Hydroponic Farms Plug Pipes

Thats an old issue. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. The best solution is to build the straight line under or over the farm tiles and make branches for each.

so do not construct things like this, make every farm tile an end of the pumping system

Share save please, in my experience this problem is caused by mixing green and white in the line, if you put all greens on one end of a pipe and all whites past that point your flow will work, if you put any white back behind a green you get confusion in the line like you describe and shared in your picture.

The problem is that water flows in 1 direction when you have a split. In this case you have 20 outputs(the farm tiles), and water flows to only 1 of them at a time. So if farm tile 1(left most) needs water, the pipe supplies farm tile 1 and stops for that tick/second. Then if Plant 1 is watered and plant 2 needs water, water flows ONLY to plant 2. And so on. You can partially solve this issue by using bridges - They split the pipe into sections, so water flows in each section independently. If you have a bridge with 4 splits at the output, water will be able to flow independently in those 4 directions, so you'll be able to water at least 4 plants. If you connect 2 plants by each split that makes 8 plants(because 2 plants work usually).

Here's a picture of a working pipe system:

Notice that a pipe doesn't go through more than 2 plants.

Another thing you can do is have 1 free pipe segment(like in the top left plan that I just made) where 10kg water gather, and then 2 farm tiles that drain water from those 10kg. That should work well.

Also notice that the split is done in the end of the bridge(and not in the beginning) - that ensures there is one output in each direction. If I made the split at the beginning of the bridge, water will first flow in the bridge and only excess water will flow towards the split - that would be a VERY BAD piping setup.

Also happens with me often when I make small patches of thimble reed; I assumed it was just because thimble reeds take so much water (all same type of piping).

On 8/8/2018 at 1:20 PM, martosss said:

The problem is that water flows in 1 direction when you have a split.

No; when you have a split it goes in both directions ( as long as there is a sink on both branches ).  I've built hydroponic farms like this without any problem.

3 hours ago, psusi said:

No; when you have a split it goes in both directions ( as long as there is a sink on both branches ).  I've built hydroponic farms like this without any problem.

My point was that water flows first in 1 direction, then in the other direction, not in both directions at the same time.

Just now, martosss said:

My point was that water flows first in 1 direction, then in the other direction, not in both directions at the same time.

Ohh, right... last time I did that I had a valve limiting the flow out of the pipe so it was always backstuffed to the hydroponic tiles.  IIRC, without that, it will alternate between the two paths and may not get enough to the hydroponics sometimes, but should get some there.

 

Ohh I think I see what the OP is doing wrong now.  I had been thinking the water was coming up from the bottom and flowing off to the right, and stopping for some reason at the second hydroponic farm.  He must be going the other way and so it tries to keep flowing down but is backed up all the way to the second tile.

Pretty sure the OP has the water coming up and then right into the farm. He even says "the first two farms" indicating those two leftmost ones are the first to receive water.

My straight-line bristleberry farm worked great for dozens of cycles till one day it stopped and only the first two plants got any water, just like the OP. I tried removing the plumbing and rebuilding but it didn't help.