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[Fedor]

Coal.  I've felt since I first used it that coal was surprisingly ineffective; I'd honestly like it to be a solid alternative to the magma.  Especially since I hear rumors that magma is going to be less of a sure thing in the next version.

Now, I have some real-world numbers to make a case.

We don't know how large a map square is, and it's not even much good supposing that it even has a fixed size.  However, for raw material purposes it probably isn't smaller than 10 feet by 10 feet by 10 feet:  1000 cubic feet.

Not all of the volume of a "coal pocket" will necessarily be coal.  But coal comes in large seams (unlike precious gems) and a figure of 25% of the total volume does seem properly conservative.

Bituminous coal from the mine weighs roughly 80 pounds per cubic foot.  250 cubic feet of bituminous coal averages out to about 10 tons (actually slightly more).

In order to actually melt and cast (as opposed to merely work) iron ore, you need about 2 tons of coal per ton, if you are using mid-19th century technology.  If you are using old-fashioned technology, it takes roughly 7 tons per ton.  We assume here that the dwarves are using the latter, and therefore claim that:

"The coal mined from one map square can melt and cast just over 1 ton of iron ore, or about 10 250-pound bars.  It can melt and cast a lot more bronze and most other metals, but less platinum."

[ September 10, 2007: Message edited by: Fedor ]

[Istrian]

I believe I read in one of the forums that in the next version we will be able to trade for materials, therefore have an infinite supply of wood to make charcoal with. So we won't really need coal.

But I agree with you that coal production is not effective enough.

Oh, and your calculation of the amount of coal contained in one square is wrong as one square can hold an infinite amount of dragons. Therefore one square of coal can produce infinite amounts of coal      

[ September 10, 2007: Message edited by: Istrian ]

[BurnedToast]

Actually, if you check the weights - 1 unit of coke weights LESS then one unit of ore, 200 'units' for the coke and 300 'units' for the ore. So you want it to be less effective? heh. 7 units of coke to make 1 iron bar = no one makes iron. On top of that, the law of conservation of mass is violated in turning coal into coke, as you get 2 200 'unit' coke from 1 300 'unit' coal so I wouldn't worry too much about trying to bring reality into it.

And as for the guy who said we can import wood in the next version... ugh, that won't help much. unless toady changes it, wood weights 250 per unit, human caravans can carry ~4000 units altogether when you have all the trade nobles, so that's only 16 logs per caravan (assuming you can get them to bring all wood, anyway). enough (sort of) for bins and barrels on a low/no tree map but not enough for anything but very basic smithing.

Consider also it takes 600 creations to make a legendary smith, more if you melt the objects down to save on metal. 600 wood is ALOT no matter how you get it.

Edit: It's actually 6000 units for the biggest caravan, 4000 was from memory. the point still stands though - 24 units of wood is still not that much. (unless someone has gotten more then 7 wagons)

[ September 11, 2007: Message edited by: BurnedToast ]

[Bricktop]

Then again in the next version you could technically have an entire level that is pure treefarm...  

[Mechanoid]

Assuming the 200 tower cap restriction is lifted, yes...
Infinite charcoal from a map-wide tree farm. The only problem is getting enough water to flood the entire thing. (glacial maps will be HELL; use wood to start fire to melt ice into water to use on dirt and make mud, to grow tower cap to make wood)

Coal really does need to be boosted, though it's equal to charcoal at the moment... Maybe it could make a better steel then charcoal does?

[Connie Radical]

What if the weight of coal was increased, and the task to process didn't involve other fuel, but rather carving the rock off from the sides and shaping it to avoid waste: something like, say, a mason's job of carving rock blocks but for a smith/wood burner?

[Felix the Cat]

quote:Originally posted by Connie Radical:
<STRONG>What if the weight of coal was increased, and the task to process didn't involve other fuel, but rather carving the rock off from the sides and shaping it to avoid waste: something like, say, a mason's job of carving rock blocks but for a smith/wood burner?</STRONG>

I don't like the idea of adding yet another step to the coal-production process.

[Grek]

quote:Originally posted by BurnedToast:
[QB]Actually, if you check the weights - 1 unit of coke weights LESS then one unit of ore, 200 'units' for the coke and 300 'units' for the ore. So you want it to be less effective? heh. 7 units of coke to make 1 iron bar = no one makes iron. On top of that, the law of conservation of mass is violated in turning coal into coke, as you get 2 200 'unit' coke from 1 300 'unit' coal so I wouldn't worry too much about trying to bring reality into it.

By my math, 1 map square's worth of coal, on average, should be able to smelt aproximatly 7.6 iron bars, or in game terms make aproximatly 7.6 bars of coke instead of the current 1 or less bars. The mass differance between coal and coke is that you need 1 coal and 1 fuel to make the coke: 500 imputed fuel for 400 outputed coke and, persumabely some smoke and low grade ash to make up the differance.

[ September 11, 2007: Message edited by: Grek ]

[ September 11, 2007: Message edited by: Grek ]

[Tamren]

One major scientific law that DF is missing right now is energy conservation. If you fire up a forge using a bundle of wood, the forge would stay warm for a very long time. Not just the time it takes for you to finish one job.

The way it should work is one bundle of fuel will generate enough heat for a job for different amounts of time. A bucket of sawdust for example might heat a pot of tea, a bucket of coal on the other hand would burn for days and melt the teapot.

Lets say you stocked your stove with a chopped up log. One bundle of firewood is composed of about 6 pieces, but you would not be able to stick 6 pieces of wood into the stove at the same time! What you would instead do, is use two pieces of wood to fire up the stove and add a piece whenever the heat drops.

Some types of iron smelters purify the metal in a continuous stream. The smelter MUST be kept hot 24/7. If for some reason it stops working, you would have to destroy the forge and build a new one because you would end up with a solid block of iron and slag bigger than an elephant.

Going into perfect detail on this would bore you guys to hell, but do you understand where im going with this?

Stoking and maintaining fires in very active workshops could be delegated as a seperate task for "firemaking dwarves". This would save a bit of your craftdwarf's precious time.

[ September 11, 2007: Message edited by: Tamren ]

[Draco18s]

quote:Originally posted by BurnedToast:
<STRONG>So you want it to be less effective? heh. 7 units of coke to make 1 iron bar = no one makes iron.</STRONG>

Nonononono

7 tons : 1 ton
But it's not 7 bars to 1 bar.  A bar of iron does not weigh 1 ton, it weighs 250 AU (arbitrary units), which we'll assume is 250 pounds.

That means a map square of coal has enough coal to melt 10 bars of iron! instead of the current 1.