What causes a generator not restarting after refueling?

When fuel hits zero the generator enters a stopped state, but adding fuel only updates the fuel value and never transitions it back to running.

How do I catch this when it only happens for some players?

Capture it automatically from the player's device with the full stack trace, the device and OS, the build, and a breadcrumb trail of what they did. That turns a vague complaint into a specific, reproducible issue you can fix without owning the hardware it happens on.

How to Fix a Generator Not Restarting After You Refill Its Fuel

Quick answer: On fuel insertion, if the generator was stopped due to empty fuel and now has fuel, transition it back to the running state and re-power its grid.

A player refuels a stalled generator and the lights stay dark because nothing flips it back on. Adding fuel updates the amount but never re-enters the running state.

How to fix it

1. Re-evaluate state on refuel

When fuel is added, if the machine is stopped and fuel is now above zero, set it running again. Updating only the fuel number leaves it stuck off.

2. Distinguish off versus empty

Track whether the generator is manually switched off versus stopped from empty fuel, so refueling resumes only generators the player wanted running.

3. Re-power the grid immediately

On resume, mark the connected power grid dirty so dependent machines come back online the same tick instead of staying dark until the next refresh.

Catching the ones you can't reproduce

The hardest version of this to fix is the one you can't reproduce — it only happens on a player's hardware, OS, driver, or save state, under conditions that simply aren't present on your machine. A report that says “it crashed” or “it froze” gives you nothing to act on, so the bug survives release after release while quietly costing you players.

Automatic error capture closes that gap. Each failure arrives with its full stack trace, the device and OS, the build number, and a breadcrumb trail of what the player did right before it broke, so even a failure you have never seen becomes a specific, reproducible issue. Fold identical failures into one signature ranked by how many players each hits, and your worklist sorts itself worst-first instead of arriving as a stream of vague complaints.

This is where a tool like Bugnet earns its place. Its SDK captures every Unreal Engine error automatically with the full stack trace plus device, OS, memory, build, and game-state context, folds duplicates into one grouped issue with an occurrence count, and ties each to the build it first appeared on — so you fix the problem that hurts the most players first and confirm it is gone when its signature disappears from the next release.

Most of the time the fix is small. Seeing the failure clearly is the part that actually costs you.