The 
Chemical Washer is a Mekanism machine that’s used to clean Dirty Slurry with Water, which turns it into Clean Slurry. It’s the second machine of 5x ore processing, sitting between the 
Chemical Dissolution Chamber and the 
Chemical Crystallizer, and it uses 5 mB of Water for every 1 mB of slurry.
It’s also the slowest part of the line when it’s first placed, as it only washes 1 mB each tick. An ore block is 1,000 mB of slurry, so one ore will take 50 seconds and 5 buckets of Water to get through, and you’ll usually want 
Speed Upgrades in it straight away.
How to Make It
The recipe is close to the one for the Chemical Dissolution Chamber, with 4 
Refined Obsidian Ingots in the corners, a 
Steel Casing in the middle and an 
Ultimate Control Circuit on each side of it. What’s different is that a 
Basic Fluid Tank goes above the casing, and a 
Basic Chemical Tank goes below it.
Refined Obsidian Ingots are made in an 
Osmium Compressor, and you’ll need 12 of them for the 3 machines of the 5x line. It’s worth crafting all of them together, as a Chemical Washer isn’t able to do anything unless the other 2 machines have been built as well.
How It Works
There are 3 tanks inside the Chemical Washer, with one for Water, one for the Dirty Slurry coming in and one for the Clean Slurry going out, and each of them holds 10,000 mB. Every 1 mB that it washes costs 80 FE (200 J), so it uses 80 FE/t before any upgrades, and it stores up to 32,000 FE.
The Clean Slurry tank can only hold one type, and it’s pushed out of the right side by default, so it needs a Pressurized Tube there to take it. If you change ores while the old slurry is still in the output tank, the machine will stop until that tank has been emptied.
How Much Water It Needs
Washing an ore block takes 5,000 mB of Water, and that goes up with the amount of slurry, so 3 pieces of raw ore need 10 buckets and a block of raw ore needs 30. The Water tank holds 10 buckets, which is only enough for 2 ore blocks, so it’ll need to be refilled all the time while it’s running.
Using an Electric Pump
The easiest way to do that is with an 
Electric Pump above a Water source, which is connected to the Washer with a Mechanical Pipe. One Water source block never runs out, and a Pump with no upgrades brings in about 50 mB each tick, which is 10 times what the Washer uses at its normal speed.
Using Water Buckets
For testing, you’re able to put a 
Water Bucket into the Washer’s bucket slot, and you’ll get the empty 
Bucket back from it. Each one is only worth 200 mB of slurry though, so you’d need 5 of them for a single ore block.
Speed Upgrades
Speed Upgrades work differently in this machine, as each one doubles how much slurry is washed every tick. With all 8 installed it’s able to wash up to 256 mB a tick, which would be a whole ore block in under a second, although the Water and power it needs go up by the same amount.
| Speed Upgrades | Slurry per Tick | Water per Tick | Time per Ore Block |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 1 mB | 5 mB | 50 s |
| 1 | 2 mB | 10 mB | 25 s |
| 2 | 4 mB | 20 mB | 12.5 s |
| 3 | 8 mB | 40 mB | 6.3 s |
| 4 | 16 mB | 80 mB | 3.1 s |
| 8 | 256 mB | 1,280 mB | 0.2 s |
With 3 Speed Upgrades the Washer is almost able to keep up with a Chemical Dissolution Chamber, which dissolves an ore block every 5 seconds, and one Electric Pump with no upgrades still covers the Water. Past that you’ll need more Water coming in, either from a faster Pump or a second one.
Speed Upgrades also raise the energy used for each mB, by a little under double for each upgrade. So it’s worth adding the same number of 
Energy Upgrades, which bring the cost back down and make the energy buffer bigger, as the Washer should slow down when it isn’t able to store enough power for a tick.
Upgrades and Automation
The Chemical Washer takes Speed, Energy and Muffling upgrades, but not 
Chemical Upgrades, as the Water it uses is always 5 mB for each 1 mB of slurry. There isn’t a factory version of it either, so upgrades or more Washers are the only ways to wash faster.
It needs 3 connections to run by itself, which are a Pressurized Tube bringing Dirty Slurry in, a Mechanical Pipe for the Water and a second tube taking the Clean Slurry out. The sides can be set in the Side Configuration tab or with a 
Configurator, and from here the slurry goes to the Chemical Crystallizer.
FAQ
It only washes 1 mB of slurry every tick when it has no upgrades, and an ore block makes 1,000 mB, so each ore takes 50 seconds. Each Speed Upgrade doubles that, which means 3 of them bring it down to about 6 seconds an ore. It’ll need more Water and power as well, so add Energy Upgrades with them.
Water can be piped in with a Mechanical Pipe from an Electric Pump, which is the way you’ll want to do it for a full line. A Water Bucket can be placed in the slot beside the Water tank as well, which is fine for testing. It uses 5 mB of Water for each 1 mB of slurry, so you’ll need 5 buckets for an ore block.
Clean Slurry is piped into a Chemical Crystallizer, which turns every 200 mB of it into a Crystal. The Crystals are then sent back through the 4x line, starting with a 
Chemical Injection Chamber. It can’t be used for anything else, and it has to be moved with Pressurized Tubes, as it’s a chemical.
One Chemical Washer with 3 Speed Upgrades is nearly able to keep up with a single Chemical Dissolution Chamber, as it’ll wash an ore block in about 6 seconds. Without any upgrades it’s 10 times slower than the chamber, so the slurry will back up. Adding a fourth upgrade, or a second Washer, is enough to stay ahead of it.
