How to Make Steel with the Blast Furnace Preheater

Build the blast furnace

Place a Blast Brick structure for the furnace body, then add a Blast Furnace Preheater against it. The preheater speeds up smelting and is required for steel production. Fuel the preheater separately from the main furnace.

Feed it the right inputs

Insert Coal Coke and iron into the furnace. Coal Coke is made by processing coal; you can store surplus as a Block of Coal Coke or Coal Coke Slab. The blast furnace outputs Steel, which you can compress into a Block of Steel for storage or crafting.

Use the steel

Steel feeds most advanced recipes: Advanced Electronic Component, Advanced Heatsinks, and structural blocks like Aluminium Structural Arm pairings. Blast Brick and Blast Brick Slab are the building blocks for expanding the furnace multiblock. Keep a Coke Brick and Coke Brick Slab supply nearby so you can rebuild or enlarge the setup without stopping production.

Scale up

Add more preheaters to cut processing time. Route Coal Coke in from a dedicated coke oven line and pull Steel out to a chest or conveyor. If you run low on iron, process raw ore through a Crusher first to double output before it reaches the furnace.