Energy Bridge

Energy Bridge
Name	Energy Bridge
Type	Machine
Tool
Stackable	Yes (64)
Data Value	2850
Source Mod	Power Converters

The Energy Bridge is a device that can convert IC2, BC, Factorization Energy and Steam into one another when provided the necessary Consumer block and Producer block for a given conversion.

Energy Bridge GUI (consuming EU to Steam, MJ and FZ)

 

The Bridge needs at least one consumer to get producers running. Consumers and producers can be placed on all sides of the Bridge. The Bridge has a little internal storage (bottom % CHG bar in the GUI). This storage will get filled by any consumer and can be a source for any sort of output, one example being a fully charged Bridge can output: 3657 MJ (BC) or 8864 EU (IC2) without new energy getting consumed. This works with Steam and FZ as well.

Be advised of the following possible bug: if you input more than 32 EU/t into an LV consumer, it takes up to 512 EU/t (tested 512, possibly more).

Usage

To use the Energy Bridge you need at least one consumer and producer. You can turn one sort (EU/MJ/Steam or FZ) Producer/Consumer lossless into another, just put one of them in the left upper crafting slot in a Crafting Table. You have to do this for Producer, there is no other Recipe, so in the next topic only Consumer Recipes are listed.

Recipe

For recipes on making the Producers and Consumers, see the Power Converters page.

Video Tutorial

The following video demonstrates how to build and use the Energy Bridge

Nuts and Bolts

Energy Type	Internal Conversion Factor
BuildCraft (MJ)	4375
Factorization (CG)	1458
IndustrialCraft (EU)	1800
Railcraft (Steam)	875
UniversalElectricity (?)	10

The above table is from the Power Converters config file. (Ultimate pack at least does not seem to include Universal Electricity nor does it have recipes for Converters/Producers for Universal Electricity.)

Through testing using these values from the config, it appears that the blue bar at the bottom of the Energy Bridge panel is about 16,000,000 "units."  When energy of any of the above mods comes in through the appropriate Energy Consumer, it is multiplied by those factors and the resulting number of internal "units" is added to the internal storage represented by the blue bar, which has no tooltip.  This internal pool of generic energy can then be converted out through Energy Producers.  In the case of IC whose Producers come in LV/MV/HV/EV flavors, the internal storage has to have enough "units" to make the appropriately sized packet.

Conversion factor: energy type in --> energy type out

↓IN OUT→	MJ	CG	EU	Steam
MJ	--	3.001	2.431	5.000
CG	.333	--	0.810	1.666
EU	0.411	1.235	--	2.057
Steam	0.200	0.600	0.486	--

Brief usage example:

Factorization CG comes in, is multiplied by 1458 into Energy Bridge generic "units," then divided by 1800 to output IndustrialCraft EU.  1458/1800=0.810, so Charge times 0.810 equals EU.  That's how the table above works.  Left column is energy in, top row is energy out.

Non-brief example:

So to use this table in an example, if you had a Factorization Solar Turbine with 1 Reflective Mirror feeding 1 CG for about 10,974 ticks (≈10,974 CG) it would fill the blue bar up (10.974x1458≈16,000,000 internal storage "units") which then I drained into an IndustrialCraft MFSU which drained the bar filling the MFSU with 8,864 EU.  10,974x0.810 (from the table above, CG in, EU out) =8,889 EU.

Note these are theoretical values based on experiment and the config values.  The lowest IC LV Producer puts out 32 EU/tick packets, so while the blue bar appears empty, the theoretical value of 8,889 will appear slightly off because it can't deliver that last fraction of a packet.  This is why if you conduct the experiment above on a test world, you will get 8,864 EU. The remaining 25 EU (45,000 "units") cannot get out, since it's less than a 32 EU packet. Also, since the Energy Bridge's blue bar has no tooltip, and 16,000,000 "units" of storage is represented by a number of pixels on the blue bar, you can't see the leftover internal "units."  But over time, the numbers work out. (In the example, the blue bar would have to be 356 pixels long for the 45,000 units to display as 1 pixel of bar.)

Outputting IC packets appears to "strobe" if energy is passing through rather than building up in the Energy Bridge,  since it has to build up enough "units" from whatever source is coming in, before it has enough to cough out the requested size of packet.

Also, implicit in this is that you could change the config values if you want to tweak conversions.  The Tables above are for the unchanged values.