And Vault 101 certainly isn't it: a control vault wouldn't have stayed closed for 200 years. Even if there are more out there, I'd be surprised if the total number is beyond small single digits.
#FALLOUT WIKI VAULT 101 SERIES#
We've only seen two in the whole series (3 and 8), and for all we know, they may be the only ones. The thing about control vaults is that there probably aren't that many of them. In context, it sounds like he's referring to "control" in the sense of the Enclave's "purify the wasteland" mission (within the vault, Vault 13 residents wouldn't have been exposed to the pervasive radiation and FEV contamination facing regular wasteland dwellers), and not in terms of Project Safehouse's control vaults. In Fallout 2, Enclave President Richardson calls Vault 13 a "control group," but he also says that it was meant to remain closed until its inhabitants were needed. Chris Avellone has stated that it was intended to remain closed indefinitely.
It's purpose is never explicitly stated in game, but the water chip problem was just a bureaucratic mix-up with shipping (the spare chips were sent to another vault) and not an actual experiment. However, the experiments can have a similar result to the control as that is what experiments are for. TLDR: Experiments cannot become a control during the course of the experiment. That is to say, although Vault 13 was an experimental vault not intended to survive long in the event of a nuclear attack, it succeeded in staying prosperous much like Vault 8 (which became Vault City) until the events of Fallout 2. Eventually they continued to live on peacefully without trouble until the events of Fallout 2. This is true for Vault 13, the vault from the original game where they did not have extra water chips so they required the Vault Dweller to get more. Vault 101 was never intended to become a control vault and in experiments, the roles for each of your experiments should be pre-determined and not ever change during the course of your experiment. A perfectly normal control vault can fail on the outside with raider attacks, wild animal hostility, unfriendly factions, etc. A control Vault is meant to be a vault with everything functioning normally and having a fixed time of when the vault should be opened.