Dropping solids to the ground without dupes

[FutureJohny]

Hello,

has anyone found out, how to drop solid item to the ground without having dupes interract with them or player doing it manually?

I was trying to figure out way to automate feeding Hatches or making dirt. Both processes need items on the ground, since hatches do not eat from compactors and fertilizer in them makes blocks of dirt when heated, loosing 50% of mass and requiring dupe to mine it.

Obviously I know doing it manually is possible and on this forum was even thread where player fed the hatches automatically, but it required dupes.

So my question is, is it possible to do it without both with the new preview buildings?

[Neotuck]

Make a mealwood farm for rot piles

Set a system to collect rot piles from a mealwood farm and automate it to deliver to the hatches and/or boiler.

the rot piles will turn into polluted dirt inside the containers and automatically drop them scene they are not cued to hold polluted dirt

Hatches will eat the Polluted dirt and a boiler will cook it into normal dirt 

[Roxanne4018]

I don't know about making dirt

In the preview:
You could always use the conveyor system to fill up a storage compactor and every cycle or so unselect whatever you want to feed your hatches so it drops to the floor. with automate the door just so that when you toggle a switch it opens.

Without the preview:
I never tried a method that doesn't involve dupes but you could try to set your hatch farm under a brunch of fertilizer makers built on automated doors, open them consecutively to try a conserve Nat gas pressure as much as possible and put you hatches in a C02 so that your Nat gas don't sink completely. You will probably need a cooling system in between ( with either a liquid or gas snake).

 

[BT_20]

@FutureJohny don’t even attempt to make dirt the only good way to do it is by boiling polluted water and if you are at that stage you won’t be using mealwood.

For the hatches there is a way to automate coal production it involves putting sideways doors on all you’re fert makers and automate them to open onnce a day to drop the fertilizer to the hatches.btw there’s no reason to give you’re minerals to hatches because of how much coal you get from the fertilizer makers I usually end up with thousand of tons of coal after a few hundred cycles.

[Falcahtas]

Putting hatches inside a Fertilizer making room should work.

With conveyors there is no need to enter the Fertilizer rooms ever again, once the hatches are inside.

You can use the autosweeper to load Coal on conveyors.

[FutureJohny]

@Neotuck

Intresting idea with the rotting, but in the preview Mealwood requires dirt, much higher mass of it than food it produces. Also dirt is either finite or hard to aquire. But issues like practicallity aside, this is working setup.

@Roxanne4018

If I wish to convert all to the fertilizer I can do like @Falcahtas said. My goal was "just in time" production. Make coal only when supply runs lown.

Also unselecting storage is exactly what I wish to avoid.

@BT_20

Honestly who said anything about practicality.

There are many uses for dirt, Temp shift plates, planters and research to name some.

I was mostly trying to find a way to fully automate coal generators. They make great power source for remote tubular entrances if you do not mind some co2.

[Zarquan]

1 minute ago, BT_20 said:

@FutureJohny don’t even attempt to make dirt the only good way to do it is by boiling polluted water and if you are at that stage you won’t be using mealwood.

For the hatches there is a way to automate coal production it involves putting sideways doors on all you’re fert makers and automate them to open onnce a day to drop the fertilizer to the hatches.btw there’s no reason to give you’re minerals to hatches because of how much coal you get from the fertilizer makers I usually end up with thousand of tons of coal after a few hundred cycles.

I hope you aren't feeding all of your fertilizer to hatches.  Farmers are amazing, but they need fertilizer to work.  They save water every time they use a farming station on a plant that needs water to grow.  One farmer saves more than enough water to pay for themselves.  It's like having a free dupe that just gives you water.  Of course, this is if you get your farmers to only boost plants and do almost nothing else.

You can still burn slime or polluted dirt or fertilizer in to dirt with a tepidizer or an aquatuner if you want to, but I agree you are better off growing something other than mealwood.

[BT_20]

@Zarquan Most of my synths  go to coal but I save some for fert now a days.

At the moment I have 400 tons of fert.

[Roxanne4018]

18 minutes ago, FutureJohny said:

Also unselecting storage is exactly what I wish to avoid

To me its not that to much trouble as I am used to Then. Then go for smart storage compactors I just haven't play with them much.