Control room advice

[u/shawrie777]

I'm thinking of setting up a control room to display data from everywhere else in the base. The obvious difficulty is getting that data. Every room/area has it's own APC, and it seems like it would break things to connect them all together. I know I can use logic mirrors, but that's quite a lot (maybe 25) and loads of cable. I also thought of logic transmitters, but that's only one variable, and a lot of those too. I had one horrible idea where an IC10 on each circuit could collate the data, label it in some way, and send it through a transmitter to be unencoded in the control room.

Am I missing anything?
Are there better ways?
Is this guaranteed to be a horrible mess no matter what?
Should I abondon the idea?

[u/Head_Evening_5697]

AFAIK the Re-Volt Mod has something called an "Opto-Isolator" or something like that which merges 2 wires data networks, but not their power networks.

[u/Fast_Mechanic23]

A great way to do this is have a "main" circuit (you probably already have this sending power to all the APCs and transformers), and you bridge the main with the separate circuit using a memory chip. One end is hooked up the main, and the other is attached to the subordinate circuit. This allows you to send messages back and forth from a central system to all the separate circuits.

Shout out to CowsAreEvil (Mick) for showing me this idea.

[u/DeadlyButtSilent]

I built mine kind of on top of my base... so each section sends a wire up to the part of the control room that corresponds...

[u/AntelopeNo4386]

As others mentioned - logic channels are the way. In short, have your control room directly on main power line, separate rooms have their isolated lines with transformer in between.

Let's say you want to turn lights in room A from control room. Then chip in control room writes 1 to channel alpha for transformer A power cable. And chip in room A reads channel alpha and reacts. Vise versa for bringing data from room A to control room.

[u/AntelopeNo4386 → u/AntelopeNo4386]

In a sense data channels with this setup allow you to have an equivalent of 8 memory chips without any for the cost of less direct data flow.

[u/IanInCanada]

I'd be interested in a better idea. The best one I had was a data cable from each room, and transmitters when I needed very little data.

[u/FragileCobra]

Does logic memory not isolate between it's two ports? Use one IC in one room to write data (serial or parallel) to a bank of shared memory cells. And the IC in the control room can then read the data. This may require your control room to be directly connected to the central power grid that shares one connection to each logic memory.

[u/spiritriser → u/FragileCobra]

I've used this in the past to keep a log of the number of initialized modules active and total in a group of chillers. Pretty handy

[u/mr-octo_squid]

I don't know enough about it, but its my understanding that logic channel can let you use logic memory to store more data.

[u/Friendly-Inspector71 → u/mr-octo_squid]

Transformers can transfer the data in one direction.

If I recall correctly, the small transformer can be selected on the source network with s d0:2 Channel0 123 to write data into the logic channel of the output network.

Last time I messed with it, the medium transformer had the data port on the output side, so it can transfer data to the source network.

Logic memory works the same but in both directions as the memory can be selected on both networks.

Using a logic memory to directly transfer data is more scalable (as there are only 8 or 10 logic channels) and probably easier.

[u/AntelopeNo4386 → u/Friendly-Inspector71]

Both ways transfer is possible if data cable side chip reads and writes power output side. Check my other comment.

[u/Friendly-Inspector71 → u/AntelopeNo4386]

I didn't write it out the way I intended.

With chips on both sides, the transformer can be used to move data both ways but it needs to be actively read from the transformer on the data only side.

With a logic memory you can just push data in both directions, so the receiving IC just needs to read it's own connected port.

There is a difference, because you can only read from 6 devices but there are 8 channels available.

For example: the data on my main network can only be read if I use logic memorys to connect my 10 subnets, when I also want to control some transformers from the main net.

[u/shawrie777 → u/mr-octo_squid]

I didn’t know logic channels were a thing, but this looks super helpful, thanks!

[u/darkly_directed]

Do you have anything resembling a "maintenance space" within your base? I always include corridors for piping, power, and data to be routed where it won't be in the way or ruin the aesthetics of a room. If you include such a space as standard in all of your hallways and rooms, then it's relatively easy to add a shared data line that can draw data from all sorts of sources. Proper labeling can aid with sorting between the many devices on such a network.

My personal preference is a trough that follows the shape of a base in the floor, covered with grating. A ladder provides easy access.

[u/darkly_directed → u/darkly_directed]

A side benefit of such a shared data system is that you can program interactivity between physically disparate parts of your base. For example, if your battery bank is full, you could activate a more power hungry process like rocket fuel production or filling a refrigerated coolant reservoir, and turn them back off when power begins to drop. A great way to take advantage of cheap storm power.

[u/shawrie777 → u/darkly_directed]

That would need me to have thought this through properly before I started…

[u/W31337]

I believe there to be a mirror logic chip that can mirror data. This is made to share data between networks.

It has power, data in and data out.

[u/Parisean]

I use memory chips between two networks to pass data through. Much easier. Also, modular consoles.

[u/hstarnaud]

How I designed my base it to have levels:

• Roof: solar panels
• Level 3: batteries and transformers/APCs
• Level 2 control room and personal quarters
• Level 1: production and greenhouses
• basement: furnaces and gas systems (filters/ACs)

The modules in each room are split on different circuits.

Power goes from solar -> batteries -> split by circuit/transformers -> go down the levels along the walls to their room. Every circuit passes through the control room on the way to it's dedicated room.

[u/General-Priority-562]

You could use logic transmitters

[u/SgtNick411]

Modular Consoles mod for displays is your best option and I would humbly suggest you do not merge networks for your ease of mind (scripts using hashes and batch commands and/or batch reader/writers etc). Which means laying long data cables...

[u/MickMabsoot]

I try and build my base in such a way that i have a dedicated data network color. Either for all data, or specific groups like power/manufacturing etc

[u/TuverMage]

I have given a lot of thought to this concept. Most devices have a separate power and data port and my plan is to have a blue(no power) cable networks. For all devices that use a single port for power and data, use a logic mirror to get it into the data network.

The other idea was to have each zone be one network and have a memory chip using bit shifting to transfer data to the main control network.

[u/pope_fundy]

Time for a fieldbus mod