The standard plate, in real numbers
Reinforced Iron Plates are the first item that makes you build a proper sub-factory. The recipe unlocked at Tier 0 - HUB Upgrade 3 is an Assembler job with a 12-second cycle:
| Recipe | Machine | Cycle | Inputs (per craft) | Inputs (per min) | Output |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reinforced Iron Plate (standard) | Assembler | 12 s | Iron Plate 6 + Screws 12 | 30 Plate + 60 Screws | 1, 5/min |
| Adhered Iron Plate (alternate) | Assembler | 16 s | Iron Plate 3 + Rubber 1 | 11.25 Plate + 3.75 Rubber | 1, 3.75/min |
| Bolted Iron Plate (alternate) | Assembler | 12 s | Iron Plate 18 + Screws 50 | 90 Plate + 250 Screws | 3, 15/min |
| Stitched Iron Plate (alternate) | Assembler | 32 s | Iron Plate 10 + Wire 20 | 18.75 Plate + 37.5 Wire | 3, 5.625/min |
“Reinforced Iron Plate: 6 Iron Plate and 12 Screws per craft, 12 s in an Assembler, 5 per minute” — the row mirrored from the satisfactory.wiki.gg recipe table into
src/data/satisfactory-recipes.json.
5 plates per minute per Assembler is the standard figure, and it is painfully slow when you first read it. Sixty plates a minute — a reasonable target once Modular Frames come online — needs twelve Assemblers on the default recipe.
Note that the second input is Screws, not Iron Rods. Older guides often list rods; the recipe consumes screws directly, and the rods are one step further back. That distinction matters when you size the line, because screws have their own conversion ratio.
Iron ingots per plate, decomposed
The cleanest way to compare the four recipes is to push everything back to iron ingot. The upstream ratios from the same dataset:
- Iron Plate: 3 Iron Ingot becomes 2 Iron Plate (30 ingot/min to 20 plate/min)
- Screws: 1 Iron Rod becomes 4 Screws (10 rod/min to 40 screws/min)
- Iron Rod: 1 Iron Ingot becomes 1 Iron Rod (15/min to 15/min)
| Recipe | Iron Plate per plate | Ingot for plates | Screws per plate | Ingot for screws | Total iron ingot |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Standard | 6 | 9.0 | 12 | 3.0 | 12.0 |
| Bolted | 6 | 9.0 | 16.7 | 4.2 | 13.2 |
| Stitched | 3.3 | 5.0 | 0 | 0 | 5.0 + 3.3 copper |
| Adhered | 3 | 4.5 | 0 | 0 | 4.5 + 1 Rubber |
The standard recipe costs 12 iron ingot per plate, split three quarters to plates and one quarter to screws. That is the number to remember: 60 plates per minute is 720 iron ore per minute, which is more than most single nodes deliver.
Bolted Iron Plate is the throughput king at 15/min per Assembler — three times standard — but it costs 13.2 ingots per plate, about 10% more iron. You are paying a small iron premium for a third of the building count and a quarter of the belt traffic.
Stitched Iron Plate is the iron saver: 5 ingots plus 3.3 copper per plate, less than half the standard cost. And Adhered Iron Plate is the lowest iron of all at 4.5, but it produces only 3.75/min — the slowest recipe in the set.
Machine counts at every scale
| Target plates | Standard Assemblers | Bolted Assemblers | Stitched Assemblers | Iron ore needed (standard) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15/min | 3 | 1 | 3 | 180/min |
| 30/min | 6 | 2 | 6 | 360/min |
| 60/min | 12 | 4 | 11 | 720/min |
| 120/min | 24 | 8 | 22 | 1,440/min |
The ore column is the reason to care about alternates. At 120 plates per minute the standard recipe wants 1,440 iron ore per minute — more than most bases are mining when the frame line goes up. The Stitched route cuts that to roughly 600 iron ore plus a copper line, and it does it without losing output per machine (5.625/min against 5/min).
Which alternate to run
Bolted Iron Plate is the choice when building space is the constraint. Four Assemblers replace twelve, and the extra 10% iron is usually available. The catch is screws: 250 per minute per Assembler is seven screw Constructors of input, which is a lot of belt for one machine. Only run Bolted when your screw line already exists for another reason.
Stitched Iron Plate is the choice when iron ore is the constraint. Half the iron, replaced by 37.5 wire per minute per Assembler — and wire is 1 copper ingot to 2 wire, so that is 18.75 copper ingot per minute per machine. On a base with idle copper and stretched iron, this is the best recipe in the game for this item.
Adhered Iron Plate is the oil-era recipe. Three plates and one rubber per craft means 4.5 iron plus a trickle of rubber per plate, but 3.75/min output makes it the slowest option. It exists for bases that have rubber but no spare screws or copper, which is rare but real in a heavily specialised factory.
A sensible progression: standard recipe through Tier 2, Stitched as soon as the Hard Drive drops (its prerequisite is only Tier 2 - Part Assembly), Bolted only if you already mass-produce screws for frames. The Hard Drive guide explains how the rolls are gated.
Where the plates go
| Consumer | Plates per min | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Modular Frame (standard) | 3 | 3 per craft, 2 frames/min |
| Crystal Oscillator | 2.5 | 5 per craft, 1/min |
| Smart Plating | 2 | 2 per craft |
| Bolted Frame (alternate) | 7.5 | 3 per craft, 5 frames/min |
| Steeled Frame (alternate) | 2 | 2 per craft, 3 frames/min |
| Plastic Smart Plating (alternate) | 2.5 | 2.5/min |
| Rebar Gun | 6 | equipment |
| Object Scanner | 6 | equipment |
| Factory Cart | 12 | vehicle |
The Modular Frame line is the main consumer and the reason most players build plates at all. Each frame Assembler takes 3 plates per minute, so one plate Assembler at 5/min feeds 1.67 frame machines. Build plates in multiples of three Assemblers (15/min) and they pair cleanly with five frame Assemblers (10 frames/min).
The Bolted Frame alternate is worth flagging: at 7.5 plates per minute it is the heaviest plate draw in the table, two and a half times a standard frame machine. If you switch frames to Bolted, your plate line has to grow with it.
Build notes that keep the line at 5/min
- Two Screw Constructors per plate Assembler. 60 screws per minute against 40/min per Constructor means one machine is never enough. This single mistake is behind most under-performing plate lines.
- Nine iron ingots of plates per plate. Six plates at 1.5 ingot each, which is 30 plates per minute — one and a half plate Constructors at 20/min for every plate Assembler. The plate feed needs its own sub-line, not a split off the main bus.
- Buffer both inputs. The Assembler takes 6 plates and 12 screws in one gulp; a manifold with no buffer stutters every cycle once the belt is near capacity.
- Do not sink these. 120 points per plate at the AWESOME Sink is low for the iron it represents — plates are almost always better spent on frames.
For the wider iron layout, the main bus guide covers how to split one ore line into plates, rods and screws without starving any of them, and the production ratio walkthrough scales the tables above.