Chute and Smart Chute

A chute is placed like any block and connects to the ones above and below. An item that goes in falls at 4 blocks per second, with no rotation at all. At the bottom it enters whatever it finds: chest, barrel, Item Vault, Mechanical Belt, Depot… If there is nothing, it drops to the ground. Each chute block carries a single stack at a time.

Under a chest, a chute serves itself: it takes up to 16 items at a time from the inventory above and sends them down. It also picks up items thrown into its opening. A tap of the Wrench switches it to a window version so you can watch the items go by; another tap makes it solid again.

Right-clicking with a Block of Industrial Iron encases the chute in a smooth shell, more discreet inside a factory wall. It works exactly the same. To remove the casing, one tap of the Wrench is enough and the iron block is given back.

Place a chute against the side of another and they link at an angle: the column then goes down like a staircase, one block sideways for each block of height. It is handy to get around an obstacle or shift a line without adding belts.

An Encased Fan placed under the column and blowing upwards reverses the flow: items rise at RPM ÷ 64 blocks per second, that is 0.5 block per second at 32 RPM and up to 20 blocks per second at full speed. A fan at the top pulling air works too. In this direction the chute takes items from a belt running underneath or from an inventory at the bottom.

The Smart Chute is placed like an ordinary chute, with an extra filter slot. It only lets accepted items through and can take an exact amount: set to 8, it waits until there are 8 in the chest above and takes them in one go.

Placed under an inventory, the Smart Chute behaves like a vertical Brass Funnel: it only extracts what matches its filter and leaves the rest. Two chests separated by a Smart Chute make a simple sorter, with no belt and no redstone.

A redstone signal pauses the Smart Chute: it stops taking items while the lever is on. An ordinary chute never stops. It is the easiest way to empty a chest on demand.