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[DnaProdigy]

Anyone care letting me know the practical purpose of a powered mine-cart (furnace + Mine-cart).

I tried putting an empty one in front of it, powering it up and then running after it to jump in. No Beans. Isn't using powered rails much more practical?

[JP_Quiggle]

It doesn't really have a purpose atm

[Foulrot]

It's cheaper resource wise to use the powered minecart, if you have the resources though the powered rails are better.

[MegaStannyBoy]

It's usefull if you do not have enough redstone. But I also think it's a little bit useless against the redstone carts.

[catokul]

it's supposed to push other minecarts with chests in them so you can transport cobblestone if your inventory gets full

[Madmechman]

Well, @Catokul, powered rails can push chestcarts easily as well....

[Jr8]

From hieroglyphics hidden deep in the jungles of Minecraft, modern archaeologists have found that in the ancient times, powered rails didn't exist. Back in those days, using a coal-powered cart was the only way to make minecarts move from one place to another, short of a glitch used to boost carts. (Un?)Fortunately, as technology progresses through the ages, old inventions like engines become obsolete.
-
Basically, before powered rails, coal was needed to move minecarts. Mojang has since appeased the masses by creating a much cheaper long-term way to move carts (as if anyone uses them to transport materials).

[catokul]

Madmechman, on 22 February 2012 - 09:13 PM, said:

Well, @Catokul, powered rails can push chestcarts easily as well....

oh then it's probably to not use so much gold, i dunno :/

[Orreven]

DnaProdigy, on 22 February 2012 - 09:07 PM, said:

Anyone care letting me know the practical purpose of a powered mine-cart (furnace + Mine-cart).

I tried putting an empty one in front of it, powering it up and then running after it to jump in. No Beans. Isn't using powered rails much more practical?

They are planning on boosting the powered cart soon, making it have more pushing power, more speed, and the ability to use more fuels than just coal. For now though, powered rails are the way to go.

[rodabon]

I honestly don't recall ever building one. I think instead of trying to make it useful, they should ditch it and give storage carts the same mass as a cart with a rider. Then the storage cart could travel on the same rail system as you can.

[DnaProdigy]

Orreven, on 22 February 2012 - 09:15 PM, said:

They are planning on boosting the powered cart soon, making it have more pushing power, more speed, and the ability to use more fuels than just coal. For now though, powered rails are the way to go.

Ok cool.

In terms of personal transportation, do you know of a way to get in an empty cart in front of your powered cart?

[rodabon]

DnaProdigy, on 22 February 2012 - 09:49 PM, said:

Ok cool.

In terms of personal transportation, do you know of a way to get in an empty cart in front of your powered cart?

Don't put coal in the powered cart until you're in the empty cart seems to be the most obvious answer.

[RakiSuta]

I just disregard the powered carts and use the rails.. What else are you going to use a large amount of gold on?

[OSX2000]

I've never used powered carts (always used glitch boosters, then went right to powered rails), but I hear they're more efficient for transporting empty carts and chest carts.

Check out this thread about them:
http://www.minecraft...urnace-testing/

[Garu1304]

The powered minecart is used to push along storage carts when done mining or tree punching. It is a fast and efficient way to move along supplies.

[DnaProdigy]

rodabon, on 22 February 2012 - 11:12 PM, said:

Don't put coal in the powered cart until you're in the empty cart seems to be the most obvious answer.

Unless I've overlooked something, when you add coal the minecart goes in the opposite direction. Now that I think about it a loop of sorts at the beginning of track would work.

[drone13]

Pretty useless except for a few fringe applications dreamt up by the lunatics in the redstone forum. The most memorable one was to use it as a component in a "steam powered" semi-automatic flying machine. Also I like to use powered minecarts as a roulette ball in giant minecart roulette tables.

[Blockstar1117]

They are used in unieq puzzles also Notch did state before Jeb was developer the powercarts will be faster than the booster the reason why they added boosters was more of a transport use and so people wont have to make the alaborate boosters they made before beta 1.5 they also would be use full for transporting goods in small distance or maybe try to race the cart with out it being impossible

[Yogierin]

Yeah, I never got the meaning of powered mine carts, they're so slow and they can't even push a storage mine cart up a track. It's better to just mine and make powered rails no matter how long it took than to use powered mine carts.

To be honest, I never got the meaning of using storage and/or powered mine carts in general, what's the point of them? I can just keep all the resources I mine in my inventory, why would I put it in a mine cart? The only possible reason I see is that if you're mining and you don't want to take the risk of losing anything, or your inventory is full, so you'd put your items in the mine cart and ship it back to the entrance of your mine, but that doesn't happen very often.

[OSX2000]

Yogierin, on 23 February 2012 - 12:45 AM, said:

Yeah, I never got the meaning of powered mine carts, they're so slow and they can't even push a storage mine cart up a track. It's better to just mine and make powered rails no matter how long it took than to use powered mine carts.

If I remember right, the powered minecart's worthlessness was due to bad minecart physics with collisions, which got fixed. It seems to work right now. Here's a quote from that thread I linked a couple posts up:

"Then I tested with a real mountain if it could overcome the challenge. Result : pushing three minecart at a time to the top like a boss."

And storage carts act like unoccupied carts, so apparently it has no problem pushing up.