Upgrading isn't clicking for me -_-

I know the problem is going to be so simple that it hurts…

I’ve done all the tutorials, and the upgrading segment twice to confirm.

Example:

I have an ingredient that is 15-19 and starts at 14
It will upgrade via an evaporator at 16 to 18

In the tutorial (if you don’t remember):
There’s a 5-12 ingredient, starts a 4, that upgrades at 7-10 via an evap.
It instructs you to first lay down three evaps to bring it to 7, and then one more to upgrade it.

By the tutorials logic, in my example, I need to run it through two evaps first in order to bring it up to 16, then one more to upgrade it.

I’ve been getting sugar pills repeatedly. Where am I going wrong?

once you have upgraded, click on the upgraded product to see what concentrations activate it, this can be troublesome when planning your line but it is necessary until they get a way to check ingredients in each upgrade state. The basic process is putting the ingredient through the upgrade machine once it is in the upgrade range, but don’t let it out afterwards (you can check it in the machine) then plan your line from there.