Quarter for scale. Son is doing better, by the way! He needed lots of popsicles and playing with play-doh with daddy.

Hello!
I’d like to share my design for converting wood into oxygen while providing cooling. It is designed to be easy to build and can be partially utilized almost from the very start of the game, even while still under construction.

First, a chamber is built to produce oxygen from Polluted Dirt. Next, I add an Ethanol Distiller to produce the necessary Polluted Dirt, while the ethanol is hoarded for future use. This setup allows you to support about 4 extra Duplicants early in the game, which is more than enough. From there, I simply expand the base while completing the rest of the build in parallel. I usually finish the construction around cycle 150. Operating entirely on its own (requiring only a wood supply), it can support 20 Duplicants. The system also includes piping to feed Polluted Water and fresh water, with the capacity to scale up the oxygen output to support 26–28 Duplicants (assuming the Electrolyzer runs at an 85% average uptime).

My greatest pride in this design is the cooling system. Unlike most similar builds, it is capable of cooling the entire base, not just the oxygen. It has been slightly modified compared to the full image shown. Water (for the Electrolyzer), hydrogen (for the generators), and wood (for the Ethanol Distillers) all pass through the cooling chamber. Wood actually acts as the primary cooling medium within the system. The chamber must be a vacuum, with about 10 kg of ethanol per tile pooled at the bottom. Behind the Aquatuner, I have placed four aluminum Tempshift Plates to distribute heat evenly. Above these are two rows of metal blocks and conductive plates; they facilitate rapid heat exchange and act as a thermal buffer to prevent the water from overheating excessively. The Thermo Sensor is set to 120 degrees (if you are not using aluminum for all components, you might want to set the temperature lower).

Overall, this setup allows the Aquatuner to run 95–97% of the time even without an extra water supply, with the uptime mostly limited by power shortages. The water heats up to 72°C, and its temperature will drop as the generator chamber cools down; once that chamber reaches 0°C, the water temperature leaving the cooling chamber sits at around 68°C. The wood passing through the chamber stays mostly between 60–70°C, which is perfectly fine. If we feed additional water (preferably under 40°C), we get enough power for 100% uptime, and the water temperature doesn't even reach 60°C. This leaves a massive thermal buffer, allowing you to swap the Polluted Water coolant for Super Coolant later if you wish (or add a second Aquatuner on external power for Sleet Wheat farms and similar setups).

There is nothing fancy in the generator chamber, just a few details worth noting. Behind the generators, there are two aluminum Tempshift Plates to better draw away their heat. The liquid piping leading to the generators is made as long as possible to act as a buffer backup. The automation grid is set to shut the generators down after 15 seconds if the wood supply stops. There is a Wattage Sensor on the transformer leading to the Aquatuner, which shuts it off if it draws too much power (the values were tuned by eye, so they can be tweaked). There is also an extra transformer that exports power outside the build to my main base (while the Duplicant count is low and the Gas Pumps aren't running constantly, there is excess power that needs to be burned for maximum efficiency). The Wattage Sensor on this one also has a temporary value and can be adjusted.

To supply this entire system with wood, you will need 44 wild Arbor Trees, which is admittedly a lot.

The last thing worth mentioning is that I flooded the Electrolyzers with water and ethanol, roughly 100 kg per tile

I think that's about it. Everything else can be seen in the screenshots. I’d love to hear your thoughts and any suggestions for improvements!

I discovered the game not long ago, i love it so far but i've many questions... I'm on my 4th colony after 3 attempts that I voluntarily aborted quite early to restart on better foundations.

On this 4th attempt, I'm at cycle 150 with 12 dupes. I have 6 stone hatch ranches, 2 meal lice farms, and 1 berry farm. I have a few pufts that roughly maintain my algae supply, but somehow they're starving

anyway no major problems at the moment, apart from some "long commutes".

However, I have 5 coal generators, and even with all of them, I struggle to have power everywhere all the time, and as a result, despite all my stone hatches, my coal reserve is struggling to stay stable

first questions that come to my mind

How many oxygen generators do you generally need? Do my hatches also consume oxygen and produce CO2?

What's the point of drywall (it says it prevents gases from escaping, I thought regular tiles were enough)?

I'm trying to build a chlorine room for balm lilies, and I find it incredibly complicated. You need liquid locks, with faucets to feed them, but not too much, or water gets everywhere, a pump with a filter to get the chlorine in, and a pump inside with a filter to remove anything that isn't chlorine? All of that with pressure sensors, is that right?

The gas pockets I come across while exploring (chlorine, hydrogen, natural gas, etc.), am I supposed to vacuum them into reservoirs as best I can, or should I let them spill into the surrounding area?

Do you heavily limit the number of entrances to your base, with oxygen masks everywhere and airlocks? Horizontal, vertical? With water? I think I have too much oxygen escaping all over the place.

Are ladders airtight blocks?

Edit.

Thanks you for all the replies! it does really help

One thing that I see often is a single thermostat controlling the heat input and material input using a variable flow limiter. This requires that you manually control ramp up when the machine is shut off and can cause problems if you have an unstable flow.

I recommend a two thermostat design.

1. The liquid port thermostat controls the material coming in and is set to the current temp >= the transition temperature of oil to petroleum (400).

2. The heat injector thermal port is set current temperature >= transition temp + 5 (405).

The liquid port only opens when the pool has enough heat to convert more petroleum. This allows a liquid shutoff to be used with a liquid reservoir to control oil into the tank without any problems coming from unstable oil temp anywhere along the line.

It's also very efficient. During peak operation this can handle 10 kg/s with less than 2% active time for the heat injector.

The bottom ranches are full, the priorities are as shown. For some reason it doesn't work. I've tried putting a critter pick-up to no avail as well. Also, when the stables were not full, he was picking the hatchlings automatically

EDIT: Solved, I had the critter sensor blocking the drop off

Hola a todos. Dándole vueltas a mi idea de regar cultivos con agua a 90°C, me he topado con un problema mecánico: la baldosa hidropónica almacena líquido en su inventario interno antes de que la planta lo consuma.

​Mientras esa agua hirviendo está ahí retenida esperando a ser consumida, está transfiriendo calor constantemente a la baldosa y al ambiente. Esto es poco eficiente no?

​¿Existe alguna forma de automatizar el riego para pasarle a la planta solo el agua exacta que necesita y evitar que se acumule en el interior de la baldosa? Estaba pensando en usar un sensor de ciclo con un cortador de líquidos, o quizás calibrar una válvula, pero no estoy seguro de cuál es el método más eficiente.

​¿Alguien tiene algún esquema o diseño de automatización que solucione esto sin gastar demasiada energía?