Help me understand this SPOM attempt

[giygus]

Pretty new at this game, trying to learn things.  First attempt at a SPOM like set up, and I am trying to understand why it isn't more functional.  I looked at the pretty pictures of real SPOMs, and they are nice, but I don't understand how they work.  Figured trying a few attempts of my own would help.

So it does great at pushing out O2 it seems, but no hydrogen?  I have 3 Electrolyzers going at once, but not enough hydrogen coming out to power even one generator continuously.  I am stumped as to how this can be.

I assume it must have something to do with pressure, as the pictures I've seen all use atmo sensors in multiple places.  But honestly, even if it isn't efficient, I just can't wrap my head around how I can't get 100 g/s into a generator when I should be making 300 g/s +.

I understand it will have heat related issues soon as well, but I should be able to fix that.  But if there is any other advice, it would be appreciated.

[Saturnus]

32 minutes ago, giygus said:

So it does great at pushing out O2 it seems, but no hydrogen?  I have 3 Electrolyzers going at once, but not enough hydrogen coming out to power even one generator continuously.  I am stumped as to how this can be.

The number of electrolyzers is irrelevant. The number of gas pumps is the key. Since you have 2 gas pumps, you effectively only have one electrolyzer because the output of one electrolyzer saturate two gas pumps. And since electrolyzer shut down automatically at 1800g/tile pressure they can only output when the gas pumps have lowered the pressure enough. Though note that the efficiency of electrolyzer/gas pump set ups in open spaces will never reach 100%. 85% is more realistic. 

The hydrogen issue is due to you not using a smart battery to control the hydrogen generators. You're also using two regular gas filters. One for each pump. That is highly inefficient as each gas filter can filter 1kg/s but you're only using half that so you're throwing away power needlessly.

So to do the calculations: Hydrogen produced per second is 112g/s x 85% efficiency = 95g/s, which equals 760W

Your consumption is: 1 x 120W (electrolyzer) + 2 x 240W (gas pumps),= 600W x 85% efficiency, so 510W, plus 2 x 120 (gas filters) equals 750W

So it appears in the best case scenario you have 10W surplus without accounting for battery and transformer losses. So not a lot of head room.

I cannot stress the importance of using smart batteries (and removing all other batteries) enough. It is of crucial importance.

[giygus]

13 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

The number of electrolyzers is irrelevant. The number of gas pumps is the key. Since you have 2 gas pumps, you effectively only have one electrolyzer because the output of one electrolyzer saturate two gas pumps.

 

14 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

You're also using two regular gas filters. One for each pump. That is highly inefficient as each gas filter can filter 1kg/s but you're only using half that so you're throwing away power needlessly.

TY, I had NO idea the pumps couldn't move gas fast enough to keep up, and I didn't realize that 1 filters can handle 2 pumps.  One of those things I never would have thought of.

17 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

I cannot stress the importance of using smart batteries (and removing all other batteries) enough. It is of crucial importance.

My base's power is becoming a mess.  The "SPOM" I am building, including the hydrogen generators, is hooked to the main power grid and not its own sperate circuit.  The average power drawn by the full grid is at any given moment greater then 800 W/S. I didn't hook up the hydrogen generators to any batteries at all because I never intended them to be turned off.  Just supplement the 4 coal generators that do most of the heavy lifting.  Those 4 coal generators are hooked to smart batteries and do turn off as needed.  3 hatch farms and mining are keeping the stock of coal pretty high, and I am going to make my first real attempt at utilizing a natural gas geyser very soon.  Cooling the SPOM here is the only other project I have going, but the 1.2KW aquatuner is going to need the nat. gas generator to keep it running.  

[Saturnus]

34 minutes ago, giygus said:

Cooling the SPOM here is the only other project I have going, but the 1.2KW aquatuner is going to need the nat. gas generator to keep it running.  

Depends on what you cool. If it's just the oxygen you intend to cool then the aquatuner only needs to run 1s out of every 12s (using water as coolant, and cooling the oxygen from 70C to 20C). So effectively about 100W consumption on average. Less if you harvest the heat energy with a steam turbine.

I advice you to make your SPOM an actual SPOM, so that it's self powered. And then channel excess hydrogen into your power supply via an additional hydrogen generator. 

[giygus]

1 minute ago, Saturnus said:

Depends on what you cool. If it's just the oxygen you intend to cool then the aquatuner only needs to run 1s out of every 584s (using water as coolant).

I need to cool the whole shabang.  Said shabang needing a rework for the whole pump issue.

The aquatuner cooling loop is also going to work on the natural gas generator and possibly petroleum/plastic production.  But the industry is a ways off.

Anyway I appreciate the help, but it looks like the O2 production may need a teardown and be redesigned.  I had read yesterday a lot of people saying just leave the Electrolyzer out in the open near a wheezewort or 2 and collect hydrogen at the top of the base.  Seems like that would be much simpler.

[Saturnus]

6 hours ago, giygus said:

Anyway I appreciate the help, but it looks like the O2 production may need a teardown and be redesigned.  I had read yesterday a lot of people saying just leave the Electrolyzer out in the open near a wheezewort or 2 and collect hydrogen at the top of the base.  Seems like that would be much simpler.

Yeah, that might have worked a few years ago. Not so much now.

But you are touching on how gas separating electrolyzer set ups work: hydrogen rises to the top. So all the compact designs (where the electrolyzer isn't submerged in liquids) is just using that principle but by trial and error have compacted the gas separation aspect to it's most compact form. It's really that simple.

[giygus]

1 hour ago, Saturnus said:

Yeah, that might have worked a few years ago. Not so much now.

What has changed that it wouldn't be advised?  Leaving the Electrolyzer out in the open, essentially, I mean.  What I was reading specifically was you don't use the hydrogen to create power, but save it for rocket ships.  

 

1 hour ago, Saturnus said:

So all the compact designs (where the electrolyzer isn't submerged in liquids) is just using that principle but by trial and error

When I do the tear down, I will probably just have to copy one on the net.  Since you said 80% efficiency just isn't going to cut it when better can be had.

[Saturnus]

1 hour ago, giygus said:

What has changed that it wouldn't be advised?  Leaving the Electrolyzer out in the open, essentially, I mean.  What I was reading specifically was you don't use the hydrogen to create power, but save it for rocket ships.  

The last argument is idiotic to say the least. By the time you can build hydrogen powered rockets you have the resources to build vast arrays of hydrogen producers that just vent most of the oxygen into space because at that point oxygen is mostly an unwanted waste product. Saving it up for the purpose of hydrogen rockets is like pissing your pants to keep warm in winter.

You can have open electrolyzer setups sure. But wheezeworts isn't going to do much. Since they got nerfed quite considerably, and at the same time they'd be in a mostly oxygen atmosphere which is 2.4 times less efficient than in a hydrogen atmosphere. It's the specific heat capacity of the gas that surrounds the wheezewort (specifically the bottom tile of it) that determines how efficient it is.

[sakura_sk]

1 hour ago, Saturnus said:

You can have open electrolyzer setups sure. But wheezeworts isn't going to do much.

Well... not 2 wheezeworts.. but I found 4-8~9 more than enough (nowhere near how reliable a SPOM is though and it had multiple failures, nothing works at its max efficiency)

Spoiler

In a 200+ cycles base

Spoiler

   

  

In a 600+ cycles base 

  

Spoiler

 

 

 

[Saturnus]

49 minutes ago, sakura_sk said:

Well... not 2 wheezeworts.. but I found 4-8~9 more than enough (nowhere near how reliable a SPOM is though and it had multiple failures, nothing works at its max efficiency)

Those are domesticated wheezes in your example though. I'm guessing the OP is looking for something a bit more basic.

[giygus]

6 hours ago, Saturnus said:

Those are domesticated wheezes in your example though. I'm guessing the OP is looking for something a bit more basic.

Not sure what you mean by more basic, I just plant the worts in a farmtile right next to the electrolyzer.  The electrolyzer wiki page says they admit 1.25kDTU/s.  Weezeworts in an O2 atmospheare delete 5kDTU/s (at best), so 4.75kDTU would cool the O2 released. 

I have no idea how to work the math behind 888 grams/s of O2 at 70c into kDTU's.  But from your comment, the 4.75 wouldn't cover it?

7 hours ago, sakura_sk said:

Well... not 2 wheezeworts.. but I found 4-8~9 more than enough (nowhere near how reliable a SPOM is though and it had multiple failures, nothing works at its max efficiency)

I appreciate the pictures.  Your setup of just have the hydrogen hit the ceiling is what I would like.  I choose 2 of your pictures I have specific questions on, if you don't mind:

1)  So the wheezeworts are up in the hydrogen, cooling the polluted water.  The water then goes back down to cool the O2 and electrolyzers themselves.  What is making the water move around in this closed loop system?  I though you would need some sort of pump, or exit from loop, for it to move.

2)  I am trying to understand your logic gate usage, and I don't.  My fault not yours.

The top I get, it stops feeding the wheezeworts if it gets too cold, so the pipes don't break.

The bottom is 2 atmo. pressure and 1 gas type.  What I THINK is happening, is when the Hydrogen builds up to hit the type sensor, and then hits a high enough pressure to trigger the upper pressure sensor, the gas pump turns on and starts pumping the gas down to the filter, that then splits the Hydrogen and O2 to wherever it is going.  

The very bottom I don't get.  The other pressure sensor is hooked to the "or" gate and which in turn hooks to 2 more gas pumps.  But ugh, my head is spinning, I am not going to figure it out.  It must have something to do with pumping O2 out into the base etc.  Which brings me to question 3.

3) Saturnus above me said that 2 Electrolyzers would need 4 pumps.  I only see three.  Is that because the bottom is open and the O2 can escape on its own pretty much?  Is that what all the logic and sensors are for?  If the O2 pressure builds up too high the bottom most pump kicks on to release it?

Thats enough for now.  Thanks in advanced for any help.

[Saturnus]

40 minutes ago, giygus said:

Not sure what you mean by more basic, I just plant the worts in a farmtile right next to the electrolyzer.  The electrolyzer wiki page says they admit 1.25kDTU/s.  Weezeworts in an O2 atmospheare delete 5kDTU/s (at best), so 4.75kDTU would cool the O2 released. 

They only cool 5kDTU if you supply them with phosphorite.

Say you want to cool the oxygen from the minimum 70C output temperature to a more balmy 30C. So that's 888g/s and 40C delta that 35520 DTU/s, or 35.5kDTU. So you're a bit short on cooling. In fact 4.75kDTU cooling will cool the oxygen just over 5C.

You need at least 3 wheezeworts in hydrogen and fertilized with phosphorite to cool a single electrolyzer. And common rule of thumb suggests using 4.

[giygus]

10 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

You need at least 3 wheezeworts in hydrogen and fertilized with phosphorite to cool a single electrolyzer. And common rule of thumb suggests using 4.

So Electrolyzers without real cooling is just asking for long term trouble then, gotcha and thanks again.

[sakura_sk]

29 minutes ago, giygus said:

What is making the water move around in this closed loop system? 

The magic of bridges. A bridge can set priority of direction but putting a bridge at the end of a pipe, can lead the water of a liquid pump there. Creating a loop and putting a bridge in between, leaves the water in motion (I'm sure there is some post explaining better how bridges work...). The loop must be filled with a bridge and not a junction in order not to clog it.

 

36 minutes ago, giygus said:

The very bottom I don't get.  The other pressure sensor is hooked to the "or" gate and which in turn hooks to 2 more gas pumps.  But ugh, my head is spinning, I am not going to figure it out.  It must have something to do with pumping O2 out into the base etc.

The pressure sensor is hooked to an "and" gate. My thought was: if hydrogen is low enough to trigger the hydrogen pump, then if the other two pumps work, they would probably also transfer hydrogen. Mainly the left pump was a problematic one, as it was too close to the hydrogen level trigger (that's why the other two builds have pump of hydrogen higher and pumps of oxygen lower)

 

46 minutes ago, giygus said:

Saturnus above me said that 2 Electrolyzers would need 4 pumps.  I only see three.  Is that because the bottom is open and the O2 can escape on its own pretty much?  Is that what all the logic and sensors are for?  If the O2 pressure builds up too high the bottom most pump kicks on to release it?

As I said in the post nothing works at its max efficiency. You would want 4 pumps (or even 5, 1 for hydrogen and 2+2 for oxygen) if you built an enclosed room and need electolyzers to work 24/7.

I didn't intend to put any oxygen pumps originally but it seems oxygen doesn't want to flow on its own.. 

[giygus]

Thank you, I do appreciate the insight

[JRup]

2 hours ago, Saturnus said:

They only cool 5kDTU if you supply them with phosphorite.

I may provide a small fix if the cooling capacity of wheezies hasn't changed: wheezeworts cool environment gas by 5ºC, I believe there was a mixup here... When using domestic in a hydrogen environment, a cooling of 12kDTU is achieved. Wild ones will have 1/4 of the throughput.

 

[Saturnus]

13 minutes ago, JRup said:

I may provide a small fix if the cooling capacity of wheezies hasn't changed: wheezeworts cool environment gas by 5ºC, I believe there was a mixup here...

No, the atmosphere in question is oxygen (or mostly oxygen) as we're discussion using them in open electrolyzer set ups.

14 hours ago, Saturnus said:

Since they got nerfed quite considerably, and at the same time they'd be in a mostly oxygen atmosphere which is 2.4 times less efficient than in a hydrogen atmosphere. 

 

3 hours ago, giygus said:

Weezeworts in an O2 atmospheare delete 5kDTU/s (at best), so 4.75kDTU would cool the O2 released. 

 

[JRup]

You are correct. I believe it's time to switch to read only mode.

Still,

3 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

in a mostly oxygen atmosphere which is 2.4 times less efficient than in a hydrogen atmosphere. 

I'd even go as far as enclosing wild wheezeworts in a glass box with hydrogen given the drop in performance. Well, at least we're not putting them in chlorine.

[gabberworld]

a small tip: you should consider using the gas shutoff instead of the gas filter.

this way you can save kind off allot gas self for produce the energy

[giygus]

44 minutes ago, JRup said:

I'd even go as far as enclosing wild wheezeworts in a glass box with hydrogen given the drop in performance. Well, at least we're not putting them in chlorine.

Why a glass box instead of insulated tile?

I use the wheezeworts by placing them in farm tiles near heat producing buildings.  Transformers spread out over the base, coal generators, powered incubators and grills seem to work just fine with one plopped down next to it.

I figured the expense and time of a real wheezwort cooling loop was was unneeded for early cooling, but the almost power free aspect of it is tempting in the long run.

24 minutes ago, gabberworld said:

a small tip: you should consider using the gas shutoff instead of the gas filter.

I assume you mean let the hydrogen gas float up and the O2 go down, then use the gas shutoff to make sure the two gasses stay separated.

[gabberworld]

2 minutes ago, giygus said:

I assume you mean let the hydrogen gas float up and the O2 go down, then use the gas shutoff to make sure the two gasses stay separated.

no, i see at your image that you use 2 gas filters, that is allot waste off energy , instead use the gas shutoffs

[JRup]

58 minutes ago, giygus said:

Why a glass box instead of insulated tile?

The scenario this applies to is "preserving" wild wheezeworts in an ice biome. (Diamond should be used instead of glass.)

The double purpose of decor and cooling is achieved.

If you have access to dreckos and have researched enough shipping technologies then the best way to make use of wheezeworts is to enclose them in the best insulation available in the context of your needs (up to ceramic is bog standard) Use at least 2kg of hydrogen per tile.

The only thing I'll try to strongly recommend when using wheezeworts is hydrogen. Accept no substitutes.

I use this setup as a booster for after cooling a combo farm that has sleet wheat, nosh bean & dasha saltvine. Piped hydrogen flows from right to left and leaves through the ice block. This works inside an ice biome that I've been to lazy to "destroy". Gas comes in at -15ºC and leaves at -25ºC:

Spoiler

You'll get many recommendations for your SPOM ranging from prebuilt solutions to using some offbeat setups. The one thing most have in common is that the expense of powering filters to split hydrogen and oxygen is avoided as much as possible as it is a major energy investment that will eat up the hydrogen you with which you intend to fuel the SPOM.

A gas filter will always output the way you set it up, if the pipes back up there is usually no risk. Power consumption is high.

An element sensor/shutoff combo will provide filtering on the cheap. If your pipes back up then there's the risk of sending an unfiltered element through. Also, depending on how you set it up, a shutoff that is always on will consume the 10w regardless of a pipe being empty. The only way this doesn't happen is when the output pipe is blocked.

Powerless filtering with a valve is achieved by taking advantage of the rules of elements within pipes. This is finicky to set up at first but your efforts will be rewarded. Again, if your pipes back up then there's the risk of sending an unfiltered element through - I can't stress that enough.

Passive filtering means you've built it so that hydrogen will slowly float to the top and oxygen will stay on the bottom of the chamber. It takes some time to get it to a steady state and the electrolyzers will still stall from time to time. Automation will be needed but it's nothing out of this world. Guess what happens if your pipes back up.

Whatever you choose, we'll be able to give an opinion.

[Occam Blazer]

Depending on how many dupes you want to support this might be a good solution for you.

Early to late game electrolyzer cooling

[giygus]

I have been busy working on other things.  The SPOM from the original question is still a work in progress, although it is functional and producing most all colony O2 while keeping at least one hydrogen generator running 90% of the time.

The addition of 2 Nat. Gas generators is now doing most all power production, and my 4 coal gens. are 95% idle.

Please forgive my cooling loop.  I will rebuilt it when I get some Oil or Petrol.  It is functional for now though. 

My next question will be on how to add multiple cooling lines to one Aquatuner, but I think I will open a new thread for that.

Thanks for all the advice.

[gabberworld]

3 hours ago, giygus said:

My next question will be on how to add multiple cooling lines to one Aquatuner, but I think I will open a new thread for that.

Thanks for all the advice.

 

 

you could also use something like this instead off Aquatuner  

 

note its only example for use different ways