Posts by Cadde

  • need help with CASUC advanced design

    But i am talking about the engines that are needed to power the wooden transport pipe next to the reactor. Is it possible to use converters to power a wooden pipe without any engines and can they be placed next to the reactor without them exploding?
    Is there any other way to power that wooden pipe using said converters and regulator pipes? Otherwise i will have to rely on redstone engines because those are the only ones that can be re-synced and reach the 1 cycle per second required for a 4 BPS CASUC but as we already know, redstone engines will never be truly 1 rev per second over a period of time and this worries me, since there's 1920 heat generated and only 2000 drawn per second in a 5 chamber with 4 buckets and the rest being u-cells. A single miss will bring the core up to 8000 heat and if a single miss happens then it's safe to assume another will follow until the engines are re-synced. If you resync too often the engines slow down, if you don't resync enough (once every 6 seconds according to my calcs) then your reactor will blow up. And anything between that can cause components melting around the reactorwhich is pretty severe in itself.


    EDIT: Oh and btw, is that an MFSU i see sitting on top of your reactor? IF that is the only energy accepting path from the reactor then that MFSU will explode once your reactor outputs more than 512 EU/t.

  • need help with CASUC advanced design


    About the ejecting upwards... Since it's a CASUC (where 99% of the cooling comes from buckets) you could just close off any space around the reactor where a bucket may slip past. And obsidian pipes, when powered by a stone engine or better (just FYI that is) has this catch pattern:


    Assuming the obsidian pipe is coming from below.


    Side view.

    Code
    #########
 #######
  #####
   ###
    H


    Top view.

    Code
    #########
#########
#########
#########
####H####
#########
#########
#########
#########


    Where # is the sucking area and H is the position of the pipe itself.


    About bucket fillers, while i admire any design that uses BC pumps (for design purposes, looking like the real deal) to fill tanks and then extract buckets from said tanks. There is a cheaper alternative... Too bad you don't want RP2 because it's deployers can fill buckets straight from the waters edge, no need to store it in tanks or use waterproof pipes.


    ----


    Finally, a question: Does your power conversion addon allow you to place a power converter or any combination of them so that they act on wooden pipes? That is the big problem with my last design... Those pesky electric engines, since they have to be up against the reactor chambers, are sucking power directly from the reactor and once the reactor passes the 256 EU/t mark they explode from overvoltage. The alternative would be to use bigger engines that allows HV (but that is very counter productive as they draw more than 50% of the power the reactor makes and thus i am better off using redstone engines.)
    Anyways, the point is. I wish i could act upon a wooden pipe from afar or at least using an engine that doesn't draw power from the reactor itself directly.

  • [Mod Idea] TBM (Tunnel Boring Machine)

    Great work! Just make it super special and people will take this over RP2's frames any day.


    And i too agree that RP2 is a bit too cheap. Eloraam should make an optional IC2 module that makes all RP2 stuff require EU's to operate. Even the circuitry! (At 1 EU/minute per item or something)

  • need help with CASUC advanced design

    Quote from Quartz

    *snip*
    I didn't calculate it, but 8 might not be enough to cool down this monster, but I already have an idea on how to relatively easily upgrade it to 10 bpret (bpret - sounds nice, doesn't it?).


    4 buckets/s in 4 slots on the reactor is enough to cool the remaining slots full of uranium cells. Heat generated by a full 5 chamber minus the 4 slots for buckets is 1,920 and 4 buckets is 2,000 cooling at > 4,000 heat in hull. That gives you a max of 6,000 heat. But it IS VERY important that you do not miss a single beat in the reactor at those figures or it will go pop in 6 seconds...


    EDIT: Oh and i hit a snag with my electric engines design... They feed off the power the reactor makes and goes pop due to overvoltage. Lucky me a had a security system set up to stop the reactor but i did press the PANIC button several times as well. ;)


    So now it's back to the drawing board and try to make something happen with that other addon instead or use the unreliable redstone engines or bulky stone engines... Since combustion engines cannot be stopped and started as easily (in the future release of BC)

  • need help with CASUC advanced design

    Quote from Quartz

    I have a power converter addon due to necessity of not having redstone engine towers, so I might as well use those electric engines and this truly sounds promising. How do they present themselves? How frequently are they ticking? Do they sync or something like that?


    Detection element sounds nice on its own in some other situation, but it has no application in CASUC since it defeats 2 major objectives. It would be truly huge without RP, also very frequent negative ticks from detector unit will just cool the engines down completely (this is the issue I had, see OP) or if you create some circuitry to adjust the desynchronisation to be appropriate it would be even bigger due to flip flops on every (!) detector unit and even more bigger because of need to make negative pulses shorter and redirect buckets to different detectors. I don't have an idea how would I even start doing this, but I could reasonably expect my design to triple its volume (= useless).
    Combustion engines require additional piping from water pumps and fuel supply, which kind of defeats the simplicity aspects (uranium cell -> energy). Also, you are probably overpaying a lot for bucket extraction since combustion engines extract stacks of items and you cannot extract stack of buckets, so fuel consumption is inadequate to its purpose.

    Well, redstone engines might be enough for a CASUC if you feel confident in your design but like i said earlier. A redstone engine will not cycle exactly once per second no matter what you do. Especially if you sync them.
    The BC->IC² crossover mod i am using introduces electric engines of 4 different flavors.


    • Small - Equal to a stone engine and doesn't require cooling. Draws ~2.5 EU/t per engine.
    • Medium - Equal to a combustion engine and requires cooling if it is to be run constantly. However, since it's full cycle is < 1 second you stop it for a brief period every cycle and that is adequate cooling as far as i can tell, but i have yet to let them do this for more than an hour. Draws ~12.5 EU/t per engine.
    • Large - Equal to 5 combustion engines. Very fast cycle speed (i think twice per second or something like that, need to check source) and needs cooling even if you cycle them. Draws ~75 EU/t per engine!
    • Industrial - Err... Supposedly equal to 5 Large electric engines (25 combustion) and cycles OMGWTF fast (as fast as they possibly can probably) and draws OMGWTF amounts of EU/t. To run these you need a DEDICATED pump per engine and gold waterproof pipes. You also probably need a CASUC reactor to feed it with power on it's own. BUT, a single one of these would be enough to pump > 4 buckets/s into/out of a reactor.

    EDIT: Oh btw, electric engines doesn't explode when they overheat. Either they slow down or they draw more power. I haven't tested to see the effects of overheating.


    I use medium sized engines (4 of them currently) and I am looking at adding another 4 because i am in the process of designing a 5 chamber CASUC, which would allow me to reach the magical 960 EU/t reactor. Something not even ICE based cooling systems can manage! This would net me a 860 EU/t reactor after the cooling system drain and that's 40 EU/t more than a redstone powered 4 chamber that is in perfect sync. Not to mention that is still 15 EU/t better than an ICE based 5 chamber CASUC... I won the internets?
    Well, since i am still in the design phase i can't honestly say i will reach my goal but in theory i will be able to. It's just a lot of testing to be done.
    And this is BEFORE i take advantage of the other addon i have installed named "Additional Pipes" which adds an advanced wooden transport pipe that can be configured to only extract an item of your choice. In this case empty buckets.
    This means i can safely FLOOD the reactor with buckets (and have an obsidian collector underneath for overflow) and possibly reduce my engine count to 6 instead of 8 which would gain me another 25 effective EU/t after the cooling systems running costs.
    These are wonderful times indeed. ;)
    Anyways, back to designing the ultimate CASUC.


    EDIT #2: I apparently had the numbers wrong on power consumption on Large electric engines. It's 75 EU/t not 90 EU/t per engine.
    EDIT #3: And i now know what the effects of overheating is. More power consumption!
    EDIT #4: And they slow down...


    EDIT #5: Ok, just for the sake of it. I timed a Large engine and it does a rev every .4 seconds. I think it's safe to assume the medium does one rev every .8 seconds.

  • Reactor with IC2+RP2

    Quote from MJEvans

    The thread ventured in to a slightly tangential, but still on topic, discussion of 'what kind of reactor would be possible with the next version of the mods in question'.

    Right, well i responded to the OP in general. Not to the current discussion of the thread.


    Either way, to me it looks like the Retrievers will be capable of retrieving several different items from a chest since it has a 3x3 grid to place items into.
    If that is the case then perhaps you can use just one retriever to collect 4 empty buckets at a time. (or less if there are less)


    The problem with a "empty bucket" retrieval system is that it has to sort through the empty vs full buckets and retrieve said empty buckets and replace new buckets on demand. There is no way to anticipate when a bucket will be emptied in the reactor, all such designs are based on assumptions. We assume one or more buckets will be emptied that reactor tick but we cannot predict how many so we send new buckets on demand which is rather slow unless we can figure out a way to teleport the buckets into the reactor. (I dont think teleport pipes will help here btw)


    Thus, it's better to have a constant flow that takes all buckets (full or not) and replace them with fresh ones. (This gave me a new design idea for a 5 chamber CASUC without using the new retriever, just now)


    Oh well, retrievers look interesting none the less but I can't help but think they are too "magicky" for my taste. They make it too easy the same way EE makes making ice blocks too easy.

  • need help with CASUC advanced design

    Just a little note unless you use detector pipes (Additional Pipes addon for BC) or RP2's tubes.
    You should use combustion engines for extraction even though it may seem wasteful. Stone engines are difficult to maintain and redstone engines (while they should be doing exactly one rev per second) aren't doing one rev per second.
    Alternatively there's the BC->IC2 crossover addon that introduces electric engines, though they will waste some EU's (my current setup uses a pretty constant 50 EU/t)


    But that isn't the reason i posted though... Detector pipes! Here's how you make one with just BC!
    Place a wooden pressure plate and a dead end pipe so that any buckets fall onto the pressure plate. When the plate is activated use an obsidian pipe and a redstone engine to suck the buckets into the cooling system and send them on their way.
    Use the same signal to activate your extraction engines. They desync on every coolant batch! (Hence another reason why you should be using petrol engines as they are faster than 1 second per revolution)
    Alternatively, make your detector system only desync your redstone engines every 10 or Xth coolant batch using a counter. (That is a bunch of T-Flip Flops)


    Note that you have to set up several detector lanes because the pressure plates stay on for longer than 1 second. Switching between the different lanes is done with an iron pipe and some redstone and an XOR gate.

  • Reactor with IC2+RP2

    AFAIK at this current stage you can only do at most 3 buckets/s (some reactor ticks will only suck 2) with RP2 unless you drop to a 3 chamber to add another filter to suck empty buckets out. I am using a combination of BC and RP2 to get 4 buckets/s which is enough cooling for a 5 chamber full of uranium cells minus the 4 slots for buckets. It cools 2,000 heat every second and accumulates 1,631 heat every second.


    For those interested i am sending 4 buckets with RP2 into a pneumatic pipe in a way that makes all 4 buckets share the exact same spot in the pipe.


    Code
    # #
#---#
  |
  |
  R


    That's what the pneumatic piping looks like. # are filters (who have chests full of water buckets as a buffer) and -| are pipes and R is the reactor.
    This way two buckets join at the exact same time and then those two join with the other two from the other side. Making 4 buckets arrive at the reactor at the EXACT same time.
    I also have a sensor right before the reactor that is wired to a counter already pre-counted to 3. The delay would be too large if it had to wait for the 4 count. The counter is self resetting and the signal is carried to a repeater series that triggers 4 combustion engines in a staggered cycle. So it takes slightly longer to pull the buckets out but 80% of the time the reactor has 4 fresh buckets. It's just a matter of timing the refill so it doesn't happen during a reactor tick.


    I am still in the process of building and stress testing but once done this design will be able to produce the maximum 820 EU/t on a water bucket CASUC.
    Doing that with just RP2 without any way to pull 4 buckets per second reliably means you will have to stick to 490 EU/t designs to be 100% safe with a 4 chamber or 680 EU/t on a 3 chamber reactor.
    Anything above those values means your reactor is unstable (for instance, assuming you have a steady 3 bucket/s and having a "hiccup" at just the wrong time to make your reactor critical for just a second and melting something vitally important.


    EDIT: Oh btw, don't use timers to clock your reactors vital components. Timers are unreliable! Instead use sequencers and attach a pulser to 2 of the outputs on the sequencer and set your sequencer to half the time you wanted. (This excludes 200 ms timingsbut there are ways to fix that too, just use two pulsers going into 1 wire. Either way works just fine.

  • [Designs] Cadde's Reactor Designs.

    So i recently took on nuclear engineering and decided to share my designs in this post. Intend to update the OP with new designs as i make them.


    Before i list them however, i have varying goals as i design my reactors and i will attempt to categorize them based on these goals. So for instance, if i need a very high Effective EU/t then efficiency is not important but rather raw effective output (that is, amount of EU/t over time including cooldown)
    Obviously i am not interested in reactors that can explode, thus i either design Mark-I's or Mark-II's (with a high consecutive cycles number / short cooldown period) or i design an automated system (CASUC or Continuously Added Single Use Coolants) to ensure the reactor stays safe.
    Initially however i will focus my efforts on designs that are NOT classed as SUC or CASUC.



    MK I DESIGNS WITH HIGH POWER GENERATION AND LOW EFFICIENCY

    Safe designs (Mark-I) that produce as much effective EU/t as they possibly can. Efficiency is non important but I still try to make these designs efficient where there is room for it.
    Obviously being MK-I there is no SUC or CASUC designs here.



    MK I-0 ED 6-chamber "FDIM" (FDIM = First Design I Made)


    This is the first design i have made (besides some previous learning experiences ofc) that i feel is ready to be used.
    DO NOTE that this being the first design (merely posted it for showing progress) it isn't as well designed as it could be (possibly) and thus could possibly be improved upon.
    This design was made to create as much Effective EU/t to rival my current GeoTherm Generator farm in power output, space and maintenance. (Which currently outputs 120 EU/t taking 24 tiles of space with cabling)
    This being a reactor (even though MK I) i do not intend to let it sit in the open and intends to build a full containment around this (and any reactors i make) with at least 4 block thick (according to wiki specifications) so size is going to be an issue no matter what i do. (11x11x11 = 1,331 vs 24)
    I just wish reactors would output double the energy they do right now under the same circumstances (a max of 2048 though, otherwise not even EV would be capable of handling a pulsed all uranium reactor)
    But enough talking...



    Stats


    Class: MK I
    Consecutive Cycles: Inf (0)
    Efficiency: 1.50 (ED)
    Active EU/t: 120
    Effective EU/t: 120
    Total EU: 24 mil
    Excess Heat: -1.0
    Highest Heat Level: 32 (0%)


    Uranium Cells: 8
    Heat Dispensers: 12
    Cooling Cells: 32



    Link


    Screenshot (clicky)




    MK II-11 EC 6-chamber "SOCLOSE" (So Close!)


    So i set out to make a more fuel efficient version of my MK I-0 ED "FDIM". Still wanting > 60 Effective EU/t i tried numerous designs but just couldn't get a reactor with an Active EU/t of > 60 that also held an Effective EU/t over 60.
    Eventually i landed with this design (sticking to pairs of uranium cells) which is SO close but "no cigar".
    This being my second ever design i was quite thrilled when i made it but now i am just sad... I can't improve on it without getting a lower eff EU/t.


    Stats


    Class: MK II
    Consecutive Cycles: 11.75
    Efficiency: 2 (EC)
    Active EU/t: 120
    Effective EU/t: 113.11
    Total EU: 24 mil
    Excess Heat: 4.0
    Highest Heat Level: 846 (5%)


    Uranium Cells: 6
    Heat Dispensers: 13
    Cooling Cells: 35


    Link


    Screenshot (Clicky)




    ================================================================================


    Changelog


    2011-12-02
    - Initial writeup
    - Two designs added (MK I-0 ED "FDIM" and MK II-11 EC "SOCLOSE"


    2011-12-05
    - Updated EU/t and total EU to reflect IC² l33t version values.
    - Posted a smaller (4 chamber) design of the MK II-11 EC "SOCLOSE" reactor below. This one not notably better but it has a MK II-E rating rather than a MK II-11 rating. Linky


    Notes


    2011-12-02
    - Next design i am going to attempt to make will be a efficiency 1.0 > 60 effective EU/t... Wish me luck!
    -- Increased size and added color of design headers.
    ================================================================================


    Well, don't just sit there... What do you think?
    I am always looking for inspiration and constructive criticism.
    And more designs will be cropping up here eventually.

  • Suggestion: CF stuff

    So in short... We need better PC's to be able to make more complex blocks. Just get upgrading people and CPU isn't such a limiting factor anymore :D


    What about making it optional? You add certain "designer" blocks knowing it will impact performance for those with low end PC's...?



    EDIT: Off topic but... The reason high end PC's are so expensive is because so few are getting high end equipment. If more people would spend a few extra $$$ then hardware manufacturers would spend more money making new and faster hardware... faster! The more you feed into the industry the faster the industry evolves.

  • Suggestion: Add the missing UU-Matter recipes

    Just as a reminder: Gravel = Flint = ITNT... That's why! Gravel is a finite resource (not nearly as abundant as dirt and cobblestone)


    And uranium ores, why not just make the recipe expensive enough that you would need a Mark-III A or Mark IV to gain anything from it. I have yet to mess with nuclear power but to my understanding you need to be THERE to operate a nuclear generator after the Mark III rating, thus the gains are directly related to time spent. The same way you could dig a 50,000 block long tunnel and find enough uranium to power your nuclear reactor for the rest of your life.

  • [Suggestion] A Sticky Resin Extractor

    Assuming you don't want to use RedPower with a deployer and a tree tap there are a few other options available to you...


    • Using buildcraft you can place a filler with a clear recipe to clear a large forest of rubber trees. You get random amounts of resin when breaking rubber logs and you get the saplings too! You can automate the process (planting, clearing and replanting at set intervals) *
    • Use another mod that allows you to put an item into a block that then acts (right clicks) in front of it.
    • Forcefully grow your rubber trees so that all holes for resin is at ground level facing you and remove any parts of the tree that isn't at ground level and/or facing you. then just mass tap those trees whenever you pass them and you will have so much resin you won't have room for it anywhere.

    * - To make an automated tree farm in BC you need to know a few things. First off, a filler with a clear recipe will reach a "done" state if all blocks in it's area is cleared, therefore ensure that it can be stopped somehow and have something fill the top layer with some block or drop sand on the trunk (highest part of a rubber tree) before the clearing happens then stop clearing once the sand starts dropping again.
    There are many ways to solve it so that the filler doesn't reach a done state. A filler with a fill recipe will never reach a done state if you place an animal (wolf is suitable because he will sit still forever when ordered) in the way of the filler.
    But really, the easiest way is to just install RedPower2 :)

  • {Sugggestion} Satellites and Outer Space

    Quote from raa1337

    Denied Ideas
    New Dimension


    However, a satellite as an improved mapping system is interesting.

    That thread is about another standard dimension. Not about outer space...
    And it's not a "DENIED" but rather a "why?" response. After all, making an alternate reality that is just another normal world for randomness doesn't make much sense but adding another dimension with cool new features (low/zero gravity, moon dust to craft moonshine... err) does make sense... Until i messed it up in my head.

  • *question* not urgent tho*

    Quote from Krazygluon

    Last I saw, it looked like forge isn't 1.0 compatible yet.


    Not to pry, but from a dev standpoint, does it look like we're just hung up on forge's release or will there likely be more 1.0 work to do after the 1.0 compatible forge drops?

    Forge is on standby for the 1.01 bugfix release last i heard. I'm sure they are looking into the changes made in 1.0 so far but are waiting for 1.01.
    Also, i think SpaceToad is on a vacation. He has great timing with his vacations, had one between 1.73 and 1.8 as well. *wink*


    Either way, if you wanna blame anyone then blame Mojang for not investing in a Mod API... It's not like they can't afford a few extra devs focused on that. Maybe they should ask Risugami and Eloraam? Or just have give a select few modders access to the source code so they can code a proper API without having to look at func_xxxx_y() and figure out which feature was added there.
    Either way, it's MCP, ModLoader (Not necessarily reliant on MCP), ModloaderMP, Forge in that order before any Forge reliant mods can be updated. The alternative isn't that great though with all the mod clashes and all and every developer having to solve all problems by themselves which means less content overall in the modding scene.



    EDIT:
    To the OP btw... Now you know to keep your old clean MC jar files. You can probably find a clean one on the net somewhere if you look hard enough.
    No... There is no archive on mincraft.net. (there really should be one)
    No... Asking for a MC jar here is not a good idea.


    I keep all minecraft jars i possibly can. (A have some from about 1 and a half year ago)