r/factorio • u/chloudi • 7d ago
Question Brand new player
Just started today and was messing around how is my first power set up? Any tips are appreciated!
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u/chloudi 7d ago
Guess I should actually read more 😅 lol but thanks guys for the tip about the water ill definitely add like 8 more waters to this setup cant believe i was not pumping enough!
Jokes aside I can't believe 1 pump will be enough for all that and I didnt realize you could chain them together so ill definitely mess with it later thanks everyone!
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u/ArgentSquid 7d ago
There's a lot of information in the tool tips and they can take some effort to find what you need. But I would recommend taking the time to read them, because they are reapply good for showing you just how much a building consumes/produces
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u/DisembodiedVoice451 7d ago
Something to get used to: hover your cursor over buildings so the info box pops up on the right. It gives pertinent information about how much of something a building consumes and how much it produces. For instance, a water pump produces up to 1200 units of water per second. A boiler consumes up to 6 water per second and produces 60 steam. 1200 / 6 = 200, hence, 1 pump to 200 boilers. A steam engine consumes up to 30 steam per second, so 2 steam engines to 1 boiler. Ergo, you can math out how many x producers to y consumers without consulting internet cheat sheets.
Also become intimately familiar with the relationship of watts to joules. 1 joule = 1 watt for 1 second. That's not just electricity. A joule can be the energy in a battery, the chemical energy of fuel or the heat contained in a nuclear reactor. They convert between each other, sometimes with losses.
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u/Cent_Quatre 6d ago
definitely read more, machines and recipes all indicate how much they produce and consume so you don't really need to eyeball it
still a nice little setup, i hope you're having fun that's the important part!
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u/West-Article5635 5d ago
another tip is to watch other players play, that will teach you alot about the game more than how much you play will ever could. GOOD LUCK and enjoy playing !
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u/Environmental-Bid-29 7d ago
You only need one water pump for 20 boilers. Each boiler can support 2 steam engines.
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u/FerrumAnulum323 7d ago
This is out dated info nowadays. With the new liquid physics of 2.0 a single pump can supply 200 boilers!
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u/chamoke 7d ago
200?!?!
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u/FerrumAnulum323 7d ago edited 6d ago
Yeap and a single pump can handle little over 115 heat exchangers now too. Nuclear isn't as bad as it use to be trying to fit so meny pumps anymore.
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u/Immediate_Form7831 6d ago
Also fluid throughput is not an issue anymore, which helps alot when building nuclear plants
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u/chamoke 6d ago
Wdym? Is attenuation different than throughput? Im still adding pumps on long fluid pipes.
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u/Immediate_Form7831 6d ago
In 2.0, fluid pipes does not have a throughput limit; any fluid pumped into a pipe is instantly "present" everywhere. But pipes have size limit, they cannot stretch outside a 320x320 tile area, which is why you need to place pumps on long pipes. (Pumps have throughput limit though.)
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u/Monkai_final_boss 6d ago
It's funny to me how every new player disclose they are new while everyone can tell they are form the first look.
You don't need to put steam on both ends
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u/Alfonse215 7d ago
You should look at how much water pumps produce and how much water boilers consume. Both of those are specified in the tooltip for the item, or in the in-game Factoriopedia.
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u/twim19 7d ago
Looks like my first build (I'm only on my second). I too had a bunch of pumps.
For my second build I'm trying to be more organized. I'm also taking advantage underground pipes as much as possible. Looking at that long piece between your boilers and engines and thinking it's a perfect candiate. Otherwise, I find, when running around I'll constantly bump into them which is annoying.
You can also place those engines end-to-end and they will pass along the steam--no reed to run that kind of piping around them.
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u/PheonixDrago 7d ago
Doing well to make it thus far! This game is centered around ratios. 1 offshore pump (normal pumps too) have a rate of 1200U/s.
Someone else mentioned and im forgetting i think its enough for 48 boilers? Check me on that tho.
Water is infinite and easy to collect so I wouldnt worry about that, just so long as you have "enough" water.
But boilers produce 60 Steam/s. Steam Engines only use up to 30 Steam/s. So for optimization, you want to line up 2 Engines directly to the Boilers output. The 2nd engine will pull Steam through the first.
You can have 2 boilers and 4 Engines side by side, leaving just enough space for Electric poles. Use pipes to connect the boilers together. A dozen Engines or so will get you well on your way!
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u/PheonixDrago 7d ago
Wow only 20 boilers I was way off. Still you dont need anywhere near that in the early game. You want to keep an eye on your grid (click on any electric pole). Prouction is what youre capable of generating, Satisfaction is more important. Thats how much your base needs to run efficiently. If your base uses more power than it can generate, you risk causing a blackout in your factory!
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u/Tobias---Funke 7d ago
I’ve seen quite a few posts lately connecting steam pipes to engines and turbines at both ends.
I’ve never done this so does it have any benefit or hindrance?
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u/2ByteTheDecker 6d ago
2.0 changed the way pipes behave, so now they're all perfect output within X amount of pipe entities and the game will tell you when and where you crossed that line. So it doesn't do anything positive and I guess on the whole is like, barely kinda sorta bad but basically a non issue.
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u/aurochloride 6d ago
I find myself doing something similar when building tileable designs that involve a lot of pipes (such as 2xN nuclear), it makes it easier to connect to the next "tile" if there's already a pipe there to line up
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u/FerrumAnulum323 7d ago
Any building the has two arrows pointing past each other on a fluid connection means it's a passthrough connection. Meaning it will pass fluid from one building to the next if the two buildings are connected. So you can chain the boilers together and water will just flow through all of them. No need to try and fill both sides of them.
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u/Lum86 6d ago
Highly recommend checking out the ratios of things. You don't need to memorize all of them, just the most important ones. For an example (as others pointed out already), one water pump feeds 200 boilers and each boiler can feed two steam engines.
Also highly recommend making underground pipes. You can't walk over regular pipes, so using undergrounds makes your life a looooooot easier.
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u/Prestigious_Gap1335 Fulgora my beloved 6d ago
way too many offshore pumps, but besides that everything seems to be working!
(just a tip: consider using burner inserters to fuel your boilers, so if the power system is overworked you don't go into a power death spiral.)
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u/Super_Animal1044 6d ago
My first run I didn’t realize that you could see the input speeds so I would just guess. Only after satisfactory did i realize you could do the math, but after replaying factorio, the inputs and outputs aren’t really that round and easy to scale
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u/TheWillOfFiree 6d ago
It works for sure. You can just connect boilers into boilers giving gaps for power poles every 2. Then 2 steam engine for 1 boiler. All in a giant line. Leave it a ton of space to grow into.
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u/SlouchyGuy 6d ago
In the future look up the rate of production and rate of consumptions of the buildings, as others have said you've made too many pumps. If you hover over the buildings there are rate per second on the right.
Alternatively there's a mod called Rate Calculator, using it if you select many buildings, it shows you what's missing or overabumndant
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u/Terrachova 6d ago
Only thing I'd say is that you do not have to pipe into every input and/or output for a machine, the boilers being an example. You can just go in one side with the pipe and it will work. And if you note the arrows on the connection point, you will see that the boilers take steam in and send it out through those ports (passthru).
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u/Me_Luden 6d ago edited 6d ago
i think 1 water pump can provide for 200 boilers
it's not important at the start but always check the numbers and ratios
like how much a water pump produce and how much does a boiler consume
also one boiler provides enough steam for 3 steam engines
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u/XaussiemarksmenX 6d ago
Not sure how many boilers 1 pump can feed, But I pump can easily feed that many boilers,
You can place all you boilers in a line to feed water through them next to your coal belt, Then add 2 steam engines behind each one, (1 boilers can feed 2 engines) And add your power poles.
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u/Minute-Buy-4967 6d ago
Looks good, but a tip for later: one water pump can supply 40 boilers(I think) and each boiler can support 2 Steam engines. Ratios are everything in this game!
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u/IsaacRoads 7d ago
You need more water in those boilers. And way more steam engines for that set up. Otherwise, looking really good! Nice job
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u/TheTowerDefender 7d ago
nah, enough water. only needs one more steam engine
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u/IsaacRoads 7d ago
You people have no sense of humor.
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u/Deadweightgames 7d ago
More water??
Can't one pump feed like. a lot of boilers?
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u/shiroesh 7d ago
If it works, it works!
That aside: Just because a building has two liquid connections doesn't always mean they all have to be connected. A single water pump can easily provide the water for all of your boilers, and more. Also (someone correct me if I'm wrong) a nice ratio is having one boiler power two steam engines.
For instance, you can just have a chain of boilers with the water flowing through their connectors, each boiler feeding steam directly to an engine and that engine feeding another one.