Quote:
Originally Posted by Varyon
While "forging" might be a bit difficult that way, I wonder if it could be possible (particularly with the assistance of a wee bit of magic) to use a sheath that contains a culture of Shewanella or similar bacteria to keep iron/steel tools from rusting. That is, you draw the item, use it for a bit, then resheathe it. Any rust that tries to form is reduced back to elemental iron rapidly enough to avoid much degradation. You'd probably still eventually see degradation, requiring the items be replaced (or shipped back to the surface to be reworked), but it sounds like an interesting paradigm.
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That might work. (EDIT - with the right energy source and electrical or chemical (or electro-chemical) potential, you wouldn't have to forge at all, just plate it layer by layer on the interface of the feeding sludge and cathode (or it's chemical equivalent - although once a few layers became plated on, it would be an cathode). You could develop an entire tech base for growing metal tools in useful shapes.)
Another option is that materials scientists have found that they can nearly halt corrosion of steel by coating it with a layer of graphene. Now graphene is clearly late TL 8 or even TL 9 materials technology - but since the OP says we are going down a divergent tech path, maybe the shark people can get some. It would also have knock-on applications (ultra-strong ropes, very efficient filters, lots of other stuff).
Luke