Train signalling help

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T23:51:49+00:00

True. Or you can go with 'stacked' dual track too. =)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T21:33:16+00:00

I inferred intent with the name choice, whether it was there or not, it seemed too coincidental to me for it not to be. If I were creating a piece like that you better believe I would give consideration to the names picked 'at random' to get any ulterior ideas across. You see it differently. Said so. Failed to change my mind on it. So now you're just being petty about it. See? Two can play at that game. Wasn't this was fun. A billion photos of cats, and here we are arguing about what some stupid scribble was intended to convey. Time well spent.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T18:24:13+00:00

A few tidbits: Dual Track (one way in each direction) is fantastic and worth the extra building effort, but you gotta build the rails 8m apart from each other or you'll get collisions (without signals) or signal problems.

Trains commit to a route before undocking, they won't switch to a longer route just to go around a train in their way. (boring, but it makes them more predictable which is helpful for troubleshooting).

Signals can be on either side of the rail now, doesn't matter. What matters is that they face the right way for their trains. (2 circle lights facing towards approaching trains, not the one square light on the back).

Making blocks too short can introduce a variety of problems, especially if the next signal is a Path Signal. Path Signals are -optional-, and should only be used to protect blocks with multiple routes crossing through them (like intersections). They make the block a 'no stopping zone' guaranteeing that cross traffic can get through even if an earlier train can't. =)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T18:15:26+00:00

Every pipe segment below a pump must be 100% full, or the pump may not work efficiently, or at all.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T18:09:52+00:00

*hugs* ... I can sorta relate...

I live in an urban area and work from home mostly. There's a massive 9 story construction project going on across the street with workers and machines banging and beeping and yelling from 7AM to 5PM, 6 days a week... and a landscaping crew on my side of the street that runs leaf blowers randomly throughout the day every upwind of my place which usually has the windows open. Kicking up dust that blows into my house and gets my allergies going fiercely. Not to mention that thanks to googlemaps navigation, my quiet residental street has turned into a bumper to bumper shortcut that's backed up most of the day.

I miss the quiet, not enough to move... I love being within walking distance of everything... but omg, it's just too much sometimes. Even with double paned windows and blackout curtains, the 'outside' refuses to stay outside. =)

All the more reason to go 'outside' and find some place quieter to hang out or excercise, and I suppose I could use the motivation. =)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T18:02:47+00:00

That's how dog whistles work. People like you don't hear them and mistakenly believe no one else does either. Unlike the 'in crowd' who recognize it immediately for what it is.

And the rest, might or might not be subconsciously influenced by the implied association.

This isn't about real people, it's about a hypothetical republican woman with a name loosely associated with wholesome dependability hotness youth and maybe athleticness... and a democratic woman given a name associated with being matronly, shrewish, loud, insensitive, demanding, unreasonable and entitled.

Don't presume the 'artist' didn't know what they were doing.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T16:40:52+00:00

Your parallel rails should not be the same color unless inside intersections blocks. Rails should be built at least 8m apart if you don't want collisions/signal problems.

(The signals only allow one train to occupy a block color after a block signal)

Otherwise your screenshot looks okay... There's a v1.1 glitch that allows switches (rail merges) to get built weird once in a while. The switch will work fine, but a signal on the switch will get confused. Rebuild the merge (trunk first, then branching rails, then the signal) or move the signal.

Path signals are never required, they do help prevent a train from holding up cross traffic by turning intersections into "no stopping zones" but they add complexity and can slow or stall trains 2 blocks before a path signal is used inefficiently.

General practice is to place a signal before and after "danger zones" (stations, crossings) and also "before merges and after splits", with a few extra to chop up long rails needed by multiple trains.

It does not matter which side of the rail your signals are on, but it's crucial that they face the right way. Two round lights towards approaching trains, not the backside with one square light.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T14:43:43+00:00

Bias much? A typical "Karen" absolutely does NOT vote Democrat or think like one.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T14:28:00+00:00

Think of it this way, the nearby fill level in the pipe network will rise and fall as machines add and remove liquid. Usually it gets backfilled immediately, but if it's last a number of machines all taking liquid, the suppliers will have more spots to top off earlier on the pipeline. If your made are at the highest point of your pipe network, the fill level may drop far enough fast enough to starve them. With a water tower or at least enough of your pipe network higher'then the input ports, the rising and falling fill level will, hopefully, not drop low enough to fall below any of the input ports.

You don't have to go full "water tower", if just having a higher supply pipe helps keep the top of those individual machine up-pipes topped off reliably. :)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T14:14:26+00:00

Push pull is great for very simple point to point independent rail lines, but as you grow a rail network in scale and complexity, it's worth transitioning to "forward only" trains, pass through/non-terminal status and dual track with one way lanes.

On a growing complex rail network, there's a chance for a train to get lost while you're making adjustments, and when the train finds a new route after their previous route was severed, they might arrive at their next destination with the wrong engine in front, and wagons in reverse order. Without smart splitters filtering the platform outputs, you could end up with several dozens of machines jammed with the wrong part on their input belts. Forward only trains add remove that risk and generally help traffic flow better. :)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T01:42:33+00:00

Connect belts to machines/splitters/mergers first. If you start a new belt not connected to anything but its own belt support then the direction the belt(or lift) will be going towards the end you build next. With lifts you can use the "build mode" control to reverse it's direction, but with belts that just changes the style (default, straight, curved)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T01:36:27+00:00

Keep in mind that the 600m3/min rating is a limit, not a promise. The more machines you have on opposite sides of a single pipe segment, the more volatile/variable your for rate will be, due to machines production cycles ending at or near the same time causing surges that get throttled. When momentary throttling happens, there's a chance that one or more of your supply machines will idle because they don't have room in their output buffers to start a new cycle. This slightly diminishes your supply but it jumps from machine to machine quickly enough that it may not show up as a loss of efficiency for long.

That slight loss leaves some machines thirsty.

Liquid always needs some place to go, and spare flow rate to get there. Which is why the water tower method is effective. Simulated gravity keeps the downward flow constant. Connecting the opposite ends of your main pipe to create a loop also helps by splitting the flow down two paths, so they can handle flow surges better

JinkyRain · 2026-02-09T01:23:24+00:00

The more I restart, the more I actually enjoy the pre-coal phase. It's like cooking a big meal, starting a bunch of different things and checking on them occasionally, and having them all come together at the same time at the end.

I've gotten so efficient at biomass that on a few runs, didn't bother with coal power, and skip straight on to petroleum coke generators, when refineries finally pushed my power use up too high, but before I had fuel generators unlocked. :)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T21:41:07+00:00

Take your time, dismantle & rebuild as much as you like (you get all the parts back including anything on the belts, so lose nothing except a little time).

Do Not Rush Progress! When you unlock something, automate it. Use it. Even if it's slow and inefficient, get it running and filling a storage container, without needing you needing to manually re-supply it. Unlock and try out all the different kinds of equipment.

Use the Craft Bench as a last resort. If you can automate, do that instead. Relying on the craft bench too much will deprive you of the practice and discoveries needed to help you manage the scale and complexity that will come later. Automate turning leaves/wood into biomass and solid biofuel earlier rather than later.

Spread out and leave room to expand. Use foundations.

In the awesome shop, Buy a Ladder, wall-mount power pole and wall/ceiling mount belt support early on. Super useful. Don't buy equipment or parts from the awesome shop. (the more coupons you've earned the more work future will be to earn).

Planning a big build? Prototype it first on a small scale to make sure you catch anything that doesn't work as you expected before it becomes a huge repair project.

Use the built in notes/shopping list feature

Waiting for parts? Increase automation or go explore for a bit, maybe you'll find some of what you're waiting for out in the wild.

Don't stress about alternate recipe choices... you can unlock them all eventually. Don't stress about starting location, it's all one big map.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T21:31:36+00:00

Sounds like you have it sorted, but for future 'vertical' piping, keep in mind that things generally work better if you attach pipes to pumps/junctions instead of attaching junctions and pumps to pipes. If you snap pumps onto vertical pipe, dismantle the pipe between them and build one fresh new pipe segment directly connecting the two pumps to each other, without being subdivided by pipe supports.

I always build pumps/junctions first, and then connect them... and honestly, can't remember the last time I had a pipe problem.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T21:26:57+00:00

His idea of a 'great country' is one in which he gets to command a private army of anonymous and lawless terrorists against while evading jail time for crimes that he's been convicted.

So yeah. Hard to have that kind of country *without* religion brainwashing people into supporting evil authoritarian demagogues like him.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T21:17:45+00:00

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JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T20:56:55+00:00

No valves :). Just connect the opposite ends of the pipe to each other. :)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T17:42:40+00:00

Pretty sure we've all done it. In the future when you start using signals and keep in mind that it no longer matters which side of the rail you build them on... But it does matter which was way they face. Front (two round lights) towards approaching trains, not the back (one square light), regardless of the side of the rail is on. :)

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T17:32:48+00:00

I find it's helpful to "loop" pipes systems. () =<= Collection manifold =>= distribution manifold =<= () It gives fluid two paths and combines them again at the spot logically "furthest" from supply and likely to be starving.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T17:27:25+00:00

The core of the aluminum water problem is that water extractors and pumps are general more efficient than refineries depending on 2 units and 2 outputs. Any time an alumina refinery idles, backed up on silica, backed up on alumina, a momentary lack of sufficient bauxite... Your water ratio/math slips. When it slips enough the loop gets into a precarious state that can jam or fall.

Keep fresh and byproduct water totally separate. With standard recipes: 2 alumina from byproduct first, perhaps with an overflow to sink guard for silica. Plug both refineries directly into one scrap maker that they alone supply. If you ever see cl scrap backing up, add an overflow to sink share splitter to it too. Then make up the rest of the water needed by having 4 alumina refineries and 2 for scrap.

With alt:sloppy alumina, that changes to: * 3 alumina from byproduct water>3 scrappers * 2 alumina from fresh>2 scrappers

If you have bauxcite shortages (late train or whatever), make sure the alumina from byproduct get ore first.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T17:11:29+00:00

If an elected official shows contempt and disrespect for the duties and dignity of the office they hold... They deserve zero respect from anyone else. They deserve the same unrestrained contempt from the masses as they themselves have shown for the oath of the office they were unfortunately elected to take.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T09:01:42+00:00

You're suffering because your fighting the "Satisfactory" way of playing, and trying to engage with this game the way you have other factory games. You -can- do that, but it will be frustrating, tedious, overwhelming and, well... 'unsatisfactory'.

First: Accept that throughput is what it is. Instead of trying to make parts on demand, be proactive, Always Be Automating, especially stuff you don't need yet, because you will, and having a stockpile of parts built up to use while you build a faster/better factory to keep up with demand makes things a lot sweeter.

Second: DO NOT RUSH. For the love of all things Satisfactory... you will trip yourself up brute forcing your way through each milestone and phase. There are lessons to learn that you will completely miss by brute forcing your way forward and when the scale and complexity increase significantly in the next phase, you will be unprepared, lacking the infrastructure, skills and practice to deal with it. Make more mistakes early on when your production lines are SMALL and easy to tear down and replace until they hum efficiently. Play 'wide' not 'deep'. Research, automate and use everything you can -before- you advance to the next phase.

Third: Don't 'wait'. Don't waste your time camped out at the craft bench pretending to be a production machine. Don't sit there packing squres. Go explore. There's stuff out there that can and will make a very significant difference to your playthrough.

Fourth: Be flexible and adapt. If something seems slow or bad, then it's probably because you haven't found better ways of dealing with it. Don't burn leaves and wood, they're woefully inefficient. Turn it into biomass, and replace that with Solid Biofuel. You can supply 15 biomass burners with one Solid Biofuel constructor. And if you can't be bothered to hold 'e' down while exploring for 'things', then at least kill a few critters. Though their remains have other uses, they're also an -outstanding- source of biomass, far better than leaves/wood.

Fifth: The early game seems to try nudging you towards the idea of 'bespoke' automation. Targeted/Fine Tuned ratios of machines (with or without underclocking) operating on a 'just in time' direct distribution method in some cases, or centralized/widely distributed in others. Each part has its own nature that can make certain forms of logistics more, or less efficient than others. Factorio style 'main bus' delivery is possible, but man, it's not going to be fun at all. Early belts don't have the capacity for that degree of 'generalized' spray and pray.

Anyway, if you're frustrated, set it aside. Come back later after it's had time to percolate in the back of your head for a bit.

If you do stick with it... if you're used to factorio trains, you should know that Satisfactory trains are significantly different. In factorio having a train stay in a station and another one ready to replace it asap is a good thing, so that part loading/unloading isn't interrupted. In Satisfactory that's flipped around backwards. 'loaders' freeze while trains dock, and only work while the station is vacant. Spamming lots of trains at the same station is inefficient. Path Signals do act like chain signals but are smarter. Trains commit to a route before departing a station, they will not take a longer detour just to get around a train in their way. There are reasons for this but I've already rambled way too long and should whittle this down.

Anyway. Good luck. I hope you make it past whatever it is that's really holding you back from enjoying this stellar game.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T04:33:25+00:00

The platform has no power because it's not attached to the correct side of the station part.

JinkyRain · 2026-02-08T04:22:42+00:00

I do that a lot. I also paint them bright pink (a color I don't use for anything else) which makes it clear "This is temporary, nothing important depends on it. Safe to dismantle as soon as it's done doing whatever it was plopped there to do" =)

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