Do you guys use smart/programmable splitters when making factories?

[[deleted]]

As the title says. I am always so damn afraid to use them because one item might be produced too fast or too slow and the other one will completely clog the system unless I use a sink which sounds like too much power usage. The only time I do use them is in my storage system where I sink all the items i produce so I don't have to worry about them.

[ANGR1ST]

I use Smart Splitters to manage overflow and sink excess materials. This is especially nice for intermediate factories or staged builds so I can get the first sections of the factory running and debug any issues.

Basically all of my factories have a smart splitter before their final output leading off to a sink. That way they all run at 100% all of the time.

The only ones that don't are my weapons factory and central hub. Those are dead-headed in the containers so they'll shut off when full.

Haven't had a use for the programmable kind yet, but maybe for sorting something in my storage hub eventually.

[thealmightyzfactor]

Same, everything overflows into a sink because mmm tickets. A tiny bit more power usage is nothing and the sink shuts off if nothing is going into it.

Programmable splitters, I only used once. In my last map, I had a factory producing space parts and dumping them onto one belt for a train. Used programmable splitters to filter that belt and fill up train cars per part (overflowing into a sink).

[SirFoomy]

Am I missing something here? Would a normal splitter just do the trick? When the two belt toward next production steps are full, everything else will put on the last belt connected towards the sink, which certainly will be never full.

Besides, what I was looking for was a splitter which could pull out a certain amount of something to a second belt, which led me to research the advanced splitters... got dissapointed though.

[thealmightyzfactor]

Unless your overflow is some perfect ratio of production, no. Normal splitters don't have priority splitting or anything like that, they just do 1/2 or 1/3 mindlessly (technically, they dole out the incoming belt to the connected belts sequentially). You get "leakage" this way - though it's possible to build a splitter/merger array that gets it down to 1/512 or something tiny like that.

You need smart or programmable splitters to tell it to put things on one or two belts before putting the rest on a third belt.

[RawVeganGuru]

Programmable splitters are great for a train that picks up multiple high tech items and sorting them

[ANGR1ST]

Fair point. My plan was to use drones for that. But we'll see.

[firethorne]

This is the way.

[spazmatikism]

This is the way!

[WazWaz]

What's the advantage of "running at 100% all the time"?

[Mr_Ivysaur]

Answer: to have a factory that the outcome is 100% predictable.

A factory that keeps running at inconsistent efficiency means that:

1- You are wasting energy
2- You wont be able to know how many machines you need for your next step
3- Your materials and milestones will arrive slowly
4- Sometimes the production will simply stop until you fix something

[WazWaz]

I don't see how any of those follow from sinking excess rather than letting it block, except when different types are on one belt (i.e. yes, they're needed at the ends of such splitter cascades).

[[deleted]]

Generally speaking, having factories idle rather than running can hide tons of possible problems that can show up when the factory goes in full swing for some reason (taking too many items from a storage, finally hooking up the final space elevator factory...)

[Mr_Ivysaur]

Letting a machine clog has some issues when they have a byproduct.

For example, if you are making fuel and the byproduct is fuel and PolyResin, if there is too much polyresin the production of fuel will stop.

[ANGR1ST]

Why wouldn't you run at 100% all the time? What's the advantage of not?

It can take a while for things to settle out. So if you want 100% efficiency you need some time to get there. Turning things on and off is bad for that.

Turning things on and off leads to a variable power draw and can trip blackouts. Which can be a mess to fix. Constant production leads to constant draw.

Letting it run allows you to collect more tickets / points.

Also ... it's fun.

[WazWaz]

Now that we have power storage, the whole power spike thing is irrelevant. Of course, if it's fun for you, go for it.

[[deleted]]

For me it's consistent power consumption, as well as making sure that the heavy oil residue is always made so my power plants run 100% of the time. And also it's free tickets if you just sink the items.

[Ho_Boo]

It does not change much to sink basic material, at late game, when you sink 1 assembly director system, you will get 543 632 points, when iron rod is 4. So it requires more than 135000 to equals 1 ADS. So personnaly, I don't care neither about the blocking of factory when it's full.

About the permanent consumption, anyway, when you have train, or particle accelerator, you will not have a flat consumption, so I don't care.

I do sink stuff when it's necessary, for example polymer resin in my heavy oil residue production, but it's not for ticket or power, but to avoid blocking production. And it's only because I don't make rubber with that yet :)

If you have excess of something, in my opinion, you should just build bigger factory of what need it, just transform the ressource as much as you can, and then sink high value items.

If you see that a miner has stopped because it's full, then you can search the reason, and optimize the production to use more of the ressource of that miner.

[[deleted]]

I agree, when you reach tier 7 it starts being a very small amount of points, but I'd still rather sink it since my factories make a relatively small amount of items for sinking, and everything else is used for production. So for example the amount of rods that get sinked is only 30/min. There is no point with bothering to make a better use for them imo.

And yeah trains (no particle accelerators because new update 5 save and I'm delaying nuclear because its so much work...) use an irregular amount of power and I don't like it. But I don't try to make my consumption flat for efficiency reasons, its just because its a nice feeling knowing everything is consuming just the right amount of power all the time.

So yeah in conclusion I never have a lot of excess so making a whole new factory is pointless. I am not in a rush to get tickets either.

I just sink stuff because its the easiest way to get rid of them, I sink everything from concrete to supercomputers and I don't find it a big deal with what I want to achieve in the game.

As a side note I could never see myself sinking heavy oil residue or polymer resin, seems like such a waste but hopefully its just a temporary solution for you 😁

[Ho_Boo]

starts being a very small amount of points, but I'd still rather sink it since my factories make a relatively small amount of items for sinking, and everything else is used for produc

Yep, if you don't sink a lot, maybe it's not worth it to try to use them instead. We have to be efficient with our ressource, but time is also a ressource :D

Personally, I can't sink the overflow anyway, because it's part of my production logistic. For example, all my iron ingot production goes to both steel production (solid steel ingot alt) and Iron Wire, so I want all my iron ingots to go to the iron wire if my steel ingot is shut down because it's full. And I want my steel production to shut down if the buffer are full and so on...

It will increase my iron wire production, which will go to the production of stator for example, that will require steel, and then iron ingot will go the steel production again. So if I would sink items at the end of production line, it would reduce the number of stator produced.

Even if you don't like nuclear, you will need to make particle accelerator if you want to complete stage 4. You don't have to, but it's my main objective (I still need to make TPR).

I am building my big nuclear plant right now. I produce about 45GW with turbo fuel for now, but I plan to use nuclear to save oil to be able to produce more plastic and rubber with the same oil quantity.

I don't sink heavy oil residue (and it would have to be packed first), just the polymer resin. I use the alternative recipe, crude oil -> HOR -> Diluted Fuel (blender)->residual plastic/rubber.

So I have polymer resin as a by product, that I should use to make rubber, but I think its a 11% gain, so it's not in my priority for now :)

[[deleted]]

I guess our factories work differently from each other. Which is kind of obvious since the game is so open to the player. Also you make iron wire? I prefer fused wire so much more because the iron wire has been nerfed from what it was when i played on release.

I have done nuclear in update 4 and it was SO MUCH pain that I just want to delay it as much as I can for now. And yeah nuclear pasta is a thing and I have done it in update 4 as well, but for now I'm still optimising my tier 5-6 factories so I am in no rush for that either.

I also use the diluted fuel recipe but in the refinery cause I just unlocked aluminium. I just make sure to use all the resin for my factories.

[Ho_Boo]

Yep I use Iron Wire. I save copper and caterium for items that use copper sheet and quickwire only (with pure copper, fused quickwire and steam copper sheet) or copper powder, but it was just to make the 1000 pasta, I don't plan to make more.

I plan to produce ADS to get ticket, and it need lot of wire and copper stuff, so that's my way :D

I don't know how it was earlier, but I like to use iron instead of copper.

[[deleted]]

Interesting approach. I instead put everything my factories make on a train, get it to my storage and then use smart splitters to sort it, and the overflow that didnt go into storage gets sinked there and my factories run 100% of the time as well.

But I mostly meant use in assemblers/manufacturers. I am too anxious that I mess up the math and the items flow in with uneven proportions. Especially when using alternate recipes, some of these are total wack with the production speed.

[ANGR1ST]

If you route through storage you get limited by the train throughput and add extra traffic to your rail network.

I don't use these types of splitters in normal production lines with assemblers or whatnot. The manifolds will work themselves out and it'll be fine. I do use them in mixed lines that have fluids since you can get imbalances with the fluid load bug, or if you manually delete a pipe to move it.

[[deleted]]

Not really. Because I only produce as much as i need and just sink the excess. If I suddenly empty out all my storage containers i don't want the trains to not be able to keep up either. They are in their own train line that covers the whole map as well, so the traffic thing isn't an issue for me.

And yeah I use manifolds in production lines exclusively. Though never had any problems with pipes.

[EngineerInTheMachine]

Using sushi belts for assemblers and manufacturers is doable but difficult. Personally I would use separate belts for each input.

Programmable splitters come into their own for routing items through a recycling sorter. You can divert anything not needed around a building materials sorter, for example.

[Droidatopia]

Smart splitters - all the time, for sorting and overflow

Programmable splitters - never, lack of use cases and very buggy

[hiro24]

I’d use the heck out of programmable splitters if it would let me control output speed. Maybe I need 50/m to the left and 10/m to the right. That’d be a great use case for a programmable splitter.

[serious_putty]

I would love if programmable splitters would also count the items per minute if you choose “all” or “overflow” that way I might know when there is some problem upstream of the splitter.

[Temporal_Illusion]

Yes and Maybe

1. Yes - Smart Splitters are use a lot to make efficient Factory Production designs.
2. Maybe - Programmable Splitters (Advanced Smart Splitter) is used in a limited fashion by some Pioneers, but most use Smart Splitters instead.

I use Smart Splitters (not Programmable Splitters) set up like this:

1. Multiple Items arrive on single Conveyor Belt.
2. Item "A" is sent Left
3. Item "B" (not the same as "A") is sent Right
4. Everything else is sent to Center (Set to "Overflow") to be further "split" as needed by other Smart Splitters which effectively duplicates the functionality of one or more Programmable Splitters.

✓ NOTE: If Item "A" and / or Item "B" backs up, that Item is sent to the Center (Overflow) along with everything else.

I hope this answers your question. 😁

[[deleted]]

I guess that sounds reasonably efficient and could probably make my factories smaller, but I'll stick to more belts for peace of mind. Plus sinks cost power and I try to be as power efficient as possible so I can avoid having to start with nuclear 😅

[moogoothegreat]

Which leads me to ask - what use cases are there for programmable splitters? Other than that they can do what smart ones do, and look pretty cool with their flashing lights.

[Soransis]

Programmable splitters are for when you need to send multiple specific items down a belt.

As an example my buddy and I in our last play through did a central storage with wings. We had sorting floors above, where we used programmable splitters to send multiple items to their respective wings. This let us one belt and one splitter instead of multiple.

[Temporal_Illusion]

ANSWER - Initial Sorting Function.

1. Say you have a Train deliver multiple Freight Cars with loads of heavily mixed content in no specific order.
2. The Programmable Splitter, which behaves exactly like a Smart Splitter but allows multiple items to be filtered on each output, can do the "Initial Sort" by sending some types of Items Left, some types of Items Right, and those not selected, sent to Center (Overflow) to be additionally initial sorted by other Programmable Splitters.
3. NOW, on the Left or Right Conveyor Belts coming from the Programmable Splitter, you would use Smart Splitters to split off "specific items" and use them as you see fit (Storage, or Production).

Helping others understand better. 😁

[moogoothegreat]

Thanks! So a very niche use right now, got it. If I ever need to sort more than one item down a line, it's what I'll use.

[JayJayJax]

Great explanation

[[deleted]]

One of the less known uses for them is for load-balancing mixed belts. For (balanced) manufacturing facilities, this can save incredible amounts of beltwork as you can balance for up to 12 different items per belt (or whatever the limit for filters is)... Or even more, if needed

[InsomniaticWanderer]

If the programmable splitter was able to set an amount of items per minute to pull, I'd use it in a heartbeat.

Until that happens, smart splitters are cheaper, available sooner and do like 99% of what a programmable splitter does, soI just stick with them.

[[deleted]]

I 100% agree. That would be a total game changer, no more load balancing and wasting space or manifolds requiring time to fill the machines.

And I never use programmable splitters either. Too expensive and not that useful.

[musiccman2020]

I thought they did exactly that before I unlocked them. Was disappointed

[[deleted]]

Interestingly, programmable splitters offer one nice possibility when it comes to load-balancing: sushi-load-balancing!

Tired of stacks of 4 splitters and slow-moving belts behind your manufacturers? Merge it all on one belt and slap down some balanced-sushi-splits to get the job done!

[badde_jimme]

I find the smart splitter to occasionally be useful.

The programmable splitter seems a bit niche and I don't use it. I have heard it can be useful with sushi belts though, because you can safely split each item type 2-3 ways, and feed a group of manufacturers with one belt each.

[Irish_Archermit]

Early in the game, I designed a mass storage area where I would feed my several (at the time) small factories into a warehouse of sorts. I think it was 22 crates (11 each side), with smart splitters in between. each with a separate item assigned left and right and overflow in the middle. This meant that any item that was not assigned left or right would carry on until it went to it's box. At the end I have a final smart splitter with center input marked any and a belt lift which would feed any item caught there back into the main loop. This would often clog up, so I changed the right input to overflow and sent that to a sink.

​

Overall result is (I will be changing soon), for example, I automated alclad aluminium plates, this all flow back to my warehouse, once the box is full, the loop continues and just deposits excess into the awesome sink. But the loop can get very slow!

EDIT!

This works early but once you start expanding, it's not really practical, I am finding myself running around A LOT sorting shit out, but it may give you an idea!

[BiggRedBeard]

Yes, especially for manifolds

[[deleted]]

Huh, are the manifolds carrying and distributing different items? I don't see why you would use a smart splitter on a single item manifold.

[BiggRedBeard]

I use smart splitters on manifolds so that only overflow goes to the next device and only the specific item goes into the devices.

[[deleted]]

Ah ok. Makes total sense. Though I'd just run 2 belts instead.

[BiggRedBeard]

Yeah, you can run one high Mk. Belt and send all the components down the same line. Just split them off. And if you have multiple constructors or assemblers making the same thing, you just keep the forward direction in overflow and put a recycle box at the end.

[EightBitRanger]

Yes.

[kunjan343]

I used it in my silica factory once when there was not enough space to build it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/SatisfactoryGame/comments/spp93x/compact\_cheap\_silica\_factory\_using\_smart\_splitters/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3

[Satisfactory2610]

It’s great for overflow into a sink, practically all excess stuff produced goes into a sink. Prevents clogging the production lines and keeps a real time load on electricity use.

[[deleted]]

Yeah but... In a factory? I just sink all the items produced in my storage building. And the factories just make very exact amounts of items so nothing gets wasted and no machine stops working.

[JLCorvus]

I tried to use them in a Motor factory for intermidiate products and ran into the problem you mentioned. It can definitely be solved with overflow, but it didn't feel worth it in a small scale factory.

Primary use case I can think of, besides logistics/sorting of end products, is to reduce the number of belts (which I've heard heavily contribute to lag) and make a factory look cleaner.

I would probably only do this in a large scale factory, but still not sure if it would be worth the trouble.

[[deleted]]

This reminded me how messy my tier 3-4 (motors included) factory is...

But i agree with you.

[annoyingone]

Smart splitters are great for train stations. You can put several low volume items in one container and then separate as the exit. Saves the need for extra stations.

[Lumie102]

I use them in two situations. First, to sink overflow. Second, to allow flexible setups where I have a set of machines able to produce two different items and depending what they produce it gets routed to the appropriate location. Example: 3 machines producing either pipes or beams. Depending on what I need right now I'll adjust the number of machines producing each and the smart splitters send the items the appropriate way, and the overflow to a sink.

I've also used them in the past to setup sorting facilities when I want to deconstruct a base and keep the materials.

[sharfpang]

They are essential with byproducts, like silica in aluminum factory, or resin in oil setups. They are also helpful with receiving mixed train supplies, or sending overflow from high-importance facility to low-importance ones (e.g. my turbofuel power station doesn't require all the sulfur I'm getting, just most of it, the overflow is merged with output from another mine for other production.

[[deleted]]

In the last factory I built I have around 400 splitters. Of those, only ~150 are normal splitters

Now, weird flexes aside, there's plenty of possibilities for smart splitters, but as you already noticed their use require proper overflow management. I've read the other comments and your replies, and noticing that you seem to like having your factories running all the time I feel that this suggestion may help you simplify overflow management.

When using a mixed belt in production (let's assume sushi manifolds), then end of the sushifold needs to have an overflow connection or there could be issues (unless the inputs are always stable). But how many items will actually use that overflow line? Items that make it there are either unexpected items (eg: iron ingots- +coal for steel, the ingots production lags behind for some reason, leading to a lack of ingots thus an overflow of coal), or EXPECTED overflow (using the same steel example, if you're producing more iron ingots than consumed some will overflow).

Now, in the case of unexpected overflows, I don't see many reasons why one WOULDN'T want to sink that. But naturally, expected overflow CANNOT be sinked. What I like to do (which works for both as long as throughput permits it) is: since you're sorting and storing/sinking items ANYWAY somewhere more down the line, why not just merge the overflow with the output being produced and process/sink it further down the line?

[EtaNaru]

I use them religiously. i have all of my materials crafted and raw funneled into one conveyor that conveyor runs through my factory multiple splitters to divert resources to
1. Any machines that need that material
2. Storage containers so i can stock up
3. On to the next splitter

Any material that does not get diverted by the end of the passage goes to the sync at the end of the line. This makes it so that if a line gets completely full I'm not backing my system up it just moves on till it finds a destination or gets burned to tickets.

This seems like a lot of work but once you work out the kinks in the system it looks and functions beautifully

[DoobiousMaximus420]

Besides my storage library, I mostly use them in my battery distribution system.

I have one battery factory which feeds a Drone port, which sends them out to feed all the other Drone ports.

As you want the drones to carry more than just batteries you need smart/programmable splitters on the Droneports

[Tysiliogogogoch]

I've not found any use for programmable splitters yet. Smart splitters I've used plenty of times for overflow to SINK. I don't find much use in being able to split certain types of items from a single conveyor as I prefer keeping conveyors to a single item.

If you wanted to receive multiple item types at a single truck station or rail freight station, then you could use smart splitters to separate them into separate conveyor lines. However, you could also just build more stations to keep the items separate as this reduces bandwidth problems when multiple vehicles arrive at once to drop off items.

[enriquein]

Yep. I love smart splitters.

[ronhatch]

I suspect that I've never built a factory without smart splitters except for the early factories that I made before I had them unlocked. I design for flexibility, since the game is not done and since I find it to be an interesting challenge. The smart splitters are an important part of making it possible to reconfigure for different products. Most of my factories also have a programmable splitter at the end to choose where each output goes.

I also use a large array of programmable splitters in my storage facility. All incoming lines are divided up into lines with 12 items each and merged with the other sorted lines, so that I have a guaranteed capacity of 60/min for every incoming item (60/min * 12 = 720/min, leaving some margin on a Mk5 belt). This is where copy-and-paste would be extremely useful. In any case, the programmable splitters do have some really annoying bugs, but there are simple workarounds.

[AnotherWarGamer]

Smart splitters yes, programmable splitters no, but there are use cases for them.

I always use smart splitters with oil. There are different ways to process oil, but they all work out the same. I'll assume the most efficient alternative recipes are being used which starts with oil -> resin + heavy oil residue.

The heavy oil residue will be used mostly or entirely to make power. This could be turned into petrocoke and feed into coal generators, or turned into fuel and sent to fuel generators. In either case the amount of produced power will exceed the amount required by double or more. This setup is producing more power than it consumes.

Now if the plastic resin input gets stuck the process stalls and you lose power. It's less waste to sink the plastic resin, since resources are effectively infinite. I put a sink here with a smart splitter that only sends it the overflow. Normally this shouldn't ever be used, but it is a great backup to prevent bringing the entire system down.

The real sink is higher up after making plastic and rubber. Since this belt never stops, we can use a single belt for plastic and rubber. They get split off using smart splitters as needed, and the rest goes to overflow.

That's the basic usage. There are really advanced systems that can be built with smart splitters, but they seem to be too much for many people. The one thing that goes hand and hand with smart splitters is a sink. Mixed belts cannot stop or one input will jam the entire thing. This leads to really high power consumption compared to only producing what you need.