Electricraft: Briefer on Resistors

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Pyure

Not Totally Useless
Aug 14, 2013
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I actually didn't intend to make a thread for this, but I can't seem to get images to work in private conversations. So, moderators, feel free to move this to somewhere more appropriate as necessary.

I was asked recently for a quick briefer on how resistors work. First, I should mention that there are decent youtube videos for this if you're into that sort of thing. For those that aren't, I'm demonstrating this in the way that I learn things: visual step by step through utilization.

******************************************************
First Image: We see a maximum tier Auroral Battery (on the right) outputting into an induction motor (on the left) via a lossless wire. The induction motor provides conversion of ElectriCraft Volts(V) and Amps(A) to RotaryCraft Rads(R, Rads) and Torque(nm), at a rate of 8:1 and 1:8 respectively. Therefore, if we send 16V 16A to an induction motor, we will receive 2R 32nm output. The power will be the same either way: 256W.

Note that, unlike in RotaryCraft, power is never transferred unless it is "requested" by an end point. In this case, the induction motor will always request and consume power. Therefore, we can see (in the dynamometer) power flowing.

2014-07-17_21.51.59.png


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Second Image: We have added a resistor.

As you can see, it has 3 bands on it. These are used via color-coding to control how many amps are permitted through the wire.

Note that the induction motor is now reporting 0 power. This is because, by default, the resistor allows 0A.
Important: the Auroral Battery is no longer sending power because no end point will accept it.
2014-07-17_21.52.23.png


******************************************************************
Third Image: We are now color-coding the resistor.

To control how much amperage can flow through the wire, we can assign the following colors to each band:

Black = 0
Brown = 1
Red =2
Orange =3
Yellow = 4
Lime = 5
Blue = 6
Purple = 7
Gray = 8
White = 9

Each band confers a different change to the amperage.
Band 1 multiplies each value by 10
Band 2 multiplies each value by 1
Band 3 adds zeroes to the end result.

By adding orange to Band 1, therefore, we are allowing 3*10=30A. This could also have been done by adding orange to Band 2, (3A), plus brown to Band 3 (adding a zero, for 30A)

Important Notes:
  • The voltage is always unchanged, unless 0A are flowing, in which case 0V are also flowing.
  • The voltage in this case is purely the product of an Auroral Battery's maximum output, with zero loss due to the superconducting wires used
  • We are now receiving 240nm (30A * 8)
  • The Auroral Battery is not sending more amps than are requested. Power is not being cut off at the resistor and then wasted: we send what we request. In laymans terms, this is pure badassery.

2014-07-17_21.52.50.png


******************************************************************
Fourth Image: More color-coding

We've added yellow to band 2. Band 2 multiplies by 1, so we're adding 4(yellow)*1=4A, for a total of 34A permitted through the wire.

Note that torque is now 34*8=272nm

2014-07-17_21.53.42.png


******************************************************************
Fifth Image: More color-coding

Just to confirm the last band, we've added brown to Band 3. Band 3 adds zeros, so we're adding 1(brown) zero to 34, for 340A total.

As a result, we're now receiving 2720nm of torque

2014-07-17_21.54.17.png


This about sums up resistors.

Please feel free to correct me on anything. My ElectriCraft is a bit rusty and I've likely missed something. Also, I encourage discussion in general on improvements, clarifications, or anything else that may be of benefit to those getting their electrical feet wet (don't do that by the way).


ADDENDUMS (Anything else I think of or someone suggests)
* The minimum amount of power you can get from an Auroral Battery without a transformer (see next) is 66536V * 1A = 65536W (65KW).
* ElectriCraft does not provide native transformers. RotaryCraft gearboxes serve the same purpose but requires sending power to an always-consuming induction motor. So I think we're still stuck with 65kw minimum from this battery.
* Only Vanilla dyes are currently applicable; others, including from Reika's Dye Trees, will not work. (thanks Ieldra)
 

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Last edited:

Ieldra

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Apr 25, 2014
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Fantastic Post. 100 points for usefulness and being informative in exactly the way I like it! I'll "report" back about my experiences with EC once I get to it. May be some time.

One question: why are there two cable connections that go out of your battery? Is that somehow important?
 
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Pyure

Not Totally Useless
Aug 14, 2013
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Waterloo, Ontario
Fantastic Post. 100 points for usefulness and being informative in exactly the way I like it! I'll "report" back about my experiences with EC once I get to it. May be some time.

One question: why are there two cable connections that go out of your battery? Is that somehow important?

Not at all. Batteries only output from the top.

For clarity I should have let the wire go 1 more block to the left before going down to prevent the loop. Afaik it is not creating an issue (although I avoid doing this for reasons of sanity and presentation in a real build)

Appreciate the kudos, now I have 100 points burning a hole in my pocket and not sure what to buy.[DOUBLEPOST=1405686836][/DOUBLEPOST]Important, glaring correction. Just noticed I haz cant do maths.

Therefore, if we send 16V 16A to an induction motor, we will receive 2R 32nm 128nm output. The power will be the same either way: 256W.

I apologize if this threw anyone.
 

Ieldra

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Apr 25, 2014
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If I may put in a correction:

The number 5 is coded by lime dye, not green. Otherwise, this works beautifully.

There is only one really serious drawback: only vanilla dyes work on the resistor. Other dyes won't, for instance the tree dyes from Reika's own mod, or others oredict'ed as "dyeXXX". For instance, Biomes O'Plenty adds a "brown dye" which won't work. At least In the case of the dye trees, I suspect this is unintended.
 

Pyure

Not Totally Useless
Aug 14, 2013
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Waterloo, Ontario
If I may put in a correction:

The number 5 is coded by lime dye, not green. Otherwise, this works beautifully.

There is only one really serious drawback: only vanilla dyes work on the resistor. Other dyes won't, for instance the tree dyes from Reika's own mod, or others oredict'ed as "dyeXXX". For instance, Biomes O'Plenty adds a "brown dye" which won't work. At least In the case of the dye trees, I suspect this is unintended.
Fixed "green" to "lime" above, thanks @Ieldra. Added your note regarding vanilla dyes. Fixed a typo with "purple" spelling as well.

I'm not sure if the vanilla-dye thing is intended or not. Its been around forever; I can't imagine Reika never noticed. I suspect its either intentional or just incredibly low on the priority list. Perhaps he'll chime in himself.

@Reika: vanilla-only dyes in ElectriCraft: intentional?

Brown dye requirement in particular makes people want to kill themselves.
 

Ieldra

Popular Member
Apr 25, 2014
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@Pyure:
On the MC forum thread, Reika has confirmed that "only vanilla dyes work on resistors" is a bug.
 
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Reika

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This is interesting, but appears to have very little to do with actual physics. I'm kind of surprised.
ElectriCraft had to take liberties with the physics of electricity, because the original realistic model (involving Kirchoff's, Ohm's, and Faraday's laws) did not translate well into the fixed-torque, fixed-speed shaft power system, was incredibly unintuitive to use ("I added another generator, why is the current here LESS?!"), carried severe computational overhead (though calculation was, as it is now, only done on changing network topology or power input), and was a nightmare to debug for someone whose understanding of electrical physics is limited to some university courses.
 

Pyure

Not Totally Useless
Aug 14, 2013
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Borg/star trek jokes go right over Reika's head. You've been warned :p

Personally I think the EC abstraction level hits the perfect note.

I'd still kill for performance improvements (slower updates, dont care about potential abuses) and ability to run resistors in parallel/series (I forget which one lets me do 259 amps if I desire)
 

Omega Haxors

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Jul 29, 2019
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With intelligent use of resistors, and gearboxes you can get an extremely efficient setup where one single auroral can power an entire base worth of rotarycraft machinery and still have half of its potential left.

Find out exactly how much power (in watts) you need to run a device at max speed and then do the math to figure out the closest resistor you can get to that amount, and then use gearboxes or CVTs to convert to the correct torque. Now just set up a bit of redstone into a relay and you can turn your machine on and off with the flip of a lever.
 

Aetherpirate

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Just getting into proper use of EC, starting a rewire of the whole base. Going from a Jet-Fuel powered system to fission reactors -->HP Turbine. This was incredibly helpful.

Time to go hunt for a source of brown dye. Then see if I can MineChem up more.
 

Inaeo

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Jul 29, 2019
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I'm running a personal pack using RoC, ElC, and ReC as the core. I'm just getting to a point where ElC is becoming a priority. This thread has made me rethink my setup completely (no, no, that's a good thing!). Even though the thread was posted a year and a half ago, I feel the basic knowledge is the same. Nice presentation.
 
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Microjet

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Jul 29, 2019
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I'd like to point out here that the battery is actually outputting its max amps in spite of your resistors setting just that the rest of the amps the resistor doesn't use is going back to your battery since you have looped the wire from the output to one side that is an input.

So your point here :
  • The Auroral Battery is not sending more amps than are requested. Power is not being cut off at the resistor and then wasted: we send what we request. In laymans terms, this is pure badassery.
Is not strictly true as based on your comment here confused the hell out of me for a while as I tried to do what your doing here except without that loop to the side of the battery and couldn't figure for a while why by battery was draining all the time, even though I was only 'requesting' a few amps. Without that loop, the power does indeed get wasted as far as I can tell.

Edit: Just realised the OP posted this over a year ago, possible things have changed since then?