Why ain't my oxygen flowing?

[Jigsawn]

Please take a look at my oxygen pipe here (bottom right):

The oxygen is flowing up from an Electrolyser below the screen. This pipe was working fine before, until I added one new vent at the top of the pipe system (not shown). The oxy outputs at 4 vents around my base, each vent branching off the main line as you see at the top left. The filtration system mid-screen outputs oxygen into the main pipe, and was working fine before.

Now I added that one new vent (it's just like the other branches with vents), the oxygen has stopped flowing up beyond the point you see on the screenshot. It is still outputting oxygen normally at the first vent next to the coal generator at the bottom of the screen - just not making it much farther. I tried saving and reloading with no luck - before the save when I had just added the vent, the oxygen was travelling a little further up and then turning back on itself.

A bug maybe? Any ideas how to fix this? Thanks.

[Luminite2]

Not 100% sure what the problem is, but it might be just that the oxygen keeps wanting to turn back and exit through that vent. You should make more use of bridges, which in this scenario are useful for their one-way properties. Immediately after the branch to the vent, put a bridge; this should prevent the oxygen from turning back.

[Jigsawn]

Thanks, I'll try that. It's weird because the oxygen was flowing equally between all the vents in the system fine before - the gas was branching off correctly in each case and the bottom vent wasn't affecting it. Add one more and boom, it seems to have messed up the game's pipe logic. 

[amas]

You should see the green outputs as 'pushing' the gas away, while the white inputs as 'sucking' gas in. In your picture, the end of the oxygen 'trail' doesn't know where to go because on the top you have both pushing and sucking, so it will stay stationary. You can solve this with a gas bridge to manipulate the pushing and sucking.

[Jigsawn]

Gotcha, thanks. Weird that it worked before - though I added the filtration stuff after the main pipe network was already up and running. Maybe that didn't update the pipe logic, but adding the new vent updated the pipe pathfinding and then it figured out it should be pushing and pulling at the same time. Bridges it is then!

[Jigsawn]

Placing a bridge just after the first vent branch did solve the problem. Thanks.

Now I've ran into a new, similar issue. I made a new branch off my main oxy pipe to my exosuit docks. This is the first branch in the line now. The oxygen keeps pausing at this branch even when the branch is already full of oxygen. I tried installing a valve at the start of the branch and closing it, but the oxygen is still pausing in the main line periodically at the branch junction before moving on. I also tried putting a bridge on the main line just after the branch but that didn't fix it either. I also tried a variant setup where the main line continued in a straight line with the exo branch going off to the side, with the same result. Any way I can get rid of the pause at the junction?

Screenshot of the exosuit branch setup - my cursor is over the offending junction:

[Kiako]

Did you check the total mass of O2 ? two packet before the bridge may join to become one, same mass overall. Use a valve after the bridge if it's a problem for you.

[Luminite2]

Pipe junctions tend to do this. They distribute packets in an alternating fashion between each offshoot. However, even when one branch is blocked, they still try to send packets down it (resulting in what you see, which is the oxygen just stops for a bit).

There is a common theme in piping problems: bridges are the answer here too (or valves). Instead of having a pipe junction, place a bridge DIRECTLY on the line. Something important to note: the difference with doing this is that the packets will no longer be evenly distributed, and will instead attempt to go through the bridge until that line gets backed up, and only then will they continue down the line. I'd recommend prioritizing the exosuits just because they will fill up pretty quickly.

So, for your specific setup, I labeled three spaces in your pic, and here's what you should do:

First, sever the connection between 1 and 2 (by deconstructing the pipe at 2)

Second, place a bridge going from 1 to 3

Third, reconstruct the pipe from 3 to 2 and into the valve input.

[Jigsawn]

Cool, thanks guys. Luminite I will give it a shot, appreciate the help.

Edit: That worked! Thank you. Hope they fix the pausing gases in the future.

[SkunkMaster]

Jig you should consider trying to learn how to draw efficient vent/pipes... the way you vent your system results in a very poor throughput.

I will give you a few pointers, maybe they will help you.

 

1. vent, valves and bridges act as "prioritized way" for gas/liquids to go. 

2. Valves and bridges let full amounts pass if the direction they are facing is backed-up.

3. You should always use bridges or valves when you split-up your lines.