Codex Energy Industrial Boiler

Industrial Boiler

The Industrial Boiler turns water into steam. It burns solid fuel or fuel gas in its Combustion Chambers, or takes heat from other plants through Heat Ports, and boils water in its Heat Exchanger Tubes. Its steam drives the Steam Turbine and the Gasifier. It is the heart of every tier I power plant.

How it works

1. Fuel burns. Each Combustion Chamber burns up to 100 HU/t, but only while the boiler is colder than its setpoint.
2. The boiler heats up. All heat raises the temperature of the whole boiler; a big boiler needs more heat for each degree.
3. Water boils. Above 100 °C the Heat Exchanger Tubes turn water into steam, up to 40 mB/t per tube. Every mB of steam takes 1 HU out of the boiler.
4. Steam leaves through the Fluid Output Port; pipes pull it to the turbine.

Water expands 10-fold: 1 mB of water gives 10 mB of steam. The example below has nine chambers and eighteen tubes: it burns up to nine times 100 HU/t and boils up to eighteen times 40 mB/t of steam.

Building

Shown size: 5 wide, 5 high, 5 deep (adjustable: Width 3–16, Height 4–16, Depth 3–16).

One example of many: within the rules on this page, size and arrangement are up to you; the Build Projector shows the plan in every allowed size.

	Key	Block	Count
	A	Boiler Casing	85
	D	Heat Exchanger Tubes	18
	C	Combustion Chamber	9
	B	Industrial Sight Glass	8
	F	Fluid Input Port	1
	H	Fluid Output Port	1
	G	Gas Input Port	1
	E	Item Input Port	1
	0	Industrial Boiler Controller	1

Step by step

Each picture adds one layer, from the bottom up; the newest layer is bright. The controller wall faces you on the left.

Step 1: Layer 1

Parts in this step: Boiler Casing (A) ×25

Step 2: Layer 2

Parts in this step: Boiler Casing (A) ×11, Combustion Chamber (C) ×9, Industrial Sight Glass (B) ×2, Industrial Boiler Controller (0) ×1, Fluid Input Port (F) ×1, Item Input Port (E) ×1

Step 3: Layer 3

Parts in this step: Boiler Casing (A) ×12, Heat Exchanger Tubes (D) ×9, Industrial Sight Glass (B) ×3, Gas Input Port (G) ×1

Step 4: Layer 4

Parts in this step: Boiler Casing (A) ×13, Heat Exchanger Tubes (D) ×9, Industrial Sight Glass (B) ×3

Step 5: Layer 5

Parts in this step: Boiler Casing (A) ×24, Fluid Output Port (H) ×1

Rules

• Size: at least 3 wide, 4 high and 3 deep, at most perf.maxStructureSize (default 16, allowed 5–32) in every direction. Any box shape works; the boiler finds its size from the controller.
• Edges and corners: only Boiler Casing.
• Walls, floor and roof: Boiler Casing, Industrial Sight Glass, Inspection Hatches, Safety Valves, the ports and the controller.
• Inside: air, Combustion Chambers and Heat Exchanger Tubes. Combustion Chambers may only stand on the lowest layer of the inside; tubes may go anywhere inside.
• Needed: at least one Combustion Chamber and one Heat Exchanger Tubes block.
• Controller: in a wall face (not on an edge), front facing out, with the inside directly behind it.
• Ports (any number, in wall faces, each works only on its outer face):
• Fluid Input Port: water in.
• Fluid Output Port: steam out (pipes pull it).
• Item Input Port: solid fuel in.
• Gas Input Port: syngas or natural gas, and oxygen.
• Heat Port: heat in from a neighbouring plant.

An Inspection Hatch opens the controller's screen from wherever it sits in the wall.

Fuel

• Solid fuel: everything that burns in a furnace, plus Biomass (25 % of the heat of coal). Every tick of furnace burn time gives 100 HU: one piece of coal, which burns 80 seconds in a furnace, gives 160,000 of them. The fuel goes into nine fuel slots through the Item Input Port; the screen has no slots of its own.
• Fuel gas: Syngas gives 1 HU per mB, natural gas 2 HU per mB. The gas tank holds one kind at a time. Fuel gas is only burnt when the heat of the solid fuel is not enough for the chambers. Compressed gas is not accepted.
• Oxyfuel: with oxygen in its oxygen tank (16,000 mB) the boiler burns gas with oxygen: 1 mB of oxygen per 2 mB of gas, and each mB of gas gives 1.25 times its heat. Without enough oxygen it burns with air as before. Oxygen comes from the Electrolyzer or the Air Separator.
• Heat Ports: a Heat Port takes heat from the Heat Port of a neighbouring plant (the exhaust of a Gas Turbine or Gas Engine, a Solar Receiver, a reactor loop), from a Geothermal Heat Exchanger or an Electric Heater. All Heat Ports together take at most 40 HU/t per tube, as much as the tubes can boil.

The server's volt.fuelConsumptionMultiplier (default 1.0, allowed 0.01–100.0) makes fuel last shorter (2 = half the heat per piece and per mB).

Tip

Syngas belongs in a gas turbine In the boiler syngas gives only 1 HU per mB. A Gas Turbine makes more of it and hands its hot exhaust to the boiler anyway.

Operation in depth

• Setpoint: the chambers only burn while the temperature is below the setpoint. The - and + buttons change it by 10 °C, between 100 and 350 °C; a new boiler starts at 250 °C. Fuel alone can therefore never overheat the boiler.
• Steam rate: each tube boils up to 40 mB/t times the superheat: 0 at 100 °C, rising evenly to the full rate at 250 °C. Below a setpoint of 250 °C the tubes never reach their full rate. The steam is also limited by the heat stored above 100 °C, by the water (one mB of water per 10 mB of steam) and by room in the steam tank. Only whole mB of water are used.
• Heat capacity: for every degree the boiler needs 50 plus 10 for every block of the box (walls included), in HU. The 5×5×5 example (125 blocks) needs 1,300 for one degree.
• Losses: the shell loses 0.005 HU/t per degree above 20 °C, times the square root of the box volume. A hot boiler without fuel cools down slowly.
• Load: the steam rate against the most the tubes can boil.
• Chambers and tubes: one chamber gives 100 HU/t, one tube boils up to 40 mB/t. Two and a half tubes per chamber use the chambers fully. The example, with two tubes per chamber, is limited by its tubes; its chambers simply pause whenever the setpoint is reached. More tubes give more steam and also let more heat in through Heat Ports.

Overpressure and Safety Valves

Heat from Heat Ports keeps coming even above the setpoint. If the steam cannot leave (the steam tank is full or no pipe takes it), the temperature keeps rising:

• From 380 °C a warning sign appears over the boiler and the screen warns. Every Safety Valve in the walls then blows off up to 1,000 HU/t as steam into the air ("Overpressure: safety valves blowing off").
• Without valves the screen shows "OVERPRESSURE: steam cannot leave, the shell will burst".
• At 450 °C the shell bursts: an explosion, stronger for a bigger boiler and more stored steam, and all water and steam are lost. Blocks are only destroyed when the server allows it with safety.terrainDamage (default false).
• With safety.safeMode (default false) the boiler refuses outside heat from 380 °C instead of bursting.

See Incidents for what an explosion does.

The screen

• Status: "Formed", the overpressure lines above, or the structure error.
• Bars for Water, Steam and Fuel gas.
• Temperature, Setpoint, Load, Steam (the steam rate in mB/t), Fuel heat (HU) (heat of the solid fuel already taken in and not yet burnt), Safety valves (how many there are) and Oxygen (oxyfuel +25 %).
• The diagram: fuel → combustion (with the heat that came in) → heat exchanger → steam; water flows into the heat exchanger.
• - and + next to the setpoint.

Automation

• Pipes bring water to the Fluid Input Port, fuel to the Item Input Port and gas to the Gas Input Port. Each port only accepts what the boiler can use.
• Steam leaves only through the Fluid Output Port and must be pulled by a pipe.
• Nothing else can be taken out: the fuel slots are input only.
• A Grid Monitor does not pause the boiler.

Error messages

Message	What to do
The controller must sit in a wall, front facing out	Put the controller into a wall face, front outwards, with the inside behind it.
Structure too small (…)	Build at least 3 wide, 4 high and 3 deep.
Structure too large or not closed near …	Close the wall at the position shown, or build smaller.
Wrong block at … (expected: Boiler Casing)	Only Boiler Casing on edges and corners.
Wrong block at … (expected: Boiler Casing, Industrial Sight Glass, Inspection Hatch, Safety Valve)	Only these parts, the ports and the controller in the walls.
Wrong block at … (expected: Air, Combustion Chamber, Heat Exchanger Tubes)	Only these blocks inside.
Wrong block at … (expected: Combustion Chamber on the floor)	A Combustion Chamber stands above the lowest layer of the inside; move it down.
Missing parts: Combustion Chamber ×1 / Heat Exchanger Tubes ×1	Add at least one of each.
Port not allowed here: …	Only the five port kinds above work; energy ports do not.
Second controller at …	Remove the other controller.
Part of the structure is not loaded (…)	Load the chunks of the whole boiler.

Building the parts

	Redstone Dust
	Redstone Comparator		→ Industrial Boiler Controller

	Bricks
Bricks		Bricks	→ Boiler Casing
	Bricks

	Bricks
Bricks	Furnace	Bricks	→ Combustion Chamber
	Bricks

			→ Heat Exchanger Tubes

	Iron Bars
			→ Safety Valve

Breaking the controller

The fuel in the slots drops. Water, steam, gas and the heat of the boiler are lost.

In the world

Behind the glass embers glow and steam swirls, stronger with the load. While solid fuel burns, flue smoke rises from the roof. The Combustion Chambers and, less, the tubes glow red with the temperature, from about 120 °C up to the warning temperature.

Tip

Closing the water loop A Condenser turns the turbine's exhaust steam back into water at the same ratio of 10 to 1, so the water runs in a circle and you only top up what Safety Valves blew off.

Warning

Plan the steam path before you add Heat Ports A boiler that only burns fuel is safe: at the setpoint the chambers stop. A boiler with Heat Ports needs a steam consumer that always takes the steam, or at least one Safety Valve.