Conveyor system
You want to transfer ores from miners into Refineries, ice into O2/H2 Generators, or ammo to turrets? The conveyor system is a game mechanic allowing items to be moved from one inventory on a ship or station to another.
As long as the grid is powered and ports are connected, transfer is instantaneous. Small-grid conveyors have some limitations discussed below.
Usage
You create a pipe network between blocks by connecting any block with a conveyor port to another such block, either by building them next to one another so that the ports touch, or by using any combination of the following tubes to connect the ports over a distance:
| In any ship or station: | In small ships only: |
|---|---|
What if there are no conveyors in my G-Menu?
If Progression is enabled, you need to unlock conveyors first by building any cargo container.
What are conveyor ports?
Blocks can have conveyor ports and inventory ports. Conveyor ports mark mount points on blocks where you can attach conveyor tubes to integrate inventories into the conveyor system.
All inventory ports are also conveyor ports, but conveyor ports are not inventory ports. This means Engineers can't directly interact with conveyor ports to access the inventory.
Both ports look like yellow squares. Conveyor ports look flat, whereas inventory ports have two parallel bars in the middle that look like physical bar handles to pull an imagined cargo hatch open.
How can I transfer items manually?
Access connected inventories from any inventory screen on the grid. Once two conveyor ports touch directly or have been connected by conveyor tubes, you can drag items directly from one inventory to another without having to physically carry the items.
How can blocks transfer items automatically?
When connected in a conveyor network, some blocks will automatically pull items from other inventories, or send their own items for storage elsewhere. When their inventories are full, production blocks push items from their output into any connected inventories that have capacities. If everything is full, factories are temporarily clogged and stop producing. Blocks with inventories either accept or decline items, depending on their type, e.g. some only accept ores, or only components.
Chain the following blocks (if you are using them) through conveyors, so that one block pushes what the next one pulls, for example, "drill -> refinery -> assembler -> welder".
| Block | Pulls What? | Pushes What? | Accepts Only? |
|---|---|---|---|
 Ship Drills |
- | Ores | Ores |
 Refinery |
Ores | Materials | Ores, Materials |
 Assembler |
Materials | Components | Any |
 Ship Grinders |
- | Components | Any |
 Ship Welder |
Components | - | Any |
 Large and  Small Reactors |
 Uranium Ingot |
- | Uranium ingots |
 O2/H2 Generator |
 Ice, bottles |
- | Ice, bottles |
| Block Weapons | Ammunition | - | Ammunition |
| Parachute Hatch |  Canvas |
- | Canvas |
How to pipe gases?
Gasses themselves flow through conveyor ports and tubes of any size. Gas bottles however only fit through large conveyors.
- Enable "Stockpile" in tanks to actively pull gas for storage.
- Disable "Stockpile" in
Hydrogen tanks to let Hydrogen Thrusters pull hydrogen for flight - Disable "Stockpile" in
Oxygen tanks to let Air Vents pull oxygen to pressurize a room.
How to transfer items between ships and stations?
Use the following blocks to transfer items between two ships, or from ships to stations:
- Two grids connected by their
Connectors (see there) share a conveyor system that respects ownership. See also Trading Mode. - Connectors configured to "throw out" are called Ejectors. Ejectors pull items from conveyored inventories and eject the items into space, where the items can be picked up by anyone, or left to despawn.
Collectors catch items floating in space and push them into their grid's conveyored inventories.
Using these blocks in combination, two ships transfer items with minimal effort.
How can I filter items?
While Connectors and Ejectors can't be directly told which items to move and which to ignore, there are ways to limit what cargo they pull:
- To filter which items should or shouldn't be pulled through Connectors/Ejectors, build a Conveyor Sorter between the Connector and the inventories.
- Ejectors only take items from inventories that are flagged to supply such requests, meaning, materials in Assemblers and fuel in Reactors, for example, are left where they are.
- Ejectors do not access inventories that are not a part of their conveyor network. Transfer items you want to keep onboard into one container, then disable use conveyor network on that container's control panel. Re-enable the conveyor network for the container after the transfer.
Collectors pick up every floating item, if you want to filter something out, use a Sorter and an Ejector afterwards.
What's the difference between large and small ports?
Small-grid (SG) ships support the same conveyor system as large ships and stations (LG), but they also have a scaled-down "small small-grid" version. Using small SG conveyors makes building compact mining or battle drones easier, but also has limitations:
| ✔️ Fits through Small port | ❌ Too large for Small Ports |
|---|---|
Small conveyor ports on a small grid can transport:
|
Small conveyor ports on a small grid can not transport: |
Small conveyor systems fit to SG ships designs more easily and have a much smaller profile. Small Conveyors are frequently used on SG mining ships (owing to the cheap SG Drill having three small ports), and fighters Block Weapons that are fed with ammo through a small port (in contrast to 
Rocket Launchers that must be reloaded manually).
Large conveyors on a SG ship increase the profile of the ship, but are unavoidable when the ship must be able to transport large components or rockets: For example, SG Constructor Ships that use Welders and Grinders; or SG Fighters using 
Reloadable Rocket Launchers.
With its 3x3 SG blocks wide tubes, large conveyors have trouble fitting next to 1- and 2-SG-block wide gaps; use 
Conveyor Frames to adapt the large system more easily to a variety of SG ship designs.
How to transition between large and small SG ports?
You can use large and small conveyor blocks on the same small-grid (SG) ship. However, ports of different sizes cannot connect directly to one another.
An example of a large grid block that can convert between large and small is the 
Conveyor Junction. Several other SG blocks, such as the 
Conveyor Converter, 
Medium Cargo Container, O2 H2 Generator, Oxygen Tank, 
Fighter Cockpit, 
Cockpit, have ports for both the large and small system and can "convert" between large and small conveyors.
Connecting conveyors to two ports on these dual-use blocks lets small items (such as ores) travel across the whole system, if desired. It still does not enable you to move large items through small ports though!
Troubleshooting Conveyor Systems
There are some frequently occurring causes why you are not able to transfer items between inventories.
Check the following things:
- Does the grid have power?
- Is the target container too full?
- Are Containers/Junctions really fully welded?
- Tubes with red status lights? The grid needs power!
- Tubes with yellow status lights? Grid has power but these tubes are not connected on one or both ends.
- Is the line of tubes disrupted or damaged?
- Make sure that hinge parts / piston heads / rotor heads are also fully welded. Make sure you use Advanced Rotors and not basic ones.
- Tubes with green status lights? They are connected and powered.
The problem must lie elsewhere:- Are you trying to transfer large items (e.g. most components) through small ports? Won't work.
- Does the target inventory only accept specific item types? E.g. an Assembler will never accept ores.
- Is there a Conveyor Sorter that has your item blacklisted, or, not whitelisted?
Note that not all blocks of the conveyor system have coloured status lights -- e.g. Mechanical Blocks and Junctions don't.
Examples for why your inventories could be full are rocks accumulating during mining, and gravel clogging the Survival Kit/Refinery. If your inventories are often full and overflowing, consider using the Ejector function of Connectors.
Related DLC Content
The Heavy Industry Pack contains Industrial Conveyor Pipes. They are aesthetic variants of conveyor tubes that look rounded like pipes. The functionality and mount points are identical to the standard tubes.
As a retroactive Heavy Industry DLC update in 2023, the stylish Conveyor Pipe Cap was added to cover up open conveyor ports. It is a functionally identical rounded variant of the standard Conveyor Cap.