Cogwheel

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Cogwheel

By KimacchiOwner

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Cogwheel is an interactive factory designer to have an overview of your farms, factories and entire automation pipelines.

Mod Loaders
Minecraft
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About

Description

Cogwheel

A node-based visual factory planner for Create and other recipe-driven mods. Plan your factory as a graph before you build it.

Cogwheel banner

Cogwheel is an in-game factory designer built on the same wavelength as Satisfactory's blueprint tool. Press a single key, and instead of throwing recipes into a wiki, you wire them up on a canvas — Cogwheel does the throughput math, tracks Create's stress for you, and warns when your kinetic budget can't keep up.

It works as a planning notebook for any modpack with recipes, but it really shines next to Create.

✨ Features at a glance

  • 🎛️ Visual graph editor — drag recipes onto a canvas, connect outputs to inputs, watch your factory take shape before you place a single block.
  • ⚡ Create stress calculation — every Create-backed recipe knows its SU draw at any RPM. Mixer at 128 RPM? 512 SU. The math just shows up.
  • 🔋 Cross-factory power sources — define your steam engines, windmills or flywheels once, assign factories to them, get warned the moment your budget tips over.
  • 🌀 Sequenced assembly auto-expands — drop a Precision Mechanism recipe and Cogwheel unfolds it into a locked cluster with all five steps, the loop control, and the right SU sum.
  • 🔁 Loop nodes — gate a chain with a Loop node that runs the contained recipes N times. Connect via the violet bottom-port ports.
  • 📚 Multiple factories per save — separate JSON file per factory in cogwheel/factories/, switchable from the left panel, easy to share.
  • 🔗 Cross-factory wiring — export an item from Factory A and import it as a source in Factory B by reference.
  • 🧩 Clusters — group any selection into a sub-graph (USER cluster) or get auto-built ones (LOCKED) from sequenced recipes. Edit clusters in-place.
  • 🎨 Fully themeable — every color, every text scale, every panel size is configurable from a tabbed settings page.
  • 🔍 JEI integration — recipe pickers render JEI's own categories. Right-click any picker row to jump straight to JEI's full recipe view.

🚀 Getting started

Press K in-game (or whatever you've bound Open Factory Editor to) to open the editor.

Editor overview

From left to right:

  1. Categories panel (left side): browse Recipes, Sources, Sinks, Outputs, Logic, Factories, Power sources, Settings.
  2. Canvas: pan with middle-mouse, zoom with scroll, drop items here to add nodes.
  3. Properties panel (right side): right-click any node → Edit, or double-click. Configure parallelism, RPM, recipe variant, port pairing.
  4. Solver overlay (bottom): live readout of what your factory needs, produces, and wastes — plus RPM and SU draw against your assigned power source.

Adding nodes: drag an item or logic block from the left panel onto the canvas. Items land where you drop them.

🔧 Create integration

Cogwheel reads Create's stress-impact tables and recipe types directly. Every Create recipe is recognized and contributes its SU draw at the configured RPM:

Recipe type SU per RPM At 128 RPM (1 machine)
Crushing wheels (pair) 8 1,024 SU
Mechanical Press 8 1,024 SU
Mechanical Mixer 4 512 SU
Millstone 4 512 SU
Mechanical Saw 4 512 SU
Deployer 4 512 SU
Spout / Item Drain 4 512 SU
Encased Fan (washing/haunting) 2 256 SU

Per-factory and per-recipe RPM

Each factory has a default RPM (1–256). Each Create recipe node and each cluster can either inherit that RPM or override it with its own value via a checkbox in the properties panel.

RPM override

Sequenced assembly clusters

Drop a Precision Mechanism, Track, or Brass Casing recipe and Cogwheel builds an entire LOCKED cluster for you — every step in order, the right ingredients flowing through, a Loop node showing the iteration count.

Sequenced cluster Sequenced cluster

⚡ Power sources

Power sources live outside any single factory. Create them once in the Power category (left panel) with a name and an SU capacity:

  • Steam Engine — 16,384 SU
  • Big windmill array — 4,096 SU

Then assign each factory to a power source via the ⚡ button on the Factories page. Cogwheel sums SU draw across every factory pointing at the same source and:

  • 🟢 Green: comfortably within budget
  • 🟠 Orange: nearly at capacity
  • 🔴 Red ⚠: over budget — by exactly how much

🎨 Settings

Three tabs in the settings page:

  • Colors — every node body, border, port dot, edge, canvas background. Click the swatch, pick a color from the HSV picker, done.
  • Texts — text colors and the two scale knobs (node text scale, sidepanel text scale).
  • Cogwheel — behavior toggles. Hide vanilla recipes from the picker so your modded factory isn't drowned in compaction recipes. Ponder integration is on the roadmap.

Settings page

📦 Logic nodes

In addition to recipes, sources, and sinks, the Logic category has:

  • Splitter — 1 input, 2–8 outputs. Configurable distribution mode.
  • Merger — 2–8 inputs, 1 output.
  • Limiter — caps the rate of flow on a single line.
  • Void — discards items (useful for modeling waste on purpose).
  • Cluster — empty user-created sub-graph for grouping.
  • Loop — gates a chain to run N iterations per cycle.

📋 Requirements
Minecraft 1.21.1
Mod loader NeoForge 21.1.228+
Java 21
JEI Required
Create Recommended — unlocks SU calculation, sequenced assembly expansion, and accurate Create recipe enumeration

The mod is client-side only — no server install needed.

🗺️ Roadmap

Things I'm planning but haven't shipped yet:

  • 🎬 Ponder integration — auto-build example contraptions for your factories.
  • ⚡ Bottleneck-aware solver (real backpressure modeling).
  • 🪶 Per-output weights / fixed rates on Splitter and Merger.
  • 🔗 Better Create addon coverage (CC&A, Create: New Age, etc).

If you want to ask for a feature or report a bug, head to the issues page.

🤝 Compatibility notes

  • Designed for modpacks heavy in Create + addons, but works fine as a vanilla planner too.
  • Recipe enumeration goes through JEI, so any mod that ships JEI categories will have its recipes pickable.
  • Cogwheel doesn't change any in-world behavior — it's a planning surface. Your factory still has to be built by hand. (For now.)

👤 Credits

Made by Kima. Built on NeoForge + JEI + Mojang Codec. Stress values cross-checked against the Create wiki.

Source / issues: Github

Cogwheel

A node-based visual factory planner for Create and other recipe-driven mods. Plan your factory as a graph before you build it.

Cogwheel banner

Cogwheel is an in-game factory designer built on the same wavelength as Satisfactory's blueprint tool. Press a single key, and instead of throwing recipes into a wiki, you wire them up on a canvas — Cogwheel does the throughput math, tracks Create's stress for you, and warns when your kinetic budget can't keep up.

It works as a planning notebook for any modpack with recipes, but it really shines next to Create.

✨ Features at a glance

  • 🎛️ Visual graph editor — drag recipes onto a canvas, connect outputs to inputs, watch your factory take shape before you place a single block.
  • ⚡ Create stress calculation — every Create-backed recipe knows its SU draw at any RPM. Mixer at 128 RPM? 512 SU. The math just shows up.
  • 🔋 Cross-factory power sources — define your steam engines, windmills or flywheels once, assign factories to them, get warned the moment your budget tips over.
  • 🌀 Sequenced assembly auto-expands — drop a Precision Mechanism recipe and Cogwheel unfolds it into a locked cluster with all five steps, the loop control, and the right SU sum.
  • 🔁 Loop nodes — gate a chain with a Loop node that runs the contained recipes N times. Connect via the violet bottom-port ports.
  • 📚 Multiple factories per save — separate JSON file per factory in cogwheel/factories/, switchable from the left panel, easy to share.
  • 🔗 Cross-factory wiring — export an item from Factory A and import it as a source in Factory B by reference.
  • 🧩 Clusters — group any selection into a sub-graph (USER cluster) or get auto-built ones (LOCKED) from sequenced recipes. Edit clusters in-place.
  • 🎨 Fully themeable — every color, every text scale, every panel size is configurable from a tabbed settings page.
  • 🔍 JEI integration — recipe pickers render JEI's own categories. Right-click any picker row to jump straight to JEI's full recipe view.

🚀 Getting started

Press K in-game (or whatever you've bound Open Factory Editor to) to open the editor.

Editor overview

From left to right:

  1. Categories panel (left side): browse Recipes, Sources, Sinks, Outputs, Logic, Factories, Power sources, Settings.
  2. Canvas: pan with middle-mouse, zoom with scroll, drop items here to add nodes.
  3. Properties panel (right side): right-click any node → Edit, or double-click. Configure parallelism, RPM, recipe variant, port pairing.
  4. Solver overlay (bottom): live readout of what your factory needs, produces, and wastes — plus RPM and SU draw against your assigned power source.

Adding nodes: drag an item or logic block from the left panel onto the canvas. Items land where you drop them.

🔧 Create integration

Cogwheel reads Create's stress-impact tables and recipe types directly. Every Create recipe is recognized and contributes its SU draw at the configured RPM:

Recipe type SU per RPM At 128 RPM (1 machine)
Crushing wheels (pair) 8 1,024 SU
Mechanical Press 8 1,024 SU
Mechanical Mixer 4 512 SU
Millstone 4 512 SU
Mechanical Saw 4 512 SU
Deployer 4 512 SU
Spout / Item Drain 4 512 SU
Encased Fan (washing/haunting) 2 256 SU

Per-factory and per-recipe RPM

Each factory has a default RPM (1–256). Each Create recipe node and each cluster can either inherit that RPM or override it with its own value via a checkbox in the properties panel.

RPM override

Sequenced assembly clusters

Drop a Precision Mechanism, Track, or Brass Casing recipe and Cogwheel builds an entire LOCKED cluster for you — every step in order, the right ingredients flowing through, a Loop node showing the iteration count.

Sequenced cluster Sequenced cluster

⚡ Power sources

Power sources live outside any single factory. Create them once in the Power category (left panel) with a name and an SU capacity:

  • Steam Engine — 16,384 SU
  • Big windmill array — 4,096 SU

Then assign each factory to a power source via the ⚡ button on the Factories page. Cogwheel sums SU draw across every factory pointing at the same source and:

  • 🟢 Green: comfortably within budget
  • 🟠 Orange: nearly at capacity
  • 🔴 Red ⚠: over budget — by exactly how much

🎨 Settings

Three tabs in the settings page:

  • Colors — every node body, border, port dot, edge, canvas background. Click the swatch, pick a color from the HSV picker, done.
  • Texts — text colors and the two scale knobs (node text scale, sidepanel text scale).
  • Cogwheel — behavior toggles. Hide vanilla recipes from the picker so your modded factory isn't drowned in compaction recipes. Ponder integration is on the roadmap.

Settings page

📦 Logic nodes

In addition to recipes, sources, and sinks, the Logic category has:

  • Splitter — 1 input, 2–8 outputs. Configurable distribution mode.
  • Merger — 2–8 inputs, 1 output.
  • Limiter — caps the rate of flow on a single line.
  • Void — discards items (useful for modeling waste on purpose).
  • Cluster — empty user-created sub-graph for grouping.
  • Loop — gates a chain to run N iterations per cycle.

📋 Requirements
Minecraft 1.21.1
Mod loader NeoForge 21.1.228+
Java 21
JEI Required
Create Recommended — unlocks SU calculation, sequenced assembly expansion, and accurate Create recipe enumeration

The mod is client-side only — no server install needed.

🗺️ Roadmap

Things I'm planning but haven't shipped yet:

  • 🎬 Ponder integration — auto-build example contraptions for your factories.
  • ⚡ Bottleneck-aware solver (real backpressure modeling).
  • 🪶 Per-output weights / fixed rates on Splitter and Merger.
  • 🔗 Better Create addon coverage (CC&A, Create: New Age, etc).

If you want to ask for a feature or report a bug, head to the issues page.

🤝 Compatibility notes

  • Designed for modpacks heavy in Create + addons, but works fine as a vanilla planner too.
  • Recipe enumeration goes through JEI, so any mod that ships JEI categories will have its recipes pickable.
  • Cogwheel doesn't change any in-world behavior — it's a planning surface. Your factory still has to be built by hand. (For now.)

👤 Credits

Made by Kima. Built on NeoForge + JEI + Mojang Codec. Stress values cross-checked against the Create wiki.

Source / issues: Github