| Refinery | |
|---|---|
| |
| Category: | Facility |
| Status: | Functional |
| Function: | |
Used to process ores into useful ingots for the  Assembler.
| |
| Fits large ship and station | |
| Mass: | 25,208 kg |
| Capacity: | 7,500 L |
| Power: | Standby -1 kW Active -560 kW |
| Data Controls: | [edit] [purge] (?) |
The 
Refinery is a mid-game and late-game production block in Space Engineers, necessary for converting raw ores into useful refined materials.
In contrast to the similar mid-game focused 
Basic Refinery which cannot process platinum, uranium, silver, and gold, the Refinery can process all ore types. The Refinery has much higher construction costs than the basic one, however, it can process ores faster, more efficiently, and uses less power.
Construction[]
The Refinery takes up a 2x2x4 block space, having a square footprint and being quite tall. It has 4 conveyor ports / inventory hatches: one on the front near the base, one on the back, one on the bottom face and one on the top. When placed, it attaches to blocks on its top and bottom face, as well as the first block around its base on the other four sides.
If you intend to benefit from Upgrade Modules, consider the extra space needed, and the potentially covered up conveyor ports.
Usage[]
The Refinery takes raw ores and turns them into refined materials, which the Assembler can use to create components and tools. To begin the process, simply place the ores into the Refinery’s input (top) inventory slots.
After the Medical Room, the Refinery is a secondary raid target in an enemy vessel or station, due to the immense amount of Steel Plates that can be salvaged from it, and its likelihood of containing valuable minerals inside of it, like Platinum or Uranium Ore.
The Refinery works at maximum speed when supplied with 560 kW of power. Supplying it with less will cause it to stutter and process ores slower, but it will still be functional.
Refineries’ large ports will allow ammunition, components, hydrogen gas, ice, ingots, oxygen gas, scrap, and tools to pass through them. This means there is no worry about connecting them in the middle of a conveyor system.
Inventory[]
With Realistic settings, the Refinery has two inventories, both with a capacity of 7,500 L on large ships and stations. The input inventory accepts and pulls ore type items. The output inventory accepts and pushes material type items. It stores some of the ingots that have just been processed.
If attached to a conveyor system or placed with its ports directly touching other conveyor ports:
- The input inventory is flagged to receive pushed ores from other inventories.
- The output inventory is flagged to send pulled materials to other blocks.
- If it is running out of ores to refine, it will automatically issue pull requests to get more.
- If its output inventory is full, it will automatically issue push requests.[1]
Conversion[]
During the conversion process from Ores to Ingots, some of the mass of the raw material is lost. For example; 1000 kg of Uranium Ore will not give you 1000 kg of Uranium Ingots. The following table will present the percentage of how much of the raw material gets converted into the refined product.
| Raw material (ores) | Conversion ratio | Refined material |
|---|---|---|
| Stone | 1.4% | Gravel |
| 3% | Iron Ingots | |
| 0.24% | Nickel Ingots | |
| 0.4% | Silicon Wafers | |
| Scrap Metal | 80% | Iron Ingots |
| Iron | 70% | Iron Ingots |
| Silicon | 70% | Silicon Wafers |
| Nickel | 40% | Nickel Ingots |
| Cobalt | 30% | Cobalt Ingots |
| Silver | 10% | Silver Ingots |
| Gold | 1% | Gold Ingots |
| Uranium | 1% | Uranium Ingots |
| Magnesium | 0.7% | Magnesium Powder |
| Platinum | 0.5% | Platinum Ingots |
To clarify, this means:
- 1000 kg of Uranium Ore will give you 10 kg of Uranium Ingots,
- 1000 kg of Iron Ore will give you 700 kg of Iron Ingots, and so on...
Production/Consumption Rates[]
Refining different materials does not happen at the same rate. For example; Iron Ingots are produced at a much faster rate than Uranium Ingots. The following table presents both the consumption and production of the different materials through the refinery at "Realistic" speed.
| Input (ores) | Consumption | Production | Output (material) | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kilograms per hour | Seconds per kilogram | Kilograms per hour | Seconds per kilogram | ||
| Stone | 468000 | 0.008 | 6552 | 0.55 | Gravel |
| 14040 | 0.256 | Iron Ingot | |||
| 1123.2 | 3.205 | Nickel Ingot | |||
| 1872 | 1.923 | Silicon Wafer | |||
| Scrap Metal | 117000 | 0.03 | 93600 | 0.04 | Iron Ingot |
| Iron | 93600 | 0.04 | 65520 | 0.055 | Iron Ingot |
| Gold | 11700 | 0.31 | 117 | 30.77 | Gold Ingot |
| Silicon | 7800 | 0.46 | 5460 | 0.66 | Silicon Wafer |
| Magnesium | 9360 | 0.38 | 65.5 | 54.95 | Magnesium Powder |
| Silver | 4680 | 0.77 | 468 | 7.69 | Silver Ingot |
| Nickel | 7091 | 0.51 | 2836.4 | 1.27 | Nickel Ingot |
| Platinum | 1560 | 2.31 | 7.8 | 461.54 | Platinum Ingot |
| Cobalt | 1560 | 2.31 | 468 | 7.69 | Cobalt Ingot |
| Uranium | 1170 | 3.08 | 11.7 | 307.69 | Uranium Ingot |
Upgrade Modules[]
In order to improve some of the capabilities of the Refinery, the May 7, 2015 update (r1.081) brought upgrade modules to the game. You can attach up to 4 of those modules to a free standing Refinery, and in order for them to be fully active, two attachment points at the bottom of the module must match two of the attachment points on the Refinery. If only half the attachment points are connected, the module’s effect is reduced by half.
The Speed Module increases the speed at which the refinery works by 100% but will also increase the power consumption of that Refinery by 100% per module added to it (up to a maximum of 400% increase). This can effectively turn one Refinery into an high-speed processing block but ramping the energy usage up from 560 kW to 2,800 kW. It will, however, save space, building materials and, since Refineries can affect performance when in large numbers, it will also decrease the CPU load on your local machine and cost less PCU on multiplayer servers.
The Yield Module increases the efficiency of the refining process so that you get up to 200% more ingots. Also, it will not increase the power consumption of the Refinery, and will save some trips to your mines. As of 2021, it is possible for certain ores to produce more ingot output mass than inputted ore mass. This means that if you have a 200% boost and you refine Iron Ore, which already has a conversion rate of 70%, you will get a 140% conversion rate to the kilograms of Iron Ingot produced! This applies to Scrap Metal at a max rate of 160%, and Silicon Ore at a max rate of 140%!
The Power Efficiency Module reduces the power usage of the Refinery by a certain amount. This can be very useful if you are running on solar power alone, especially at the beginning of the game. But as the game progresses, Uranium becomes more likely to be found, and power consumption is no longer an issue, therefore rendering this module a bit obsolete in late game. That said, on some servers where Uranium Ore is extremely hard to get, this module can be a life saver, since it reduces the power consumption of the Refinery from 560 kW down to a mere 112 kW. But when refining uranium, productivity modules provide more power per ore and hour.
Finally, those modules can be mixed and matched any way you want. For instance, you could add 1 Yield Module, 1 Power Efficiency Module and 2 Speed Modules to the Refinery, to get 200% increase to the speed while keeping the power consumption low and refining more ores per kg.
Recipe[]
| Refinery | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Component | Large Ship/Station Required | Large Ship/Station Optional | ||
 Computer | 20 | — | ||
 Metal Grid | 20 | — | ||
 Motor | 16 | — | ||
 Large Steel Tube | 20 | — | ||
 Construction Comp. | 40 | — | ||
 Steel Plate | 1,100 | 100 | ||
Video[]
