Bridging Two Powerhouses: The Thermal Smeltery Mod Explained
If you have ever built a sprawling factory floor powered by Thermal Expansion and then painstakingly set up a Tinkers’ Construct smeltery in the same world, you know the frustration of duplicate infrastructure. Thermal Smeltery is the tiny mod that finally unites these two titans of automation. It takes every single smeltery recipe from Tinkers’ Construct and adapts it for the Magma Crucible, letting you melt metals with raw Redstone Flux instead of lava. Suddenly your high-tech ore processing line can directly feed your tool forge, and all those double-ingot tricks become available without a second multiblock.
What Is Thermal Smeltery?
Thermal Smeltery is a lightweight compatibility bridge. It doesn’t add new blocks, new ores, or flashy gadgets. Instead, it silently registers every fluid-based smelting recipe from Tinkers’ Construct inside the Thermal Expansion Magma Crucible. That means any metal you could melt in the smeltery – from iron and gold to Manyullyn and Ender Amethyst – can now be produced by feeding solid items into a powered Crucible. The mod even pulls in recipes added by other Tinkers’ add-ons, such as Extra Tinkers’ Construct, so your custom alloys won’t be left behind.
How It Works
Once installed, the mod scans the existing smeltery recipe list and generates matching Crucible inputs. Drop a block of ore, a dust, or even a tool part into the Magma Crucible, supply RF, and watch it melt into the exact same liquid metal you would get from a traditional smeltery. The fluid is identical – it can be piped into a casting table, a casting basin, or any tank that accepts Tinkers’ fluids. The conversion respects ore doubling rules too, so a single ore block yields two ingots’ worth of molten metal, just as the smeltery does.
Key Features at a Glance
- Ore doubling built in. Smelting a raw ore block in the Crucible gives you twice the molten metal, matching the smeltery’s output perfectly.
- Full fluid compatibility. The molten metals are the same liquids from Tinkers’ Construct, so you can cast tools, ingots, and blocks without any extra steps.
- Faucet and casting support. Set the Crucible’s output side to orange and attach a faucet directly. Pour into your casting table or basin exactly as you would with a smeltery drain.
- Automatic recipe discovery. Any mod that adds smeltery recipes – including add-ons like Extra Tinkers’ Construct – gets its melts converted without manual configuration.
- RF-powered efficiency. Replace lava tanks and timer-based smelting with on-demand, speed-upgradable Crucible processing that scales with your power grid.
Compatibility and Version Notes
Thermal Smeltery was originally built for Minecraft 1.7.10 with version 1.0.1, offering a pure recipe conversion and nothing else. The 2.0.0 release for Minecraft 1.10.2 carries the same philosophy but has one known limitation: it does not yet convert recipes that involve tool parts. The developer has noted uncertainty about whether tool part melting can be implemented in the future, so for now you will need to keep a small smeltery around if you want to recycle broken tools. Otherwise, all standard metal, alloy, and block recipes work flawlessly.
If you prefer a minimal experience, those early versions are exactly what you need – no extra blocks, no RF-powered smeltery multiblock, just the recipe bridge. For players who want a dedicated Thermal-style smeltery structure, the mod’s author has teased a “Thermal Smeltery” machine as a possible future addition, but it remains a distant plan.
Installation and Getting Started
Adding Thermal Smeltery to your pack is straightforward. You need both Thermal Expansion and Tinkers’ Construct already installed, of course. For a hassle-free setup, many players turn to modern launchers that handle mod management automatically. This mod can be easily installed via the foxygame.net launcher – a convenient, flexible, and modern Minecraft launcher where you can download mods right from the menu, letting you browse, select, and launch your custom modpack in just a few clicks. Once the mod is loaded, there is nothing to configure; the recipes appear immediately in JEI or NEI, and your Crucible is ready to melt.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does it double ores when smelting?
Yes. Any ore block that would normally give two ingots in a smeltery will produce twice the amount of molten metal in the Magma Crucible. This works for all supported metals and alloys.
Can I use the molten metal to make tools, ingots, or blocks?
Absolutely. The fluids are the same ones registered by Tinkers’ Construct. You can pour them into a casting table to create tool parts, into a casting basin to form blocks, or into an ingot cast for standard ingots.
Can I stick a faucet to the side of the Crucible and pour into my casting table?
As long as the Crucible can output to that side – set the side to orange in the machine’s configuration – a faucet will work exactly as it does on a smeltery drain. You can even pipe the liquid out with fluiducts for fully automated casting lines.
Is this all the mod will ever be?
For now, yes. The developer has mentioned a possible RF-powered smeltery structure in the future, but the current releases focus solely on recipe conversion. The lightweight approach is intentional, keeping the mod small and compatible.
Couldn’t I just do this with MineTweaker?
You could, but you would have to manually add every single recipe for every metal and every mod. Thermal Smeltery does that work for you automatically, saving hours of scripting and keeping your pack lean.
Why You Should Add It to Your Modpack
Thermal Smeltery removes the need to maintain two parallel ore-processing systems. It lets you channel all your raw materials through your existing Thermal Expansion infrastructure, then pipe the molten metals straight into your Tinkers’ workshop. The result is a cleaner base, less lag from redundant multiblocks, and a genuinely satisfying synergy between magic-like smeltery alloys and high-tech RF power. Whether you are building an expert-style pack or simply tidying up a personal world, this tiny mod delivers enormous quality-of-life improvements without bloating your instance.