Hi!
Haven't really tried modding much before, but I did mess around with something last night, essentially a 'rock grinder'.
Now, before I go any further, I should point out that I have no issue with reality, but equally, I don't necessarily apply reality to how I do things in DF. So, when I thought up some further additions to my modding, I didn't think 'oh well, that isn't real'.
My current rock grinder takes any random stone, and converts it into (generic) stone chips, with a small (5% each, so you could theoretically get 4 items) chance of producing a random piece of iron ore, copper ore or silver ore (I just picked a couple).
What I'd like to do is take the stone chips, and process them through a further workshop, to produce potash, with a chance of producing fuel.
So, I figure I'll take another workshop first and have it produce a 'quicklime' style substance from any flux rock, and then use that in another workshop with the stone chips to produce the potash + fuel combine.
I figure 90% chance of producing potash and 50% chance of producing fuel per combine should be weighted enough that it's not ridiculously unbalancing considering the prevalence of both lignite/b-coal and magma nowadays. I'm simply making a method whereby a) I get rid of excess stone and b) it means I can start making magma proof piping easier to pump magma up to my forges.
Anyway, I'm open to suggestions, and feedback, and if anyone else is interested, I'd be more than willing to share the finished raws.