X-BTF Silicon Factory not self-generating profit

[Nethog]

I am playing my first game of XBTF and still have not left the starting zone. I finally built my first factory, a silicon mine on an asteroid rated at 26 Silicon. I have purchased 2 transport ships. The problem is the only way I can get the mine to generate Silicon Wafers is to transfer credits from my ship to the factory. After some gameplay when I check the status of the mine, all the credits are gone and I do see Silicon Wafers that were mined. If I transfer more credits the same thing happens again. It seems that no matter how long I wait the Factory doesn't sell the Silicon Wafers to make a profit. Is the Factory AI that poor? Or is this a bug? Also I notice that one of my two transports is perpetually parked at the mine, and the other shows it perpetually on purchasing 3000 energy. What's up with the transports?

[Cpt.Jericho]

The trouble with your transports is, they only haul in E-cells but don't sell silicon. Can't quite remember if they are actually capable of selling products but I think they don't. You'll have to lower the selling price of your product to attract freighters from factories. -1 below the average may do the trick. And while you're at it, lower the price for buyin E-cells to a reasonable rate, so your mine will not run short.

[Alan Phipps]

Cpt.Jericho is correct - see this old thread.

[Praefectus classis]

It can also take a while for the NPC factories to notice your mine. You have to initially nurse the mine (or any other factory) until it's at capacity. You will then find it will be like buses as a number of NPC's arrive at the same time.

[Nethog]

Thanks all! I set the price of my Silicon Wafers to the minimum (295), and also reduced the max energy purchase to 8 credits. Finally I transferred 10,000 credits to the Silicon mine factory. After a while I returned to my mine and I saw that all my credits were spent but I did have ~180 silicon wafers in stock! It took a while, but I finally saw a Teladi ship from a Chip factory in Profit Share outside my mine, which eventually docked at my mine and purchased all of the Wafers leaving me with over 52,000 credits. The only thing that doesn't make sense is when I explored the entire Profit Share sector, I could not find a Chip Factory that apparently the ship that bought my Wafers originated!

[Praefectus classis]

Thanks all! I set the price of my Silicon Wafers to the minimum (295), and also reduced the max energy purchase to 8 credits. Finally I transferred 10,000 credits to the Silicon mine factory. After a while I returned to my mine and I saw that all my credits were spent but I did have ~180 silicon wafers in stock! It took a while, but I finally saw a Teladi ship from a Chip factory in Profit Share outside my mine, which eventually docked at my mine and purchased all of the Wafers leaving me with over 52,000 credits. The only thing that doesn't make sense is when I explored the entire Profit Share sector, I could not find a Chip Factory that apparently the ship that bought my Wafers originated!

I think you will find it's Greater Profit for the location of a chip plant.

[Nethog]

I think you will find it's Greater Profit for the location of a chip plant.

Oh really? Maybe it's because I haven't played enough to know how to locate the Factory? I assume it would appear as an unexplored symbol on my nav map wouldn't it? I.e. like a 4 die, 4 dots in a square pattern? I revealed all of the stations that are on my nav map in Greater Profit. I looked around anyway and I did discover BoGas floating around which appeared as a small green square symbol on my nav map!