Mod Feedback [By Request] RotaryCraft Suggestions

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Omicron

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Jul 29, 2019
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I kind of got the impression it was rather impractical..... but had never looked into it much. Though I've stumbled across documentaries suggesting there are people today trying to institute such power systems..... but then there are fools born every minute. The one that springs to mind was suggesting it as a "free" power source for the worlds poor........

If you want to play with the concept (as a gameplay mechanic, not as a study in realism), you can look into Resonant Induction. As Calclavia's mods usually go, it's poorly documented, but you can in fact build giant tesla coil towers that transfer power via arcs of lightning.
 

ScottulusMaximus

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Jul 29, 2019
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hellooooooo

Any chance of changing some of the machines to multiblocks/

Specifically the temperature dependant ones as you quickly run out of sides in a cooler biome eg; my sludge fermenter in a magical biome needs fire under, cooling fin top, power back, then input, output, water, and redstone. There are easy ways around it yes but for asthetic compact builds it's a bit of a mission.

Also on one of the 14 000 threads I read researching RotaryCraft you mention the GasTurbine sucks you in according to real world engines at a distance of less 4m or so. I can confirm that in 25f at least the range is 14 blocks in diameter 7 blocks in front of the engine
 

Pyure

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i'd dearly love to see more multiblocks in RoC (especially since they're supposed to be older-tech and bulky as a result) but I imagine it fits under "lot of work with little benefit to the player"
 

Reika

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I imagine it fits under "lot of work with little benefit to the player"
Agreed.
hellooooooo

Any chance of changing some of the machines to multiblocks/

Specifically the temperature dependant ones as you quickly run out of sides in a cooler biome eg; my sludge fermenter in a magical biome needs fire under, cooling fin top, power back, then input, output, water, and redstone. There are easy ways around it yes but for asthetic compact builds it's a bit of a mission.
RC is not set up for technical blocks, nor do I feel it fits the design aesthetic. Generally speaking, I dislike multiblocks.

Also on one of the 14 000 threads I read researching RotaryCraft you mention the GasTurbine sucks you in according to real world engines at a distance of less 4m or so
At idle. The Gas Turbine during normal operation is closer to takeoff power.
 

Teslaterror

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Jul 29, 2019
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Hey I have an idea that would kind of make it more practical, why not make a type of engine that Accepts both Biofuel from MFR and Forestry's Ethanol/Biofuel, or make an engine say like the performance engine/Fuel powered engine accept it.

I myself invest heavily into biofuel Infrastructure to the point where I am normally the guy thats using it to produce RF but when it comes to Rotarycraft, I have to build Tons of Magnetostatics in order just to power my RC infrastructure. It would be nice to be able to directly input my biofuel into a RC engine.
 

dothrom

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Jul 29, 2019
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Hey I have an idea that would kind of make it more practical, why not make a type of engine that Accepts both Biofuel from MFR and Forestry's Ethanol/Biofuel, or make an engine say like the performance engine/Fuel powered engine accept it.

I myself invest heavily into biofuel Infrastructure to the point where I am normally the guy thats using it to produce RF but when it comes to Rotarycraft, I have to build Tons of Magnetostatics in order just to power my RC infrastructure. It would be nice to be able to directly input my biofuel into a RC engine.
Already done. Not directly, but there's a device to convert to RoC fuels.

Edit: And in older versions (v23c it still worked I think) you could pipe forestry ethanol directly into engines via the controller.
More Editing: Also, either you're using a rather old version, or are working too hard. Because magnetostatics are tiered now, making you go through the tech tree anyway. And now they also need lubricant.
 
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Omicron

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The device to convert other mod biofuels is the liquid distillery. I'm using one in my current world to convert Forestry biofuel.

One thing you really need to keep in mind in this is that you need to decide whether it's worth it to convert the stuff. Rotarycraft is very much a world of its own that isn't directly comparable with or integrates consistently with other mod ecosystems. For instance, putting one ethanol crystal into a gasoline engine (which gives more energy per ethanol than a performance engine without additives) and then trying to covert that power into another mod's energy, you'll be getting about... 70 MJ / 700 RF total. Per ethanol crystal. And you're supposed to get one crystal per bucket of for example Forestry biofuel. Right now in 1.6.4 you get 10, but that's a bug. But even with 10, that's 700 MJ / 7,000 RF you can convert back out of RoC to a different mod. Do you know how much energy it costs to make that single bucket of Forestry ethanol? About 10,000 MJ / 100,000 RF, and that's just the recipe costs in the fermenter and the still factored in. No farm consumption, no optional squeezer for fruit juice, no energy losses to power perdition in the machines and so on.

What this means is, you really need to think hard: does it benefit me if I'm turning something costing likely 11,000+ MJ into something that's worth 70 MJ? This may be possible, since Rotarycraft is also counting energy in a completely different manner. That single crystal does run the gasoline engine for 60 seconds, and that's enough to power any individual stage of an extractor, for instance. In fact, you can set it up so that 1+4 run together or 2+3 run together. It'll be slow, but it will complete multiple work cycles during those 60 seconds. Maybe as many as 10 if the fast stages 2+3 are running. Now try asking any machine running off of RF to complete 10 work cycles on 700 RF - usually it won't even do one.

So maybe it makes sense for you, but you need to have that application for ethanol where it benefits you in similar ways to just using it in their source mods. And you really, at all costs need to avoid a cyclic dependency loop scenario where you convert an outside fuel to Rotarycraft only to power something outside of Rotarycraft. This can even be an indirect loop, such as using a gas turbine to power the Forestry machines that produce ethanol that you then convert to Rotarycraft ethanol crystals. That would be a colossal waste of fuel value, equal to tossing out 99.9% of the energy you could be getting.

TL;DR is: the power systems are nothing whatsoever alike and converting power and fuels back and forth will screw you over royally. Only ever convert in one direction. Which one isn't so important, so long as you don't build a cyclic dependency.
 
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dothrom

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Converting BC fuel to jet fuel might be worth it though :p

If nothing else, just because Gas Turbines are way cooler than anything that uses BC fuel.
 
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Omicron

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Whooops! Sorry, I completely ballsed up a unit conversion somewhere in my math. A single ethanol crystal is actually worth closer to 1,250 MJ / 12,500 RF when exporting the power back out. Derp.

Still, the point remains that you get far, far less out of a converted Forestry ethanol bucket than you put into making it (or would get out if using it in Buildcraft engines). The moment you use RoC power to drive Forestry machines to make fuel for conversion into Rotarycraft, you're losing out on tons of power. You should be driving Forestry by its own engines (biogas or Buildcraft combustion engines) and then convert the excess fuel into Rotarycraft.

As for gas turbines... you get about 115,000 MJ / 1,150,000 RF back out per bucket of Buildcraft fuel converted into jet fuel. That same bucket would have been worth 600,000 MJ in a Buildcraft combustion engine. If you abuse the deliciously efficient idle power mode via ECU (nerfed in 1.7.x versions), you actually get over three quarters the original value out, so that's a pretty good deal. But still a net loss of over 20%.
 

dothrom

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I still stand with my original statement.
I've said it once, I'll say it again. Objective most efficient =/= subjective best. :p
I'll totally agree on the most efficient use. But note that I said earlier:
If nothing else, just because Gas Turbines are way cooler than anything that uses BC fuel.
And I'm pretty sure Railcraft steam boilers are even more efficient than the other (non RoC) engines that burn BC fuel.
 

Reika

RotaryCraft Dev
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Hey I have an idea that would kind of make it more practical, why not make a type of engine that Accepts both Biofuel from MFR and Forestry's Ethanol/Biofuel, or make an engine say like the performance engine/Fuel powered engine accept it.

I myself invest heavily into biofuel Infrastructure to the point where I am normally the guy thats using it to produce RF but when it comes to Rotarycraft, I have to build Tons of Magnetostatics in order just to power my RC infrastructure. It would be nice to be able to directly input my biofuel into a RC engine.
You can convert it, but I will not add direct acceptance again, as ethanol is part of the (early) techtree.
 

Omega Haxors

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Jul 29, 2019
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Sure the mod might not be designed for the magnetostatics but it's by far the most effective way to get shaft power. Every other engine has either a lot of downsides or very little power output. The magnetostatic does not. Once you have a sizable RF source, such as a reactor, there's no excuse for using normal RoC engines other than for visual appeal and the occasional gas turbine.

My base is completely run by magnetostatics. Over 300k RF/t worth of them. I'm trying to find a good use for the regular engines and I have over 20 stacks of ethanol crystals and 100 buckets of jet fuel but I still stick to my magnetostatics. Nothing compares to the ease and convenience of tesseract+magneto.

Adding lubricant requirements to converter units was a step in the right direction but the magnetostatic is still overpowering the other engines for usefulness. You can even match the power output of a gas turbine at the highest upgrade.
 
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ljfa

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I'd rather go the other way round - I have a solar tower producing around 4 MW at daytime, feeding into a rotational dynamo for 350 RF/t.

BTW you can use tesseract+gasoline engine or tesseract+microturbine just as easily.
 

Reika

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Sure the mod might not be designed for the magnetostatics but it's by far the most effective way to get shaft power. Every other engine has either a lot of downsides or very little power output. The magnetostatic does not. Once you have a sizable RF source, such as a reactor, there's no excuse for using normal RoC engines other than for visual appeal and the occasional gas turbine.

My base is completely run by magnetostatics. Over 300k RF/t worth of them. I'm trying to find a good use for the regular engines and I have over 20 stacks of ethanol crystals and 100 buckets of jet fuel but I still stick to my magnetostatics. Nothing compares to the ease and convenience of tesseract+magneto.

Adding lubricant requirements to converter units was a step in the right direction but the magnetostatic is still overpowering the other engines for usefulness. You can even match the power output of a gas turbine at the highest upgrade.
*digging through closet for nerf gun*
 

Omega Haxors

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I'd rather go the other way round - I have a solar tower producing around 4 MW at daytime, feeding into a rotational dynamo for 350 RF/t.

BTW you can use tesseract+gasoline engine or tesseract+microturbine just as easily.

I made myself a sexy Tokamak so I don't have to worry about RF production. At this point i'm going out of my way to look for excessive ways to use up all that RF. I suppose I would have used that system if I had it before hand but once you get reactors, even small ones, RF production is no big deal.

While it's true you can use tesseracts with gasoline engines and mictroturbines, they don't really give enough power to be worth the effort. When you use the magnetostatic for so long you start looking down at all the engines' pathetic outputs. The only one that's even somewhat respectable is the gas turbine since it has the same max power output as the magnetostatic.

*digging through closet for nerf gun*

Good.