Yea in the example they just divide the temperature by 400 and feed that number to the control rods. I am controlling my prototypes by changing that number via a keypad and with a numerical switcher I can switch to a throttle lever. But I think you can also just a pid but you have to tune it really carefully.
I made quite a lot of testing and this is what I found for best performance: Rods melt at 1,100 degrees, boilers burst at 10 pressure, Boilers give the best performance if the boiler temperature is closer to 100, but won't work under 100. Also need to keep pressure on boilers as close as 10 but clearly not go over. Condensers will condense fine if kept under 100 temp, You need 12 steam turbines, 6 boilers, and around 25 fuel rods? (i think if you run them at high temp they degrade quickly so its good to have sligthly more and throttle up over time to compensate radiation loss) to match the power of a large diesel engine. (if everything has great efficiency and running at near max capacity, with rods reaching almost meltdown temp). You'll need likely one condenser with 2 large radiators to cool all that down. So... basically... Nuclear power seems to be quite under powered taking into account that you need all that to match a single large diesel engine, and takes about 10 times the space. Ridiculous... Only good thing... well... lasts longer and doesn't need air.
If you flipped it upside down and did a power switch to the track, you could have an emergency shut down where you cut power and the fuel rods just drop out of the reactor when they are ejected
That's how I'm building a small reactor atm, the fuel rods are lifted in and the entire fuel rod/control rod/primary water containment assembly is also on a set of rails so the whole lot can be lifted/slid out for refuelling/repairing a damaged core. Not relying on gravity also has the added benefit that the reactor can be led down for use in trains and ships that aren't that tall (subs etc). Its just a shame the steam turbines are really weak right now, either that or I'm doing something wrong lol
@@marko247 I had the same thoughts about it, especially looking to build a reactor horizontally to better fit in a sub, for example. I haven’t tested enough yet, but how do you actually replace a depleted or damaged rod when the time comes? Can’t seem to see how :/
I'm working on one for my test ship with system that sealed the engine room and then ejected the entire reactor out and switch to battery. Yeah Neptune gonna hate me but I just wonder if the radiation still on the ship if the reactor is gone.
I feel like the steam turbine and boiler need a buff, steam turbines need to atleast be as strong as a jet engine, maybe even stronger. And the boiler can only take 10 bar in pressure, even a plastic bottle can do better.
Seriously? The Flying Scotsman (built in 1923) had a boiler that operated at up to 15.16 bar (220 psi)! So the boilers we have aren't even up to coal standards. 😳
@@MrNJersey I’m not sure where you would find the information, but 1 atmosphere is about 14.7 PSI, so if Stormworks uses the same atmospheric pressure as Earth, a boiler at 10 PSI would be under vacuum at sea level.
Stormworks developers: I wish users can build more creations with the new nuclear reactor update! Me: Yay! I can finally build nuclear powered submarines! Also me: **C H E R N O B Y L I N T E N S I F I E S**
*grins* On my list of many wacky things to try are nuclear cars, planes, and other such things that the crazy people working on reactors in the 40s and 50s thought we'd be able to do one day. Submarines are an obvious application, as well as boats in general, but slap a reactor into a car and now you've really got a hot rod. ;) Nuclear trains should be totally feasible too.
Everyone makes nuclear ships, but you cannot escape people shooting missiles on servers anyways. I must think admins are constantly doing radiation maintenance
That's a really easy setup^^ Setting it up with a PID should be fairly simple; just need to set your temperature target as the setpoint (Can use a throttle or keypad for that). Use the actual core temperature for your variable, and then just play with your PID values until it behaves. When you want it completely turned off, you can just use a numerical switchbox and a button, with the On value being Reactor Shutdown, or vice versa.
In my experiments with making miniature reactors, I have found that you actually do not need control rods. The way I was controlling my reaction rate was by removing the fuel rods from the fuel assemblies if the boiler was at temp, or if the fuel rods got too hot. It honestly worked exceptionally well, the only issue I was having was the boiler its self would consistently generate too much pressure and blow, but everything else worked like a charm. I should say it was also pretty neat, seeing glowing fuel rods retract from the fuel assemblies.
this is risky but surprisingly effective. doing it this way gives up granular control of temperature in exchange for very rapid cooling capabilities at the caveat that you are adding quite a bit more load on the game's physics engine.
@@tacoman487 Indeed, I eventually found that a dual system works best. Using the rapid cooling of the removal way as an emergency tool. Given the reactors I was playing with were so small I only 2 control rods were needed to control the reaction, and so the size reduction wasnt major enough. It might actually work out better with larger reactors where theyre reactions are harder to control.
@@sjoerdbreimer Only for the moment though, they talked a lot lot about disposing the nuclear waste so eventually you will need new fuel rods once that's added. But the rods will still probably last way longer then a medium engine on a couple large tanks.
It found out when I was building the RBMK 1000 reactor for my Chernobyl reactor 2 build that the controle rods do not work when upside down. Also, 1693 fuel rods will slow down the game by a lot. Amazing update
Woot woot after seeing this i made a 24 core reactor with 3 control rods and a function gate for the control rods(x/500) and then i have the fuel.rods on a compact linear track, controlled by a numerical switchbox, greater than box, a few constant numbers, and a temp gauge for water (52k litre-think i need to lower cuz it aint gettin above 50), also each main core set (3 sets of 8) and it rides between 700, 800 in temp, seems to run fine, ty for the help!
Same here. I assumed they would start inserted and you would have to withdraw them to increase reactivity and temperature. I guess you can start inserted, just have the input set to 1 until you're ready to start up
Good,now I hope that the Devs will add more things to this nuclear space,for example IV Gen reactors,which are the standard for any ship or submarine,or maybe some other types of reactors because the one you built is basically a LWR,which uses a single channel of water both for cooling and for transferring heat. Maybe some BWR,PWR or even the CANDU would be awesome. The application are a lot,I know something would be pretty hard to understand but trust me,once you know the principles of nuclear and the key parts, you're set
When you first put the ten fuel rods on the top of the rail, you should have gotten a maximum output reaction -- they don't "start" generating heat when they're in their assemblies, they start just by being close to each other. They should be kept isolated until they're inserted into the reaction one at a time.
well I managed to get my rods to generate 17 degrees then drop back to 15 ... guess I'm doing something wrong... at least I am not near any meltdown risk :D
Hmmm, a sealed door, rods that have electrical connectors, water on standby for pumping in/out etc and you can build a horizontal reactor :O Thanks soooo much, MrNJ
Thank you for the tutorial, I'd like to add some help of my own. Control rods were the most annoying part of a reactor for me, since function blocks keep a static temperature and if you want to test what temperature works best, it is a god damn nightmare. Also that control rods are confusing to put in and for a while I actually thought they inserted into the fuel assembly like fuel rods - thank you, Stormworks description. To place them in right, you have to line up the black 'weld lines' on them with the fuel assembly, or three blocks lower than from the top of the assembly. Also, control rods limit the reaction rate of their neighbours, which means fuel rods that are diagonal or horizontal to them, that are right next to them. To use a PID to control the temperature of the rods, positive P values wont work. You have to use negative P values. I also recommend using a clamp for the PID, with the lower bound being 0.1 and the higher bound being 1. In my nuclear reactor, before I added the clamp, the temperature would fluctuate by about 300 degrees if I was aiming for 500. With the clamp, it only fluctuates by about 100. Not the best, but not the worst either. Quick edit: For the boilers, you dont have to use an on/off valve to control the pressure and temperature. Instead, you can use two PIDs. PID A reads the temperature of the boiler. PID B reads the pressure of the boiler. For PID A, link the output to a variable valve going to the "coolant" in of the boiler. For PID B, link the output to a seperate variable valve going into the water in on the back of the boiler. For me, PID A using P=1 and 0 on everything else works extremely well, and a target temp of 130 gets it to 129 and some decimal.
Touched Stormworks again recently, learned some new things from slapping together a reactor to get the basic concept down. A couple things: 1. On the PID that controls the control rods, set a max value of 1. This acts as a clamp and prevents integer runoff (correction value going up to 7 billion when the system only accepts 0-1). I find that a P value of -0.1 works beautifully at regulating reactor temperature, with an error of 0.3 degrees. Can't remember if I had any I/D gain, though.. 2. You can 'control' pressure by limiting the amount of water the boiler gets. This is done by making a closed loop with a water tank. This way, the boiler pressure will stay the same once it gets up to steam (hahahaha) 3. Condensers are... weird. Try to use a normal cooling loop and they turn steam into steam. From what I understand you can only put cold water in, making them a sort of black hole for water. This is fine for ships, though, because you have an infinite water source everywhere around you. For other things... not as much. I just put fluid ports onto the condensers with a pump straight into the coolant intakes. Works like a charm and is at ~55. 4. Reactors don't have to be terribly hot, apparently. Maybe it's the heat generated from the reactor seeping into everything around it but I could run it at 200 degrees and have enough temperature in the boiler to get steam. I thought something like 300 would be what you need, considering how much of a nice orange the fuel rods are. 5. I haven't tested it myself but I have heard you can take the steam from a turbine and run it directly into another turbine with no losses. (wtf infinite power?!?!?!) 6. 1000% have pumps to circulate steam and water throughout your closed loop. I tested to see if pumps vs. no pumps made a difference and they absolutely did. Without pumps I had 10-20 RPS or so on my turbine. With pumps it got to 50. Both without load, yes, but a massive difference.
So I set up my reactor, it is perfectly stable around 800-850 temp with 10 fuel rods and 4 control rods, however when I press the button to shut it down, the fuel rod blows up and irradiates the area. I assume it's due to shutting down the control rods as you disconnect the fuel. Am I correct in thinking this?
i can never stop the boiler from exploding, even with a regulator of some sort. and even with overheating turned off at some point the reactor stops producing power entirely.
I believe this is my opinion from some of the other guys I’ve seen that you’re supposed to use two different types of coolant for the boiler one from the heat source and one to keep the boiler from overheating that’s from some of the guides I’ve seen that A needs to be heat source, B needs to be something to keep the boiler from getting too hot
Unfortunately right now the reactors are just a huge waste of weight in any vehicle you make, the turbine makes close to no power whatsoever and even with multiple boilers and turbines the power output is laughable.
@@MrNJersey The most powerful one I've found makes 390 watts (or whatever the output figure for the generators is), which is a ridiculous number for something that big. I get 5 times that with a 4 cylinder 3x3 modular engine in a package which weights 10% that of the reactor (and that not taking into account the water spawned in the reactor vessel). I know reactors will always weight more that an internal combustion engine, but with the power they make right now it is impossible to use them in anything. I would need 3 reactors like that just to power a large electric motor at max power, it's just to much.
I think the reactors are more about lasting longer, as the fuel rods wont have to be replaced often. We may need more time with them too as playing with different reactor and steam setups gives greatly different results. If I'm wrong and they are underpowered though if we express this opinion enough the devs might change it.
Hrm, I've built a reactor identical to yours and my control rods do nothing. The description for control rods says they can be inserted into fuel assemblies, but that's pretty confusing since they seem to actuate on their own (they make a sound at least, I don't actually see the part moving..) EDIT: I'm dumb, the control rods were 1 block off from being aligned with the fuel assemblies, once I fixed that they worked fine.
The boilers, like radiators, don’t actually need tanks for the water that will be turned into steam. The boilers automatically contain fluid. However, it performs better with extra water tanks :)
@@MrNJersey I know, I was just saying it because of me forgetting to add tanks to a steam train I made before the tutorial lol. But what about the second question? I’ll have to test it.
I've been waiting for this update and I started playing around with different designs, but the only problem is that it seems that tge turbine does not have enough torque even using a single gearbox connected to a generator (the medium one) the best output I get is around 85 charge which can drive a large propeller at a mere 6 rps before it starts draining the batteries. So my question is what would be the one thing you suggest I add. Btw I'm using the same design at the preset provided from the update.
My pump doesn’t pump. Can’t figure out why. It’s hooked to a dedicated battery and constant on signal. It just doesn’t turn on. There’s way in the system. Piping is hooked up and fluid ports connected correctly.
you dont need a water tank for the boiler and condenser, they spawn with fluid in them like radiators EDIT: NVM from my testing having multiple turbines per boiler works best and turbines dont spawn with steam so when the boiler boils it loses water to steam so using a fluid tank inbetween the condenser and boiler will allow you to get to higher pressures.
Super cool video MrNJersey! If you do another one, it would be nice if you could put a word on at which speed the rod deplete? I guess they are not eternal right? And how to monitor this...
@@MrNJersey So can we consider the rod as "eternal" or they will be depleted at some point? (Sorry I am not in front of my gaming computer). Will test it out later :)
You have tutorial for everything. Something that does not exist on youtube is the way to configure the boiler intake valve so it wont blow up when the pressure will reach 10. Very difficult info to find. A clip on this would be awesome!
it does not.. sadly. because that's the current bottleneck, is the steam output of the turbine builds up... if we could convert sea water to fresh water with a desalinator we could actually get some power from these things.
I know this is old, but can anyone help with the boiler not blowing up, I know that it's because the pressure comes over 10, but I don't know how to stabilize it.
If you have not figured it out yet, you need to limit the coolant(hot water) in to the boiler by either using a variable or on/off valve. I actually use a throttle and variable valve so that i can set the flow to balance the flow with the pressure and temperature. You don't want to let the boiler get much over 115c so reducing the flow of heated water, you can balance the heat so it doesn't build or lose too much pressure.
My condenser just doesn't work. The water volume just slowly goes down, until it's on zero. I have a 2x3 fuel rod reactor, 4 boilers , 1 turbine for every boiler, 1 pump for every boiler, boiler fill level is on 0, tank fill level is on 7 and the function block is on x/10000. There is one condenser for every turbine and the condenser has 4 large radiators. The reactor's top temp is about 1100 °C. Every turbine goes to it's own fluid jet. Please help.
Top tips 1.make sure you place fuel rods on rail assembly.not ontop of fuel rod assembly. 2. Make sure your liquid spawner is set to water not diesel. 3. Drink more coffee
The rods dont actually cool the chamber, they stop it from getting more hot. The reason the temperature starts going down is because the steam generater attached is taking some of the heat
The control rods absorb the reaction created by the fuel rods. Pumping in cool water won’t help, as the reaction in the fuel rods is far too strong to let the temperature be affected by the water.
I don't get it, if you divide the fuel rod temperature by the desired temperature the result does not correlate with the desired position of the control rods. Eg. The core temperature is 250 and the target temperature is 250 then 250/250=1 and the control rods will be totally inserted and this will kill the reaction.
@@Tarucz Once I figured out how to make my fission water boiler actually work, then you basically have a overglorified radioactive tea kettle the size of a oil rig.
Can you use salt sea water or do fluitspawners spawn in fresh water for free asking because i dont know if fluid spawners work in carreer because they didnt work in carreer months ago
In game the control rods are used to regulate the reaction as the water in the reactor is not replaced nor is there any coolant for the reactor. If im correct in real life control rods are more of a safety mechanism to stop the reaction in emergencies right?
Is there anything i need to change that this reactor can run on a ship? I tried to integrate the reactor that you build in to my current submarine and it always overheats no matter what I try.
This is not how Nuclear reactors are built in RL but I guess if it works in stormworks... Why not. For anyone who is intereted in how it actually looks and works, I recomend the Chernobyl HBO serie. They explain it realy well there. (it's not for weak nerves thou. The series can be pretty heavy)
I built the nuclear reactor correctly, it seems like its working at first but then the turbines will just die, nothing explodes so Im wondering if anyone have any ideas on how this is happening, and what I could do to fix this.
Thank you so much for making this MrNJersey i was stuck making one, the preset one doesn't really make sense and doesn't have any output on the Generators.
Absorption rods must be between the fuel rods to slow down their reaction. And the fuel rods, if they are close to each other and there is nothing between them, should start a reaction and heat up even if they are not in the fuel assembly. By the way, the overclocked reactor cannot be stopped so easily. It will need more time for reactor to slow down. But the fact that loading nuclear fuel does not happen immediately and you need to manually load it is cool. It was possible that they did not spawn, but that they needed to be buy and brought from somewhere else and then inserted Nuclear fuel can be used up for a long time. With normal operation, it should be enough for 25 playing years The idea is that it is difficult to charge. And not because the nuclear reactor is weak or will end in 10 days. To absorb heat and radiation, you can make special heavy blocks or use ordinary heavy blocks. (Ру)
I made a massive reactor with 6 boilers and 10 turbines I was utterly disappointed at the performance. reactor temperature was around 1000 I was having 0 liquid in my boilers even with added tanks in my steam pressure was 41. Considering how heavy and large they are completely under powered at the moment.
I know a little bit about nuclear reactors Im not some smart dino that knows nuclear physics but i do understand reactors ... The Chernobyl reactor that blew up was the same design
I decided to take a few hours to try to make a reactor module so that it can fit in the center of a ship laying down, its been a challenge but I got through it I think
@@ILoveFood0911 not yet, still trying to work out the bugs in that, I just wanted to make sure I can get it to work at least. Right now I'm doing ship tests to see how effective it will be and such. I am thinking a cargo hatch setup on the top to be able to swing out to be able to reach down to get it but im still working on it
@@NightTyrant6 what I did was a winch and the slider tracks that have brakes on them, they can clear a one block gap without coming off track so you drain then open the hatch use a pull and release winch to pull it out, disconnect both winches and remove it however you please before setting your Second core on the track attaching your winches pulling it back in and refilling with water
-My engineering genius is glowing again
-The ideas are just radiating off of me
-My brain is already steaming
Your brain is chernobyl
@@redstone_orange my brain is chernobyl, meltdowns all dayyyy
* hardbass slowly fades in*
That pun hurt
XDXDXDXDXDXDXDXDXDXDXDXD
Ok, this seems... surprisingly simple, honestly, looking forward to giving this a go at some point
@@LaserTractor I can imagine something like a robotic arm that can attach itself to the rods and move them to special sealed containers.
@@LaserTractor the rod extraction process in real life is insanely complicated
@@LaserTractor true, I find NJ’s responses to be a little unhelpful
@@urgedpanda while at the same time simple, at least individually, that's redundancy for you
Comments posted moments before disaster
"You can acutally automate this process (controlling a nuclear reactor) by some simple logic."
All nuclear engineers: "Am I a joke to you?" :D :D
Just add a few AND gates, and boom, irl nuclear reactor
@@thatonedude-6819 Actually, you can build any logic by using only NANDs. So, it's basically true 😀
Yea in the example they just divide the temperature by 400 and feed that number to the control rods.
I am controlling my prototypes by changing that number via a keypad and with a numerical switcher I can switch to a throttle lever.
But I think you can also just a pid but you have to tune it really carefully.
I love how the first workshop creation i saw using the new update was a dirty bomb lol
The first thing I did was cause a meltdown!
About all it's useful for at the moment
Same
Wait until camodo gaming finds it :)
MrNJersey: Calm, Cool and Controled, no meltdowns for another 8000 years.
Me: Daily Meltdowns And a Brain that makes Chernobyl look tame and healthy.
Chernobyl is actually pretty much okay at the moment as far as i know
Chernobyl is actually pretty much okay at the moment as far as i know
I made quite a lot of testing and this is what I found for best performance:
Rods melt at 1,100 degrees, boilers burst at 10 pressure, Boilers give the best performance if the boiler temperature is closer to 100, but won't work under 100. Also need to keep pressure on boilers as close as 10 but clearly not go over. Condensers will condense fine if kept under 100 temp, You need 12 steam turbines, 6 boilers, and around 25 fuel rods? (i think if you run them at high temp they degrade quickly so its good to have sligthly more and throttle up over time to compensate radiation loss) to match the power of a large diesel engine. (if everything has great efficiency and running at near max capacity, with rods reaching almost meltdown temp). You'll need likely one condenser with 2 large radiators to cool all that down. So... basically... Nuclear power seems to be quite under powered taking into account that you need all that to match a single large diesel engine, and takes about 10 times the space. Ridiculous... Only good thing... well... lasts longer and doesn't need air.
I agree, also the torque obtained from the turbine is ridiculously low. considering we are talking a nuclear reactor.
If you flipped it upside down and did a power switch to the track, you could have an emergency shut down where you cut power and the fuel rods just drop out of the reactor when they are ejected
I'll be waiting to see creations with your ingenious idea!
That's how I'm building a small reactor atm, the fuel rods are lifted in and the entire fuel rod/control rod/primary water containment assembly is also on a set of rails so the whole lot can be lifted/slid out for refuelling/repairing a damaged core. Not relying on gravity also has the added benefit that the reactor can be led down for use in trains and ships that aren't that tall (subs etc).
Its just a shame the steam turbines are really weak right now, either that or I'm doing something wrong lol
@@marko247 I had the same thoughts about it, especially looking to build a reactor horizontally to better fit in a sub, for example. I haven’t tested enough yet, but how do you actually replace a depleted or damaged rod when the time comes? Can’t seem to see how :/
@@holgerkrog8549 not sure if they drop out automatically without power tho, going to do some tests
I'm working on one for my test ship with system that sealed the engine room and then ejected the entire reactor out and switch to battery.
Yeah Neptune gonna hate me but I just wonder if the radiation still on the ship if the reactor is gone.
I feel like the steam turbine and boiler need a buff, steam turbines need to atleast be as strong as a jet engine, maybe even stronger. And the boiler can only take 10 bar in pressure, even a plastic bottle can do better.
They are weak, they are also insanely heavy.
Seriously? The Flying Scotsman (built in 1923) had a boiler that operated at up to 15.16 bar (220 psi)! So the boilers we have aren't even up to coal standards. 😳
Heck, the Titanic could manage 215 psi!
I don’t remember seeing anything saying it was measured in bar or psi, can you tell me where I can find that?
@@MrNJersey I’m not sure where you would find the information, but 1 atmosphere is about 14.7 PSI, so if Stormworks uses the same atmospheric pressure as Earth, a boiler at 10 PSI would be under vacuum at sea level.
I feel like they should have added pistons much like a real steam train that could maybe be hooked up to modular engine crankshafts.
Great news they have
Flywheels 😳
@@TheJelleH you can use modular flywheels if you have a modular clutch on each side of it
Stormworks developers: I wish users can build more creations with the new nuclear reactor update!
Me: Yay! I can finally build nuclear powered submarines!
Also me: **C H E R N O B Y L I N T E N S I F I E S**
*grins* On my list of many wacky things to try are nuclear cars, planes, and other such things that the crazy people working on reactors in the 40s and 50s thought we'd be able to do one day. Submarines are an obvious application, as well as boats in general, but slap a reactor into a car and now you've really got a hot rod. ;) Nuclear trains should be totally feasible too.
@@stevepittman3770 ive already built a nuke train, was great. Now spycakes terminal is a radioactive dead zone
@@masterenos 'I blew up a reactor and all I got was this t-shirt' lol.
Everyone makes nuclear ships, but you cannot escape people shooting missiles on servers anyways. I must think admins are constantly doing radiation maintenance
I was so scared when my reactor blew up first time XD
Such great help for a large majority of players that couldn't figure it out with the preset!
Glad you enjoy it!
Nice fake verified checkmark...
@@cdredstone I am me tho.
Yea, or say, forgets about the examples, and throws 30 cores in with no way to remove them so it blows up and ruins an island.
That's a really easy setup^^ Setting it up with a PID should be fairly simple; just need to set your temperature target as the setpoint (Can use a throttle or keypad for that). Use the actual core temperature for your variable, and then just play with your PID values until it behaves. When you want it completely turned off, you can just use a numerical switchbox and a button, with the On value being Reactor Shutdown, or vice versa.
How would you turn off a reactor tho?
@@NCIA-93 Release the fuel rods and pull them up out of the assembly. It will automatically shut off.
In my experiments with making miniature reactors, I have found that you actually do not need control rods. The way I was controlling my reaction rate was by removing the fuel rods from the fuel assemblies if the boiler was at temp, or if the fuel rods got too hot. It honestly worked exceptionally well, the only issue I was having was the boiler its self would consistently generate too much pressure and blow, but everything else worked like a charm. I should say it was also pretty neat, seeing glowing fuel rods retract from the fuel assemblies.
this is risky but surprisingly effective. doing it this way gives up granular control of temperature in exchange for very rapid cooling capabilities at the caveat that you are adding quite a bit more load on the game's physics engine.
@@tacoman487 Indeed, I eventually found that a dual system works best. Using the rapid cooling of the removal way as an emergency tool. Given the reactors I was playing with were so small I only 2 control rods were needed to control the reaction, and so the size reduction wasnt major enough. It might actually work out better with larger reactors where theyre reactions are harder to control.
Is it just me or are the reactors quite underpowered? A medium engine has more power than the example reactor.
I fully agree
I am getting only about 10rps on a large generator with nuclear power compared to 22rps with a large engine and a large gen.
@@thingymuhbob you must admit its unlimeted power
@@sjoerdbreimer Only for the moment though, they talked a lot lot about disposing the nuclear waste so eventually you will need new fuel rods once that's added. But the rods will still probably last way longer then a medium engine on a couple large tanks.
@@riker8146 thats for sure
I will install some blue lights in my reactor just to imitate cheherenkov radiation
Great idea! I just did the same. Thanks.
It found out when I was building the RBMK 1000 reactor for my Chernobyl reactor 2 build that the controle rods do not work when upside down. Also, 1693 fuel rods will slow down the game by a lot. Amazing update
Woot woot after seeing this i made a 24 core reactor with 3 control rods and a function gate for the control rods(x/500) and then i have the fuel.rods on a compact linear track, controlled by a numerical switchbox, greater than box, a few constant numbers, and a temp gauge for water (52k litre-think i need to lower cuz it aint gettin above 50), also each main core set (3 sets of 8) and it rides between 700, 800 in temp, seems to run fine, ty for the help!
Honestly I built the reactor only to find that I was using the control rods wrong
Same here. I assumed they would start inserted and you would have to withdraw them to increase reactivity and temperature. I guess you can start inserted, just have the input set to 1 until you're ready to start up
Thank you for this tutorial, it has helped me create an unimaginably compact generator for my micro stealth submarine. You deserve a million likes
Good,now I hope that the Devs will add more things to this nuclear space,for example IV Gen reactors,which are the standard for any ship or submarine,or maybe some other types of reactors because the one you built is basically a LWR,which uses a single channel of water both for cooling and for transferring heat. Maybe some BWR,PWR or even the CANDU would be awesome.
The application are a lot,I know something would be pretty hard to understand but trust me,once you know the principles of nuclear and the key parts, you're set
When you first put the ten fuel rods on the top of the rail, you should have gotten a maximum output reaction -- they don't "start" generating heat when they're in their assemblies, they start just by being close to each other. They should be kept isolated until they're inserted into the reaction one at a time.
Alas, the game only "activates" them when they are in their little assemblies.
well I managed to get my rods to generate 17 degrees then drop back to 15 ... guess I'm doing something wrong... at least I am not near any meltdown risk
:D
Hmmm, a sealed door, rods that have electrical connectors, water on standby for pumping in/out etc and you can build a horizontal reactor :O
Thanks soooo much, MrNJ
Thank you for the tutorial, I'd like to add some help of my own.
Control rods were the most annoying part of a reactor for me, since function blocks keep a static temperature and if you want to test what temperature works best, it is a god damn nightmare. Also that control rods are confusing to put in and for a while I actually thought they inserted into the fuel assembly like fuel rods - thank you, Stormworks description.
To place them in right, you have to line up the black 'weld lines' on them with the fuel assembly, or three blocks lower than from the top of the assembly.
Also, control rods limit the reaction rate of their neighbours, which means fuel rods that are diagonal or horizontal to them, that are right next to them.
To use a PID to control the temperature of the rods, positive P values wont work. You have to use negative P values.
I also recommend using a clamp for the PID, with the lower bound being 0.1 and the higher bound being 1.
In my nuclear reactor, before I added the clamp, the temperature would fluctuate by about 300 degrees if I was aiming for 500.
With the clamp, it only fluctuates by about 100. Not the best, but not the worst either.
Quick edit:
For the boilers, you dont have to use an on/off valve to control the pressure and temperature. Instead, you can use two PIDs.
PID A reads the temperature of the boiler. PID B reads the pressure of the boiler.
For PID A, link the output to a variable valve going to the "coolant" in of the boiler. For PID B, link the output to a seperate variable valve going into the water in on the back of the boiler.
For me, PID A using P=1 and 0 on everything else works extremely well, and a target temp of 130 gets it to 129 and some decimal.
What did you put the setpoint of PID B as?
@@Babadaboopi 1, but so far I haven't been able to control pressure using PIDs, only temperature
Touched Stormworks again recently, learned some new things from slapping together a reactor to get the basic concept down. A couple things:
1. On the PID that controls the control rods, set a max value of 1. This acts as a clamp and prevents integer runoff (correction value going up to 7 billion when the system only accepts 0-1). I find that a P value of -0.1 works beautifully at regulating reactor temperature, with an error of 0.3 degrees. Can't remember if I had any I/D gain, though..
2. You can 'control' pressure by limiting the amount of water the boiler gets. This is done by making a closed loop with a water tank. This way, the boiler pressure will stay the same once it gets up to steam (hahahaha)
3. Condensers are... weird. Try to use a normal cooling loop and they turn steam into steam. From what I understand you can only put cold water in, making them a sort of black hole for water. This is fine for ships, though, because you have an infinite water source everywhere around you. For other things... not as much. I just put fluid ports onto the condensers with a pump straight into the coolant intakes. Works like a charm and is at ~55.
4. Reactors don't have to be terribly hot, apparently. Maybe it's the heat generated from the reactor seeping into everything around it but I could run it at 200 degrees and have enough temperature in the boiler to get steam. I thought something like 300 would be what you need, considering how much of a nice orange the fuel rods are.
5. I haven't tested it myself but I have heard you can take the steam from a turbine and run it directly into another turbine with no losses. (wtf infinite power?!?!?!)
6. 1000% have pumps to circulate steam and water throughout your closed loop. I tested to see if pumps vs. no pumps made a difference and they absolutely did. Without pumps I had 10-20 RPS or so on my turbine. With pumps it got to 50. Both without load, yes, but a massive difference.
For anyone who needs it, if your boiler keeps exploding, you need to lower the amount of fluid in your system.
Thank you! Probably alot easier than regulating the temp of my reactor perfectly
Yes mentioned in coal video and nuclear vidoe
nj:makes a nuclear engine
me:makes a nuclear missile that overheats and sends out radiation
So I set up my reactor, it is perfectly stable around 800-850 temp with 10 fuel rods and 4 control rods, however when I press the button to shut it down, the fuel rod blows up and irradiates the area. I assume it's due to shutting down the control rods as you disconnect the fuel. Am I correct in thinking this?
i can never stop the boiler from exploding, even with a regulator of some sort. and even with overheating turned off at some point the reactor stops producing power entirely.
I believe this is my opinion from some of the other guys I’ve seen that you’re supposed to use two different types of coolant for the boiler one from the heat source and one to keep the boiler from overheating that’s from some of the guides I’ve seen that A needs to be heat source, B needs to be something to keep the boiler from getting too hot
Admit it, everyone tried to blow this up the first time you tried these new blocks out... lol
Yup lol!
Unfortunately right now the reactors are just a huge waste of weight in any vehicle you make, the turbine makes close to no power whatsoever and even with multiple boilers and turbines the power output is laughable.
Make sure you are building them correctly, alot of workshop creators have already got amazing powerful creations using them.
@@MrNJersey I’m pushing the limit of the reactor/steam setup and I can’t get more than 40 rps and 26 torque with no load
Shh, remember we're not allowed to have opinions in this community
@@MrNJersey The most powerful one I've found makes 390 watts (or whatever the output figure for the generators is), which is a ridiculous number for something that big. I get 5 times that with a 4 cylinder 3x3 modular engine in a package which weights 10% that of the reactor (and that not taking into account the water spawned in the reactor vessel).
I know reactors will always weight more that an internal combustion engine, but with the power they make right now it is impossible to use them in anything. I would need 3 reactors like that just to power a large electric motor at max power, it's just to much.
I think the reactors are more about lasting longer, as the fuel rods wont have to be replaced often. We may need more time with them too as playing with different reactor and steam setups gives greatly different results. If I'm wrong and they are underpowered though if we express this opinion enough the devs might change it.
Hrm, I've built a reactor identical to yours and my control rods do nothing. The description for control rods says they can be inserted into fuel assemblies, but that's pretty confusing since they seem to actuate on their own (they make a sound at least, I don't actually see the part moving..)
EDIT: I'm dumb, the control rods were 1 block off from being aligned with the fuel assemblies, once I fixed that they worked fine.
The boilers, like radiators, don’t actually need tanks for the water that will be turned into steam. The boilers automatically contain fluid. However, it performs better with extra water tanks :)
But in theory, couldn’t you let the steam vent to atmosphere and have no tank, simply sucking in water from the ocean?
Already covered in Coal build of what the use of fluid tanks are.
@@MrNJersey I know, I was just saying it because of me forgetting to add tanks to a steam train I made before the tutorial lol. But what about the second question? I’ll have to test it.
Its cool that MrNJersey a nuclear expert now :D
I remember wishing this game had reactors and steam engines. I'm excited to learn that they are here
Stormworks is turning into Allworks: Build and Utilize.
and i love it
Thanks for helping to build nuclear.
Just a thought, build the reactors upsidown to how he did it so the rods won't just drop into the assembly in the event of power failure on the track
Honestly little surprised he built them that way up, one lightning strike or accidental power failure and that's going boom
For those wondering why there condenser is not working. Add more radiatiors.
I've been waiting for this update and I started playing around with different designs, but the only problem is that it seems that tge turbine does not have enough torque even using a single gearbox connected to a generator (the medium one) the best output I get is around 85 charge which can drive a large propeller at a mere 6 rps before it starts draining the batteries. So my question is what would be the one thing you suggest I add. Btw I'm using the same design at the preset provided from the update.
First idea that pops into my head… “how many rods can I use until I practically break the game
1693 according to another guy
@@EdyAlbertoMSGT3 wow that’s a lot
Can you vent ballast tanks with steam. That would be nice would solve the pumps not working at high pressures.
Interesting idea, however does steam get effected by pressure
Interesting idea, however does steam get effected by pressure
Shouldn’t the reactor itself work as a boiler?
My pump doesn’t pump. Can’t figure out why. It’s hooked to a dedicated battery and constant on signal. It just doesn’t turn on. There’s way in the system. Piping is hooked up and fluid ports connected correctly.
Figured it out. Boiler was backwards. Did realize the direction of flow mattered for the boiler but it does.
Can I suggest a tutorial on nuclear rod replacement, storage and other information tutorial?
It's not that hard, to replace it you just need quite simple moving parts and magnets
you dont need a water tank for the boiler and condenser, they spawn with fluid in them like radiators
EDIT: NVM from my testing having multiple turbines per boiler works best and turbines dont spawn with steam so when the boiler boils it loses water to steam so using a fluid tank inbetween the condenser and boiler will allow you to get to higher pressures.
Hope to see a epic nuclear reactor build would be epic
You already know I’m going to intentionally cause a meltdown
Question, if you are using 25, how much temperature can withstand?
Super cool video MrNJersey! If you do another one, it would be nice if you could put a word on at which speed the rod deplete? I guess they are not eternal right? And how to monitor this...
Currently no way to monitor externally
@@MrNJersey So can we consider the rod as "eternal" or they will be depleted at some point? (Sorry I am not in front of my gaming computer). Will test it out later :)
You have tutorial for everything. Something that does not exist on youtube is the way to configure the boiler intake valve so it wont blow up when the pressure will reach 10. Very difficult info to find. A clip on this would be awesome!
My question is, does the does the boiler+condenser also convert sea water to fresh water?
My question is does it accept salt water
it does not.. sadly. because that's the current bottleneck, is the steam output of the turbine builds up...
if we could convert sea water to fresh water with a desalinator we could actually get some power from these things.
That’s it I’m sold give me fucking stormworks
I know this is old, but can anyone help with the boiler not blowing up, I know that it's because the pressure comes over 10, but I don't know how to stabilize it.
If you have not figured it out yet, you need to limit the coolant(hot water) in to the boiler by either using a variable or on/off valve. I actually use a throttle and variable valve so that i can set the flow to balance the flow with the pressure and temperature. You don't want to let the boiler get much over 115c so reducing the flow of heated water, you can balance the heat so it doesn't build or lose too much pressure.
Can you build a horizontal reactor tho?
One question: can we put rods horizontal way? Or only vertical?
You can do both horizontal or vertical.
Everyone gansta till Comrade Dyatlov joins the game.
My condenser just doesn't work. The water volume just slowly goes down, until it's on zero. I have a 2x3 fuel rod reactor, 4 boilers , 1 turbine for every boiler, 1 pump for every boiler, boiler fill level is on 0, tank fill level is on 7 and the function block is on x/10000. There is one condenser for every turbine and the condenser has 4 large radiators. The reactor's top temp is about 1100 °C. Every turbine goes to it's own fluid jet. Please help.
Thanks! A great start to my nuclear bomb!
for some reason my control rods dont do anything, the tempature still keeps rising
Top tips
1.make sure you place fuel rods on rail assembly.not ontop of fuel rod assembly.
2. Make sure your liquid spawner is set to water not diesel.
3. Drink more coffee
What I'm seeing; A nuclear meltdown is possible, and bad.
What I'm hearing; It's absolutely possible for me to drop a dirty bomb on my friends.
can i only cool the reactor with the rods or could i also pump in cool water?
The rods control the reaction rate. Pumping in cool water won’t do much.
The rods dont actually cool the chamber, they stop it from getting more hot. The reason the temperature starts going down is because the steam generater attached is taking some of the heat
The control rods absorb the reaction created by the fuel rods. Pumping in cool water won’t help, as the reaction in the fuel rods is far too strong to let the temperature be affected by the water.
Can't wait to build an RBMK
Last time they built an RMBK in a town where the name started with C it didn’t go well
I don't get it, if you divide the fuel rod temperature by the desired temperature the result does not correlate with the desired position of the control rods. Eg. The core temperature is 250 and the target temperature is 250 then 250/250=1 and the control rods will be totally inserted and this will kill the reaction.
can it be a horizontal reactor too?
yes, I did it and it works very well, I cant refuel it tho idk if its possible horizontally
I just wanna build like, a bigass reactor.
Like, BIG.
Soo big it needs to be on the oil rig kinda big.
I will be definitely using it lol
@@Tarucz Once I figured out how to make my fission water boiler actually work, then you basically have a overglorified radioactive tea kettle the size of a oil rig.
@@germanmemerboi3157 lol
Now my nuclear submarine is finally coming to life thank you my good sir
Why does the heated reactor fluid need to be additionally heated in the boiler? Isn't it already heated?
6:15 does the water have to be fresh water or can it be pumped in from the ocean
"And hopefully, we will be using gravity Go and drop it into that assembly"
-physicist Louis Slotin, May 21 1946
Nuclear powered car incoming!
Be a massive car
Ok, and?
hey @MrNJersey can we turn seawater via the steam components into fresh water?
Could you make a microcontroller to control the temperature of reactor depending on how much we want
Use a PID
@@ILoveFood0911 yeh problem solved thank
I wosh you had made this like 12 hrs ago lol before i ruined my island accidentally
how are you seeing all that info when you mouse over things like the boiler and such
Put tooltip detail (in settings then general) to detailed
Can you use salt sea water or do fluitspawners spawn in fresh water for free asking because i dont know if fluid spawners work in carreer because they didnt work in carreer months ago
Yes. You can spawn either sea water or fresh water in career mode.
Usually you would use gravity to insert the "control" rods, not the fuel rods.. but.. to each their own :D
In game the control rods are used to regulate the reaction as the water in the reactor is not replaced nor is there any coolant for the reactor. If im correct in real life control rods are more of a safety mechanism to stop the reaction in emergencies right?
@@natelav534 Correct. They regulate the reaction, but SCRAM inserts them all the way to stop the reactor in emergencies.
Next Major Update: Fusion Reactors
Is there anything i need to change that this reactor can run on a ship? I tried to integrate the reactor that you build in to my current submarine and it always overheats no matter what I try.
This is not how Nuclear reactors are built in RL but I guess if it works in stormworks... Why not.
For anyone who is intereted in how it actually looks and works, I recomend the Chernobyl HBO serie. They explain it realy well there. (it's not for weak nerves thou. The series can be pretty heavy)
You can buld a atomic ice cruszer with a 2 big reaktors
I wish I had PC so I could make things like this
Great video keep up the good work!
Thanks!
I can already see all the chernobil builds......
I want to build gipsy danger from pacific rim using a nuke reactor to power it
@@KiRiTO72987 good luck
When i made this with more fuel rod and control rods, the temperature are not coming down at all, any idea why?
You should have showed us what the reactor looks like if you blow it up!
I built the nuclear reactor correctly, it seems like its working at first but then the turbines will just die, nothing explodes so Im wondering if anyone have any ideas on how this is happening, and what I could do to fix this.
Thank you so much for making this MrNJersey i was stuck making one, the preset one doesn't really make sense and doesn't have any output on the Generators.
Glad to hear it!
How long does the fuel last?
Can i use salt water for the boiler?
You can try……
@@MrNJersey I will thanks!
the x/600 only goes to that temperature then cools back to 0 how do i keep it between two temperatures?
how do you get the stats to pop up to check for flow?
Time to make the nukes!!!!!
Absorption rods must be between the fuel rods to slow down their reaction. And the fuel rods, if they are close to each other and there is nothing between them, should start a reaction and heat up even if they are not in the fuel assembly.
By the way, the overclocked reactor cannot be stopped so easily. It will need more time for reactor to slow down.
But the fact that loading nuclear fuel does not happen immediately and you need to manually load it is cool. It was possible that they did not spawn, but that they needed to be buy and brought from somewhere else and then inserted
Nuclear fuel can be used up for a long time. With normal operation, it should be enough for 25 playing years
The idea is that it is difficult to charge. And not because the nuclear reactor is weak or will end in 10 days.
To absorb heat and radiation, you can make special heavy blocks or use ordinary heavy blocks.
(Ру)
Thats how it would work irl but stormworks isnt that sophisticated. Even the devs demonstration reactor only has the rods on the sides.
Glad to see more things being added that I’m not gonna touch because it’s literally nuclear science
I made a massive reactor with 6 boilers and 10 turbines I was utterly disappointed at the performance. reactor temperature was around 1000 I was having 0 liquid in my boilers even with added tanks in my steam pressure was 41. Considering how heavy and large they are completely under powered at the moment.
this helped!
exept that i screwed something up and now the temp is raising slow..
when you make a nuclear power car: Chernomobile
I know a little bit about nuclear reactors
Im not some smart dino that knows nuclear physics but i do understand reactors
... The Chernobyl reactor that blew up was the same design
I was always thinking: when will I use functions. Now I know
I decided to take a few hours to try to make a reactor module so that it can fit in the center of a ship laying down, its been a challenge but I got through it I think
Is it able to be refueled or no
@@ILoveFood0911 not yet, still trying to work out the bugs in that, I just wanted to make sure I can get it to work at least. Right now I'm doing ship tests to see how effective it will be and such. I am thinking a cargo hatch setup on the top to be able to swing out to be able to reach down to get it but im still working on it
@@ILoveFood0911 nuclear reactor doesn't require refueling. It's unlimited.
@@thelightbrigadef4172 it won't stay that way, the rods are supposed to burn out eventually whenever they add that
@@NightTyrant6 what I did was a winch and the slider tracks that have brakes on them, they can clear a one block gap without coming off track so you drain then open the hatch use a pull and release winch to pull it out, disconnect both winches and remove it however you please before setting your Second core on the track attaching your winches pulling it back in and refilling with water