Crypto's Cacti Farm v2 - Automatic Mod

Howdy again folks; today I have made a simple modification to the existing version 2 farm that makes it almost completely automatic.

Yes there are a few pics in this post so be patient on slower net connections.

The simple modification of the farm is done via the addition of loads of hoppers (I recommend making an iron farm) around the cacti bearing sand blocks, connected via the below flow path. Adding glass in the right areas seals up 16 cacti blocks into a single cell that yields 32 Cacti blocks per growth period.

Apologies for image alignment, Google Blogspot not quite working right for me today.  

The hoppers collect the Cacti item blocks, created after the required growth period, and the pistons are extended which then pass it through to the end chest (or even a silo if you build one and arrange the hoppers to link up to it on each floor). This happens once the pistons are then switched off as the Redstone circuitry when activated alternates how the hoppers function.

Note: An alternative is to use loads of repeaters to leave the hoppers in their default states at all times; but since the pistons only need to be on briefly to harvest the 2 cacti blocks per growth period, we can accept the minor tradeoff whilst saving a load of resources. However the option is there to use repeaters if you do modify the circuitry to more compact solutions than the more open design I used to make up these farms.

I hope this image is enough to give a rough idea of the flow path you should aim for when connecting up all these hoppers.

Adding glass around (and also on top of the piston blocks in) the 'cell' (a cell being every 2 rows of cacti) seals up the area so when cacti blocks are itemised, the random directions they jump to all bounce back over top of the hoppers around the cacti bearing sand blocks. This then sends them to a chest at the end of the hopper chain which you can then access to get all the cacti blocks you need after a few times you harvest the farm (once or twice if you keep scaling the farm up as needed).

Note: Compacting the Redstone circuitry would also lower the amount of space and glass needed for ensuring cacti item blocks go into the hoppers. Ensure though that any circuit you use activates the hoppers when the lever is pressed and glass (or other filler block of choice) does not change/break the Redstone circuit and directs cacti items into the hoppers.

Additional cost for automation is loads of wood (chests to make each hopper), iron (you guessed it, the hoppers) and glass (or other filler block of choice), however the result of all this is that single lever holds a great deal of harvesting power in a scalable cacti farming system.

Your only limits are time, the additional resources and perhaps a little computer power from any lag generated by the hoppers.

Why build this farm anyway?
Cacti is used for making Green Dye, an ingredient used for mixing with other dyes for more colors (lapis and green dye makes cyan dye) and in turn be used on things like wool, clay and glass.

All that aside, you could design the farm into a tower that has the appearance of an air purification system (photosynthesis converting carbon dioxide into oxygen) in a space station or other themed builds where a decorative yet functional farm could be used.

Comments are welcome; provided you are patient between submission time and when I get back online to moderate them.

Happy Minin'
Crypto (crypto4coin)