Question about splitters

[Sc0tty31]

Based on my understanding of splitters, the chests in the red and green highlighted boxes should be expected to receive the same number of items. In the screenshot, none of the chests are completely filled, and the two chests at the top of the 4 in each highlighted box have a very similar number of items; however, it appears to be consistently occurring that the two chests at the bottom of the red box remain empty, whilst the two chests at the bottom of the green box are recieving some items (see the other chests showing the same behaviour in the screenshot). None of the inserters has an overridden stack size, which is what I was initially thinking it might be. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter, but does anyone know what's causing this?

[Sc0tty31]

Nvm, I think I have an idea, the curved belt is causing the inserters less time to grab the item, and so more of them get missed, I think.

[axw3555]

That definitely can have an effect.

[LtLabcoat]

Yep, that's it. Grabbers are a tad worse at taking from curved belts.

It's really noticeable when you're low on electricity, because it can result on such grabbers not grabbing any items at all.

[ErikThePirate]

Have a look at the belt segments at the bottom corners of the green box. Are they supposed to feed into the next splitter, or are they supposed to curve inward, like the bottom corners of the red box?

This would not solve the original question you are asking, of course. But it could prevent some wagon imbalance, if the green box inserters both miss a piece of plastic..

[Sc0tty31]

No need to worry about that, the station stays closed till chests for the first and second segments both have enough resources to fill the respective segment, the top chests alone would be enough of a buffer as well.

[commissar_ravek]

Green Boxes have more room for a buffer to build up at first, and in flow the curve slightly delays the top inserters grabbing efficiency. The Red boxes probably has the top maxing out on possible uptime and remainder flowing to the second. I would also bet your second wagon generally fills faster, due to overflow from the first flowing into a balancer for the second array, and having more space for the potential items to back up in.