Help with getting started with Boilers

[Golrith]

I'm slowly reaching the stage where I need to get some dedicated power generation going, beyond my 2 hobbyist steam engines.

I'm aware I need to build a boiler system (as an option) but haven't a clue to how you actually build it.
I've seen some big blocks with lots of steam pipes leading from it, but some of these pipes seem to go into another large boiler looking big block.

What are the key blocks I need, and how do they interact with each other, and how do I feed these blocks and obtain their output?

TIA.

 

[solidity]

The Railcraft Wiki is a great place to look specifics up. The basic gist is, put down one or more fireboxes, put Boiler Tanks above, supply fuel to the firebox and use the produced steam for steampowered Railcraft engines.

 

[Hydra]

What I tend to do with new stuff I don't understand is just create a SP flat world, turn NEI cheat mode on, and with the wiki in hand muck about with the different things I want to try. That way you don't waste precious materials on stuff you don't need.

For a boiler setup a solid fuel fired one running on charcoal is easy to set up. The railcraft wiki explains everything.

 

[Freyr]

If you want visual aid: youtube.com/watch?v=2sS1ynteH64

 

[TheLoneWolfling]

A couple of things:

How much of a fuel supply do you have? (Not fuel stored in chests, but fuel getting mined/chopped down/etc.)

How much iron do you have?

Bigger boilers are more fuel efficient, but take longer to warm up, and you really don't want a boiler running intermittently.

 

[Golrith]

A couple of things:

How much of a fuel supply do you have? (Not fuel stored in chests, but fuel getting mined/chopped down/etc.)

How much iron do you have?

Bigger boilers are more fuel efficient, but take longer to warm up, and you really don't want a boiler running intermittently.

At the moment, no fuel production. Trying to establish in my mind what I need to prepare myself for.

My aim is to set up a Steves Cart tree farm and Biofuel generation from saplings (two things I've never done before), and I believe that using a TE sawmill provides slightly more net power from the bonus logs and sawdust then turning the logs into charcoal.

Naturally I need the automated tree farm first (to replace my manual one), but first I need to get more resources and also get my sorting system sorted and get the foundations of my TC3 tower built. I just like to think far ahead


Does a boiler system need a constant supply of water?

 

[Freyr]

Does a boiler system need a constant supply of water?

Yes, you could use TE Aqueous Accumulator for that.

 

[MilConDoin]

I've got a cart tree farm feeding a bunch of boilers, currently trying out, how many boilers I can keep fueled up.
The farm (16x16 footprint of the tracks) cannot keep up with 5 stills, I should downgrade that soon, so 5 HP boilers are too many. Maybe 3 or 4.
The logs can fuel several 36HP solid boilers (sawmill -> planks like you wrote) , currently the 3rd heats up, maybe even a fourth will work.
If you have interest in the setup: Search around in the forums, I posted an album of the farm+plank part. I can also post an updated version (some stuff has changed since then), if somebody is interested.

 

[INCSlayer]

im running 3 36hp boilers and 1 36lp boiler on 4sugar cane farms processed through 2 fermenters and 8 stills with biofuel to spare not much biofuel mind you but some surplus atleast

 

[TheLoneWolfling]

At the moment, no fuel production. Trying to establish in my mind what I need to prepare myself for.

For a large LP boiler, 158.4 fuel units/second I believe. Also, a large fuel supply to start the boiler.

My aim is to set up a Steves Cart tree farm and Biofuel generation from saplings (two things I've never done before), and I believe that using a TE sawmill provides slightly more net power from the bonus logs and sawdust then turning the logs into charcoal.

A TE sawmill is more efficient - actually, I believe I was the one to popularize that.

Does a boiler system need a constant supply of water?

Yes, but a single aqueous accumulator will supply even a large HP boiler.

 

[Peppe]

The second tank you are probably seeing is a storage tank to buffer supply to the liquid boilers. Unless your fuel production is way oversized to startup on most fuels takes about a 400-500 buckets of fuel, but the boiler itself only holds 16. When the boiler is cold it uses up to 8x the normal fuel amount, so you need a good buffer to get past that to the hot and efficient zone.

For a solid fuel boiler you would probably want a double chest of charcoal level fuel or so (adjust to your fuel of choice's burn time/value). Like if you use coal coke then you might need a quarter of that, but if you use planks double it... etc. On solid fuel boilers you can put this buffer chest right next to the boilers and they will auto pull fuel from the chest. For a cold start just leave the boiler unfinished, and when you are ready to startup place the last block.

 

[Celestialphoenix]

You're starting fuel needs depend on the size of your boiler, and if you make it a high pressure one double it.

Unless you like manual feeding, a couple of relays are the easiest way of getting a massive fuel supply to drop in as needed.
(36HP- about 6 relays of coal coke should sort you out).

Unless blazes get nerfed, I'm all about solid fuelled setups. (2x36HP+36LP per shard). Second choice would be biofuel.

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