Anybody know a TRUE, cheap replacement for pneumatic tubes?

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Grydian2

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That's a myth, although an oft-repeated one. RP2 components don't emit light. The red wire and the diddy little torches on the gates are just a light red texture.
I think your confusing a light update with emitting light. The timers dont give off light in the game but they cause blocks to update the lighting mechanics. This is a fact and it causes lag. Back in 1.2.5 it wasnt as bad but in 1.4.7 RP2 was a lag machine. One of the big reasons was the the red alloy wire and timers produce a raw redstone signal. This causes a lot of block updates. If you noticed rednet cable does not do this unless you wrench it into forced connection mode. This is why rednet cable is superior is every way. I love RP2 but I can admit where it had huge problems.
 
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Supplier pipe. beat that AE.
On its own, there isn't any simple solution to this with AE. But with Transposers? Just set an ME interface to keep items stocked and a transposer to keep however much you need in the machine. As long as the network has the supplied items or crafting components for them, the machine will always have the right amount.
 

casilleroatr

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Jul 29, 2019
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LP can drop items in other ways too. When I was learning how to use the mod I had a setup roughly like this:

key:
p = normal pipe (golden)
(iP) = insertion pipe
(bLP) = basic logipipe
(eLP) = extractor pipe
m = machines (TE ore processing)
c = chest

(bLP)*ppp(iP)(iP)(iP)
p m m m
p
p
(eLP)c <---start here

* configured as item sink for ores

Now I am happy to accept that this is NOT an appropriate use of logistics pipes but when items were pulled out of the chest they travelled to the basic pipe where they got stuck for about 20 seconds until they dropped out. I don't know if this will occur in a correctly configured logipipes network but I am just putting it out there.

And while I think that Applied Energistics is good I don't use it for any where near all my processing. It is fantastic for storage, especially when combined with DSUs and storage busses and the terminals are really nice and I prefer to use them over the Logistics pipes request pipe (at least in my main base). I also use AE for on demand crafting, via the mac and diffuse ME interfaces on some machines. However, I will usually combine AE with a combination of vanilla buildcraft pipes and logipipes for this. I use AE for machine inputs and I use pipes to take all output back to a central ME interface. I can't stand spamming import and export buses everywhere. Especially for Thermal expansion machines, they autoeject so why use a power hungry bus to suck stuff out of it. The ME interface blocks are majestic however and synergise very well with Chickenbones translocators as a handy alternative to the supplier pipe.

Permenant processing including item processing, farm handling and ore processing, as well as a couple of other little things are all done outside of AE for me. Everything is ideally processed before it lands in my AE network. I use a combination of logipipes, vanilla buildcraft, infinitubes (a very good replacement for pneumatic tubes by the way), translocators, routers, hoppers and conveyor belts. In this playthrough I am adding railcraft into the mix.

Instead of using an export bus on a machine set to output my ores, I prefer to have them logistics pipes routed into a big diamond chest as soon as they are delivered to my base via tesseract. From there they are translocated into a router which will distribute them between a large bank of machines and from there they are taken to DSUs with storage buses. They get put into the DSUs via routers too not automatically via AE. Watching that system was hypnotic.

Sorry for wall'o'text.
 

Loufmier

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On its own, there isn't any simple solution to this with AE. But with Transposers? Just set an ME interface to keep items stocked and a transposer to keep however much you need in the machine. As long as the network has the supplied items or crafting components for them, the machine will always have the right amount.
i dont think transposers can actually draw items from ME interface. are you sure you didnt mean translocators?
anyway AE`s inability to mimic supplier pipes in a simple manner is the reason i cannot ignore LP. plus it doesnt require pesky quartz...
 

AlanEsh

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Jul 29, 2019
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I'm with casilleroatr -- i've started using less and less pure-AE setups and adding in more BC pipes again. Here's how my Quarry sorter/processor works:
Item Tess -> Diamond Pipes shunting the more common items (cobble,dirt,sand,etc) into DSUs (with attached Storage Buses)

Anything not picked off by the DSUs doubles back and goes through another series of pipes:
Diamond Pipes dump ores into Hoppers which feed Pulverizers and Furnaces

The output of my Pulverizers and Furnaces goes out via BC pipes into a single ME Interface block, and into my network.
Likewise, anything that doesn't go into the ore processing Hoppers gets BC piped straight to the above mentioned ME Interface block, into my network.

So my entire quarry support system is free of AE blocks, aside from that single, terminating ME Interface.
 
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Deleted member 38496

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i dont think transposers can actually draw items from ME interface. are you sure you didnt mean translocators?
anyway AE`s inability to mimic supplier pipes in a simple manner is the reason i cannot ignore LP. plus it doesnt require pesky quartz...
Right, I meant translocators. My bad.
 

zilvarwolf

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Jul 29, 2019
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I'm with casilleroatr -- i've started using less and less pure-AE setups and adding in more BC pipes again. Here's how my Quarry sorter/processor works:
Item Tess -> Diamond Pipes shunting the more common items (cobble,dirt,sand,etc) into DSUs

Anything not picked off by the DSUs doubles back and goes through another series of pipes:
Diamond Pipes dump ores into Hoppers which feed Pulverizers and Furnaces

The output of my Pulverizers and Furnaces goes out via BC pipes into a single ME Interface block, and into my network.
Likewise, anything that doesn't go into the ore processing Hoppers gets BC piped straight to the above mentioned ME Interface block, into my network.

So my entire quarry support system is free of AE blocks, aside from that single, terminating ME Interface.


I guess I just don't understand why you'd want to do that. I keep seeing 'AE isn't good for all that processing' (or variations), and I don't get it.

Why is your setup superior (computationally, emotionally, memory, processor, whatever) to, say.. quarry to ender chest.

AE system has import module pulling in a stack at a time (or a couple stacks at a time if it's coming in too fast...two import modules should work. I've never had to use more than one).

Cobble, dirt, gravel to go barrels with priority 3 using storage buses. A storage bus exists for some form of disposal (in this case, we'll use one of the new fancy compressors setup to make quantum singularity pieces..but you could just as easily make matter balls or just trash it). That's priority 2. The drives are priority 1.

You have two or three pulverizers, or the equivalent IE or mekanism machines. Each one gets some subset of the various ores in your game world. You might or might not want to process everything (TC aluminum, for example), so you don't always process. Some ores overlap (iron, tin, copper, typically) so that if any machine isn't busy, it'll pick up. You have 3 machines, so if you have more than 8 ores (likely) and aren't using a fuzzy bus for duplicate types you can spread out the excess. Same thing for furnaces, again using export buses..precision or fuzzy, either works. I like TE machines so that I can have them spit out of the bottom onto a conveyer (they look cool) and spit the results back into the system using the same ender chest from before.

If I'm doing AE full time, I'm not too worried about power, but I suppose if I was borderline on having available juice I might want to do it differently. I'm not seeing how your system is superior in any way. You just have more inventories along the way to keep track of, with the pipes and hoppers. I guess the AE solution is more expensive? I imagine that's fair..it seems to do more.
 

Antice

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Jul 29, 2019
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using anything except logi pipes as interfaces or junctions always causes logi pipe systems to fail. Logistic pipes do not recognize other pipe types except as a pathway towards the next logistics junction.

the correct way to use the default route system in logistics pipes is to put a buffer inventory at that juncture to separate the logi network from the BC/pneumatic/insert other pipe system. this is something that works very very well with logistics pipes. doing it with AE is harder, altho AE will never overload your buffer if you just set it to export into it. (nor will logi pipes if you have a secondary storage option in case the buffer is full)
The AE network will not accept any more items once it is full however, so a BC quarry overloading an AE network will result in spilled items at the quarry end.

there simply is not any network that can be 100% guaranteed to never spill items somewhere in the system. proper system design can reduce the chance of it happening to a very very small number tho. by utilizing voiding and other overflow countermeasures. Both AE and Logi pipes have built in void devices of their own, so no excuse for not adding one tbh.
the RP2 tube system however, used infinite backfill. however, once backfilled that filter would no longer pull items out of the inventory it was connected to. thus causing the input buffer to overflow and then spill items. The RP2 tubes was fast at sorting compared to logi pipes (the main contender back then), but it did sometimes result in spilled items, and it did not have a built in void function either. you had to use something else for that.
 

AlanEsh

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Jul 29, 2019
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I guess I just don't understand why you'd want to do that. I keep seeing 'AE isn't good for all that processing' (or variations), and I don't get it.

Why is your setup superior (computationally, emotionally, memory, processor, whatever) to, say.. quarry to ender chest.
...
If I'm doing AE full time, I'm not too worried about power, but I suppose if I was borderline on having available juice I might want to do it differently. I'm not seeing how your system is superior in any way. You just have more inventories along the way to keep track of, with the pipes and hoppers. I guess the AE solution is more expensive? I imagine that's fair..it seems to do more.
I left something out!
The DSUs do have Storage Buses on them.

Your points:
Power -- I am concerned about power. I try to build as efficiently as possible when it comes to power use.
Cost of Infrastructure -- AE is expensive and it is hard to come up with enough materials for it prior to having a Quarry. I want a quarry running as early as possible, but I won't start that without a small ME Network in place.
Inventories -- A quarry won't overwhelm my system, so there are no inventories to manage. Just stand back and watch the magic blocks float through the magic pipes.
Does more? -- All of my materials end up accessible to my ME Network after pre-processing, neither system "does more" that I can see.
Pre-Processing vs AE Processing -- Every in/out operation costs extra energy. I prefer to do as few I/O ops as possible due to point #1 up there.
 

trajano080

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Jul 29, 2019
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Regarding Pneumatic-Tube-Like-Systems, I really think the mod that best replicates that behaviour would be Logistics Pipes. It has guaranteed delivery, sorting options, intelligent routing, the works. It even has the same wonderful feature of negatively impacting your framerate! YAY! :D


But, they require diamonds...
 

zilvarwolf

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Jul 29, 2019
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I left something out!
The DSUs do have Storage Buses on them.

Your points:
Power -- I am concerned about power. I try to build as efficiently as possible when it comes to power use.
Cost of Infrastructure -- AE is expensive and it is hard to come up with enough materials for it prior to having a Quarry. I want a quarry running as early as possible, but I won't start that without a small ME Network in place.
Inventories -- A quarry won't overwhelm my system, so there are no inventories to manage. Just stand back and watch the magic blocks float through the magic pipes.
Does more? -- All of my materials end up accessible to my ME Network after pre-processing, neither system "does more" that I can see.

I had an LP setup to work with my MFR tree farm. It was cool, but I didn't get a good feel for how much power it was really using (vs what an ME system might have used for similar operations). But since I had to have power anyway, the extra couple of mj per few operations didn't seem like a big deal.

Cost: I think you're overstating the cost of ME pretty significantly. I have an 8 drive system with a dozen storage buses, a condenser, and a few export/import buses and haven't run a quarry. I -did- use dartcraft, but if that hadn't been available, I still would have gotten the quartz I needed with tinker's construct or default fortune. Or, ultimately, one at a time, since I have a few hundred quartz just laying around. I stopped mining it a while back. LP felt pretty expensive to me, actually. Especially in terms of time and needed infrastructure...I needed quite a few of those golden chipsets, or the cost was pretty stiff, whereas with AE the cost is one extra redstone (and I've already noted I had fortune).

Infrastructure: I don't believe a quarry will overwhelm my system. I haven't felt any desire to make one, so I can't be sure, but I've used variations of this setup before with automatic mining (including a DW20 mining well platform that was 16 turtles wide) with no loss.

Just from your response, it looks like six of one, half-dozen of another to me.
 

Vaygrim

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Jul 29, 2019
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I do actually think that AE is cheaper to start with, plus it seems much more 'performance friendly' in terms of not bogging down client / server gameplay.
 

casilleroatr

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Jul 29, 2019
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I guess I just don't understand why you'd want to do that. I keep seeing 'AE isn't good for all that processing' (or variations), and I don't get it.

Why is your setup superior (computationally, emotionally, memory, processor, whatever) to, say.. quarry to ender chest.

While I can't say from personal experience or knowledge, I have read that buildcraft pipes and logistics pipes have been well optimized in terms of computational load. I can't say if it compares favourably or unfavourably to AE though.

Emotionally, I think we both know that there is no superior version. You like yours, I like mine, everyone (hopefully) likes theirs. On a personal note, I really like to see items wizzing around pipes, but I do like the whole idea of items stored as data. It does make me feel like I am making awesome hi-tech stuff.

Logistics pipes are cheaper now, in material and energy costs. I do remember a time when chassis mk5 pipes cost tons of diamonds and gold. Now they are much cheaper. I could even use about 2 or 3 in my set up. They are useful for holding a lot of item sink modules which I used as ME interface termini instead of default routing a lone piece of BoP barley into my AE network to be forgotten about forever.

The reason I use non-AE item transport for all of my processing and sorting is because it is more configurable and you end up with more control over everything that is flowing through your system. Also, while I don't find most of AE to be that expensive once you are set up well enough in the certus quartz department, I find ME cable to be the limiting factor in large scale AE networks. Those things are so expensive for what they do. I will use pipes over them when I can any time.

On a final note, I will say that AE still forms the core of my network. However I use it as more of a big dumb superchest with a modest on demand crafting rig with a MAC and around 18 machines. (At least on my last world. I am still "early" game currently, as I rage quitted my last world after a freak mass fabricator explosion destroyed my entire logistics pipes sorting system. Don't worry about donations but flowers would be appreciated.:(:))
 

zilvarwolf

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Jul 29, 2019
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ME cable was nicer when you got more per craft, yes, but it's mostly a matter of keeping enough glass on hand.
 

AlanEsh

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Really, I usually set up an "infinigen" that continuously makes a variety of blocks including glass. I am always running low on Fluix dust and both quartz types.
I run out of glowstone entirely too often, just from making recipe pattern blanks :D
 

KingTriaxx

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Glowstone makes me miss GregTech... it seems strange to say that.

Ahem. I've basically taken to using AE for storage, and LP for processing. I just have pipes sucking out of interfaces, and dumping into the LP network, with the 'default route' being back into the ME Interface. The only down side is that it means I have to have multiple machines processing with LP, where AE can do it all with one. Though, at the same time, TE machines take a bit to process so having one machine pair for each material is still pretty efficient. And one dedicated to making glass from cobble.
 

trajano080

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Jul 29, 2019
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This thread got entirelly out of hand... seriously, does anyone know a true replacement for pneumatic tubes?