How to Get Iron and Make Steel in Bellwright

Metal in Bellwright is a chain: bronze for early parts, iron for tools and nails, steel for the best gear.

Iron is not the first metal. A Strap is 1 Wood, 1 Bronze Ingot at a Toolmaker or Workshop (1m 25s), so bronze is what the early straps are made of, and the wiki lists 43 buildings and items that use a Strap. A Bronze Ingot is 1 Copper Ore, 1 Tin Ore at a Bloomery (50s), and a Bloomery costs only 15 Crude Stone.

The map has 15 copper pins (nearest villages: Haerndean (5), Bradford (4), Farnworth (3)) and 16 tin pins (Padstow (8), Blackridgepool (5), Crasmere (1)). Ore can also be bought: Luca Aldridge (Horndean) lists both copper and tin ore. More on the merchants guide.

The wiki's map pins 15 iron deposits: 10 nearest Horndean, 3 nearest Blackridgepool, 2 nearest Crasmere. From Haerndean the closest one is about 3455 map units to the south-west, so iron is a trip, not a walk around the block. Open the iron layer on the map or use the resource finder to measure from your own base.

Ore is mined from iron rock nodes with a pickaxe. The tables do not say which pickaxe grade iron needs, so check the tool in your hand before a long trip.

Hand-mining does not scale. The wiki lists 5 kinds of building whose workers gather Iron Ore: Foraging Camp, Foraging Hut, Foraging Lodge, Mining Hut, Pit. The Mining Hut (wiki tier 2) costs 4 Log, 10 Rope, 8 Thatch, 20 Wood, 22 Wooden Plank, 12 Copper Nails, 15 Crude Stone; the Pit (tier 3) costs 20 Thatch, 35 Hardwood Plank, 40 Granite, 18 Cured Rope, 8 Steel Ingot.

That last line matters: the Pit needs 8 Steel Ingots. You make steel with the hand-mined iron from steps 4 and 5, then the Pit takes over.

Both smelters take 1 Iron Ore and take 50s per ingot. They differ in fuel: the Furnace burns Peat, the Smelter burns Charcoal. The Furnace is much cheaper (15 Cob, 18 Crude Stone) than the Smelter (29 Cob, 14 Hardwood Plank, 8 Copper Nails, 24 Thatch, 22 Granite); the game's age field puts the Furnace in age 1 and the Smelter in age 2.

Peat is a map resource: 12 pins, Blackridgepool (9), Padstow (2), Bradford (1). Charcoal is made at a Coal Burner (1m 40s for 2 Log), and the Coal Burner is a tier-3 building. See the resin and charcoal guide for that side.

Steel Ingot is 1 Iron Ore, 1 Charcoal at the Smelter, 58s per ingot. The wiki lists 48 products that use steel and 42 that use iron ingots, so everything from late weapons to armour sits behind this step. Check the picks before you spend it: best weapons and best armor.

Iron Ingots also become nails and tinplate. Iron Nails are 1 Iron Ingot making 3 nails in 3m, at crafting skill 6 per the game data the wiki prints. Tinplate is 1 Iron Ingot, 1 Tin Ingot at a Workshop (45s).