Once you get drones going you can toss up a chest to have the drones to keep full, the rest is just waste. basic mats are infinite once you get miners up and running.
Guide to Use Biproduct Metals from Mining
With drones you can create a locker for every sort of stone demand with priority 0 and you set up an autocrushed / Trash with priority -1.
This way as soon as the locker is full of a stone sort the overflow will go into the autobin and the extractor will not stop extracting the rarer ores because it doesn’t gets full.
Best is to not add the rare ore to the autotrash demand so that on stand still your locker is full with the rare ore and your excarvater.
However this is obsolete once you have the extractors you can set what exactly you want to extract.
Pro tip
- Create a large/yes large storage room and set up a locker for every storable item with demand of this item priority 0.
- Place one locker in your base with supply everything priority 1.
- Now whenever you come home you can just empty your pockets into that distribution locker.
Note
The only trouble thing is the autocrafter has to be placed somewhat in the middle of that large locker room if you want it to have all the material accessible for crating.
You can place it on another floor heigher or lower though.
Other Tips
Build an Advanced Crafting Station next to the aluminum one. early game, you can take the junk metals plus some of the aluminum, and turn it into Super Alloy. This is really nice before the T2 extractor, as alloy found in the wild is in limited quantities, and you’ll likely have to make some yourself to keep up with the alloy demands.
Later on, I’ll use drones to dump the junk into lockers for each of those materials until they are full, and then after that, they go into the shredder.
You can also build an Advanced Crafting Station next to the sulphur one too, and before you go out to raid it, bring 2-3 pieces of aluminum with you to make alloy right there at the sulphur extractor, OR, use the aluminum that is found in that valley.
Building an ACS next to the Uranium Mine lets you condense all of the uranium into 1-2 rods, too. In general it’s handy to have an ACS next to each extractor for various reasons.
Bonus Tip: Have your storage in the first and third floor (first floor storage is basically your smart base setup before you automate) and put auto crafters on the second floor. Incubators and DNA-tools fit well close to all the lockers with the required stuff. That way eventhough you might have to fudge around a little bit, the autocrafters will be able to access all the necessary storage. Oh, and use large compartments, not just the basic ones.
All good value tips. In addition, I would use 2 or more shredders because that way you don’t create a traffic jam (shredder is almost filled with the last piece already bound to travel from a far away miner while everything else is completely stuck).
Bonus tip: Have your storage in the first and third floor (first floor storage is basically your smart base setup before you automate) and put auto crafters on the second floor. Incubators and DNA-tools fit well close to all the lockers with the required stuff.
That way eventhough you might have to fudge around a little bit, the autocrafters will be able to access all the necessary storage. Oh, and use large compartments, not just the basic ones.
The chaff has been invaluable for base-building, but in the case of aluminum at least, that’s been my primary super alloy source.
One big locker for each basic metal and I havn’t had to use the shredder once.
Whenever I do a round around the extractors, I just build additional lockers, there’s usually enough iron to do that. When I get drones, I set all the lockers to export.
Condensing the ore to alloy is a good idea, though. I may do that if I play again.
DONT DO SHREDDER.
Put a ton of T2 lockers in a circle and when you get the autocrafter, just create a new
T2 locker and load it up with aluminum and you’ll be swimming in super alloy in no time. Then you can put ANOTHER autocrafter next to that one and create super alloy rods (when you have the recipe). Then, later on when you get drones, you’ll have more super alloy rods than you can shake a stick at.
The only thing I’ve found a use for the shedder is nitrogen because it’s such a byproduct in the gas machines I had 4 T2 chests full of the stuff and nowhere to use it.
I saved all my “extra” minerals until I unlocked T3 extractors, and the issue went away. My experience is that stuff that looks like a glut is going to get consumed by something, sooner or later, if it’s no longer being replenished.
You could also set up an autocrafter for super alloy and/or super alloy rods. Remembering to drop off a full load of aluminum when you go there is the hard part.
Hey guys thanks for all your inputs. The shredder seems like a really good option. I have built lockers in the Iridium mine but obviously it fills up quite quick. Will play about with the drones as well as soon as they unlock. Cheers!
I have a Shredder at each location and just shred all that trash ore.
My Aluminum mine is closest to home base, so I get all my trash ores from just that mine.
These days I just rush the T3 extractor (which doesn’t have byproducts), but otherwise what you can do is put a shredder by the extractor and just delete the byproducts. It’s really not worth trying to save them unless you’re very early in the game and need to make super alloy or something.