How many items can a belt transport?

How many drills does it take to fill both lanes of a belt?

Values rounded up

For a given output, how many assemblers does it take to fill both sides of a belt?

Numbers given are for a fully-compressed belt; note that inserting directly onto a belt will usually not fully compress it.

For burner miners, use 26 miners instead of 18

How many 1:20:40 setups can be powered by a single belt full of each fuel?

Once set up, a single enrichment centrifuge provides U235 for 30 reactors.

Numbers from this Reddit post.

Given an amount of uranium ore, what are my odds of getting the necessary 40 U235 to start enrichment?

How long can I run my factory from a uranium patch?

This math assumes Kovarex enrichment and fuel reprocessing, but not productivity modules

Stack sizes of common items.

In general, items with "tiers" (e.g. assemblers, belts, ammo, science packs) will all have the same stack size.

How many items with a stack size of 100 can n containers hold?

If the stack size is 200, look down a row

If the stack size is 50, look up a row

If the stack size is 10, divide by 10

How long does it take to completely load or unload a cargo wagon?

All values given in minutes:seconds format.

Assumes max inserter capacity upgrades and buffer chests.

The compression ratio describes how efficiently a crafted item can be transported, compared to its inputs.

There are two ratios to consider: the stack compression ratio and the belt compression ratio.

The stack compression ratio is how many stacks of input it takes to create one stack of output. For example, Iron Plate has a stack ratio of 2:1 because it takes 200 Iron Ore (2 stacks of 100) to create 200 Iron Plate (1 stack of 200) Copper Cable has a stack ratio of 1:1 because 1 stack of Copper Plate (100) turns into 1 stack of Copper Cable (200).

The belt compression ratio is similar, but doesn't take stack size into account.

Because trains transport stacks of items, but belts, inserters, and robots transport items by count, we have to take both into account when designing item transport systems. The compression ratios, and their relative values for a given recipe, can inform the best strategy for dealing with a particular item.

For example, Rocket Control Units take 1 Processing Unit and 1 Speed Module as input. With 1 stack of Processing Units (100) and 2 stacks of Speed Modules (100), you'll produce 10 stacks of Rocket Control Units. This means transporting Rocket Control Units by train will be 3 times worse than transporting its inputs. But one belt full of Processing Units and one belt full of Speed Modules will produce one belt full of Rocket Control Units, which would be 2 times more efficient than transporting the inputs.

Combining these facts, we should consider using trains to move the Processing Units and Speed Modules, crafting the Rocket Control units near the Rocket Silo, and using belts or bots to move the Rocket Control Units to the Rocket Silo for consumption

You can use these numbers to understand some guidelines:

• High compression ratio recipes should be done before transport. For example, your trains will be twice as efficient when transporting Iron Plate rather than Iron Ore.
• Low compression ratio recipes should be done after transport. For example, it almost never makes sense to bus or ship Copper Cable.

What are the correct ratios when making Solid Fuel or Rocket Fuel from oil?

A setup with 25 refineries is ratio-perfect. All other values have been rounded up (meaning some buildings will be occassionally idle).

If making Rocket Fuel, use a 1:1 ratio of Solid Fuel assemblers to Rocket Fuel assemblers.

You can make Solid Fuel from oil without water. This produces about 20% less fuel per oil compared to using Advanced Oil Processing and Heavy Oil Cracking.

A setup with 25 refineries is ratio-perfect. All other values have been rounded up (meaning some buildings will be occassionally idle).

If making Rocket Fuel, use a 1:1 ratio of Solid Fuel assemblers to Rocket Fuel assemblers.

How do I make plastic from coal using liquefaction?

Here's how to read the second row of this table:

• You only need one offshore pump
• Feed 50 coal/second (2 red belts) to the 25 refineries
• Run 3 Chemical Plants on Heavy Oil Cracking and 9 on Light Oil Cracking
• Feed 9 coal/second (less than 1 yellow belt) to the 7 Plastic-making Chemical Plants
• You'll produce 18 plastic/second (less than 1 red belt)

Pro tip! The 50-refinery setup consumes almost exactly 3 blue belts of coal (you'll need to do some balancing) and produces just short of 1 blue belt of plastic.

No rounding needed in this table.

Last column lists output petroleum gas per second.

How many furnaces can a belt full of fuel power?

Note that Stone Furnaces and Steel Furnaces consume energy at the same rate, so this table works for either.

In a furnace, how many of each input resource are consumed along with each fuel type?

You can use this data to make mixed-belt smelter setups, or configure correct request ratios into Requester Chests.

You've found a big juicy patch of ore. How long will it last?

Numbers listed are for iron, copper, and coal. Stone patches will deplete about 20% faster due to higher mining speed.

This number is not affected by mining productivity.

A big lake is in your way! What will it take to pave it with landfill?

The "trips" column is how many cars full of landfill (80 stacks) you'll need.

The "time" column computes time (shown in minutes:seconds) spent running around with 6 exoskeletons, assuming you place with 80% efficiency (i.e. some overlap).

"Chunk" yardsticks: The minimap is 14 chunks wide and tall. Radar coverage is 7 chunks wide and tall. A chunk is 32 tiles by 32 tiles.

How should the 40 slots in a cargo wagon be divided to make each of these common outputs?

Few recipes use exactly 40 stacks worth of input; where possible this table will exactly empty out a cargo wagon, but not use every slot in the wagon.

These calculations assume Productivity Module 3s are used where possible.

Some recipes leave "leftover" items because an exact division in 40 stacks is not possible.

For recipes with fluid inputs, this table assumes you'll be using balanced pairs of empty and full barrels.