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Ore Smelting

Introduction

Ore, after being dug up from the ground using mines, must be smelted in one of the various buildings designed for that purpose. Smelting turns ore into metal, including the alloys of brass, bronze, steel, and Metal Blue. Although it is not an ore per se, smelting is also the process whereby red sand is converted to quicksilver.

All smelting facilities work the same way: a quantity of ore and fuel is loaded into the building, then the building is fired. A certain percentage of the ore is converted to metal, and the remainder is converted to almost-worthless clinker (or ash, in the case of magnesium ore). You will receive a message in Main when the metal is finished, and you may then retrieve the metal and clinker from the building. (Note: You will only receive clinker if you have the Masonry skill, available at the University of Architecture.)

The various smelting facilities differ in the amount of ore which can be smelted at once, the amount and type of fuel used, the firing time, and the ore-to-metal efficiency. The Ore Inferno is by far the most popular smelting facility, followed by the Precious Furnace (for rare ores) and the Dirty Smelting Pot.

(NOTE: In the list below, "ore capacity" refers to the building's capacity for a single type of ore. When smelting alloys, it is possible to exceed the listed capacity, since you will be loading the building with more than one type of ore.)

Smelting Pot

The Smelting Pot is the most basic smelting facility, converting 5 ore to 1 metal. Though easy to build, it is entirely obsolete compared to other buildings. New players are encouraged to skip the Smelting Pot entirely and start with a Craft Furnace or better (obtaining the iron bars through trade).

Craft Furnace

Craft Furnaces are basic smelting facilities which convert 25 ore to 5 metal. Though an improvement in all respects over the Smelting Pot, they too are inefficient compared to later buildings. Nonetheless, the Craft Furnace is a good beginning choice for a new player.

Blast Furnace

Blast Furnaces are rare in Egypt, due to their inefficiency and the fact that they can only be built by players who have learned the Forge Tuning skill (either from a School of Conflict or from another player). They convert 200 ore into 10 metal, making them far less ore-efficient than a Craft Furnace but somewhat more charcoal-efficient. Even so, the Ore Inferno remains the best choice by far for any large-scale smelting.

Precious Furnace

The Precious Furnace is the smelting facility of choice for rare and expensive ores (such as aluminum or red sand). For these ores, the Precious Furnace's efficiency makes it well worth the cost in charcoal.

Filled to capacity, a Precious Furnace converts 18 ore to 9 metal. However, it will also produce 9 metal from just 17 ore, so it's slightly more efficient to run batches of 17 ore at a time. (And after all, efficiency is what the PF is all about.)

Ore Inferno

Now we're getting somewhere. Fueled by petroleum, and converting 250 ore to 37 metal, the Ore Inferno is the smelting workhorse of Egypt. Though not particularly ore-efficient, the building's production capacity is large, and its firing cost of 2 petroleum is almost negligible. Moreover, the OI is an excellent choice for alloys (see Formulas, below).

For a slight improvement, the ore inferno will also produce 37 metal from 247 ore.

IMPORTANT: Ore Infernos are big ugly buildings which cause pollution, hampering wood harvests and other things in roughly a 100-coordinate radius. Therefore, be sure to build your OI a safe distance from your camp -- and everybody else's.

Dirty Smelting Pot

The Dirty Smelting Pot runs on coal (which is found in deeply dug mines), and converts 10 ore to 3 metal. Its ore efficiency makes it a reasonable alternative to the Precious Furnace when time and/or charcoal are in short supply, or for moderately rare ores such as lead and zinc.

Formulas

Any ore can be smelted in any structure (with one exception: steel cannot be produced in a Smelting Pot); however, the rarity of the ore as well as the firing cost must be taken into account. These are the most commonly used methods for each type of metal.

Common metals: Iron, Copper, Brass, Bronze, Steel

Iron / Copper

Iron and copper ores are in no short supply, so the Ore Inferno is preferred. Its low ore efficiency is compensated by its ability to smelt huge quantities of ore in a single firing as well as by its fuel efficiency.

Brass

Brass is an alloy of iron and copper. Again, since both ores are easy to come by, an Ore Inferno is the way to go. The general formula for brass is: n copper ore, 2n+2 iron ore.

Bronze

Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin. An Ore Inferno is the most efficient building to use. The general formula for bronze is: n tin ore, at least n^2 but less than (n+1)^2 copper ore.

Steel

Steel is another alloy consisting almost entirely of iron with a single deben each of aluminum and zinc. Once more, an Ore Inferno is the most efficient building to use. The general formula for steel is: n iron ore, 1 aluminum ore, 1 zinc ore.

Scarcer ores: Zinc, Lead

Zinc and lead mines produce less than half as much ore as iron and copper, and in addition the ores are harder to find in the first place. I prefer to use a Dirty Smelting Pot for these ores, but if you want to use an Ore Inferno for any reason, for example if you have a huge amount of ore and don't care about the waste, just follow the Iron/Copper formula above.

Rare ores: Red Sand, Gold, Lithium, Aluminum, Tin, Magnesium

Rare ores are typically smelted in a Precious Furnace. However, the relative value of the finished product must be weighed against the PF's firing cost of 120 charcoal. If charcoal is difficult for you to obtain or produce, or if you don't feel 120cc is worth an extra 20% metal, you may want to use a DSP instead.

Magnesium is a special case, as it produces ash rather than clinker for the ore that did not get converted into smelted metal. Depending on how much magnesium you want compared to ash, any of the previous smelters can make sense.

Others: Limestone, Silver

Limestone and silver are unique in that they come out of a mine fully processed and ready to use. (Well, you probably wouldn't want to smelt limestone anyway, given that it is a mineral and not a metal...)

(See also: Mining, Metal Blue)

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Last edited May 3, 2004 11:23 pm by Nephte (diff)
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