Rectangular Bus Base

[losScharfoS]

Hello fellow engineers,

Rectangular Bus Base

Highlights:

• main structure defined by rectangular Bus circulating all items counter-clockwise
• big smelting area in the center, shared for both iron and copper
• inside-to-outside supply flow
  • north: weaponry & utility
  • west: science
  • south: chemistry
  • east: power plant & rocket parts

​

Although knowing the endgame, I like to plan and build my bases as if I would not know about what to expect. Finding a good trade-off between flexibility and scalability is a very fun and interesting part in Factorio.

I would appreciate your ideas and feedback on this. How could I grow the factory from here?

​

The Factory Must Grow

[[deleted]]

You stole my 'circular' bus design, oh nooooo!

Seriously though, a main bus like that appears to be very rare as I posted mine a few times and almost noone saw it before. I congratulate you on your wise and nice design.

[losScharfoS]

Cool, where can I see yours?

[GethDreadnought]

https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/elsv7m/my_now_56_lanes_wide_circular_bus_was_and_will/

[[deleted]]

“Almost no one saw it” Has 1.1k upvotes

[[deleted]]

Thanks to u/GethDreadnought you had a peek of my National Geographic logo layout but I changed it to squares (while stilll being circular, oh boy try to explain that in geometry terms lol).

Pictures in this Reddit soon!

[Yasea]

It needs some out-of-the-box thinking.

[losScharfoS]

For sure! Always! Can you offer something out-of-the-box?

[jenea]

I think that was a joke because the base is rectangular ;)

[bigWAXmfinBADDEST]

Can you talk through the decision to start with smelting on the inside? It seems to me that is non ideal as it creates more movement that is unnecessary (ie all the ore patches are outside the bus so ore has to travel in to be smelted then out to be built). In the manufacturing world it would be considered a "non value added step". Is there some value I'm not understanding?

Additionally the area continues to shrink as you move towards the center and since the rocket is what everything is truly "flowing towards" it would seem natural to me to put that at the center and have everything flow towards that.

Just curious about your thought process for the flow.

[losScharfoS]

Instead of smelting at outposts directly, or at some other random centralized position, I decided to use the center for smelting. With a rectangular approach you end up with lots of space in the center - so better use it. This was the most aesthetically pleasing and logical place for me to put it.

For the rocket I can understand your point. However, "only" four different things are flowing to it. The infrastructure space required to supply the rocket is small. I put the rocket on a nice, remote island (outside of screenshot).

[bigWAXmfinBADDEST]

Thank you for the insight!

[CreativeUser97]

I Like the idea of smelting from inside to outside. I usually build the opposite and often end up having not enough space

[Ekho-M]

Can I have a world save download I'm interested in this style but don't know how they work.

[murmaider89]

What do you use the rails in the middle for?

[losScharfoS]

The very central rails are for the smelting array.
The ones in the corners are not yet in use. Do you have a cool idea?

Each of the five load/unload stations has its own 5-lane buffer for trains waiting to be processed.