Core Keeper Farm Automation: Sprinklers, Robot Farm Arms and Seed Extractors

Machines for farm automation

Machine	What it does	Power	Recipe
Sprinkler	Waters tilled ground in a 5×5 area around it	Not needed	Scarlet Bar ×8, Iron Bar ×8 Made at Automation Table
Robot Farm Arm	Harvests crops to the other side; picks up seeds and plants them	Needed	Octarine Bar ×5, Scarlet Bar ×20, Iron Bar ×15 Made at Advanced Automation Table
Seed Extractor	Makes 2 seeds from 1 crop	Needed	Octarine Bar ×5, Scarlet Bar ×15, Iron Bar ×10, Mechanical Part ×2 Made at Advanced Automation Table
Conveyor Belt	Carries harvested crops and seeds	Not needed	Tin Bar ×2 Made at Automation Table
Robot Arm	Puts crops into chests or the seed extractor	Needed	Iron Bar ×5, Scarlet Bar ×5 Made at Automation Table
Electricity Generator	Produces power	—	Copper Bar ×10 Made at Electronics Table

Automatic watering (sprinklers)

• A sprinkler waters dry, tilled ground in the 5×5 area centered on itself. Its own tile doesn't count, so one sprinkler covers 24 tiles of crops.
• It needs no power and no water source.
• Put walkways outside the 5×5 so you can use all 24 tiles. Check that water reaches the outer tiles before you copy the layout.

Automatic harvesting and planting (robot farm arm)

• Harvesting: a powered robot farm arm harvests fully grown crops on the tiles at either end of the axis it faces and moves them to the opposite tile.
• Planting: it picks up seeds from the ground or a container on one side and plants them on the opposite tile (if that tile is the right ground for the seed).
• Speed: each move and the wait after it take about 0.63 seconds each.
• Harvesting with an arm gives no seeds back. Talents that guarantee seeds when harvesting by hand don't work either, so you need a separate seed supply.
• Robot farm arms can also be found placed in scenes such as the Abandoned Farm.

Refilling seeds (seed extractor)

Put crops into a powered Seed Extractor and it uses one every 40 seconds to output 2 seeds of that crop. Golden crops also give 1 gold ore. It stops when the power is cut and resumes when power returns.

If you cook every crop you harvest, the planting arm runs out of seeds. Send part of the harvest to the seed extractor and the farm never runs dry (see how to get more seeds).

Build order for an automatic farm

1. Make a small field: till it and check the ground suits the crop (e.g. Carrock seeds need tilled stone ground).
2. Place a sprinkler: check that water reaches the outer tiles.
3. Place a robot farm arm and power it: check that seeds reach the arm and that the planted tiles get water.
4. Give the harvest somewhere to go: conveyor belts and robot arms into a chest, with part going to the seed extractor.
5. Run one full cycle: plant → grow (10 min) → harvest → seeds return. Expand only after one full loop works.

Can automation grow golden crops?

Seeds planted by a player have a 3% chance to become golden crops, raised by the skill talent "Expert gardener". Seeds planted by an arm only get the base 3%. If you want golden crops, planting by hand is better (see crops and golden crops).

When farm automation doesn't work

Mechanics from the Core Keeper Wiki (Fandom) pages "Guides/Crop farming", "Robot Farm Arm", "Sprinkler", "Seed Extractor" (CC BY-SA 3.0), which cite the Explorer's Guide 1.3 and game 1.3 data.

More automation guides

• Automation guide (overview and machines)
• Automatic wood farm (Root Seeds and drills)
• Automatic fishing (Fishing Net)
• Mob farms (spawn tiles)