Steamboiler + turbines vs. dieselgenerators

[dinnelo374]

Hi!

im refining a huge oil reservoir with the buildcraft refineries
and i was wondering which would give me more EU

Heating steamboilers with fuel and powering steamturbines with the steam
or just burning the fuel in dieselgenerators?


btw:
the advantage of steamboilers is that i might also get my MJ from steamengines right?
(right now im using electrical engines and they consum like 600-700EU/t all the time)

the advantage of dieselgenerators might be that they are cheap :O

 

[Peppe]

Diesel says 384k for a bucket of fuel.

1 bucket of fuel in a hot 36 tank boiler = 872k MJ.
1.212m EU if you use round number of turbines with some spare steam. Each turbine only takes 320 steam, 36 tank boiler should have 40 spare or 80 spare steam a tick depending on if you use LP or HP tanks. Steam converts to MJ at steam/5, so you have 8-16 MJ/t left over.

You can also convert the MJ to EU using magma crucibles. 1:1 using geothermal generators and 1:1.5 using thermal generators (1.308m EU).

You can make enough iron to replace the rotor blades at about 4 mj/t to a magma crucible. Make obsidian dust and electrolyze for iron to replace your rotors cheaply at the end of their 60 hour life.

Bottom line going through a 36 tank boiler will be at least twice as efficient vs a Diesel generator.

 

[dinnelo374]

how many turbines can i run from one 36 boiler?

 

[Peppe]

1 turbine can use 320 steam
LP = 360 steam, so one turbine with 40 steam to spare
HP = 720 steam, so two turbines with 80 steam to spare

To get a perfect round number you could do 4 HP boilers and run 9 turbines -- need a very good source of iron/steel to keep running.

 

[Guswut]

how many turbines can i run from one 36 boiler?

For a high pressure boiler, two will give you some leftover steam, or three will use all of the steam but end up not running at full output (just means less EU/t, but longer life from what I've heard).

 

[Vovk]

careful with these assertions.

Steamboilers are hella fuel suckers before they're heated up all the way. This thread explains basically everything you wanted to know about boilers and then some http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/threads/the-final-word-on-steam-boiler-efficiency.13506/

Also dieselgens and petrogens do not run while you are not drawing power, and more importantly, they scale back on fuel usage in proportion to the amount of power you're using.

The combination of not being on all the time and scaling back when not required take that metric of "steam boiler is 2-3 times more fuel efficient" and spins it a bit.


a boiler WOULD be amazing AND the most fuel efficient if you needed to run something 24/7 and you were able to use all the MJ/EU being produced constantly.

also if turbines use 320 steam and a 36 H boiler produces 720 then you'd be able to run 3 (though it would hardly be better than 2, the turbines scale down to convert all available steam) a 36L boiler would produce only 360 steam and so you'd only be able to run 2 and it would hardly be better than 1.

 

[dinnelo374]

i am using the EU produced 24/7 for my matterfabricator and tons of other machines
but still i a bit shocked from the amount of steel i would need
i was planning to run 64 or 128 dieselgenerators for around 750 to 1500EU/t
for the same with steamturbines i would need 15 turbines = too many boilers^^

 

[KirinDave]

i am using the EU produced 24/7 for my matterfabricator and tons of other machines
but still i a bit shocked from the amount of steel i would need
i was planning to run 64 or 128 dieselgenerators for around 750 to 1500EU/t
for the same with steamturbines i would need 15 turbines = too many boilers^^

I did the same math recently and my conclusion was similar. The only time you'd go for the railcraft boilers is when you're at "Steel isn't a big deal" level of production. Which is actually not endgame, but it's past the critical point where you can't just LOLava or use one of the solar mods.