Re: [Fwd: Steel tech and weapons]

[Jevan Furmanski <furmansj@expert.cc.purdue.edu>]

On Tue, 16 Jun 1998, leads metal products inc. wrote:

> 
> 
> ----------
> > Jevan Furmanski wrote:
> > >
> > > In response to the hub-bub about steel, the problem with steel isn't the
> > > working of it, but the making of it.  The planet hasn't even developed
> > > coke technology, which is essential to steel production, and I would
> > > attribute this to the planet's lack of dried up swamp land.  Steel
> > > production is the tricky part, and for the most part wasn't as we know it
> > > until the first world war, and yielded cool new ways to kill eachother.
> > > If someone wanted to have a group of super artisans like the Japanese
> > > swordsmiths, who overcame their technological limitations I could back
> > > that.  Steel as a raw material is hundreds of years away though.
> >
> 
> Being someone that works with steel every day, I know a lot about it. For one
> theres other ways to make it without coke, the main thing that is needed is the
> high heat to purify it, plus a few other things. So making steel at a blacksmith
> shop can't be done but working it there can be done. But there are other ways
>  to get the heat needed that are withing the bond of jaren, using nonmagical means.
> It can be done, it still won't be cheap but a technolgy change from iron to mostly
> steel has to happen. It may take a few year game time before things are all aviible, but
> it's already been happening. When kerions watch was taken over many years ago
> by us advantures, Kerion made a deal with the dwares to make steel for him, and dutch has
> kept that same deal going since.
> 
> What a character has to find is a good heat source. One adventure I ran I had people
> use the heat of a volcano to purify steel.
> 
> Aaron K. Alexander
> 
> 

This is finally an answer to my question about what steel on Jaern is.  If
steel is a raw material in ther respect that it is made in ovens with a
different carbon source, so be it.  If steel is not a raw material, and
has to be made piece by piece like the settlers did, so be it.  I am
toying with the idea of using "acceller technology" and making an arc
furnace.