Most efficient way to generate lava?

[Westingham]

Previously I was pumped lava out of the nether using ender chests and liquid transposers and a chunk loader, but I'm trying to avoid putting that sort of stress on the server. Currently I have a 10.3 mB iron tank that is being fed by three magma crucibles which are each fed by an igneous extractor. The iron tank is supporting six magmatic engines which are powering the crucibles.

Six magmatic engines produce 24 MJ/t. Three magma crucibles require 60 MJ/t. I think you can see that this isn't going to work, even if the magmatic engines are only drawing from the tank when empty.

(Sidebar: I want to monitor the magmatic engines fuel capacity and only activate the redstone torch that's powering the liquiduct when all the fuel is gone. Since I'm using liquiducts, I can't use gates. What's the solution here?)

One of the other players on my server had suggested switching to geothermal generators, fed by the iron tank, to power electrical engines that have been upgraded with iron electron tubes.

Geothermal generator produces 20 EU/t and the modified electrical engine will produce 10 MJ/t. Six geothermals, six modified electrical engines, 60 MJ/t.

I should note here that the ultimate goal is to use the (hopefully) unlimited lava supply to power a steam boiler. Unfortunately I'm just not sure if that's going to work out, I think I may be headed in the direction of a hugeass iron tank that powers and feeds itself and nothing else.

 

[un worry]

Hope this is OT, but I am in a similar predicament ... thinking how to turn on and off a secondary bank of magmatic-crucibles by monitoring redstone energy cells.

Gates dont work so going to test Turtles with Readers against the RECs tomorrow -- any help appreciated.

 

[Omicron]

The problem you are facing is not that the magmatic engines are too slow to power the crucibles. Operating speed of the crucibles actually doesn't have anything to do with whether or not you're turning a profit. Even if you ran them with a single engine, you should eventually turn a profit if there is a net gain to be had between the cost to melt cobblestone and the energy yield of lava in the engine. And here's the crux: there is no net positive. In fact, it's a negative. Melting cobblestone costs 20,000 MJ, and the resulting bucket of lava will give you 18,000 MJ in a magmatic engine. It doesn't matter how few or how many engines and crucibles you have - every 10 pieces of cobblestone melted, you permanently lose one bucket of lava.

Geothermals and electric engines don't work either. In fact, they are far, far worse. To run at 10 MJ/t, an upgraded electrical engine will require 36 EU/t. That means in order to produce the 20,000 MJ required to melt cobblestone, you're spending 72,000 EU. And the bucket of lava produced will give you 20,000 EU back in the geothermal generator. Meaning it costs you more than 3.5 buckets of lava to produce a single bucket of lava.

It used to be possible to make an infinite lava loop, but it required a steam boiler running on lava. It worked because the steam boiler, once heated up, was so efficient that every bucket of lava inserted would give you more than 20,000 MJ, thereby turning a net positive even while running magma crucibles to fuel itself. However, this is no longer possible, as solid fuel boilers received a (very much needed) efficiency nerf, and lava as a fuel source in boilers was also nerfed on top of that (intentionally). Nowadays you will not get more than 9,100 MJ out of a lava bucket in a boiler, no matter what you do.

So as it is, your project is not going to work. You'll need to find a way to get more than 20,000 MJ out of a single lava bucket before you can set up that loop - or, find a way to make creating a lava bucket cost less MJ. Netherrack, for example, can be used. But then you need to keep supplying netherrack, and it won't run infinitely by itself.


EDIT: As for the sidebar question, you can still use gates. They don't have to sit on the conduit or liquiduct; they will work perfectly fine as long as they are next to the engine you want to monitor. Just place a structure pipe (or any other pipe, it doesn't even have to connect) in the space adjacent to the machine, slap a gate on it, then lead a redstone wire from the gate to the liquiduct you want to power/unpower.

 

[DoctorOr]

Most efficient way is to breed up a large set of Demonic Bees as use the resulting phosphor in a squeezer.

But to address your points more closly:

It costs more MJ to generate lava _with cobblestone_ in a magma crucible than that lava will generate in a magmetic engine.

Electrical engines are far too inefficient to ever be a good way to run anything. You use them only for small jobs. It costs more MJ to generate lava with cobblestone in a magama crucible than is generated by a geothermal generator running an electrical engine.

Railcraft, of which boilers are part of, uses its own numbers for combustible items. Lava is only burnable in a solid fueled firebox, and a bucket of lava provides less heat potential than charcoal or peat. This means it's a very very poor choice to use in a boiler.

In short: Generating lava with a magma crucible with cobblestone is only done to transfer excess MJ power to EU. It is a power-lossy setup. If you wish to make lava in order to make power, you need to feed it netherrack.

 

[HeffronCM]

You can still set up a lava-production energy-positive chain, just need to use Netherrack. A quarry pretty much anywhere in the nether of default size, placed at maximum Y level, will produce more netherrack than you are likely to need.

 

[Dragonfel]

Here's a solution, use something other than magmatic engines to power the creation of lava. Tier 5 blaze spawner, some buckets of water and obsidian pipes/transposers feeding into a steam boiler or sterling engines. Or maybe an automated milking station pumping milk into biogas engines. Both of these could actually power your whole base with MJ.

Or you could just build a nuclear reactor or some advanced/compact solars and run electrical engines.

Side note: I thought they where nerfing netherack in the next update so it's the same as cobblestone

 

[HeffronCM]

Netherrack was nerfed once to half the efficiency it used to have. It is intended to be a lava production alternative to pumping from the nether, because pumps can cause server lag. I haven't seen anything from Team CoFH to say this was changing.

 

[Dragonfel]

2.1.7
Changed: Netherrack to Lava conversion is more expensive - this new default value IS enforced upon updating. You may still change it in the config file.

From this thread: http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/thr...olf20-v8-of-mindcrack-v7-of-magic-world.8805/

 

[HeffronCM]

Ahh, it was nerfed further. Netherrack to Lava originally cost 4k MJ, then was increased to 8k MJ, and now has been increased to 12k MJ. There is still a 6k MJ profit in using netherrack to power your buildcraft, but it is definitely a push toward other power sources.

 

[trunksbomb]

Most efficient way is to breed up a large set of Demonic Bees as use the resulting phosphor in a squeezer.

A largely overlooked option, but it's a truly infinite set-it-and-forget-it system of producing lava. Just make sure you don't breed your demonic bees with ANYTHING else and there will be no genetic mutations, so you'll be able to pump out the princess, drones, and combs, put the princesses and drones back, then make off with the combs to process. And if I remember correctly, squeezing the centrifuged byproduct of the embittered combs generates two buckets-worth of lava per item.

It's a bit much to set up, and there's a couple of ways to do it. Either put them in apiaries and keep a constant supply of frames coming (cheaper option) or put them in alvearies.. which requires no frames but does require royal jelly and pollen, both of which you'll have to do a decent amount of beekeeping to get to. And it's best to use BC pipes, because Redpower tubes don't interface properly with the the centrifuge. I had a tube system set up for automating my tropical bees back in 1.2.5 so it's possible, but not the most straightforward route.

 

[Westingham]

Everybody has provided very useful answers, thank you so much.

 

[DoctorOr]

It's a bit much to set up, and there's a couple of ways to do it. Either put them in apiaries and keep a constant supply of frames coming (cheaper option) or put them in alvearies.. which requires no frames but does require royal jelly and pollen, both of which you'll have to do a decent amount of beekeeping to get to. And it's best to use BC pipes, because Redpower tubes don't interface properly with the the centrifuge. I had a tube system set up for automating my tropical bees back in 1.2.5 so it's possible, but not the most straightforward route.

Since frames require manual insertion - they cannot be inserted by pipe, tube, factorization router, or golem - I'd say go with the alveary. That does require some bees other than the Demonic for construction products (Industrious for pollen, Imperial for royal jelly, and common or creative for wax)

 

[trunksbomb]

Since frames require manual insertion - they cannot be inserted by pipe, tube, factorization router, or golem - I'd say go with the alveary. That does require some bees other than the Demonic for construction products (Industrious for pollen, Imperial for royal jelly, and common or creative for wax)

Well, tubes WILL pump frames into them but they don't go where you'd like them to. And a router really won't do the trick?

 

[DoctorOr]

Well, tubes WILL pump frames into them but they don't go where you'd like them to. And a router really won't do the trick?

Frames not being able to be automated is an intentional design.

 

[Scaffolding]

If you do take the Infernal Bees route keep in mind that although Demonic Bees are the highest tier of Bee that produces the comb needed for lava gen, they are inferior to Fiendish Bees.
T1 - Embittered 1.7 minutes to produce comb
T2 - Fiendish 50 seconds to produce comb
T3 - Demonic 1.7 minutes to produce comb
I believe the reason for this is because Demonic bees also produce glowstone dust every 5 minutes.

On a side note Binnie added new alveary blocks to the latest extra bees including a frame housing block(it only has 1 inventory slot), you should be able to pipe frames into the block. Only problem is the frame housing block is broken in SMP and will cause a server crash, hopefully Binnie fixes this in the next release. If you play SSP then you should be able to use the block without any issues.

 

[DoctorOr]

If you do take the Infernal Bees route keep in mind that although Demonic Bees are the highest tier of Bee that produces the comb needed for lava gen, they are inferior to Fiendish Bees.
T1 - Embittered 1.7 minutes to produce comb
T2 - Fiendish 50 seconds to produce comb
T3 - Demonic 1.7 minutes to produce comb
I believe the reason for this is because Demonic bees also produce glowstone dust every 5 minutes.

Those times you see in the bee databank are based on the base working speed for that breed, and can be manipulated for an individual bee. Using extra bees machines, copy "Fast Worker" from Cultivated to Demonic and they will work faster than a base Fiendish (For reference: Fiendish is "Normal" speed, while Demonic is "Slow")

 

[HeffronCM]

On a side note Binnie added new alveary blocks to the latest extra bees including a frame housing block(it only has 1 inventory slot), you should be able to pipe frames into the block. Only problem is the frame housing block is broken in SMP and will cause a server crash, hopefully Binnie fixes this in the next release. If you play SSP then you should be able to use the block without any issues.

Using an Alveary to automate your frames won't help those trying to automate their Apiaries so they don't have to go through the trouble of crafting Alvearies. The Frame Housing is intended to allow the ExtraBees special frames, such as the Chocolate, Restraint, Soul, and Healing Frame, to apply to your Alveary. I imagine the Untreated, Impregnated, and Proven Frame would not accomplish much in an Alveary.

 

[Scaffolding]

Those times you see in the bee databank are based on the base working speed for that breed, and can be manipulated for an individual bee. Using extra bees machines, copy "Fast Worker" from Cultivated to Demonic and they will work faster than a base Fiendish (For reference: Fiendish is "Normal" speed, while Demonic is "Slow")

But this still makes the Fiendish Bees superior unless you want to harvest glowstone dust. I left the base values out intentionally, although they are still in the favor of the Fiendish bees.[DOUBLEPOST=1359611038][/DOUBLEPOST]

Scaffol

Using an Alveary to automate your frames won't help those trying to automate their Apiaries so they don't have to go through the trouble of crafting Alvearies. The Frame Housing is intended to allow the ExtraBees special frames, such as the Chocolate, Restraint, Soul, and Healing Frame, to apply to your Alveary. I imagine the Untreated, Impregnated, and Proven Frame would not accomplish much in an Alveary.

I made the assumption that chocolate frames would be used since the OP wanted efficient ways to make loads of lava. I already have a automated lava setup in the Nether and I abandoned using frames at all, production rates don't seem bad at all. I do have an alveary but it is being used solely as an Apiarist Clothes Factory.

 

[DoctorOr]

But this still makes the Fiendish Bees superior unless you want to harvest glowstone dust. I left the base values out intentionally, although they are still in the favor of the Fiendish bees.

Anybody who doesn't either use the extra bees machines or breed in Fast working normally has shown they don't really care about production speed.

 

[Scaffolding]

My mistake

T1 - Embittered 3.1 minutes to produce comb
T2 - Sinister 1.7 minutes to produce comb
T3 - Fiendish 50 seconds to produce comb
T4 - Demonic 1.7 minutes to produce comb

Also I don't have any samples but does a Demonic Bee produce simmering comb at a faster rate than Fiendish Bee does, if both bees have the fast worker trait?