Electric Arc Furnace
The electric arc furnace is a large automated furnace multiblock machine that can fill the role of crucible and automated smelter, and is required for progression as the only NTM machine that can produce silicon from various sources, such as sand, flint, fiberglass, and asbestos. Many mid to late game setups utilize an automated arc furnace setup to continuously turn any ores mined and preprocessed (via shredding and centrifuging) into the highest possible amount of bars via casting, using the in-built fluid mode.
Crafting
An arc furnace can be produced in an assembly machine with the following recipe:
Operation
To operate this machine, it will require both electrical power and crafted electrodes. In terms of electricity, the machine has a maximum storage capacity of 2.5MHE, and consumes 20kHE/s in operation, making it reasonably power hungry. In terms of the electrodes required for operation, there are four types available, and the machine must have three installed before it can operate, the electrodes are crafted like so:
Each electrode type has increasing durability, allowing for more operations before they melt, these are as follows:
- Graphite - 10 operations
- Lanthanium - 100 operations
- Desh - 500 operations
- Saturnite - 1500 operations
No existing electrodes last indefinitely, requiring replacement in order for the machine to operate continuously. Electrodes can be smelted down after depletion to recover one of the bars used in crafting.
Once you have the machine ready to operate, smeltable items can be placed inside, with some extra recipes that allow for smelting certain items that can't be smelted in a normal furnace. The most important of which being silicon, which is required for further progression, as it is necessary for the production of higher tier circuits.
Output Types
This machine can operate in two different modes: Solid mode, which is the easiest to setup and use, great for initial crafting, and; Liquid mode, which produces castable molten ores much like the crucible, with a small bonus to output, increasing efficiency of extraction from various ores. To demonstrate the boost, here is a table of the various ways silicon can be produced:
| Input | Solid output | Liquid output | Bonus |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sand | 1 nugget | 1 nugget | none |
| Nether Quartz | 3 nuggets | 3 nuggets | none |
| Quartz Powder | 3 nuggets | 3 nuggets | none |
| Asbestos Sheet | 4 nuggets | 4 nuggets, 4 quanta | 4 quanta, or 1/2 a nugget |
| Asbestos Powder | 4 nuggets | 4 nuggets, 4 quanta | 4 quanta |
| Fiberglass Bar | 4 nuggets | 4 nuggets, 4 quanta | 4 quanta |
| Flint | 4 nuggets | 4 nuggets, 4 quanta | 4 quanta |
| Block of Quartz | 12 nuggets | 12 nuggets | none |
| Block of Asbestos | 40 nuggets | 40 nuggets, 4 quanta | 4 quanta |
| Roll of Fiberglass | 40 nuggets | 40 nuggets, 4 quanta | 4 quanta |