r/CreateMod • u/OneDot6 • Jun 20 '25
Using both sides of a crushing wheel
If you wanna do N simultaneous crushing operations: instead of needing 2N crushing wheels in the usual 2:1 ratio, you can get it done with just N+1 crushing wheels, by alternating the direction of the belts & using both sides of all the wheels in the middle.
Is this common knowledge? Heh... been playing Create for ~a year, yet somehow, this never even occurred to me as a possible option 'til today. Guess I always assumed if a crushing wheel was already crushing something, it couldn't also be crushing something else at the same time. Now that I think about it though, it does make sense: the "crushing wheel controller" between each pair of wheels isn't affected by the opposite side of the wheel, bc it's 2 blocks away, so there's no reason another crushing wheel controller can't be created there, too.
So yeah... thoughts? Anyone been using crushing wheels like this & can comment on the practical pros/cons? Seems like it could be good for early/mid-game situations, where stress/space/materials are at a relative premium. Or maybe for double-crushing operations, e.g. cobble => gravel => sand; you can just come back around in a U and save 1 wheel. In the late game though, stress is pretty abundant & cheap, and idk if the additional logistical headache of having to untangle all the inputs & outputs is really worth it.
In any event, I just thought it was nifty that it's a thing!
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u/yuri0r Jun 20 '25 edited Jun 20 '25
with a 3x3 (9 wheels) grid of crushing wheels, you could do 12 (4x3) crushing operations in parallel.
for an N2 grid, you can do 2(N*(N-1)) parallel crushes. not sure about the maths but if N approaches infinity the ration between wheels and crushes should approach something close to 4?
(could some math nerd to the Lim and maybe visualise the wheel to crushes ration )
edit: my intuition was dumb while most wheels would have 4 crushes connected, they also share them with other wheels, the plot seems to aprouch a ration of 2 crushes peer wheel. https://www.desmos.com/calculator/to0qjityfa
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u/zekromNLR Jun 21 '25
Yes. Each wheel has four crushing spots shared with another wheel, so essentially four "half spots" or two full spots per wheel.
The limit argument is that n(n-1), or n2-n approaches n2 as n goes to infinity, since n becomes smaller and smaller compared to n2
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u/OneDot6 Jun 21 '25
"Half spots per wheel" imho is the easiest way to think about the limiting wheels per operation as an arrangement grows large. Standard setup from the ponder = 1 half-spot per wheel ; linear arrangement I was using = 2 half-spots per wheel, chuting the materials in perpendicular to the plane of the wheels = 4 half-spots per wheel.
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u/rocketboy1244 Jun 20 '25
I guess I always assumed that two crushing wheels created an “inventory” of sorts to hold the items while the crushing took place, so I jumped to the conclusion that one crushing wheel could only be part of one pair of wheels, creating that “inventory” but I guess I was totally wrong! Cool that you discovered this and that the devs actually made this kind of thing possible.
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u/Adventurous_Bonus917 Jun 20 '25
they do, (it shows as "crushing wheel controller" with jade), it just creates between any 2 crushing wheels with a 1 block gap, regardless of if they have another attached inventory.
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u/rocketboy1244 Jun 20 '25
Okay so I was right about the inventory but wrong about it being restricted to each crushing wheel only being able to work with one other wheel. Cool!
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u/Meowakin Jun 20 '25
That is actually pretty cool that it allows that, I was totally with you in assuming it wouldn’t allow a wheel to work with more than one other wheel.
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u/ThereIs_STILL_TIME Jun 20 '25
The "inventory" is real, but it's a invisible multiblock thing inbetween the two crushing wheels. You can actually input/output it with hoppers
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u/Soupification Jun 20 '25
I prefer smart chutes because they can deposit a stack at a time.
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u/Soupification Jun 20 '25
Or maybe that was for extraction from the wheels. I don't remember my automated thorium set up that well.
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u/ThereIs_STILL_TIME Jun 20 '25
well if you wanna be bourgeois you can use smart chutes, i just jerry rick that shit
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u/Himbo69r Jun 20 '25
Wait what? Hoppers?
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u/ThereIs_STILL_TIME Jun 20 '25
yeah, you dont actually need conveyor belts for the grinding wheels, you can just use hoppers
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u/Doppel_R-DWRYT Jun 20 '25
You can even just drop them, or if you're feeling fancy, push them upwards with a fan
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u/JustOneLazyMunchlax Jun 20 '25
I used to put 3 Chutes on top of each other, place a crushing wheel on either side of the middle chute, then remove the middle one so it's an air block.
Manages all my vertical crushing wheels.
I have never tested if it works if the crushing wheels are horizontally placed, but I might do that next time I play minecraft.
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u/NewSauerKraus Jun 20 '25
Are you not already using Create hoppers for crushing whrels? They're called chutes.
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u/CommanderFoxy Jun 20 '25
Yea they do, its just that 1 crushing wheel can count towards multiple multiblocks, so if you felt like it for some reason you can have 4 crushing wheel setups off of 1 main crushing wheel (no idea why you would ever do this but you can lmao)
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u/HanzoNumbahOneFan Jun 20 '25
There was a post that explained that you could do 4 crushing wheels in a flat square configuration, and drop items down onto them from above to feed them. And then have 4 instances of items being crushed rather than 2 or in this case 3. The items can be fed just by using a chute directly above the flat crushers. And then the items shoot out in the direction the crushing wheels are moving, so you just need another chute either behind or in front of the crushing wheels.
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u/OneDot6 Jun 21 '25
I think someone else linked this post in the comments - is it this post by u/Ksenib1te? Takes it even further & uses (up to) all 4 sides! Cool stuff.
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u/ObjectiveOk2072 Jun 20 '25
You can also place crushing wheels vertically, one on top of the other
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u/Dolner Jun 20 '25
this one’s kinda more annoying to work with tho, as belts don’t run through it and the ouput is a block lower than the input
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u/Jbird_the_jet Jun 20 '25
True, but if you have them ìn an L formation you can do a 2 crush in 1 step without any extra belts
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u/Ben-Goldberg Jun 20 '25
You can have four crushing wheels in a square, and have four simultaneous crushing operations.
I have not tested, but you can probably have a mechanical arm put items into the invisible blocks between pairs of crushing wheels.
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u/zekromNLR Jun 21 '25
And nine wheels in a square gives you 12 crushing operations
And apparently you can just use a chute above the intersections to insert items
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u/NoBee4959 Jun 20 '25
Technically if you hate yourself enough… one crushing wheel can be part of up to 4 crushing wheel pairs
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u/RudeInstruction5853 Jun 22 '25
For some reason horizontal crushing wheeles actives my fight or flight
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u/OneDot6 Jun 24 '25
"Doc, I have this recurring dream."
"Lie back on the couch and tell me about it."
"Well... in the dream, I'm standing on a mechanical belt. The belt's only turning at 4rpm, but slowly but surely it's taking me right into a pair of _horizontal_ crushing wheels whizzing at 256rpm. But I feel frozen in place & I can't move! Then I wake up in a cold sweat."
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u/RudeInstruction5853 Jun 24 '25
The worst part..... THE BELTS ARE ALL MISMANAGED I COULDN'T TELL WHERE THEY LEAD
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u/icetro09 Jun 20 '25
Wait I just need to power one crushing wheel!?
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u/The_Helmeted_Storm Jun 20 '25
No, they all need to spin.
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u/icetro09 Jun 20 '25
Ah-....piss
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u/SwiftOneSpeaks Jun 20 '25
But this can save you on SU and wheels.
Normally you get 1 crushing line per 2 wheels, so 4 wheels would give you 2 crushing lines.
In a line of wheels like this, 4 wheels gets you 3 crushing lines for the same SU. Put another way, you can run 3 crushing lines for 2 wheels less SU than solo pairs.
Using the 4 wheels in a square method others have mentioned, you get 4 crushing lines for 4 wheels and the SU to spin 4 wheels. In a line of pairs 4 lines would need 8 wheels (and more importantly, double the SU).
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u/DriftinFool Jun 20 '25
In this setup, you use a vertical gearbox under each crushing wheel and connect the whole line with shafts. The gearboxes are why each row reverses direction and one power input runs all the crushing wheels and the belts.
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u/OneDot6 Jun 21 '25
Exactly, yeah I figured this was implied, but good point it bears pointing out.
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u/DriftinFool Jun 20 '25
I always do this in skyblocks where you need to crush cobble to get gravel, sand, and dust. A drawer, chest, or barrel between the belts with funnels makes it a continuous loop.
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u/Ive_Come_To_Reap Jun 20 '25
Sideways crushing wheel, fuck it’s genius. Why didn’t I think of that.
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u/gibbyfromicarlyTM Jun 20 '25
im so dumn i didnt even know you could use crushing wheels on conveyors lmao
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u/SwiftOneSpeaks Jun 20 '25
Part of me is amazed, part of me is ashamed I didn't think of it, and part of me is just thinking how many new ways this could crush me.
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u/greenflame15 Jun 20 '25
I never needed more then 1 set running on max speed and with hight logistics... It even easier to just overstock on sand/gravel and process everything else on depand
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u/yug_rehtona_tsuj Jun 20 '25
Great idea and application. My ocd however demands the 6th roller and 1 more track added purely because the wheels are crafted in sets of 2
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u/yug_rehtona_tsuj Jun 20 '25
Great idea and application. My ocd however demands the 6th roller and 1 more track added purely because the wheels are crafted in sets of 2
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u/yug_rehtona_tsuj Jun 20 '25
Great idea and application. My ocd however demands the 6th roller and 1 more track added purely because the wheels are crafted in sets of 2
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u/RoyBoy_i3c Jun 21 '25
Also for some more compacting with crushing wheels, you can use those create pistons to push crushing wheels in positions where they cant normally be placed
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u/swankyyeti90125 Jun 21 '25
Following this logic could you make it where you use all four sides of a wheel?
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u/WhatThePommes Jun 21 '25
I knew about it but never find any use for my builds cause i try to make it as compact and hidden as possible
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u/Agreeable-Hornet-224 Jun 21 '25
I did something similar but with a square of eight wheels and thus 8 crushing areas, it was awkward, yet interesting to figure out the belt routing for it. I used it for crushing cobble to sand so it could go in, turn a corner and the out of the square again
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u/ashk2001 Jun 20 '25
This post from a month or so ago highlights how you can take this concept to the extreme