Ever since we have come out of the stone age and figured out how to work with metals the human race's abilities have grown far beyond what our bodies are capable of. Working with metals isn't easy though, ore has to be mined and then smelted in a forge to separate the metal from the impurities it's contained within. Different types of metals also have different melting points which further complicates forge construction.
Merly smelting ore isn't enough though. Mined ore consists of rocks that contain the metal elements one is looking for, but not all ore is made equal. For a smelting operation to be profitable only ore containing a certain purity of metal should be considered for smelting. This requires sampling batches that are delivered to test if their purity is up to par and throwing out batches that don't match the criteria.
A further step in the metal manufacturing process is the process of alloying: mixing two or more different types of metal yield an alloy that has favourable physical properties like being a harder less brittle material. This puts a smelting operation in the position to set up some form of a production pipeline whereby different types of ore can ultimately be converted into complex alloys.
Iron ores:
- Hematite
- Magnetite
Copper ores:
- Chalcopyrite
- Chalcocite
Aluminium ores:
- Bauxite
- Corundum
Zinc ores:
- Zincite
- Calamine
Bronze: Copper & Zinc
Light Bronze: Bronze & Aluminium