hello, merry chrismass ^^

Is it possible to get more info on what this mod add ? compatibilties and dependencies ? like i got some rough idea of what this mod entails by searching for the mode realistic reactors but i would love to know more about this mod... compatible with bluetonium ?

goodbye

i think i listed all of the changes in the changelog, but i can make a list for the overview page at some point.
if bluetonium works with the vanilla reactor, it should work with this too, but i think i don't have custom power/efficiency/bonus cells curves for it yet

Also the other version had removed blueprint support, my formulas and the atomic explosion setting. That's not listed there

I think they are looking for a manual on how to best run the reactor.

not a manual on how to build a reactor setup, but like a description and details and quirks of the blocs added, like the difference between a vanilla reactor and theses ones

like by fidgeting a bit with them, i found out that you don't need to fidle with the control rods for it to be safely working, like yeah you can accelerate the speed at wich the reactor core heat up, but like it can't transfer heat fast enough to the heatpipes connected to it, it's like there is a choke point there, so you want to make increase in core temperature slowly.
so for me it's like not worth risking too high temperature by not inserting control rods fast enough to slow down heat production

Ho and higher core temperature doesn't mean more energy is produced by the reactor.
like yeah it increase the temperature of the heatpipes connected to it ( if you didn't put more steam production and consumption than what energy as heat comme out of the reactor core, thermal energy will accumulate in the heatpipe like a battery charging up )

so why would you want higher core temperature then ? well first, heat travel further in the heat pipes from the reactor core to the furthest boiler if you get higher temperature from the start, like heat need to be higher at the source to be able to flow to the next one, like a staircase, you just can't get the temperature of your core at the end of the boiler linein normal production mode

second, energy consumption of your fuel cell per energy unit of heat produced get different depending on the fuel cell and core temperature, look at graphics from original mod,
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/RealisticReactors
and https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=93&t=56621

, so it consumme less nuclear fuel per energy unit of heat produced, or more, depending on core temperature and fuel cell caracteristic ( and the seting you chose ) so it's like having an efficiency module bonus for running the reactor at specific temperature

and then there is a production multiplier of the reactor heat produced, like +50% heat output is like a speed module enabeling the core to produce more heat without a fuel consumtion bonus.

and then be carefull, because if the core reach too high temperature (999°c), it WILL meltdown and damage stuffs around, biologics included.

ho and the core scraming goes way faster than the 300 seconds, but it's like the core mechanisms are put on pause when the reactor is stopped, like no heat will be exctracted from it by heatpipes ( so no on/off strategy where you let the core bleed of heat if it's going too hot)

BUT, scraming enable for a really fast insertion of control rods strategy to slow down heat production of the core for when you restart, so if your core is getting too hot and you can't insert control rods fast enough while in normal operation of the reactor via the logic system, you can make an emergency stop, inserting control rods to max ( wich will slow heat prod to mininmum for when you restart the core )
that enable you to later on restart the reactor with control rods inserted to max, helping you to reduce temperature of the reactor core once you restarted it ( like your steam prod and consumtion is higher than the reactor thermal energy output, temperature will decrease )

but the core doesn't stop like a light switch on the heat energy production, it's more like the control rods, take time to be inserted, that's like the time you take to lift from the accelerator and put your foot on the break pedal, and how fast you foot press down on it, but then there is the reactor core heat production that still continue a bit (because of fission products still making heat, even when there the control rods are max inserted) so that's more like the time your car take to slow down.

and there is the cooling tower, i think there is a bug because it produce more 15°c water from 500°c steam than what is needed in water to produce that 500°c steam, or maybe it's a mod conflict, i play pretty heavely modded.

you can cool the reactor core faster by injecting water in the ECCS port of the reactor and sending that water to cooling tower, and you can recirculate it, i just put a pump with logic via a tank to read water level and fill the loop if needed, didn't see any water duplication there

oh and for the control rods, they go from a 0 to 1000, but it's like if you set them at 1, the reactor is already outputing nominal power, you can't like run it at half power or a fraction of it's normal power, i mean i can think of strategies with multiples reactors on the same heatgrid to make different heat production levels to trottle steam production, but i mean, control rods are meant to throttle the reactor power output in real life, so i don't see why not in the mod.

If you scramed and stoped your reactor core, ok the control rods are inserted and stopped the reaction, but when the reactor core goes into stopped mode, it will not let heatpipes interact with it's internal temperature, so let it cool naturaly via air temperature heat loss, or use ECCS loop ( can't remember if they work while reactor in off state )
or restart the reactor when scram rod at 0 and you can extract that heat via heatpipes and steam production and consumption ( you can use ECCS loop while the reactor is running normaly)

all in all, i like this mod, but i would love more infos, like, ok if you get a constat combinator, there is a little explaining on what each symbol represent, but like man, i needed to dig for thoses infos, plus the old mod page and old forum for infos, it will make peoples just not look into it, it's like a barrier of sort to acces knowledge on the rules of the stuffs

Nice mod, continue man, love it ^^ have a nice day, and merry chrismass

You can put the control rods in a higher state before starting the reactor, but it's very risky because it takes experience knowing how much temperature they will add
They will only boost your power output though, at the cost of safety (internal exponential temperature).
It simulates the heattransfer inside the reactor core
Unfortunately they need to be controllable very slowly when the reactor is running, or using some combinator logic would make the reactor way too safe
There's a setting for the speed though or you could just ignore the feature entirely
You could control the water that the boilers get instead for example

why not enable the feature of the control rods where like your reactor is active, heat is flowing and stuffs, but you can insert control rods at maximum to slow down all the way to zero the fissions reactions, meaning if power consumption on the grid goes down, turbines consumme less steam, wich mean boilers consumme less heat, wich mean if the reactor is still going normaly, the temperature will goes up,

and having the ability to just throttle the reactor down instead of just turning it off would be nice.

By the way, with my testings, reactor heat energy output ( heat getting out of the building into adjacent heatpipe ) doesn't increase that much when you increase core temperature, in the contrary, it's like, it's less fuel efficient, AND power production logic signal indicate lower power output

from my testing, the reported power values are correct if the heatpipes have reached equilibrium and no other reactors are connected that induce environmental cooling (gonna take a look at that aspect again)
with control rods pulled out entirely, a reactor can produce up to 310 MW, but will already reach it's max operating temperature at effectively 300°
they are especially useful for heating up your network and reacting to spikes in electricity demand

what????!!!! i don't get thoses numbers at all, ywhat 300°??? boiler start at 500°c you have a discord onto wich we can speak ?

the reported temperature (in gui/signals) is the core temperature. that was 1000°.
those 300° were at the heat pipes next to the reactor, which is basically the same temperature as the reactor's heat interface

this means, the reported temperature is the "simulated" temperature of the reactor core, directly at the fuel rods , which dictates output characteristics and when the reactor will explode.
since the actual heat interface temperature is basically irrelevant, it's not reported anywhere and you can only check it in the nearby heat pipes' tooltips
without using control rods, the reactor core's temperature will be the same as the heat interface

updated the mod overview page

i couldn't reproduce the cooling tower issue... it should produce 50 water from 300 steam which it also did in my testing, the values are fixed and don't depend on other variables. maybe it really did get patched by one of your mods

yeah probably some mods messing with it, obviously not your fault ^^

and what do you think about the controls rods being able to throttle down the reactor all the way to zero Mw? that way you are obliged to set controls for the reactor to run and not just simpli start the reactor with the rods at minimum power so that you don't overheat your reactor ???

i have a modified version of this mod. that has a limiter for smaller builds, that is set when the reactor is Off and cold.
1 to 100% and it just affects the fuel usage and output. more use for the control rods in the long run, and if you mess up on a smaller build explosions happen.
i have other changes but just a idea.
and i will let OwnlyMe have my files if they want to take a look at the changes i made.

I feel like the mod would become too easy if you could throttle the reactor
In their current state the control rods already make it much easier...
I find it unlikely that someone is making a <50 MW build

sounds like my builds are abnormal.
well changes are the following, use them if you want, im unlikely to post it because i changed it for my base build.
but i am trying to be helpful.
-- made reactor the size of vanilla.
-- changed heat pipe layout to vanilla
-- removed Breeder reactor (may add it later)
--fixed running flicker glow and glow the color of the fuel by making the reactor_template a dummy reactor, with vary low consumption and have a slot for fuel. and filling and clearing it in the formula file. dimmed or removed most lighting but the core changes are.
energy_source =
{
type = "burner",
fuel_categories = {"nuclear"},
effectivity = 0.0000001,
fuel_inventory_size = 1,
burnt_inventory_size = 1,
light_flicker = {
color = {1,1,1},
minimum_intensity = 0.4,
maximum_intensity = 0.95,
minimum_light_size=0.01,
light_intensity_to_size_coefficient=0.01,

also for the working light picture i made it white and added
draw_as_glow = true,
and in formulas
reactor.displayer.burner.currently_burning = nil
reactor.displayer.get_fuel_inventory().insert{name = fuel_cell_name, count = 1, quality = fuel_quality}
-- fixed heatglow in entity's
reactor_template.heat_lower_layer_picture = apply_heat_pipe_glow {
-- fixed items for rockets by adding weight = 1 * ton otherwise they are to heavy.
--changed neighbour to match the default reactor. could not get the original to work. not sure if its because i made it bigger.
-- removed the ECCS playing with it may add it back in.
-- added the limiter signal setting when the reactor is cold. if you need a like 5MW reactor for some reason.
here is the basics though you need to add the signal.
in on_tick in the networking part

        if reactor.state == 0 and reactor.core.temperature <= 400 then
            local limit_set = network.get_signal(SIGNAL_LIMITER_SET)
            if limit_set ~= 0 then
                limit_set = math.min(100,limit_set)
                limit_set = math.max(0,limit_set)
                reactor.limiter = limit_set
            end
        end
        if reactor.limiter ~= reactor.signals["limiter-at"].count then
            reactor.signals["limiter-at"].count = reactor.limiter
        end

in on_tick in the fuel_consumption part
if reactor.limiter > 0 and reactor_state == 2 then
fuel_consumption = (fuel_consumption/100) * reactor.limiter
end
at the end of formulas.
if reactor.limiter > 0 and reactor.state == 2 then
output = (output/100) * reactor.limiter
end

there are other smaller changes but they are more custom fuel mod i use, i dont see others using them.
i hope this helps, with the graphics at least. your doing a good job with maintaining it and this is how i can help.

thx i've adressed the missing glow pulsing and the rocket capacity

Glad i could help.

what if throttling the reactor would continuously cause damage?
idk, there's not many approaches i could offer to keep it challenging
efficiency reduction would be obvious
idk, maybe i can make it a setting to enable that mode.
it would be controlled with negative values and the slider would start in the middle though

hummmm
my idea is this.
A. first make startup and shutdown related to the control rods in number 2

1. first control acts like a isolation barrier, valves or pumps in a really reactor for coolant.
   but it could be like a neutron reflector shutters around the core.
   when 100% closed they block the heat from getting to the heat pipes. (fully or by a portion)
   this control the Efficacy of the reactor to a degree. however limits how much power that can escape the reactor.
   This will have a similar effect of keeping the power output the same during power spikes.

2. the second control is how much the control rods effectively reduce the power output.
   however they do this by turning the reaction to heat, and keeping that heat inside the reactor. acting similar to the reflectors.
   so you can limit the reactor power output, for fuel savings and lower power output but you need to run the reactor hotter.
   or if you want to shut down the reactor you would need to lower the rods at the same time make sure you don't overheat.

3. remove the ECCS and make the cooling towers connect to water, AND the heat pipe network, they would have a much lower say 100degrees unlike the boilers 500 for energy.
   This would make the reactors something to be vary careful of as you can get runaway reactions.

to deal with runaway reactions and or shut down the reactor.
A. one would need to dissipate the energy by using it in boilers and or cooling towers.
B. slowly lower the control rods, to lower the power output, however this absorbers and keeps heat inside.

This if done right should keep it changeling even if running the reactor at a lower power output.
as you cant just Cool it down with ECCS, and it blocks the heat.
and one would want to heat up quickly to start spikes and drops in power could cause a meltdown at any power output state.

simulating heat transfer between core and heat interface in these dimensions would have a performance impact and i'm currently working on reducing the performance impact as much as possible (its gonna be crazy) (not like the mod really had performance issues before, but the current tick delayer was just an afterthought and is not too polished)
50/50 that i'll just implement throttling in a basic way anyway

so the update i worked on didn't adress your issue, sorry.
but i hope that the performance has increased, or at least the update frequency of the reactors

Okay you can make 1mw reactors now and the control rods have no temperature effect anymore (can be re-enabled in the settings)
I found the previous system better/much more balanced but apparently people didn't get it.

or maybe separate coolant pumping rate in the core ( slower pump increase temperature inside the core if you keep your power via the control rods the same )
and the control rod insertion level to manage reactor core MW production ?

yeah you can imagine it however you want, it will ultimately behave kinda like enabling the cooling rod temperature offset setting

because you literally described how that worked before i canned it into that setting, because nobody understood it

wait, watt ? ( pun intended XD )