Smelting Stuff...

[OneManStanding]

Before I just go experiment in-game, I'm wondering if anyone has done a table for how much wood or coal you would need to smelt down a full stack of the various resources - iron, brass, lead, stone, clay... given if a forge has bellows or not. It would be a handy note to have available.

[Rotor]

MIN/MAXER ALERT!

 

[FranticDan]

smelting time is 1 second for each unit of resource, with the exception of brass being 0.4 seconds (without a bellows)

[OneManStanding]

I did some experimentation. I tend to divide my stacks in half and burn them double, so the forge will open back up in a reasonable(ish) amount of time. In any event, here it is should anyone want to know...

 

                            PER 3000
                  WITHOUT / WITH BELLOWS

IRON:               50:00 / 33:20

BRASS:             20:00 / 13:20

LEAD:               50:00 / 33:20

SAND:            200:00 / 133:20

STONE:          125:00 / 83:20

CLAY:            250:00 / 166:40

 

That is how much time (wood or coal) you will need to burn down a 3000 stack of each resource, with and without the bellows. You might want to round over with an extra bit to make sure it all gets done.

[pApA^LeGBa]

@OneManStanding The question is why? Once i can smelt whole stacks, i don´t care if i waste burning material tbh.

[OneManStanding]

@pApA^LeGBa Different playstyles.

 

It's not about using the exact amount of fuel but knowing how long it takes to smelt a whole stack of anything. If you tell your forge to make so-many bullet casings (or even craft anything in the game) it tells you exactly how long that's going to take so you can put in the fuel you need for that specific job. However it doesn't tell you how long it's going to be smelting for - and that's useful information.

 

I simply didn't know off the top of my head how long 6000 stone took to smelt. I know it's a background task but I have an assembly line mentality, so the time it takes is nice to know so I can leave it cooking, go out do a mission, come back and it's done and the fire went out automatically.

 

Maybe I played with my brother at first too much, but he told me always to put in no more fuel than you needed - I never asked why, it was just efficient, but there's obviously a heatmap effect to worry about. I share his pet peeve with my newer friends of coming back into the base to find EVERYTHING merrily alight and loaded with a stack of fuel and nothing in the queue. I'd think you'll agree that sticking in five or six jars of murky and then 2400 wood and leaving it running is a waste, even if wood is inexhaustible.

 

So, really, it's just handy information to have.

Edited November 12, 2023 by OneManStanding
Spelling error (see edit history)

[pApA^LeGBa]

Yeah, not gonna make 5 jars with that much wood ofc. Once i have stacks to smelt i usually have a 3 block wide moat around my base filled with spikes. So heat doesn´t bother me, the screamers usually all die in the spikes unless i want them to see me. That´s for SP only though. In MP we are a bit more carefull with heat.