Better Than Wolves Forum

Hello everyone, new user here.

I've been trying to automate the post-mining process as much as possible and have run into a few snags I was hoping to get some advice on. I have an automatic unloading depot for a storage minecart up and running, and I was wondering if there was any way to automatically filter the unprocessed ore blocks from cobblestone? It doesn't look like any hopper filter would do it as they both count as blocks, and both of them sink with Hardcore Buoy.

The end goal here would be to automatically route the ore to my autokiln for smelting while passing the stone along to my crucible, after unloading them from the same minecart.

I'm terribly sorry if I missed an obvious solution, but google and pouring over the wiki didn't turn up anything useful.

Thank you very much for your time, especially given current events.

Nope, nothing in the hopper filters to help your here.

I can only see two things, both not being perfect :

First would be to directly fed the stone and the ore to a full-speed Kiln, and filter out the ingots. Pretty slow.

Second would be to use the new item auto-stack thingy. When you drop an item close to another one, they'll stack together. Use a dispenser with ores in it. Spit one out every minute to make sure all your ores stack together. Collect them all and send one back to the hacky filter. I think Sethbling have a video about that feature.
Borderline exploit for me, still haven't used it in anything yet, but kinda cool looking ;)

Unfortunate, lol.

Anyways thanks for the help, saved me a few hours of trying in vain to find a solution that doesn't exist. Guess for now I'll have to settle with separate depots for various goods.

The only thing that I can add to what Battosay said is that you could have everything feed into a mining charge setup. Cobble is converted to gravel and ores stay the same. Gravel can then be filtered out with hoppers and ore can be fed to a kiln. It would be expensive though, and you wouldn't be able to keep the cobble to be converted to various building materials, although you would never run out of glass or flint blocks.

What I would do in this situation is route the cobblestone and the ore to a hopper with a dispenser below it. Then have the dispenser on a timer to dispense the blocks and in the area that the blocks are getting dispensed have two more block dispenser sucking up the ore and the cobblestone. One has at least one cobblestone and the other has at least one ore in all the spaces. Here are some pictures.
The trick here is to get the timing right. None of the dispensers that have the ore and cobble can never dispense a block or when they suck it up, it will combine stacks. The dispensers also have to have slightly different timing so that they don't glitch if the timing does go wrong. Lastly the initial block dispenser has to have a pulse long enough that both dispenser can pulse and suck up the blocks but a short enough pulse that the dispenser filtering don't cycle twice. Good Luck :)

DAGR99 wrote:One has at least one cobblestone and the other has at least one ore in all the spaces.

BDs are not intended to be used as universal block sorters. Sorting items by using a full inventory is more or less exploiting inventory mechanics, and is generally frowned upon as a result.

Also, blocks that enter this sorting system have no way to leave as items without player intervention.

...

On a different note, this thread just gave me an idea for an addon...

Edit: And before anyone asks me any questions about that idea:
Don't ask me any questions about that idea. :)

Best approach I can think of would be a tube kiln with one wall on sticky pistons. Pull the wall out before pushing blocks forward so item form objects don't risk glitching into the fire and you can direct drops into a collection channel.

ExpHP wrote:BDs are not intended to be used as universal block sorters.

That is true. In fact it is quite possible that it is an exploit, how would one go about telling FC?

Battosay wrote:I can only see two things, both not being perfect :

First would be to directly fed the stone and the ore to a full-speed Kiln, and filter out the ingots. Pretty slow.

I don't mind the idea of feeding them conveyor-style through a kiln with a piston/BD set up, but the main issue would be that the only way to get the cobble back into item form would be to have another BD at the end pick them up, which leads to the issue of there being no way to automatically unload a BD. Sadly at that point it's just easier to manually sort and send the stone to one depot and send the valuables to another.

Although the thought of feeding your mined goods into an almost pizza-oven style kiln conveyor is a pretty amusing visual, heh.

danielngtiger wrote:

ExpHP wrote:BDs are not intended to be used as universal block sorters.

That is true. In fact it is quite possible that it is an exploit, how would one go about telling FC?

If you find an exploit, Bugs is the place to go. But please do search first to make sure it hasn't been reported yet.

In this case, I'm pretty certain he is already aware of it. It's the reason why the "bricks as filler" feature was removed, as that made it even easier to pull off.

I'm actually curious why you don't separate ores and cobble from the start.


There is one ridiculously expensive method not noted here yet:

Mining charges never destroy ore in item form. It would be possible to dump all your cobble and ore in a pit, make a mining charge go off and collect the remaining ore. Note: might take more than 1 charge...

Dude, bit of a necro, I think. And your "not noted" solution was already suggested

Rianaru wrote:The only thing that I can add to what Battosay said is that you could have everything feed into a mining charge setup. Cobble is converted to gravel and ores stay the same. Gravel can then be filtered out with hoppers and ore can be fed to a kiln. It would be expensive though, and you wouldn't be able to keep the cobble to be converted to various building materials, although you would never run out of glass or flint blocks.

I believe batto was talking about block form, and devak was talking about item form, unless item cobble is converted to gravel.

If 3 days is a necro, this forum is a graveyard....

Also, the above note is indeed correct. Gravel only forms from block-form cobble when blasted by a mining charge. this was originally different but changed for balance reasons

devak wrote:If 3 days is a necro, this forum is a graveyard....

Again...it's not about time, it's about content.