¶ Guide to Wirechem
Would you believe it, you can make chems and chem machines and factories with circuits. What a concept. While this guide is being written post-reintegration of the old plumbing based factories, this will still serve as a necessary resource for those that want to use this system. It is highly robust and is actually much cheaper in both power cost and server lag. The downside is that you have to use your brain a tad more than the relatively simple plumbing-based factories.
¶ Things Needed to Get Started
Most of the stuff you will need to begin will be in the Pharmacy. It consists of the following:
- A component printer (the same one used for circuits)
- A chemical manufacturer
- A medical circuit board (one is placed alongside each roundstart manufacturer)
- A power cell (a stock tier power cell is available at roundstart)
- A multitool
¶ The Equipment
For one point of reference, the [Guide to Circuits] will provide some additional knowledge regarding the circuit components we are not going to cover here.
¶ Component Printer
This is the same piece of equipment that you find in the Circuit Lab. It is the gateway to all the other circuit components for this kind of system.
¶ Chemical Manufacturer
Here we have the core of wiremod based chemistry: the manufacturer. It has an internal storage tank for anything output to the manufacturer output and will contain the circuit board.
¶ Medical Circuit Board
This is the primary circuit board that you start the whole process with. The power cell that is typically included is enough to get started, but for large batch operations, you will want to have a bigger and better cell. Use a screwdriver to pop it out.
¶ "Remote" Machines
This system has a series of remote machines in them that serve as either outputs or inputs from the manufacturer based on how you choose to configure it, some more useful to other jobs than chemistry. All machines here have an ALT CLICK function to drop their associated circuit components and configure them in other ways depending on the machine. Each machine requires 10 sheets of iron and can be made either with using iron in hand or the CRAFTING MENU.
- remote chemical fermenter: ferment booze in the same way you do with a regular plumbing based one.
- remote chemical grinder: an input machine that grinds whatever you toss into it and adds it to the system
- remote chemical input tank: A holding tank that can use
- remote chemical tank: remote output machine that can hold 500u of reagents within it.
- remote factory output: output machine that can be configured between patches, pills or bottles when it receives chems from the manufacturer.
- remote geyser pump: a simple machine that pumps fluids from geysers in the ice wastes or lavaland. internally powered by geothermal activity, so all you have to do is bring it to the site and wrench it down.
- remote injector: a machine that, when wrenched down and given an input from the manufacturer, will inject chems directly into someone that stands on it.
- remote patcher: a machine that, when wrenched down and given an input from the manufacturer, will slap a patch on anyone that stands on it.
¶ The Circuit Parts
We will be focusing on the important parts for wirechem in this article. Again, please refer to the [Guide to Circuits] for a look over of the non-wirechem related parts.
¶ Chemical Synthesizer
When triggered, the synthesizer will output a single chem of a desired amount. The more requested, the more power per operation.
¶ Chemical Mixer
When triggered, takes two or more chems, configured with +/- at the top, and will spin them together at the desired heat level. Once complete, it will be available in its output for the next step.
¶ Weighted / Chemical Splitter
When triggered, takes an input chem and splits it up. The regular one is always a 50/50, the weighted variant gives you the fine control to split it up.
¶ Chemical Filter
When triggered, input chemicals or mixes can have filters applied to split into two streams, filtered and unfiltered. The filter list is configurable.
¶ Patcher Output
When triggered, sends chemicals to the tank in the output.
¶ Injector Output
When triggered, sends chemicals to the tank in the output.
¶ Tank Output
When triggered, sends chemicals to the tank in the output.
¶ Factory Output
When triggered, sends chemicals to the tank in the output.
¶ "Tank Input"
When triggered, it brings in chems from the storage tanks of these machines.
As of the current writing of this guide, the inputs for the Fermenter, Geyser, Grinder and Tank remote inputs are marked as the same thing in the circuit viewer. When this is corrected, the guide will be updated to reflect on this.
¶ Example Cases
¶ Voice Activated Iron Pill Factory
For this example, we will focus on a simple voice activated circuit that will send 50 units of iron to a remote factory, where one can touch the factory to acquire an iron horse pill.
- For initial setup, stick your starter power cell into the medical circuit board.
- Place the medical circuit board into the manufacturer.
- Put a multitool in hand and click on the manufacturer to view the circuit view.
- Pull 10 sheets of iron and make a remote factory output. Put it someplace.
- ALT CLICK on the factory output. Select PILLS, call it Iron, then set the value to 50. Select a pill sprite of choice.
- In your hand, you will have the factory output component. Place that into the manufacturer.
- Build the following components from the component printer. You may want to have the parts inside upgraded so it makes things cheaper: Voice Activator, String Contains, Chemical Synthesizer.
- Place each component into the manufacturer.
- Use image below as a guide to setup a voice activated system.
When complete, the factory output can be placed anywhere, wrenched down, and folk can acquire iron pills as long as there is stuff in the tank. Downside, the manufactory has to hear the commands. But this example is just to demonstrate a simple feature. This can be exapnded to trigger several synthesizers that feed into a mixer, then feeds out into wherever you desire. This system is highly robust.
If more detailed chemistry systems are built by you, the players, feel free to wire up steps and give images, if they work on my end I will add them to this page!