Recyclers - how are they stuck??

[finite aurora]

let's branch off from the main chat

your system assumes after iron plate is cleared there is only copper plate left before X can take in new batteries

but if that's not the case, the ring can be easily jammed when two materials got mixed, say A started processing copper but D still has iron surviving and is waiting for A to clear it's copper + trash slot

[covert sequoia]

wouldn't that still potentially unclog itself in this scenario by eventually clearing all the copper into Recycler C, Recycler A being clear of all Copper Plates and turning into a Iron Plate recycler?

[finite aurora]

referring to the cardinal rules here #fulgora message

as long as you are not creating a system for the recycler to prioritise what's being produced from processing the unwanted products, it is at risk of clogging

[covert sequoia]

definitely see how this fails the second you do anything more complicated the plates

[finite aurora]

assuming you have some sort of system that prevents the machines from going into a iron-copper-iron-copper deadlock

[finite aurora]

actually nevermind what I said, I have created a mockup and after 172k of batteries recycled what you described is still true. For extreme case, X goes up to 100 iron/copper while waiting for the ring to change recipe.

[covert sequoia]

i mean i assume what you said is theoretically possible to happen, which i still don't want to have in my building setup just been changing how i work and got distracted in factorio again

[finite aurora]

there are more conditions needed for this system to get clogged yes, probably when the byproduct breaks into even more different types of items

but yea the uptimes were: 172k craft (battery) > 85k crafts > 21k crafts > 5.3k crafts > 1.3k crafts

[covert sequoia]

I'm not overly fussed by the uptime downside, since it's a relatively small footprint to have a Full sink of a Plate Product.

[finite aurora]

I did occasionally observe C holding a few iron plates while waiting for D to clear copper plates.

If the conditions are more extreme I think it might just clog.

[covert sequoia]

@finite aurora turns out these rings are more resilient then you think, had a minor one handling everything but LDS, Blue Circuits and solid fuel at my little "starter base" (basically just getting a functioning rocket silo if i need to get off planet to bring more stuff) and it hasn't clogged once in ~6 hours of play, it might just be a matter of making sure your not putting in too much at once (as this loop is only supplying 1 recycler on a yellow belt sushi belt) think it basically turns out that the inserters allow everything to function neatly because they will allow the recycler to finish before interrupting what it's doing and attempting to add more product, for Blue circuits and LDS I definitely think a loop this small would break, but adding a couple of recyclers to the loop means you can probably break down anything you don't want quite easily with no clogging.

[finite aurora]

if you are having an arbitrary restriction of "not putting in too much at once" then I have nothing else to say

but if that restriction is removed

I manage to clog this in 400+ crafts