Patton Hunts for Turbine (WIP)

[lStealtherl]

 

English is my 3rd language. I only started SS13 less than 2 month ago. I'm a dreamer. And if you don't get what I'm talking about, my thinking process is a total mess.

 

There hasn't been any much mention of the good old Gas Turbine in this guide section, to my dismay. Even with google, it netted me with nothing productive (do point me out if you found one). Then again, I'm a bad googler. Anyways, hereby I presents you:

 

Patton Hunt's ultimate search for Gas Turbine knowledge!

 

This guide is being made in hope of popularize the opposite side of the main engineers, and to rally against the (doombringer) singularity. There's a safer option, namely the Gas Turbine.

 

I assume there have been many (or few) attempts on this Gas Turbine system while people tried the job, but found out that the amount of work needed to make it function wasn't as rewarding at the end. I've asked few people saying they got 50k, others roughly 100k, some somewhere in-between or even lower. I was one of them, in all categories. That's about worse to a single solar station which generates constant 90k, with abit of downtime every now and then. TullyBBurnalot made a remark:

Personally, I feel the Gas Turbine is more of a pet project than a reliable source of power.

That had me thinking, because I had been rushing the turbine without considering many other options available to me. And I wanted to make it a reliable power source.

 

So I did many fine tunings to the whole turbine system, inspired by other Atmos techs' attempts, their layout and theory, and this was the result:

 

 

What you are seeing here are extensive experiments throughout many shifts, and it wouldn't be possible if I haven't met these Atmos techs which had so different ideas from what I had (I'm sorry! I can't remember your names! Please drop by!). Combining all of those, the turbine got better shift by shift.

 

Before moving on, please read viewtopic.php?f=15&t=4941 so you get basic understanding of how Atmosia works, or should work.

 

Read that? Good, now scratch that entire pipe layout it suggested. Now don't get me wrong, there's nothing faulty with that build and there are many, many ways to re-modify Atmosia, which might as well be loads better than my current pipe layout. But for the current exercise, if you have been observant to the first picture, we need the freezer/heater machines for the Gas Turbine. Thus comes the question: What else is there to replace the freezers for the potential incoming gas pressures?

 

 

There's a space loop just outside the Atmosia, not used for anything, and is only connected to connector ports. Strip those off and connect them to the waste pipes, flip the volume pipes and you have already done a basic cooling project in 3-4 minutes, capable of dealing with small incidents. There are always options to improve it, of course, but this is usually enough for most shifts, plus (if you're alone, like I am, OTL), you want to spend your time elsewhere, namely gas turbine. If you want to, you could apply the same theory in the guide linked, using parallel and loop pipes to de-pressureize even further if needed. Or innovate better layout. I've seen one making use of Heat Exchanger modules, and I gotta say it was really impressive. Unfortunately, I forgot to screenshot it (maybe I'll try remake it at some point for a cooling guide section, although it might belong to the other guide focusing more on the Atmosia).

 

Start of the round:

 

 

• Get insulated gloves. This is needed because we're going to need to rewire cable(s) later on.

• Check if there are any active scientist doing the R&D. Try to communicate with them and have them tell you their progress. If it's empty, pray the following arrivals comes with the needed skeleton crew, or ask CE communicate with RD. He should get the job done if the spot is vacant.

Optional, depending on your commitment, order plasteel (and metal) from the cargo, remind them send it to Atmos (can't stress this enough, they always send it to engineering in any case). It is to expand and reinforce the turbine chamber for a second turbine system.

 

 

The following steps will guide you to a minimum good functioning Turbine.

(There are other ways to supply gas to the turbine chamber for better or worse. Perhaps I'll try make them some other time, or when I feel like it *gasp*. Otherwise send me your layouts.)

 

At Atmosia, we need to optimize some pipes to easier maintain the gas output for the Turbine. The usual gas mix setup inside Atmosia works, but I've often found out that some time after, the burn mix chamber runs out of plasma due to the Gas Mixer's maximum 4500 kPa, which doesn't seem limiting at first. Not to mention there's 9 tiles in the chamber, making gas split evenly up, so there's less amount of plasma on the vent tile. Make a direct pipeline from the Toxin chamber to the pipe leading out of the Burn Mix chamber, and that's one less problem.

 

 

Just this step is what probably differ from most attempts on the Gas turbine. What we are now attempting to do is to mix it at the turbine room instead, by using compressed gas with the help of the space loop we are going to build soon.

 

Now we have to lay out a whole new pipeline from the pure O2 pipe, through the space and into the turbine room. I used h/e pipes for O2 and plasma (and normal, if lazy mood).

 

 

The idea here is, with the h/e pipes, the gas becomes more dense and thus, more particles per tiles. That means the Gas Mixer in the turbine room is still capable of outputting the same amount the chambers are doing, and is not limited by the 4500 kPa max. If you go down along the walls of the turbine room, you will find an air injector, not particularly used for anything. Remove the pipes and place a bent scrubber pipe and universal adapter. We'll be using it as an outlet for CO2 (compare with the first pic).

 

Perhaps you might have noticed I've used volume pumps right before and after the space tiles. Why is that? On my first try, I didn't use volume pumps when building the O2 pipeline. Those pipes, including the original which was also connected to the air gas mixer, became bugged for some unknown reason. No gas were registered, no gas transfered and you were unable to unwrench them. The only way I could save the station (and myself) was to unwrench the O2 digital outlet and make a new line to a new gas mixer.

The only guess I have is that h/e pipes bugged it somehow. So I attached volume pumps before pipeline goes to space as counter-measure. Working fine so far. You're welcome to try without it and see if it's been fixed.

 

Oops, I went off course... So with most of the space stuff done (we'll have to return to it later, depending on your commitment), what leaves us left is the turbine room. Bring the pipe dispenser there. Remove ALL the pipes you see in that room, including gas pumps behind the airlock. Don't forget to move up the air vent. I was unfortunate to forget that once. The heaters which was on the supply pipes, allowed the air mix get in and bugged the whole pipeline yet again, even with gas mixer put on full plasma.

Anyways, in the turbine chamber, replace the vent with a passive vent and put up the pipes and following the picture (ignore the pipeline with h/e and the volume pump going back to the heater pipeline, was just testing recycling):

 

 

The idea here is to heat up the gas with help of the incoming heaters, expanding the compressed gas and pressure before it enters the turbine chamber and keeps it rolling. Also, don't forget the gas mixer settings, 4500 kPa, 33% Plasma (node 1) and 67% O2 (node 2). Those are just my preferences, so if there is a better mix out there, do tell me (and why that is). And don't turn the gas mixer on yet, save it for the very last step. Also, don't forget to install the scrubbers, and set it to eat CO2. Without it, CO2 will slowly decrease the efficiency of the energy output.

 

Now open up the volume pumps near space tiles in Atmosia, which has been offline so far. Let the gas build up.

 

With all that done, it's time to go to science desk and ask for upgraded components, do try to inform them beforehand. I don't settle for less than quadratic capacitor and super matter-bin. As for the micro-lasers, get the best they currently got, or wait til they upgraded it too together with the other components.

 

TL:DR, order minimum upgraded 6 quadratic capacitor, 10 super matter-bins and 10 high-power micro-lasers, or better.

 

But sometimes, they still haven't reached the needed tier for us to utilize. It's okay, we still have some work left to do, while waiting for the tier they eventually (hopefully) will attain (and promised you).

 

 

Bad Ending:

Scientist aren't there? Not doing their job? No hope in sight? Redo the pipeline in turbine room to a single line towards the chamber, don't use any volume pumps. Using basic heaters are optional, it just makes igniting the gas easier (the gas is still cold, just less cold). You should get roughly 110k. Better than 1 solar station at the very least (OTL).

 

Get going to the Atmosia, dismantle the freezer/heater and move only the metals, cables, console screens and the circuits to the turbine room. Remember to use screwdriver on freezer circuits, it turns them to heater. Set up the basic machine frames and put in to components you brought from Atmosia, and later the components you ordered and brought from R&D. Install the Heaters, and upgrade the Turbine. Once done, you'll have to "update" the compressor and turbine again by opening their hatch and wrench them a full spin, so the computer can find it. If you don't, you'll get an error message from the computer that either says that compressor cannot be found, or turbine is inoperable. You'll also have to re-wire a(ny) cable between SMES and Turbine (otherwise no input/output will be registered), and that's where the insulated gloves finally comes in (and more if you wishes to expand).

 

Set temperature on all heaters to max, power on the volume pumps and turn on the gas mixer.

 

Congrats! That's the minimum amount of work to get a good performing turbine. Go and impress the CE and convince him to shut down singularity, or do you want to optimize with it further?

 

--- Not finished

 

Assuming the latter, you have the choice of adding recycling loop to the gas turbine, or perhaps adding another gas turbine system in the small chamber (I never managed to finish it, solo. Why can't the station be more peaceful! Have yet to try with someone experienced who gladly helps) and another SMES or two.

 

Want to use every particle? Lets do the recycling loop. It could either be advanced or basic.

 

pic link

 

Feeling greedy? Perfect, lets show others what Atmos tech got, except, well, I don't really tend to take screenshots of unfinished projects, so I'll just draw my ideas, where and how.

 

 

Red line = Scrubber pipes

Red circle = Scrubbers

Red triangle = Universal Adapter

Red X = Compressor and Turbine

Red square = Reinforced walls

Yellow line = Normal pipes

Yellow square = Airlock

 

Actually, at this point you are probably well-experienced with the turbine. The picture itself should explain the intents. Good job, veteran! Show them what we got!

 

 

---

 

MISC.

 

Why aren't we upgrading the compressor? Doesn't it improve the turbine system as well? Well... Not as far as I've seen. So far, I've found the turbine output generally lower than one with a basic compressor, although I could have been doing different pipe setups in every attempts. I'll return to it, when we've found the most optimal pipeline for the turbine system.

 

Turbine with unupgraded capacitor generates roughly 110k maximum.

Turbine with Advanced capacitor generates roughly 150~160k maximum (Had only 1 attempt with this component).

Super capacitor

Turbine with Quadratic capacitor can atleast reach 400k.

Don't know if there's a higher tier than Quadratic capacitor.

 

Ideal starting point would be 3 atmos tech, each doing their work in Atmosia, the space part, and turbine room. Hopefully it could be finished in 25 minutes (then there's the issue of scientists research pace and materials). But you can keep the turbine going while waiting for the components.

 

The truth is always harsh. Remember the very first picture? With current setup, at stabilized output/pressure, a single Gas Turbine generates almost 300k with quadratic capacitor. So how would we raise the gas output/pressure? What if we added another Gas Turbine?. It just shows there is always something else we could improve upon if we wish to reach that constant height, and I don't know what. Always open for improvements, so go ahead and suggest what else could be done. I might have been going on this with wrong mindset the entire time.

 

 

To do:

Making it easier to read, more like step by step sentences instead of paragraphs, I think. Maybe.

Clarifying sentences/paragraphs.

Re-formatting and cleaning.

More ideas/stuffs.

 

 

 

The guide will probably never be finalized (of course I'll update it with new findings), as there are huge loads of improvements and layouts, tailored for all different things. I've thought many times that it was the limit, but I kept stumbling upon knowledge unbeknownst to me before. I hope this guide will unite the Atmos Technicians together and will create the ultimate Gas Turbine the server has ever seen (and finally replace singularity mid shift, a noble goal).

 

Edited November 28, 2015 by Guest

[pinatacolada]

I hope this guide will unite the Atmos Technicians together and will declare Atmosia as a free, independent, self sustaining nation create the ultimate Gas Turbine the server has ever seen .

[tastyfish]

Oh yeah, I've seen almost this exact layout 2 or 3 days ago, I'm guessing that was you then. I didn't want to interfere and just made disposal fast travel to it though, heh. Good, detailed guide of it.

[TullyBBurnalot]

 

...

 

You, sir, are amazing. I applaud you, your efforts, your creation, and your absolute dedication to Atmosia's cause. You are one of the few that make me proud to have ever learned how to work the piping system.

 

You are one magnificent fucking bastard. Infinite karma for you, you absolutely deserve every last bit of it.

 

---end tearful salute---

 

For realsies now, WOW, this is good. I haven't had the time to properly experiment with the Turbine, but I'm glad someone actually did it, and got it to work fantastically. This is actually amazing.

 

I'll probably be making an Atmospherics Guide V3, with my latest setup, which does include Heat Exchangers and plasma. Hell, the V2 was done before I realized LINDA actually made the Space Loop useful.

 

[lStealtherl]

 

Awww, I got so emotional from that response! I got somewhat tear-eyed as well *salute*

 

Off topic, how do I edit the OP? I don't find any button for it on this page.

 

[NTSAM]

You don't have the [edit] button? It should be just really right of the title.

[lStealtherl]

Right of title? There isn't any. The only button I see is "Quote" in the whole OP.

[NTSAM]

 

That's... odd.

Maybe you should get Regens to try to help or something?

 

[lStealtherl]

Okay, I found it. Somehow the rest of the buttons were invisible (marking the area didn't show up either). And still is invisible after removing the cookies and cache. What else am I missing...

[GelatinousGlob]

 

Ive gotten over 2 million watts off the turbine by expanding the burn chamber to be longer and thus farther from the compressor. I also used three air injectors as input and was running two gas mixers, although with my results two injectors and a single gas mixer might be enough. I eliminated as many pumps as possible and only used volume pumps when necessary. I think it was 2.7 million watts sustained output with stock parts in it too, although I may be wrong on the parts since I was building it while also explaining how atmospherics works to a first time atmosian and may have sent them to science.

 

However, because of the restrictive nature of the default turbine chamber and the difficulty in removing reinforced walls I rebuilt it in the middle of atmosia. Rebuilding requires more plasteel and/or plasma glass though and requires removing and relocating most of atmosian pipes.

 

Ill post screens next time I build it, last time I unfortunately discovered passive vents are now broken again so I spent a bunch of time containing the gas released when I had to break into the exhaust and then when I did get it perfect the blast chamber glass got blown up by a surgery bomb so i didn't get pictures.

 

I hope they fix or maybe even already fixed passive vents, they are by far the most useful for dealing with turbine exhaust without venting direct to space. My goal next time is to recycle any of the plasma and oxygen that is unburnt and a cooling and storage system for the CO2.

 

[Tauka Usanake]

Can't you just pipe back the CO2 into atmos? I'd call that a job done well enough. Otherwise I want to try this out sometime. Hopefully the server won't be too filled

[tastyfish]

 

I hope they fix or maybe even already fixed passive vents, they are by far the most useful for dealing with turbine exhaust without venting direct to space. My goal next time is to recycle any of the plasma and oxygen that is unburnt and a cooling and storage system for the CO2.

 

Passive vents are indeed fixed.

 

[lStealtherl]

 

Ive gotten over 2 million watts off the turbine by expanding the burn chamber to be longer and thus farther from the compressor. I also used three air injectors as input and was running two gas mixers, although with my results two injectors and a single gas mixer might be enough.

 

Do you mind elaborate on turbine chamber? In what way does the size matter? Do you want it to be small, or big? Thick or narrow? And what do you mean with "and thus farther from the compressor"?

 

Is there a quicker way installing air injectors? From what I've learned you have to set frequencies and install computer. Too much hassle from what I've seen.

 

I hope they fix or maybe even already fixed passive vents, they are by far the most useful for dealing with turbine exhaust without venting direct to space. My goal next time is to recycle any of the plasma and oxygen that is unburnt and a cooling and storage system for the CO2.

 

How would you use the passive vent? Do you place it at the rear end of turbine, or do you use some kind of combo setup with pipes within the chamber? Then again, how would it suck the gas? It's just passive, right? Do you use gas filters?

 

Can't you just pipe back the CO2 into atmos? I'd call that a job done well enough. Otherwise I want to try this out sometime. Hopefully the server won't be too filled

 

You can, but I'm not doing it because I don't see the need. In what way do the CO2 benefit us? Do you mind tell me?

 

[Tauka Usanake]

 

You can, but I'm not doing it because I don't see the need. In what way do the CO2 benefit us? Do you mind tell me?

By having it put somewhere it's out of the way because you're not using it? I called it storage I guess

 

[pinatacolada]

You could just scrub it out and space it, it's faster to build.

[Tauka Usanake]

I would but I worry LINDA would bitch about it. Not sure how gasses act when they reach the map limit

[LiquidNightfury]

 

http://imgur.com/a/OBlkK

 

Stole the biohazard room to make this little contraption since I hate working with upgrade-required machinery. Only real issue I'm having is with the gas mixer. No matter what I set it to it seems to just come out 50/50 on plasma and O2, and I'm getting really low pressures from the O2 line, like 1500kPa where the plasma is sitting around 3-4k. Any ideas?

 

[pinatacolada]

Did you try adding a pump to the O2 line just before the H/E section?

[LiquidNightfury]

I'll give it a shot. Might help it stay steady.

[tastyfish]

This will sound dumb, but did you set the ratio on the gas mixer?

[LiquidNightfury]

 

Yeah, there's just some weirdness with LINDA not running computations occasionally, it's stupid.

http://imgur.com/a/FP9Fz

My final construction aside from a few tweaks. Managed to hit 110,000W unupgraded for about half an hour before the carbon dioxide buildup started to become overpowering. The heat exchangers are pretty solid, got the fuel incoming up to about 10,000 degrees, but they do take up quite a bit of space. However, no need to upgrade them, so yay. Still haven't worked with an upgraded turbine or compressor, and I feel like an upgraded compressor might be more useful at higher internal pressures? I'm not sure, but I want to try dragging down the computer for the mix chamber in atmos and use it to try a 3x3 chamber with 3 air injectors and 4-5 scrubbers, and a gas sensor so I can actually see what's going on in the chamber without stepping into it.

 

[davidchan]

 

While I appreciate atmos techs trying to do something useful and making the turbine do somethign other than burn off extra plasma.

 

Stop asking for diamond tier parts 5 minutes into a round when there are no miners active Four or Five rounds straight I've had atmosia harassing me for parts I simply did not have the resources to gather. If you want shiney Quad lasers, Bluespace bins and quantom capacitors, get mining out on the rock gathering 20 gold, silver, uranium and plasma as well as 5-20 diamonds and some sand and iron ore for glass, metal and plasteel.

 

[tastyfish]

 

While I appreciate atmos techs trying to do something useful and making the turbine do somethign other than burn off extra plasma.

 

Stop asking for diamond tier parts 5 minutes into a round when there are no miners active Four or Five rounds straight I've had atmosia harassing me for parts I simply did not have the resources to gather. If you want shiney Quad lasers, Bluespace bins and quantom capacitors, get mining out on the rock gathering 20 gold, silver, uranium and plasma as well as 5-20 diamonds and some sand and iron ore for glass, metal and plasteel.

 

I'm liking the heat exchanger solution more and more for that very reason. You can def get respectable power levels without upgrading the turbine or compressor.

 

Also, if you're using a scrubber to remove the CO2, don't forget to set it to extended range, it actually does remove [number of adjacent open turfs] times more moles than in normal range.