My iron smelter array. Total capacity is 9600 iron ingots/minute, using the basic recipe. I actually only have Mk.4 belts, so I can only use the bottom four (of ten) floors... But I like building oversized.
The idea was to centralize the production of basic resources (ingots and concrete). Then, the actual factories making stuff could be located more or less anywhere, regardless of local resources. Centralizing the smelting would reduce the many-to-many distribution problem of resources to a many-to-one (resources to smelter) and a one-to-many (smelter-to-factory).
But actually integrating the train station was a pain in the ass and not really fun compared to the factory. I have lots of ideas for how I want factories to look and nowhere can I fit three or more train stations. Maybe this is more a Factorio style and Satisfactory is really more about building the factory close to the resources. So I may not actually end up using this lol.
That said, everything is blueprinted now, so I may end up using a smaller version of this design in a different factory.
The back, with observation tower for scale.
Shoutouts to the 1.1 vertical nudging feature, which should have been in the game from the start and the new curve mode for conveyors, which look great with the gentle curvature of the main structure.
Dubious shoutout to the feature/bug that vertical splitters now allow you to build X.5m long vertical conveyors, which is a power that I should have used more sparingly.
Oh my god.
Why not just pure iron?
I considered it. There is no shortage of iron ore on the map, it would just mean a few more trains coming in. By the time this thing would be at capacity, I would have Mk.3 Miners and then 9600 ore is just 8 pure nodes, fully overclocked.
I didn't check the difference in power consumption, maybe that would be enough to tip the scale. Mainly I didn't want to deal with head lift in such a vertical build.
Maybe I should note that to me, more machines and more machines are not downsides, but upsides. I like lots of trains and I like huge Arrays of machines :)