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Sandustry Production Chains

Every step from sand to gold, with the actual yields — including the two steps most players skip that triple what a pile of sand is worth.

GamePrimer EditorialUpdated Verified

Stopping at the Shaker gets you 1 Gold per 2 Sand. Burning the residue, pressing it, and planting the seeds that come out gets you 3 Gold per 2 Sand from the same input — three times the yield, for two research unlocks.

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Materials with a dotted underline expand to show where they come from and what they become.

The currency every research unlock is priced in.

  1. Step 1

    +→

    1 Sand + 1 Water makes 2 Wet Sand

    No building needed — the two pixels only have to touch.

    OfficialSource

  2. Step 2Shaker

    →+

    Always 1 Residue, plus a 1-in-4 chance of 1 Gold

    Gold drops out of the bottom. Residue stays on top and is pushed off very slowly, so run Shakers in a downward staircase.

    OfficialSource

  3. Step 3Fire

    →

    25% chance per pixel; the rest burns away with no output

    Lava, a Flamethrower, a Pyro Dispenser or a Burner Belt all work. A big enough pile keeps burning once lit.

    OfficialSource

  4. Step 4Kinetic Press

    →+Seed

    1 Burnt Residue always gives 1 Gold and 1 Seed

    Must fall from at least 25 blocks up, or it just sits on top and blocks the press.

    OfficialSource

  5. Step 5

    Seed+→Wet Seed

    1 Seed + 1 Water makes 1 Wet Seed

    The water is absorbed rather than doubling the output, unlike sand.

    OfficialSource

  6. Step 6Planter Box

    Wet Seed→+Amethelis

    Each Flower head holds 1 Gold and 4 Amethelis

    Destroy the grown Flower with a weapon or fire to drop its contents.

    OfficialSource

What the whole chain is worth

Two different answers, both correct, depending on how far you process. Running Wet Sand through a Shaker and stopping there averages 1 Gold per 2 Sand. Carrying the Residue all the way through burning, the Kinetic Press and Flowers averages 3 Gold per 2 Sand.

  • Shaker only2 Sand : 1 Gold
  • Through the Kinetic Press1 Sand : 1 Gold
  • Full chain, including Flowers2 Sand : 3 Gold

These are averages, not guarantees. Two of the three steps are probabilistic (the Shaker's 1-in-4 Gold roll and the 25% burn survival), so a short run can land well above or below the ratio; it only holds over volume.

A large Sandustry factory under a blue sky: banks of vertical machines on the left, a water tank above, and conveyor lines running across the whole screen.
A mature factory: the sand-to-gold loop scaled up, with washers, shakers and belt runs feeding each other.Hooded Horse

Why the residue matters more than the gold

The Shaker is where everyone starts, and it is the least productive part of the chain.

Every wet sand pixel gives you one residue guaranteed, and gold only one time in four. So the residue coming off your Shakers is not waste — it is the majority of what you produced, and it carries the same gold you were mining for, one processing step later.

Burning residue only converts a quarter of it. Then the Kinetic Press turns every surviving pixel into gold and a seed, and those seeds grow into flowers holding another gold each. Two lossy steps followed by two lossless ones, which is why the total comes out ahead.

Concretely, one sand pixel averages:

  • 0.5 Gold from the Shaker
  • 0.5 Gold from the Kinetic Press
  • 0.5 Gold from the flower its seed grows into

Three equal thirds. Skip the second half of the chain and you are throwing away two of them.

The two unlocks that pay for themselves

To run the full chain you need the Kinetic Press (500 Gold) and the Planter Box (2,000 Gold). Together that is 2,500 Gold to triple the gold value of every grain of sand you already process — see the Research Planner for where they sit.

Almost nothing else in the tree changes your economics that much. Most unlocks let you do something new; these two make everything you already do worth three times as much.

Things that will cost you throughput

  • The Kinetic Press needs a 25-block drop. Anything less and the burnt residue lands on top and blocks the press. This is a build-height requirement, not a suggestion.
  • Shakers push residue very slowly. Build them in a downward staircase so wet sand, which is denser, settles onto each one while residue floats up and flows onward. A flat row clogs.
  • The Kinetic Press has no built-in conveyor. A row of angled Launchers along the top clears anything that lands wrong without disturbing what is falling correctly.
  • The Flux Emanator stalls if you do not harvest it. Fluxite grows outward in a circle; no room to grow means no more conversion, and a large ball hurts performance.

Sources

How we work

  • First-hand tested where it matters
  • Official-confirmed vs community-reported, always labeled
  • No piracy terms, no made-up numbers

Read our methodology