# Trains, trucks & drones

> Canonical source: [Trains, trucks & drones](https://satisfactorybase.its-live.dev/guides/transport)
> Language: en

Version check pending: The vehicle speed/fuel tables and timing examples include estimates. They do not account for acceleration, gradients or traffic; use measured cycle time for throughput planning.

Capacities, speeds, fuel and throughput of tractors, trucks, trains and drones – and when to use which.


## When to use what

| Distance / volume | Best option |
|---|---|
| Inside a factory, up to a few hundred metres | Belts and pipes – no fuel, no stations, up to 1 200/min per Mk.6 belt |
| Medium distance, moderate volume, rough terrain | Tractor / Truck – cheap stations, any fuel, follows a Vehicle Path |
| Long distance, high volume, many item types | Train – 32 slots or 2 400 m³ per car, unlimited cars, up to ≈ 2 250 items/min per car |
| Long distance, small volume of valuable parts | Drone – 9 slots, flies straight over everything, 100 MW per port |

## Road vehicles

| Vehicle | Slots | Max. km/h | 0→50 km/h | Consumption (MW) | Unlock | Automatable |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| :icon[Desc_Tractor_C] Tractor (“Sugarcube”) | 25 | 69 | 6.7 s | 55 | Tier 3 – Vehicular Transport | yes |
| :icon[Desc_Truck_C] Truck (“The Unit”) | 48 | 89 | 4 s | 75 | Tier 5 – Logistics Mk.4 | yes |
| Fluid Truck (1.2) | 3 200 m³ (wiki) | 89 | 4 s | 75 | Tier 5 – Logistics Mk.4 | yes, Fluid Truck Station only |
| :icon[Desc_Explorer_C] Explorer | 12 | 107 | 1.8 s | 90 | MAM Quartz – The Explorer (10 Crystal Oscillator, 100 Modular Frame) | yes |
| Cyber Wagon | 1 | 164 | – | 150 | AWESOME Shop 20 Coupons | **no** |
| Factory Cart / Golden | 1 | 50 | 2.3 s | **no fuel** | AWESOME Shop 10 / 50 Coupons | yes (own path type) |

- All motor vehicles (except the Factory Cart) burn **any** fuel from Leaves to Plutonium Fuel Rods. Consumption per minute of driving = `MW × 60 / MJ`; e.g. a Truck on Coal (300 MJ) burns 15 Coal/min. Consumption only counts while accelerating or driving, not when standing or rolling downhill.
- Runtime per unit of fuel = MJ / MW. Anchors for the Truck (75 MW): Coal 4 s, Solid Biofuel 6 s, Compacted Coal 8.4 s, Packaged Fuel 10 s, Packaged Turbofuel 26.67 s, Battery 80 s, Packaged Rocket Fuel 96 s, Packaged Ionized Fuel 133.33 s, Uranium Fuel Rod 10 000 s (2 h 47 min). A Battery stack (200 → 1.2 GJ) is the best non-nuclear fuel per stack.
- Vehicles protect from fall damage, poison gas, radiation and all creatures except Stingers; they kill creatures when driven over them.

### Truck Station and Vehicle Paths

- :icon[Desc_TruckStation_C] Truck Station: 16 × 22 × 12 m; 3 belt inputs (left: fuel; middle 2×: cargo), 2 belt outputs; 48 slots; not overclockable; mode **load or unload**. Docking takes 8 s, then all stacks that are not actively growing transfer. Power 20 MW while a vehicle is in range, otherwise 0.1 MW. Fluid Truck Station (1.2): 1 belt input (fuel) + 2 pipe in + 2 pipe out.
- Refuelling: same fuel type only, only as much as one round trip needs; “Replace Differing Fuel” swaps foreign fuel out.
- **Vehicle Paths (1.2)** are built single-lane paths (types Factory Cart, Explorer, Tractor, Truck, Fluid Truck, Universal); 180° turning circle 4 m (Cart), 8 m (Explorer/Tractor), 18 m (Truck/Fluid/Universal); only on smooth terrain or foundations; Y-splits and merges allowed; crossings act like block signals; trucks have priority, otherwise “longest wait first”; at least 2 Truck Stations per path. Before 1.2 routes were recorded while driving (Q).
- Bottleneck rule: cargo per round trip ≤ slots × stack size; the loading station must not empty faster than its supply (buffer with a Storage Container).

## Trains

| Element | Key figures |
|---|---|
| :icon[Desc_Locomotive_C] Electric Locomotive | 6 × 16 × 6 m, 300 t; max. ≈ 120 km/h; 2 000 kN at 110 MW; power 25 MW minimum (also standing) to 110 MW, regenerative braking up to 33 MW (net up to +8 MW); build cost 5 Modular Frame, 10 Motor, 20 Steel Pipe, 20 Rubber, 50 Wire |
| Freight Car | 6 × 16 × 6 m; **32 slots** or **2 400 m³** (1.2; 1 600 m³ in 1.0) – never both; one fluid type per car; empty 30 t, full 100 t; coupled only on build |
| :icon[Desc_TrainStation_C] Train Station | 34 × 16 × 20 m; **50 MW** permanently; directional; rails conduct power |
| Freight Platform | 48 slots; 2 belt in + 2 out; 50 MW during transfer (else 0.1 MW); load **or** unload; transfer **27.08 s** (all cars at once), belts blocked meanwhile |
| Fluid Freight Platform | **3 200 m³** (1.2); 2 pipe in + 2 out; head lift lower outlet 10 m (real 12 m), upper 14 m (real 16 m) |
| Railway | segment 12–100 m; 1 Steel Pipe + 1 Steel Beam per started 18 m, then per 12 m; min. 90° curve radius 17 m; max. slope 28 m over 94.5 m (1:3.375); up to 3 branches per switch |

- Unlock: Tier 6 – Monorail Train Technology; signals: Tier 6 – Railway Signalling.
- Automation needs a timetable with ≥ 2 stations; only a locomotive at the front in travel direction drives; use a locomotive at both ends for bidirectional trains (the autopilot does not reverse). Recommendation: 1 locomotive per 4 cars. On a 1 m ramp (7.125°) one locomotive pulls 1 644 t (44 empty / 18 half / 13 full cars); on a 2 m ramp (14.03°) 800 t (16 / 7 / 5).
- **Signals:** a *Block Signal* turns red when the next block is occupied; a *Path Signal* reserves a path through a block (crossings) and only admits a train that can also leave the block. Block size ≥ the longest train; 300–400 m is typical; trains brake ≈ 250 m before a red signal. Trains and their passengers are immune to all damage; collisions derail (re-rail with E).
- **Throughput:** time to fill a car `TtF = stack × 32 / belt rate + 0.4513 min`; if the round trip is longer than TtF the car is full and `throughput = stack × 32 / round-trip time`. Maximum per car with 2 × Mk.6 (2 400/min): stack 50 → 1 431/min, 100 → 1 793/min, 200 → 2 053/min, 500 → 2 248/min; fluids → 979 m³/min (1 958 with 2 × Mk.2 pipes). Because of the 27 s lock, buffer with Industrial Storage Containers in front of and behind platforms.

## Drones

| Element | Key figures |
|---|---|
| :icon[Desc_DroneTransport_C] Drone | 9 slots; 16 × 6 × 3 m; take-off and landing **51 s** each; cruise speed by fuel (below); build cost 4 Motor, 10 Alclad Aluminum Sheet, 1 Radio Control Unit, 2 AI Limiter, 1 Portable Miner |
| :icon[Desc_DroneStation_C] Drone Port | 24 × 24 × 15 m; **100 MW** permanently; 2 belt in (cargo + fuel), 1 belt out; 2 × 18 slots (out/in); exactly 1 home drone per port, any number of visiting drones |

| Fuel | Energy (MJ) | Speed (m/s) |
|---|---|---|
| [Packaged Fuel](/wiki/items/packaged-fuel) | 750 | 50 |
| [Packaged Turbofuel](/wiki/items/packaged-turbofuel) | 2 000 | 60 |
| [Battery](/wiki/items/battery) | 6 000 | 75 |
| [Packaged Rocket Fuel](/wiki/items/packaged-rocket-fuel) | 7 200 | 75 |
| [Uranium Fuel Rod](/wiki/items/uranium-fuel-rod) | 750 000 | 90 |
| [Packaged Ionized Fuel](/wiki/items/packaged-ionized-fuel) | 10 000 | 100 |
| [Plutonium Fuel Rod](/wiki/items/plutonium-fuel-rod) | 1 500 000 | 100 |

- Unlock: Tier 8 – Aeronautical Engineering. Only these fuels work (contrary to the in-game text). A drone flies strictly home port ↔ 1 destination port on a 64 × 64 grid with obstacle avoidance; loading does not block the belts (unlike trains).
- Throughput ≈ `9 × stack / (2 × flight time + 102 s)`. Example: 2 km with Batteries (75 m/s) → 2 × 26.7 s + 102 s = 155 s → stack 100: 348/min. Worth it for small amounts of valuable parts over large distances.

## Hypertube and misc.

- Hypertube (Tier 4): 1 Copper Sheet + 1 Steel Pipe per segment, entrance 10 MW; accelerates to 50 km/h without input; chained entrances (“Hypertube cannon”, 4 m support spacing) reach 54 / 65 / 79 / 95 / 114 km/h with 1–5 entrances and > 500 km/h with more. Tubes protect from aggro, out-of-bounds damage and gas – not from radiation.
- Jump Pad (5 MW, 0–90° in 5° steps) and U-Jelly Landing Pad (5 MW, prevents fall damage from any height): Tier 2 – Jump Pads.
- Personnel Elevator (1.1): 4–200 m, 25 stops, 20 MW while moving.

## Routes in the planner

A **route** in SatisfactoryBase is one vehicle, an ordered list of wagons (the *consist*) and a circuit of two or more *stops*. Each stop points at a station in one of your factories and says, per wagon, what happens there: **load**, **unload** or **ignore**. You configure the factory, not the train – the site works out which wagon carries what, in which direction, how much per minute, what the station and the route are called, and where it does not add up.

### Create one

1. On the [map](/map), right-click a factory → **Connect from here…**, then click the second factory.
2. Pick **Vehicle** in the dialog (**Belt** is the straight belt/pipe link).
3. For each side choose an existing station or **New station…** with a vehicle type. For a tractor, truck or drone you also pick **Load / Unload** and the item; a train gets its wagons afterwards in the route settings.
4. The line above the buttons tells you what will happen: *Creates a new route · Train*, or *Adds a stop to route X* when the station you picked already belongs to one. Both stations of a route must use the same vehicle type.

Connecting a third factory to a station of an existing route appends a stop, and the circuit closes back to the first station – three stops mean three legs, including the way back.

### Use it in a factory

Open a factory and drag a machine output (or input) onto the station card. Item, wagon, direction and rate come from the factory's own solved plan; you are only asked when it is genuinely ambiguous, e.g. when several wagons carry that item. A train station without wagons is called `…-PASS` and warns that it has no freight operations – add wagons in the route settings.

### Route settings

Reachable with one click from every station of the route (station card header, station dialog, the map's connection panel, the overview's Transport panel):

- **Stops** in schedule order, drag or use the arrows, add and remove stops (a drone route always has exactly two).
- **Consist**: wagons, their item, freight or fluid, and the order – which applies to *every* stop.
- **Actions per stop**: the wagon × stop matrix with load / unload / ignore and an optional fixed rate.
- **Vehicles**: how many vehicles run the route (and locomotives per train), plus the estimated capacity and utilisation per wagon.
- **Problems**: shortages, capacity limits, wagons nothing ever fills, stations whose factory has not been solved yet. They are hints, never blockers.
- Renaming: names are generated from biome, resource and role (`RD-IO-LOAD`, *Rocky Desert Line*); type your own to override it, clear it to go back.

### Where routes show up

- **Map**: each leg is a dashed line in the vehicle's colour, labelled `Route · Stop 1 → 2`; selecting one highlights the whole route, and a circuit of three or more stops runs one vehicle marker around the loop.
- **[Overview](/plan)**: all legs of one route share a colour and carry its name; the Transport panel says which route a leg belongs to and opens the route settings.

Older pairwise station links keep working: they become two-stop routes the next time the workspace loads, without losing any cargo.

In short, a **vehicle link** between two factories or stations carries the vehicle type (Tractor / Truck / Train / Drone), item and amount and is drawn as a route on the map ([Using SatisfactoryBase](/guides/using-satisfactorybase#routes)).


- [Belts & pipes](/guides/belts-pipes)

- [Routes in the planner](/guides/using-satisfactorybase)

- [Power grid](/guides/power-grid)