experimenting with the HC distribution to the LHEs, I am not sure which pipes of the many available pipes to use maybe someone has experience with this? If no pipes are practical I would consider using fluid distributors although I have not managed to get them running yet (they dont extract the coolant from the reactor and they wont accept pulling or ejector upgrades. Ideally the pipes would be the ones from Immersive Engineering since the look most realistic but I can settle for EnderIO or the classic Buildcraft pipes (now in Mekanism). What are your suggestions?


    4. Which pipes would you recommend for steam transport? There has to be a filtering option (otherwise the boilers will output distilled water) and the amount of transferred steam needs to be large (I am expecting huge amounts).


    5. Which reactor design(s) would you recommend or is the one I posted the one with the highest Heat output?


    6. What do you use for automation of the fuel rods? Which mods and which transport system?


    7. is the Experimental reactor planner usable for 1.10.2?


    8. How do you heat up MOX reactors safely?


    Now this is quite a lot to read I hope you don't mind.

    Some of the questions might be obvious to you but keep in mind I just recently returned to modded Minecraft, last time was 2012, back then reactors were simpler ;)


    I love the way the fluid reactors work and that you kept the components, I prefer this system over any other out there!

    • Official Post

    I'm going to try to answer some of your questions. The biggest problem I have is I am a MOX NOOB.


    0. I use IC2 Experimental Reactor Planner from MauveCloud, https://github.com/MauveCloud/Ic2ExpReactorPlanner/releases. It can handle anything.
    - A good "rule of thumb" is to run the simulator as an EU reactor, then double the result for Fluid HU/Tick. For example, this one runs 1280 HU/t average, because it is 640 Max Heat in EU mode:
    0003030C09110D0C0903000C0D0C0D0C0D11030C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D110D140D140D110D11

    1. This seems like an EU reactor. Those stats are "if you heat it to 7500 for start, it will put out 1040 EU/t". this is confirmed in the planner. The planner also has it blowing up in fluid mode.

    - That is an IMPRESSIVE number for eu/tick, I can't see more than 1005 EU/tick from the best fluid reactor I have, with standard IC2 steam turbines.


    2. I have NO CLUE how to use the 20K+ HU/sec I see in IC2 minecraft, stick to the simulator.


    3. Use a setup like this to get steam generation. 2 LHCs per Boiler. Can't vouch for pipes, I only use IC2. Stackable Nuclear Steam generation Crib Notes You can yse fluid distributors instead of all of the tanks and control flow better, but its more expensive in survival.


    4. Again, someone else will hopefully talk on pipes. I use tanks and distributors.


    5. Here are my highest heat designs. Again, no MOX. I'll see if I can get a decent MOX reactor one of these days... but they're tricky.

    4x Quad Uranium / MOX, 1280 heat -> 960 EU/t in IC2:
    0003030C09110D0C0903000C0D0C0D0C0D11030C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D110D140D140D110D11


    IRIDIUM REFLECTORS: 2x Quad Uranium, 4x Reflectors, 1340 heat -> 1005 EU/t in IC2:
    2303230C09110D0C0903230C0D0C0D0C0D11230C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D110D140D140D110D11

    3 Quad + 1 Dual MAX, 1376 heat -> 1032/t EU in IC2: (WILL EXPLODE if run for 20,000 seconds)
    0605000C0A120D0C0A06000C0D0C0D0C0D12060C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D120D120D120D120D12

    • Official Post
    Quote from SirAlexTheGreat

    I ran this one in creative mode and got a weird reading of 20000-24000 HU/t (I read somewhere that in 1.10.2 the reading is off and I should divide it by 20, but I can't find that thread anymore). Is this because I have not heated up the reactor to >51% Heat?

    Divide it by 20, the output is per-second not per-tick as the GUI suggested

    Quote from SirAlexTheGreat

    is the Experimental reactor planner usable for 1.10.2?

    It should be, nothing has changed that would break it/make it unreliable

    Quote from SirAlexTheGreat

    How do you heat up MOX reactors safely?

    Pull out any vents that are cooling it then run it with the uranium in until it reaches the kind of temperature you're aiming for. Don't forget to put the vents back in again afterwards though ;)

    145 Mods isn't too many. 9 types of copper and 8 types of tin aren't too many. 3 types of coffee though?

    I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realise that what you read was not what I meant.


    ---- Minecraft Crash Report ----
    // I just don't know what went wrong :(


    I see this too much.

    Thanks a lot for the answers! I will answer in detail later when i have more time, while experimenting I just ran this reactor quickly:



    And for some reason the reactor runs out of coolant after about 15 seconds, I have tried pulling upgrades, installing more fluid ports and it still doesnt keep up with the consumption. This is my setup:
    2z8ib49.jpg


    Any ideas why this is happening?

    Quote from albijoe

    I'm going to try to answer some of your questions. The biggest problem I have is I am a MOX NOOB.


    0. I use IC2 Experimental Reactor Planner from MauveCloud, https://github.com/MauveCloud/Ic2ExpReactorPlanner/releases. It can handle anything.
    - A good "rule of thumb" is to run the simulator as an EU reactor, then double the result for Fluid HU/Tick. For example, this one runs 1280 HU/t average, because it is 640 Max Heat in EU mode:
    0003030C09110D0C0903000C0D0C0D0C0D11030C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D0C0D110D140D140D110D11

    Thanks for the clarification.


    Quote from albijoe

    1. This seems like an EU reactor. Those stats are "if you heat it to 7500 for start, it will put out 1040 EU/t". this is confirmed in the planner. The planner also has it blowing up in fluid mode.

    - That is an IMPRESSIVE number for eu/tick, I can't see more than 1005 EU/tick from the best fluid reactor I have, with standard IC2 steam turbines.


    Does that mean a Fluid reactor will not maintain heat? I tried this and the heat always returned to 0.00% when putting back the heat vents.

    Quote from Chocohead

    Pull out any vents that are cooling it then run it with the uranium in until it reaches the kind of temperature you're aiming for. Don't forget to put the vents back in again afterwards though


    So this wont work for MOX Fluid reactors? Is there anyone who knows a good MOX Fluid reactor design? I would really like to utilise both types of Fuel in my Fluid reactors (I will not use EU reactors if avoidable).


    Quote from albijoe

    Assume each lhc is holding 1000mb of fluid, up to 2000 if there's a backlog. Does that help?

    Not really :/ The pipes fill up with coolant (visually seem full) and drain completely when I turn off the reactor. I have fluid ejectors in the LHEs so they shouldnt store it?

    • Official Post
    Quote from SirAlexTheGreat

    So this wont work for MOX Fluid reactors?

    I meant uranium in the more general sense of fuel rods rather than only uranium fuel rods. If anything it works better with MOX reactors because the designs are more likely to not overvent so the heat will get maintained when it's off.

    145 Mods isn't too many. 9 types of copper and 8 types of tin aren't too many. 3 types of coffee though?

    I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realise that what you read was not what I meant.


    ---- Minecraft Crash Report ----
    // I just don't know what went wrong :(


    I see this too much.

    • Official Post
    Quote from SirAlexTheGreat

    Not really :/ The pipes fill up with coolant (visually seem full) and drain completely when I turn off the reactor. I have fluid ejectors in the LHEs so they shouldnt store it?

    All of those items (pipes, LHEs) hold some fluid. Though they are ejecting fluid, it is not instantaneous, and they have to take an action to remove the heat. So Let's say you have 14 pipes holding 500mb fluid each (waiting to be used) and 14 LHE's holding 1000 fluid each. you would need at least 21 buckets of fluid to keep the pipes filled. I often put 36-40 buckets of coolant into a reactor to keep it filled for 14 LHEs, and I will see 4 buckets, more or less, in the primary tank after that.

    Quote

    Is there anyone who knows a good MOX Fluid reactor design? I would really like to utilize both types of Fuel in my Fluid reactors .

    Keep in mind MOX works just like uranium but with 1/2 the life, at 0 heat. Therefore you could just sub it in when you wanted. If I can fix the MOX reactor you showed for fluid, I'll let you know... but it's a HUGE balancing act, you have to get Net 0 heat loss or gain.

    IF you had something like Nuclear Control, you could pull a part when it reaches 7500 and add it back at 7000 to keep high efficiencies... but I don't have nuclear control

    • Official Post

    Summary: MOX reactors are even more of a pain in Fluid mode. I can't get it closer than +/- 1% (core heating or cooling). I recommend using MOX fuel like uranium fuel.


    EU MOX reactors slowly ramp up in EU mode, creating progressively more EU. To my knowledge, their heat stays constant.


    Fluid MOX reactors suddenly output 2x heat in Fluid mode but otherwise do nothing. This means it's tricky to even GET them to the right heat without them running away and blowing up, you have like 30 seconds.


    EXAMPLE: Imagine the reactor put out 600 heat per tick, and you removed 500. It would heat up at 1% per tick (100 of its 10,000 capacity). At 50.001% heat, it would start emitting 1200 heat per tick. You are removing 500, so it heats up at 700 per tick, 7% of 10000. It has 50% capacity, so it will take no more than 8 ticks (57%, 64%, 71%, 78%, 85%, 92%, 99%, 106%) to explode, or melt down, or whatever it decides to do. Lava will likely happen sooner, it looks like 8500 heat / 5 ticks.

    If you have the heat vent capacity to get rid of the 2x heat, you will be cooling 600 heat with 1200, and unless you dump 5701 heat into the reactor, you will not get it to ever heat up.

    Assume I'm a complete noob on this :) Are you saying that if I manage to get that heat in there (perhaps using another reactor to heat up components and transfer them in) it would be possible? sounds like a very fragile thing to do ^^


    Thanks a lot for your help btw!

    • Official Post

    There are... I forget what they are called, heating cells or something. You can use those. I could not get a high-heat MOX reactor that was better, or even as good, as a basic uranium reactor. It was more efficient, but not more powerful. It is SUCH a pain to get those perfectly balanced, I think it SO much easier to use MOX fuel like uranium fuel at 0 heat. Don't forget, the fluid reactor flexes it's output up and down, too...


    The 1280 reactor (4x quad uranium or MOX) or the iridium 1340 reactor would be better in all ways but final efficiency.


    2 qns: are you using some kind of automation?


    Have you read the post on the 1370 reactor?

    Well, assume I got a way to automatically turn the MOX fluid reactor on and off, according to the wiki they are twice as effective above 50% heat, Shouldnt a MOX desgin be better in any case then? More Heat more EU?


    I did read the post I think, Im looking for a MOX design though.


    Quote from albijoe

    Oh, also, are you allowing iridium reflectors in your designs?

    Sure, why not?

    • Official Post

    The most heat I've been able to get from a reactor is 1376 HU/t. I cannot get more if it's MOX, that's not how the rules are built.


    The most I've been able to get running "continuously" is 1340HU/t. The 1376 needs a bit of cool down time.


    MOX doubles heat above 50% reactor core heat. Since I can't seem to get more than 1376 heat out of a reactor without blowing it up, the "double heat" is only helpful a) if you can KEEP it above 50% core heat, and b) to improve efficiency, since you can't get much more than 1370 heat anyways. If either different parts or a different mechanic for fluid MOX is implemented, this would be different.


    If you shut off a reactor, it will dump its remaining heat into the coolant, so you can't just "shut it off" and hope it'll be ready to turn it on in an instant. Only the EU reactors do that.

    Thanks for your input albijoe, I have decided to leave a MOX fluid reactor for later since I cannot get a stable design with continuous steam flow.


    Here is a little update on the project:

    I have the reactor and the the turbines set up in creative and all works well together, getting a LOT of energy out of one reactor.


    Now its time to tackle the automation which might be even trickier since I have no experience with it, so Id like to ask for some input from you experienced players.


    1. Which mods/system would you recommend to automatically replace Quad Rods? Will Mekanism pipes work well?


    2. What do I do with all the Plutonium (since MOX is not really working in fluid)?

    • Official Post

    I don't yet automate, but I think any pull filter and push filter should work with 2 doors on the reactor. Like, pull depeleted uranium and MOX from 1 access hatch, push new from the other, and fill empty spaces with reactor plates if needed to keep things in the right place.


    As for the plutonium, use MOX as half-duration uranium. That's all it is if you ignore the heat bit.

    Hmm, I dont think ill use MOX reactors, they seem inferior in design as of now, and I've got plenty of uranium, resources are not an issue,


    Any filter that comes to mind? I dont know many mods, have tried the Mekanism one now but the pipes dont connect to the reactor when relogging so that's a problem.

    • Official Post

    Buildcraft can probably do it.


    I've tried AE2. It has ejectors and extractors that can be filtered pretty easily. And has more flexibility than buildcraft in my opinion.


    There's a random component, you have to find 4 separate patterns in meteors to progress beyond the basics for AE2.


    It's also a separate set of pipes than buildcraft if you are already using that.

    I dont have these two mods, we are on 1.10.2 and I dont think theyre updated but I found a way with Ender IO pipes, these are great so much versatility.


    Now the design is clear and I get to building, not looking forward to craft 4000 solar distillers but well.. ^^


    Ill post some pictures once Im making some good progress, thanks for the input so far.