Anti-jam Stack Inserter

Anti-jam Stack Inserter

A stack inserter that never jams up waiting for a full hand.

The Space Age stack inserter won't swing until its hand is full, but a hand only holds one kind of item at one quality, so it can get stuck:

• Quality items: A higher quality item from a machine or on a mixed belt can leave it

stuck waiting for more items of that quality.

• Spoilable items: discarding spoilage from a machine can leave it stuck.

An anti-jam stack inserter will swing immediately when picking up items from a chest. When picking up items from a belt it waits about a third of a second before it will swing.

It's purple, in the style of the classic filter inserter, so you can tell them apart at a glance (other colors are available, see below). It has the same speed, power use, health and hand size as the stack inserter, and inserter capacity research applies the same way.

Getting anti-jam stack inserters

A startup setting, Item mode, chooses how they're obtained.

Smart swapping (default)

There's nothing extra to craft or research: anti-jam stack inserters are built from your stack inserters, and mining one gives you a stack inserter back, keeping its quality.

• Upgrade planner: add a rule from stack inserter to anti-jam stack inserter (or the

other way) and drag it over your inserters. Construction robots swap them for free. Set the rule's quality to match the inserters you're upgrading.

• Blueprints and ghosts: anti-jam stack inserters in a blueprint are built by

construction robots from stack inserters in your logistic network.

• Pipette (Q): pipette an anti-jam stack inserter or its ghost and you can place real

ones straight from the stack inserters in your inventory.

• Quickbar: you can put the anti-jam stack inserter on your quickbar. If your interface

settings give you a ghost when you pick an item you don't have, picking it uses the stack inserters in your inventory instead.

• Placing a stack inserter from your inventory still places a regular stack inserter.

Your inventory, chests and logistic network only ever hold stack inserters, so there's nothing separate to stock or request. Cheat mode can create actual anti-jam stack inserter items but that's up to the user to deal with.

If you switch an existing save to smart swapping, any anti-jam stack inserter items are turned back into stack inserters when the save loads.

Distinct item

The anti-jam stack inserter is its own item. It's crafted with the same recipe as the stack inserter, unlocked by the same research, and recycles into the same ingredients.

Distinct item with quick swap

As distinct item, plus two quick recipes that turn a stack inserter into an anti-jam stack inserter and back. They keep the inserter's quality and don't take quality modules, so can't be used to cheese quality.

Crafted upgrade

The anti-jam stack inserter is its own item, crafted from a stack inserter, a selector combinator and a processing unit. It's unlocked with the stack inserter, recycles back into those three, and can be crafted with quality modules.

Upgrading from bulk inserters

By default the anti-jam stack inserter is the bulk inserter's next upgrade: an upgrade planner with no rules set upgrades bulk inserters to anti-jam stack inserters, and downgrades anti-jam stack inserters to bulk inserters. Turn off Bulk inserters upgrade to anti-jam stack inserters to remove that. Stack inserters themselves still don't upgrade or downgrade.

Colors

A startup setting picks the anti-jam stack inserter's color: purple, aqua, magenta or black. Automatic (the default) is purple, or black when the Long Stack Inserter mod is installed, since that inserter is purple too.

Yellow hand keeps the stack inserter's yellow hand and only recolors the platform and arm, the way the long-handed stack inserter looks. It's off by default (the whole inserter is recolored), and on by default when the Long Stack Inserter mod is installed.

Long Stack Inserter

With the Long Stack Inserter mod installed, you also get a long-handed anti-jam stack inserter: the long-handed stack inserter's reach, without waiting for a full hand. It works like the anti-jam stack inserter in every item mode, with the long-handed stack inserter in place of the stack inserter: smart swapping builds it from long-handed stack inserters, the distinct item modes use the long-handed stack inserter's recipe and research, and the crafted upgrade starts from a long-handed stack inserter.

More settings appear when it's installed:

• Long-handed anti-jam stack inserter color: purple, aqua, magenta or black. Automatic is aqua.
• Long-handed stack inserter color: recolors the long-handed stack inserter itself.

Automatic and purple keep its own colors.

• Yellow hand for each of them, on by default so every stack inserter shares the

long-handed stack inserter's style. Turn it off for a full recolor.

Compatibility

Works with mods that change the stack inserter: it follows changes to its recipe and research.

Credits

The anti-jam stack inserter's graphics are adapted from Factorio's stack inserter and the classic filter inserter, © Wube Software Ltd., and included under the Factorio Terms of Service. They aren't covered by this mod's MIT license; see LICENSE-graphics.md.

The long-handed variants follow the look of snouz's Long Stack Inserter. This mod's recolors of it are made from that mod's graphics (MIT licensed, themselves adapted from Factorio).