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Guides/Metal Treatment

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NOTE: You must have Tongs to remove anything from a Chemical Bath without dumping the acid.

Note: Chemical treatment values have changed drastically in T8; the base values for the metals are unchanged. The updated values appear below under Treatment Values.

The goal of metal treatment is to impart certain attributes to the metal placed in a chemical bath. For example, treating metal with cactus sap will increase its corrosion resistance, and will decrease its strength.

The closer a substance's values are to the current values of the metal being treated, the greater the effect it will have. For example, cactus sap has a corrosion value of 72 (corrosion-proof). A metal whose corrosion value is 50 will respond much more quickly to cactus sap than a metal whose corrosion value is 12. It will take much more sap to move the second metal's corrosion value. Treating metal efficiently may require using multiple substances with values close to the current value of the metal, rather than dumping tons of one substance into the tank.

Somebob's Example Recipes and Theory Behind Them

Note: This recipe is unlikely to work for your tank exactly as written due to varying k-values, but will help to explain some of the concepts behind treatment, and should be easily tweakable to work

For the first example, a relatively straightforward recipe will be used to make Hard Corrosion-Resistant ?? for the purposes of building a Steam Shovel.

?? doesn't start all that far from where we hope to end up - Corrosion-Resistance can easily be imparted, but increasing the Strength is slightly trickier. The first ingredient that suggests itself is Cabbage Juice. Cheap, and it has favorable values for both Corrosion and Strength. We'll only see a little movement in Corrosion from this ingredient, but the increase in Strength is key.

10 seconds - the maximum amount of time you get for 1 deben of an ingredient - moves Corrosion bar as far as the ingredient is able to take it, but Strength still has a ways to go, so I need more than 10 seconds. Because in many instances there is little harm from letting a treatment go on slightly too long, and round numbers are easier to type, I treat it for another 10 seconds, which is perhaps a second or two more than strictly necessary.

At this point Strength is getting pretty close to where we want it to be, and Corrosion is on its way, too. The next ingredient of choice is Coal - while Saltpeter would move the Corrosion bar more quickly, it would also move Strength in an unfavorable direction, enough so to be counterproductive overall.

Adding 10 seconds of Coal moves things in a good direction, but isn't quite enough. Another 10 seconds also fails to do the trick, so another 10 are added - again, the full 10 being more than strictly needed. This ends up with the ?? having the attributes Hard, Corrosion Resistant, Conductive, and Purity of 7. Purity doesn't matter for this use, but does for several other uses of treated metal, so it's a good thing to make note of. The extra attribute of Conductive is merely a side-effect of this route of treatment, and is completely irrelevant for our intended use of the metal - extra attributes on a treated metal, or treated board, are simply ignored, so long as the required attributes are present.

My complete recipe for Hard Corrosion-Resistant Conductive ?? is thus 20 seconds Cabbage Juice and 30 seconds of Coal. As this is a relatively simple recipe, it likely will work in your tank with only minor tweaks.

The next example, for the Gold-Plated Stainless Insulative Non-Toxic ?? needed to make Tongs, has much tighter tolerances and a much more complicated treatment, which is unlikely to work the same in your tank as it does mine. As such it will be written up later when I get the time.



Metal Attributes and Properties

Property Very Low
<=13.5
Low
13.5<X<=23
Very High
>61
Tensility Brittle Ductile
Lustre Tarnished Shiny
Strength Plastic Hard
Corrosion Stainless Corrosion-Resistant Corrosion-Prone
Conductivity Insulative Conductive
Toxicity Nontoxic Toxic
Plating Plated


Note: Stainless will not suit a project that requires Corrosive-Resistant (T9: tried Stainless Insulative Nontoxic Purity 8 steel sheeting to create a Pig sty)

Treatment Values

Treatment Tens Lustre Stren Corr Cond Tox Purity Plating
Arsenic 72 40 48 0 16 8 (8) 24
Cabbage Juice 24 48 56 32 0 64 (2) 72
Cactus Sap 16 64 8 72 56 24 (6) 0
Coal 40 56 72 16 64 0 24 (4) 32
Gravel 48 72 24 8 40 16 32 (5) 64
Lime 0 24 16 56 32 48 64 (9) 40
Potash 8 16 64 48 24 30 0 (1) 56
Salt 32 8 0 40 48 56 72 (10) 16
Saltpeter 64 32 40 24 8 72 16 (3) 48
Sulfur 56 0 32 64 72 40 48 (7) 8

Metal Salts Treatment Values

  • Purity value changes to 72 when the metal salts matches the metal being treated.
Treatment Tens Lustre Stren Corr Cond Tox Purity Plating
Salts of Aluminum 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Antimony 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Copper 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Gold 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Iron 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Lead 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Magnesium 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Platinum 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Silver 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Tin 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8
Salts of Zinc 24 40 32 48 48 40 8 8

Untreated Metal Values

Treatment Tens Lustre Stren Corr Cond Tox Purity Plating
Aluminum 21 36 36 22 28 29 54 4
Antimony 20 43 37 36 14 29 54 4
Brass 25 43 31 43 31 29 54 4
Bronze 25 40 35 43 31 29 54 4
Copper 28 43 44 58 32 36 54 4
Gold 22 54 51 36 30 29 54 4
Iron 36 29 41 36 18 29 54 4
Lead 16 14 24 36 12 50 54 4
Magnesium 19 29 37 22 24 36 54 4
Metal Blue 37 43 52 61 59 29 54 4
Moon Steel 21 29 34 36 25 29 54 4
Nickel 16 36 29 36 16 36 54 4
Pewter 19 36 29 36 13 43 54 4
Platinum 32 54 39 36 18 29 54 4
Silver 23 47 36 50 32 29 54 4
Steel 35 43 45 36 20 29 54 4
Sun Steel 18 58 39 36 27 29 54 4
Thoth's Metal 46 36 53 58 15 43 54 4
Tin 19 36 26 36 17 29 54 4
Water Metal 16 47 30 36 36 29 54 4
Zinc 25 22 40 29 22 29 54 4