40d:Smelting

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This article is about an older version of DF.

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Smelting is the act of refining raw stone ore(s) into useful bars of pure metal(s) or alloys. Smelting is similar but distinct from melting, which reclaims existing metal objects back into (fractional) bars. Metal bars produced at a smelter are usable in a wide variety of goods, from weapons to goblets to furniture to buildings.

Smelting also refines bituminous coal or lignite into coke, a fuel which is equivalent to charcoal. Fuel is required to operate a smelter, metalsmith's forge, kiln, or glass furnace.

Smelting requires the ore (or coal) to be processed, a smelter, either fuel or (for magma smelters) magma at least 4/7 deep, and a dwarf with the furnace operator skill enabled. Training in the skill is not required - since bars have no quality the only difference is the time the labor takes.

Since smelting coke requires fuel in a conventional (non-magma) smelter, usually one wood is burned in a wood burner to create one charcoal to start the process. Alternatives are to bring one bar of charcoal or coke with the expedition at embark, trade for one from caravans, or go straight to magma smelters.

Smelting ore results

All ores smelted alone have a % chance of producing a certain kind of bar. The following table shows those chances.

Ore	Iron	Gold	Silver	Copper	Nickel	Zinc	Platinum	Tin	Bismuth	Lead	Aluminum	Adamantine
Hematite	100%
Limonite	100%
Magnetite	100%
Garnierite					100%
Native platinum							100%
Native gold		100%
Native silver			100%
Horn silver			100%
Galena			50%							100%
Tetrahedrite			20%	100%
Native copper				100%
Malachite				100%
Sphalerite						100%
Cassiterite								100%
Bismuthinite									100%
Aluminum											100%
Adamantine strands												100%

Note that smelting galena often produces only lead, which is mostly used in producing lay pewter. Additionally, smelting Adamantine strands results in wafers, which are needed in greater quantities than bars when creating items.

Coke smelting

Please note that wood is not actually smelted, it is burned in the wood furnace. It is not called coke when burned, it is called charcoal.

Bituminous coal smelts into 3 coke
Lignite smelts into 2 coke
Wood burns into 1 charcoal

Since smelting coal requires using one unit of fuel, bituminous coal is effectively twice as efficient at producing coke as lignite. You'll need twice as many coke smelters to support your metals production if your source of coke is lignite.

Flux

Flux is a stone that is used in the production of pig iron and steel. 5 types of stone are classified as flux: Calcite, chalk, dolomite, limestone, and marble. All function the same way, so if a recipe requires flux, any will do.

(In real life, flux helps get the impurities out of the raw metal.)

Alloys

Certain metals can be smelted together to create a new metal called an alloy. There are 2 sets of recipes for alloys. The first set use only ore while the second set use only bars. You cannot mix the two.

Recipes using ore

Please note that when copper or silver ore is needed, any type of ore that produces copper bars or silver bars may be used. This means that you can actually make billon bars out of just tetrahedrite.

Ingredient 1	Ingredient 2	Output
Copper ore	Silver ore	Billon bars[2]
Copper ore	Sphalerite	Brass bars[2]
Copper ore	Cassiterite	Bronze bars[2]
Native gold	Silver ore	Electrum bars[2]
Copper ore	Cassiterite[3]	Fine pewter bars[4]
Copper ore	Cassiterite[2]	Trifle pewter bars[3]

Recipes using bars

The following are all the recipes when smelting bars at the smelter.

Ingredient 1	Ingredient 2	Ingredient 3	Ingredient 4	Output
Copper bars	Silver bars			Billon bars
Copper bars [2]	Tin bars	Bismuth bars		Bismuth bronze bars [4]
Copper bars [2]	Silver bars	Gold bars		Black bronze bars [4]
Copper bars	Zinc bars			Brass bars [2]
Copper bars	Tin bars			Bronze bars [2]
Gold bars	Silver bars			Electrum bars [2]
Copper bars	Tin bars [3]			Fine pewter bars [4]
Copper bars	Tin bars [2]	Lead bars		Lay pewter bars [4]
Copper bar	Nickel bars [2]	Zinc bars		Nickel silver bars [4]
Iron bars	Coal fuel¹	Flux		Pig iron bars
Copper bars	Gold bars [3]			Rose gold bars [4]
Iron bar	Pig iron bars	Coal fuel¹	Flux	Steel bars [2]
Copper bars [3]	Silver bars			Sterling silver bars [4]
Copper bars	Tin bars [2]			Trifle pewter bars [3]

^{1: The fuel used as a reagent for making pig iron and steel bars also counts as the fuel needed by a conventional (non-magma) smelter. It is still required at a magma smelter for the reaction.}

Note: Every recipe that is not used in steel making (except electrum) requires some copper. If you want to have a variety of metals in your fortress, you will want to conserve this resource.

A spreadsheet listing these recipes can be found at the following link. Work is being done currently to allow a person to input how much ore and bars he has, and the sheet will tell him how many of what kinds of metals he can make. Both Excel and Open Office formats are included: [1]

See also