Thermal Evaporation Plant

Thermal Evaporation Plant
32px
Name	Thermal Evaporation Plant
Source Mod	Mekanism
ID Name	Unknown
Type	Structure
Stackable	Unknown

The Thermal Evaporation Plant (called Solar Evaporation Plant in Mekanism 8) is a multi-block structure used in the production of brine and Liquid Lithium for the Mekanism mod. Brine is used in the ore refining process and to create various chemicals. Liquid Lithium is used in the creation of Tritium, which is used with Deuterium as the Fuel in a Mekanism 8 Fusion Reactor.

The Thermal Evaporation Plant can store up to 10,000 mB of brine and the amount of water storage available is height x 64,000mB.

Efficiency

Both Brine and Liquid Lithium are produced at the same speed. The production rate depends on the temperature of the Thermal Evaporation Plant, and is directly proportional to the height of the plant. The following numbers are obtained when the Thermal Evaporation Plant is at its maximal temperature.

Size	Consumption Rate	Production Rate
Smallest (3 blocks)	1,800 mB/t	180 mB/t
Additional line	+600 mB/t	+60 mB/t
Tallest (18 blocks)	10,800 mB/t	1,080 mB/t

Interface

The interface of the Thermal Evaporation Plant is show below and each area of the interface is described under the image.

1. This shows the current level of water/brine in the internal tank. Hovering over the gauge will show how many mB of water/brine there are.
2. By placing a water/brine storing item in the top slot, the water will be placed into the internal tank and the empty item will be placed in the bottom slot.
3. By pressing the "Thermal Evaporation Plant" button, the plant will check the rules and will either recognize the plant and start it up or say that it is incomplete.
4. This will either say "Structured" if the button has been pressed and all rules followed, or "Incomplete" if the button has not been pressed or if some assembly rules were not followed.
5. This shows the height of the plant.
6. This shows the current multiplier of the plant. This example is from a Plains biome.
7. This shows the maximum temperature of the plant.
8. This gauge shows how close to the max temperature the plant is. Hovering over it will show exactly what temperature it is.
9. Placing an empty fluid storage item in the top slot will cause the plant to fill the item and place it in the bottom slot.
10. This shows the current level of brine/Liquid Lithium in the internal tank. Hovering over the gauge will show how many mB of brine/Liquid Lithium there are.

Construction

The Thermal Evaporation Plant is 4 blocks square horizontally and it 3 to 18 blocks tall. The height of the Thermal Evaporation Plant determines the maximum temperature that is achieve able and therefore the brine production rate.

Base Layer

The base layer must be a four by four square built out of Thermal Evaporation Blocks.

Middle Layers

The middle layer(s) are a two by two ring built on top of the base layer. They can be built out of Thermal Evaporation Blocks or Thermal Evaporation Valves. There can be one to sixteen middle layers and at least two Thermal Evaporation Valves are required which can be located on any layer.

Top Layer

The top layer is again in a ring shape with an Advanced Solar Generator in each of the four corners. There must also be a Thermal Evaporation Controller located in the ring with the remaining blocks in the ring being Thermal Evaporation Blocks.

Usage

Once the Thermal Evaporation Plant has been constructed, right click on the Thermal Evaporation Controller block and press the Thermal Evaporation Plant button on to top of the GUI. This will register the Thermal Evaporation Plant and start warming up the Thermal Evaporation Plant. The plant will warm up to a temperature that is determined by the number of levels in the Thermal Evaporation Plant. See the Mechanics section for details.

Water can be supplied using pipes such as a Fluiduct or Mechanical Pipe to one of the Valve Blocks. This will begin to fill up the internal reservoir of water in the plant and begin producing brine. The brine can be pumped out of another Valve Block using the same type of pipes.

The Thermal Evaporation Plant does not need any external power source as it uses the Advanced Solar Panels for power. As it is based on solar power, the plant will only heat up during the day. At night it will begin to lose heat and set the multiplier to zero, thus stopping brine production.

Mechanics

Temperature

The higher the temperature is, the faster the plant will produce brine. During the day the Thermal Evaporation Plant will begin to heat up to the Max Temperature. During the night or when none of the Advanced Solar Generators can see the sun, the temperature will begin to fall.

Increasing

The temperature increases when the Multiplier is not zero. Each tick the temperature is incremented by MaxTemp x Multiplier / 10,000 to the maximum temperature. It therefore takes 500 / Multiplier seconds for the plant to warm to maximum temperature.

Decreasing

When the multiplier is zero the temperature starts to decrease. Each tick the temperature is decremented by MaxTemp / 10,000. This means that the plant takes 500 seconds to cool down which means that it will totally cool down during a normal minecraft night.

Max Temperature

The maximum temperature is the highest temperature that the Thermal Evaporation Plant can reach. The higher the temperature the more quickly the Thermal Evaporation Plant can produce brine.

The maximum temperature is determined by the overall height of the Thermal Evaporation Plant and is calculated as: MaxTemp = 100 x (height - 1). This means that for the minimum height of 3 blocks, the plant has a maximum temperature of 200 °F and increases by 100 °F for each block of height that is added to a maximum of 1,700 °F.

Multiplier

The multiplier determines how quickly the temperature raises. This does not affect how quickly the temperature drops however.

The multiplier is dependent upon the Biome's temperature and the number of Advanced Solar Generators that can see the sun. This is calculated as Multiplier = biomeTemp x (activeSolars / 4). For example, the Plains biome has a temperature of 0.8. Assuming all the solars can see the sun the multiplier would be 0.8x.

Brine/Liquid Lithium Production

Before production can begin the Thermal Evaporation Plant checks the following criteria:

• The "Thermal Evaporation Plant" button on the Thermal Evaporation Controller has been pressed and the GUI indicates that it is "Structured".
• The height is between three and eighteen, inclusive.
• The internal water tank contains at least 1 mB of water/brine.
• The multiplier is not zero.
• The internal brine/Liquid Lithium tank is not full.

Assuming all of these critera are met each tick the Thermal Evaporation Plant consumes Temperature / 2mB of water/brine and produces WaterUsed / 100mB of brine/Liquid Lithium. If there is not enough water/brine in the tank, the remaining amount of water/brine will be taken. If there is not enough space in the output tank for the brine/Liquid Lithium produced, the remainder will be discarded.