Create Wiki · Fluids
Smart Fluid Pipe
The Smart Fluid Pipe is a Fluid Pipe with a filter. It only lets one fluid through, the one held by the item you give it: a lava bucket, a honey bottle, a chocolate bucket. It is the tool to pump a single liquid out of a basin that holds several, or to send each fluid to its own tank.
Quick facts
- Category
- Fluids
- Crafting
- Brass Sheet + Fluid Pipe + Electron Tube
- Filter
- Right-click with an item containing the wanted fluid (bucket, bottle…)
- At the source
- Chooses which fluid is drawn from a basin or tank
- In the network
- Only lets the filtered fluid continue
- Shape
- Straight pipe, placed on the floor, a wall or the ceiling
- Version
- Create 6.0.8 · Minecraft 1.21.1
Crafting table recipe
→ 1 Smart Fluid Pipe
A pipe with a filter
The Smart Fluid Pipe is placed like a straight pipe, with a small filter slot on top. While the filter is empty, it lets everything through and acts like an ordinary pipe. It can sit on the floor, on a wall or on the ceiling, so the filter stays reachable whatever the direction of the line. It joins pipes, tanks and pumps exactly like a straight pipe, through its two ends, so it can replace any straight section of an existing line.
Choosing what is drawn
Placed right against the source, the smart pipe decides which fluid is extracted. A Basin can hold two fluids at once, say milk and chocolate: with a chocolate filter, the pump only draws the chocolate and leaves the milk in the basin. Without a filter, it would take whichever fluid comes first.
Setting the filter
To set the filter, right-click the slot with an item holding the fluid you want: water bucket, lava bucket, milk bucket, chocolate bucket, honey bottle… The item is not used up, it works as a label. Right-clicking with an empty hand clears the filter. Like every Create filter, it can be changed without breaking the line.
Sorting inside a network
Placed further along the network, the smart pipe lets its filtered fluid through and blocks the others. With two branches, one filtered for milk and one for chocolate, each fluid ends up in its own tank, even though the pump draws both from the same basin. This is the basis of fluid sorting at a mixer's output.
Use cases
At the output of a Mechanical Mixer, a smart pipe collects the fluid produced without drawing the liquid ingredients left in the basin. In front of a row of Spouts, it makes sure each one receives the right liquid. On a lava store, it prevents a wiring mistake from sending water into it, which would otherwise block the tank for good.
Using it well
The filter works in both flow directions. A filtered branch that cannot find its fluid simply stays empty, without bothering the other branches. If a pump seems stuck, check that no smart pipe along the way still carries a forgotten filter. To cut a network off completely, a Fluid Valve is simpler: the smart pipe sorts, it does not close.
Smart pipe, valve or plain pipe?
A plain pipe carries everything, the Fluid Valve shuts or opens the whole passage, and the smart pipe chooses which fluid goes through. The three work together: a valve to stop production at night, smart pipes to share out the liquids, and glass pipes to check at a glance that each branch gets its own. Above all, a well-filtered network keeps a big tank clean: once a fluid has gone in, the tank must be emptied completely before it can store anything else.
Related pages
Sources for the numbers (Create 6.0.8 code)
- Recipe: crafting/kinetics/smart_fluid_pipe.json
- Filter: SmartFluidPipeBlockEntity (FilteringBehaviour, the item's fluid), SmartFluidPipeBlock (floor, wall, ceiling)
- Basin with two input tanks: BasinBlockEntity (inputTank, 2 × 1,000 mB)
- Scene: PipeScenes.smart; flow simulated from PumpBlockEntity and FluidNetwork
Original texts and animations by Create France, rendered from the mod's Ponder scenes. Create is a mod by the Create Team, not affiliated with Create France.