A build train is extremely handy for working away from your base where your building materials are located. By having a dedicated train station setup with a freight platform for each material you can send the train back to that station and it will automatically reload the carriages for you. All you need to build at the remote site is an individual train station that the train can return to. This assumes you have a piece of loop track each end so the train can turn around, or a two-way train line setup.

There are two sorts of methods on supplying the build train with materials. 

1. Dedicated production lines of materials being delivered to the freight platforms.
2. All materials on one belt that passes through a series of Smart/Programmable splitters which feed each freight platform and then the overflow goes to an AWESOME Sink.

It's also advisable to have Industrial Storage containers before each freight platform as a buffer, if you are building a lot then the platform will be topped up rather quickly from the buffer instead of waiting for the materials to be produced.

This setup also functions as a local central storage, there's no point duplicating this elsewhere. You can start planning for the build train early on, in the screenshot below you can see a layout of specifically where on the foundations the storage containers need to be placed to line up with the input of the freight platform. Each freight platform will require a 2 x 7 foundation footprint.

So what materials should be in the build train? In the Hovrinskaya playthrough I had a limited space to put the train, so I came up with a list of 17 freight platforms which I think provides everything a player needs for most building situations.

1. Personal Storage
   • This carriage is for items you only need a few stacks of, like gas mask filters, packaged fuel
   • You will need to manually put materials in this freight carriage
   • Use an empty platform instead of a freight platform
2. Concrete
3. Iron Rod
4. Iron Plate
5. Reinforced Iron Plate
6. Steel Beams
7. Encased Industrial Beams
8. Alclad Aluminum Sheet
9. Steel Pipe
10. Copper Sheet
11. Wire + Quickwire
    • Merge equal incoming amounts to have an even amount of materials
12. Cable
13. Rotor
14. Motor
15. Modular Frame
16. Heavy Modular Frame
17. Computer

This setup is 48 foundations (F) long including spacing train tracks and turns.

• 4 x F = turn radius
• 2 x F = spacer track
• 2 x F = Train Station
• 34 x F = 17 Freight platforms
• 2 x F = spacer track
• 4 x F = turn radius