Reliably mix 3 ingredients for a factory
I have a line of Inserter assemblers, and I need to feed them cogs, circuits, and iron plates. I decided to mix the cogs and circuits on one side of the belt, and have the iron plates on the other side:
This works well providing there aren't any shortages up the line. If one side of the cogs develops a shortage (so there are only cogs on one side of the belt feeding into the "combining splitter"), then the ratio of circuits:cogs gets messed up, and the ingredient loop in the bottom right gets plugged up with circuits. To get the system going again, I need to manually pick up the ingredients plugging it up, and let it continue on:
I tried using a filter arm to pick out circuits, but they're too fast, and end up taking way too many off, then I have the problem of cogs plugging everything up.
How can I reliably mix 3 to 4 ingredients on a single belt, and maintain the correct ratio (one cog per circuit in this case), even during shortages?
Best Answer
Consider making the cogs from iron where they are needed and inserting them directly from one assembler to another.
This way you only need 2 items on the belt, and you completely avoid the difficult issue of feeding your belt with the correct ratios of the 3 items.
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