JRup Posted May 17, 2022 Share Posted May 17, 2022 Hi! I'd like to ask a question: Is your thermo regulator sealed? (If you actually use one at all...) It so happens I kind of use them every now and then... For research purposes... I find them to be like the hobbyist's go to for chilly builds... If something ever happens to not add up, consider the following: gas will sometimes get caught in the building and exchange heat with its surroundings. Only when the thermo regulator is turned back on by automation will the gas be released, it won't wait till taco Tuesday otherwise. Here's the innocent piece of equipment, it so happens that it retained 1kg of hydrogen and did not release it back to the pipes when disabled by automation. The rest of the piping is insulation-insulated gas pipes where needed and properly retained the chilly temperature. I did not wait for the gas in the TR to finish heating up to take the screenshot, but you get the gist of it. I have a similar build right below so I decided to test the TR in "favorable" vacuum conditions, this means I mopped up the petroleum that was on the bottom and vacuumed the hydrogen. I then proceeded to dab some naphtha and visco-gel to the tiles that are not the building's tile-of-interest so as to avoid heat exchange with its contents. It worked like a charm. Here's the screenshots of the fix. Extra points to the one that guesses what I was dabbling with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blakemw Posted May 17, 2022 Share Posted May 17, 2022 I've had Thermo Regulators accumulate large amounts of hydrogen in their buffer, not merely one packet. I've found some pipe layouts to be much more prone to stuck packets than others. Normally with regulators, I use a single bypass bridge, fill the loop with the Regulator disabled, and then remove the filling bridge and let the Regulator start running, and have no problems with stuck packets. I tried testing if the gas that briefly exists in a normally functioning Regulator exchanges heat: and it doesn't seem to. Both a "sealed" and "leaky" Regulator seemed to perform effective cooling of a target mass at precisely the same rate, if no packages get stuck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gurgel Posted May 17, 2022 Share Posted May 17, 2022 With Aquatuners, you already need to avoid that in many uses because you will end up causing damage when the liquid evaporates. Some of the same tricks can be used for Thermo Regulators as well. One is to have a tank in there and make sure to cut of input and have the Regulator run a bit longer so it completely drains. Another one is to pulse the Regulator and have it run, say, a minimum of 1% of a cycle all the time. Overflow-piping seems to not be reliable for this purpose, unfortunately. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRup Posted May 17, 2022 Author Share Posted May 17, 2022 4 hours ago, blakemw said: I tried testing if the gas that briefly exists in a normally functioning Regulator exchanges heat: and it doesn't seem to. Both a "sealed" and "leaky" Regulator seemed to perform effective cooling of a target mass at precisely the same rate, if no packages get stuck. That's mostly the issue here. If the building is operating then it's temperature sealed for all practical purposes. Once disabled, then there's a chance that a packet may get "stuck" inside the building which "wasn't temperature sealed in the first place" and exposes the packet to the environment temperature. 2 hours ago, Gurgel said: With Aquatuners, you already need to avoid that in many uses because you will end up causing damage when the liquid evaporates. This issue isn't seen as much with TR's but the risk is indeed very real if the packet material temperature ranges that are being used are incompatible. If we're using steam in the pipes and a "cold" environment for the TR, for example... Does this set of circumstances with AT's and TR's have a bug report already? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gurgel Posted May 17, 2022 Share Posted May 17, 2022 6 minutes ago, JRup said: This issue isn't seen as much with TR's but the risk is indeed very real if the packet material temperature ranges that are being used are incompatible. If we're using steam in the pipes and a "cold" environment for the TR, for example... Or if something in the cooling cycle cannot deal with a few high-temp packages. 6 minutes ago, JRup said: Does this set of circumstances with AT's and TR's have a bug report already? I do not think this is a bug in any way. It is just a, possibly intentional, aspect to be aware of. It is also realistic, somewhat expected behavior and it is not hard to deal with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRup Posted May 17, 2022 Author Share Posted May 17, 2022 1 hour ago, Gurgel said: somewhat expected behavior and it is not hard to deal with. Hmm, so what do you think about automating the process? I whipped up this convoluted automation scheme. The idea is to activate a shutoff located right in front of the TR in this case. The push button is a mod... Edit: I filled the loop and adjusted the buffer to 2s. Works fine, I guess. Here's the automation, still a bit wonky but it works. Packet robber automation.webm And here are the pipes... Packet robber pipes.webm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRup Posted May 17, 2022 Author Share Posted May 17, 2022 6 hours ago, Gurgel said: somewhat expected behavior and it is not hard to deal with. I'm also testing this other variant of a fix, a buffer with 0.1s ... seems compact enough. Let me know if you've tested on any ATs: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRup Posted June 20, 2022 Author Share Posted June 20, 2022 A bug report for this was added. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zarquan Posted June 20, 2022 Share Posted June 20, 2022 I think it is more odd that the Thermoregulator has storage to begin with. Seems unnecessary. If you break the output pipe, it can trigger this more and cause it to act as an infinite storage machine, but it only releases if it is being fed material. I think aquatuners and thermoregulators should release any material they are holding even when disabled or unpowered or have an empty input pipe. Because I definitely get buildup in my aquatuners sometimes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRup Posted June 21, 2022 Author Share Posted June 21, 2022 4 hours ago, Zarquan said: I think it is more odd that the Thermoregulator has storage to begin with. It does flicker with its contents for an instant while the building is in operation. Even a liquid/gas vent will do so as well... 5 hours ago, Zarquan said: I think aquatuners and thermoregulators should release any material they are holding even when disabled or unpowered or have an empty input pipe. Because I definitely get buildup in my aquatuners sometimes. I had upped the buffer gate to 0.2 seconds to allow for that last packet to exit the TRs and it should be just enough time to prevent another packet from entering the cooling device. This does not account for the power loss scenario, though. AT's have gone untested so far as I haven't stumbled upon the problem with them... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saturnus Posted June 21, 2022 Share Posted June 21, 2022 On 5/17/2022 at 5:40 PM, JRup said: The double bridge is the wrong way around in this set up as far as I can tell. The idea is that the the second bridge overflow outputs next to the TR output. And the first overflow bridge outputs after following the first in, last out principle. No matter the configuration however a double bridge on a TR does not have the same effect on a TR unless it is put anywhere on the loop itself except over the TR. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRup Posted June 21, 2022 Author Share Posted June 21, 2022 12 minutes ago, Saturnus said: The double bridge is the wrong way around in this set up as far as I can tell. Thanks for pointing it out. This was a consequence of trying to fit in a shutoff in a not so successful idea for me. This automated packet stealer would need more fleshing out before considering its use. I'm still leaning on just using a 0.2s buffer gate I'm currently just building the double bridge in loops as follows (with arrows showing the flow): Most builds I do with TR's are cramped enough for me to need the double bridge around it. So far so good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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