Perhaps there is a miscommunication, but I do not understand how that matters, at all, when you are dealing with them connecting to things, as they then take on a state of being either input, or output (orange, or blue, I believe). Are you saying that if you place a conduit it is a bidirectional (should be true, no reason it shouldn't be) and when you place an engine next to it, it is still bidirectional even though the conduit displays the blue (conduit output) state?
If so, I can confirm that conduit don't care which state they are in around engines (which is, obviously, a bug), and your idea of a three state conduit appears to have no relation to the matter at hand.
Either way, thank you for keeping it civil, and maybe, just maybe, we can come to an understanding!