Chests

Chests are 1 by 1 cubic boxes that have no specific rotation. They let you store items at a fixed location. Wooden chests have 16 storage slots, iron chests have 32 storage slots, and steel chests and their upgraded versions all have 48 storage slots. Each slot in a chest can hold a partial or full stack of any item. Items can be added or removed from a chest either manually, or using any type of inserter that is next to the chest. In addition, mining drills can directly drop ores into chests located in front of their output chutes.

Chests cannot be moved unless you empty them and pick them up. If you attempt to mine a chest with items, the items in it will be transferred to you inventory first, but if your inventory fills you'll be unable to pick it up. If a chest is destroyed, all the items inside are lost.

Unlike player inventories, chest inventories are not automatically sorted. Instead you have partial stacks and empty spaces spread out as you like. Chest inventories also support the locking of slots.

Locking chest slots

It is possible to restrict the inventory size of a chest by locking any number of its slots. When a slot is locked, inserters or item transfer shortcuts will not be able to put any items into it. You can only manually put items into it using "LEFT BRACKET" with the stack in hand. Meanwhile, items can be removed from locked slots as normal.

When chests are used as automatic buffers, like for collecting outputs from assembling machines, locking the slots let you set a custom buffer size. This prevents overproducing items. For example, you can lock all slots except for the first one in an output chest so that your assembling machine produces only one stack of an item until you collect from it.

When the chest inventory is open, press "PAGE UP" or "PAGE DOWN" to increase or decrease the limit by 1 by locking or unlocking a slot. The locking of chest slot begins with the end of the last row and it moves backward until the first row. Hold "SHIFT" while pressing to increase or decrease by 5. Hold "CONTROL" while pressing to increase or decrease by 100 maximum amount.

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