36HP Boiler to turbine

[zilvarwolf]

Has anyone done the math/testing to optimally affix a boiler/turbine combination and design?

I was trying to play with it last night and it seemed that one boiler would optimally turn only a small turbine, but I'm fairly sure that's because I haven't completely understood the turbine math.

25 steam/t will turn 1 rotor blade, and the boiler can only put out 720. So a 7x7x6 size seems pretty close to optimal (24 rotor blades) unless having extra blades isn't a bad thing. Two inputs to handle the full steam load. What about the coil. If it's made of 8 blocks of enderium, is it OK? Or does the steam cost of the coil eat into the turbine turning power?

I tried to poke around in creative last night. Had a turbine with 48 blades and a 9 enderium coil. I was able to stabilize the turbine at 1800 RPM (and about 4k rf/t, or about 3 times what a steam boiler could do with industrial steam engines) with only 445 steam used. That's the part that didn't make sense. I thought the steam usage would be higher because of the number of rotors and the enderium coil.

Anyone have the experiences to enlighten me?

 

[Giddimani]

A simple explanation is the rotor blades convert steam into rotation, the coil produces RF by "slowing" the rotor.

A rotor blade can convert up to 25 steam/t into rotation, so round up the number of blades you need (720/25=28.8 -> 29 blades).

An enderium coil can convert up to ~54 steam/t into RF so 720/54=13.3 coils. You can choose 14 coils but that would slow the turbine down to about 1710rpm (ineffecient) or you can use 13 coils, which only need about 700 steam/t and should be about 8.2kRF/t.

And I hope these numbers are still correct in 1.7.10, at least for 1.6.4 they are correct.

 

[zilvarwolf]

To get more than 8 coils, you make the coil blocks taller (rather than wider)?

 

[Giddimani]

The coil need to "touch" the rotor, so the 8 blocks surrounding it can be used for coils, then you start a new circle.

 

[zilvarwolf]

Very cool. I seem to have been on the right track, but was missing some information about the coils. Thanks for filling me in. Getting 8k rf out of a steam boiler sounds like a good efficiency upgrade over the baseline

 

[zilvarwolf]

Numbers don't seem to be quite correct. 13 enderium blocks, 720 steam/t (actually 760 incoming, but limited to 720 in the GUI), 29 rotors. 1830 RPM and climbing and only 5.2k rf. Quite the pain in the rumpus to fine tune one of these!

 

[Zarkov]

Numbers don't seem to be quite correct. 13 enderium blocks, 720 steam/t (actually 760 incoming, but limited to 720 in the GUI), 29 rotors. 1830 RPM and climbing and only 5.2k rf. Quite the pain in the rumpus to fine tune one of these!

Are you using the default Big Reactor configs? It seems that mod packs frequently tweak those, either nerfing or boosting power output.

 

[zilvarwolf]

As far as I am aware, yes. I haven't changed the configs and the results of running a small passive reactor were similar. It's a Bevo tech pack world.

Spoiler: pics

 

[b0bst3r]

In Bevo's tech pack BR is heavily nerfed via configs.

 

[zilvarwolf]

In Bevo's tech pack BR is heavily nerfed via configs.

Oh! well ain't that just peachy. More reason to stick to wind turbines

Do you know if there is a location where the changes are summarized? I can't be sure if the differences I am seeing are due to a lack of understanding or just plain Doin' It Wrong.

 

[Giddimani]

It's a Bevo tech pack world.

Posting on the FTB forum, the information you are running a pack from ATLauncher would have been useful.

But BigReactors is really easy to test stuff, just slap on more coils until it doesn't reach 1800rpm anymore. If it's stable at 1750+rpm you are good to go, otherwise remove 1 coil block. Done.

 

[zilvarwolf]

Posting on the FTB forum, the information you are running a pack from ATLauncher would have been useful.

For the original question it didn't matter since my ignorance was quenched with general information

But BigReactors is really easy to test stuff, just slap on more coils until it doesn't reach 1800rpm anymore. If it's stable at 1750+rpm you are good to go, otherwise remove 1 coil block. Done.

The number of rotors doesn't matter here? Also, does it matter if a rotor is unbalanced (there's no configuration of rotors that will yield a balanced 29-rotor turbine, as far as I can see).

 

[ljfa]

The number of rotors doesn't matter here? Also, does it matter if a rotor is unbalanced (there's no configuration of rotors that will yield a balanced 29-rotor turbine, as far as I can see).

More rotors and more blades = more mass = it takes longer to spin up, but the maximum speed is the same. Balanced or unbalanced doesn't matter.

 

[zilvarwolf]

More rotors and more blades = more mass = it takes longer to spin up, but the maximum speed is the same. Balanced or unbalanced doesn't matter.

OK. Thanks!

 

[epidemia78]

5k RF?! For a max sized Turbine? Thats highway robbery! Someone doesnt have the slightest notion what balance means.

 

[ljfa]

This is not max sized It's also not max steam (that would be 2000 mb/t)

 

[zilvarwolf]

5k RF?! For a max sized Turbine? Thats highway robbery! Someone doesnt have the slightest notion what balance means.

lol. oh, goodness no. I like to play with steam boilers for some dumb reason. It's a very small turbine (7x7x8, iirc) and a 36hp boiler.

(edit) Bevo pack reduces power output to 70% of default and fuel usage to 130%, or did as of his version 10.4. That appears to be inline with the results I'm seeing (except for my rotor speed climbing to ~1850 with 29 rotor blades and 13 enderium blocks. That still doesn't seem to make sense).

 

[Giddimani]

Bevo pack reduces power output to 70% of default and fuel usage to 130%, or did as of his version 10.4. That appears to be inline with the results I'm seeing (except for my rotor speed climbing to ~1850 with 29 rotor blades and 13 enderium blocks. That still doesn't seem to make sense).

If you aren't limiting your steam the rotation seems about right at 720 steam/t, for 1800rpm you should need about 704steam/t.

5k RF?! For a max sized Turbine? Thats highway robbery! Someone doesnt have the slightest notion what balance means.

These posts crack me up

 

[Skyqula]

(edit) Bevo pack reduces power output to 70% of default and fuel usage to 130%, or did as of his version 10.4. That appears to be inline with the results I'm seeing (except for my rotor speed climbing to ~1850 with 29 rotor blades and 13 enderium blocks. That still doesn't seem to make sense).

I havent looked at bevo's tech pack. But these are now the noteworthy things that can be changed:

general {
  D:fuelUsageMultiplier=1.0
  D:powerProductionMultiplier=1.0
  I:maxReactorHeight=48
  I:maxReactorSize=32
  I:maxTurbineHeight=32
  I:maxTurbineSize=16
  D:turbineAeroDragMultiplier=1.0
  D:turbineCoilDragMultiplier=1.0
  D:turbineFluidPerBladeMultiplier=1.0
  D:turbineMassDragMultiplier=1.0
}

As you can see, these include turbine tweeks to make people construct bigger/smaller turbines with more/less coils/blades. Ontop, limits can be set to turbine size. Meaning you can make it impossible to construct a turbine that can handle 2000mb/t. Even a 20x20x20 turbine coudnt in theory handle it

 

[zilvarwolf]

If you aren't limiting your steam the rotation seems about right at 720 steam/t, for 1800rpm you should need about 704steam/t.

I added another enderium block, as another poster suggested above and cranked it up to the actual input value of 760 steam/t. That seemed to balance out better