Efficient water supply

[PickPay]

I would like to use a Metal Refinery (and other machinery) to supply my pincha pepper farm without having water clogging my pipes (therefor stopping my Refinery) or needing to be recirculated through the water basin (more power to pump it back) and yet make sure there is a constant supply so my farm doesn't dry out if I dont use any machinery for a while. Do I need a water reservoir or automation... ?

[beowulf2010]

14 minutes ago, PickPay said:

I would like to use a Metal Refinery (and other machinery) to supply my pincha pepper farm without having water clogging my pipes (therefor stopping my Refinery) or needing to be recirculated through the water basin (more power to pump it back) and yet make sure there is a constant supply so my farm doesn't dry out if I dont use any machinery for a while. Do I need a water reservoir or automation... ?

A couple water reservoirs would work and would be my solution. 

You could also automate the metal refinery to turn on only when the feeder pipe is empty via a pipe element sensor and a NOT gate. The issue with this is if a Dupe is too delayed in running the refinery, you could run out of water for a bit, depending on the buffer you give yourself with the placement of the sensor. 

[PickPay]

Thanks for the ideas. I wish the water reservoir could be controlled by automation and act just like a battery does for power.

[SharraShimada]

Yes this would be nice, but you can do it with a workaround. Use to brigdes, one tile displaced, and on the pipe, that not be in use, as long as the liquid flows, set a liquid element-sensor. It this triggers, you know, the system is full.

[beowulf2010]

47 minutes ago, PickPay said:

Thanks for the ideas. I wish the water reservoir could be controlled by automation and act just like a battery does for power.

You can control a reservoir via automating a door under it. Note that the reservoir will still fill when "off" (door open) but nothing will flow out. 

Unfortunately, there is no way other than an overflow detector like Sharra mentioned for generating an automation signal from a reservoir. 

Hmm. If you use a memory toggle to turn the refinery off with an overflow detector "before" the reservoir and then back on with an empty pipe detector "after" the reservoir, that might do what you want.