Aluminum is a precious and useful resource. It is used to craft and repair a lot of your gear. Aluminum is one of the resources that I always found myself running out of before I researched and wrote this guide.
The best way to get a lot of aluminum quickly is to clear out Big Bend Tunnel and mine the eleven aluminum veins there while wearing Excavator Power Armor. Then smelt the ore in a chemistry workbench while using the Super Duper perk card.
Big Bend Tunnel
Big Bend Tunnel is in the southern part of the map. It’s got two entrances, one on the west end and one on the east. The western entrance is east of Lewisburg Station and north of both the Garrahan and Hornwright Estates. The eastern entrance is southeast of Lucky Hole mine and west of Watoga.
It doesn’t matter which end you choose. You’re going to face a lot of high leveled Scorched in this area. So come prepared to defend yourself as they can be tough, and if you’re not careful, they can gang up on you.
Whichever end you choose, move through the main tunnel until you come to the main cavern. You’ll know it by the fact that it has some infrastructure built up. Instead of continuing through the main tunnel, there will be another tunnel through the south wall.
Go through the southern tunnel and start keeping your eyes peeled for aluminum veins. There will be a total of eleven aluminum veins throughout this relatively short tunnel. It’s a dead-end, so keep moving. You can’t get lost.
Nice haul, right? So it gets better. Server hopping still works here. You can hop servers and then rinse and repeat. I did like six times while writing this post because I couldn’t believe it. I ended up with hundreds of aluminum ore. So much in fact that now I have to write a guide on getting acid now.
Abandoned Mine Shaft 1
Abandoned Mine Shaft 1 is in the far southwest corner of the map just south of Welch Station. It is also one of my favorite aluminum farming locations because it’s just dead-easy, and you get a lot of aluminum for it.
From the spawn point on the southside, you should be able to see the small metal mining shack and stairs leading up to it. Head towards the stairs, but don’t go up — instead, circle around the rock wall to the left (west). You should quickly see a cluster of four aluminum veins in the cliff wall.
Now head up to the shack and then to the east towards the backside of the mine shaft. On the wall facing the back of the mine shaft, are a cluster of six aluminum veins. A couple of them are a little temperamental, but all are minable.
That’s ten aluminum veins for killing a few mole miners or Scorched. If you mine that in your Excavator Power Armor, that’s an absolute minimum of forty aluminum ore and more like eighty to one hundred. When you smelt that down at a chemistry workbench, you’re looking at an aluminum scrap yield of eighty-plus if you equip the Super Duper perk card while doing it.
Harper’s Ferry
Harper’s Ferry is on the far east side of the map and north of Camp Venture. From the spawn point, you should run west across the bridge following the railroad tracks. Once across, start to move off to the left a little and look over the edges of the cliff. You will see a cluster of three aluminum veins.
Now head directly west and make your way to the road. Continue to follow the road west. Note the buildings on your right and the rock wall. You’ll see what looks like a church on your right climb the wall on the south side of the church. You should see another cluster of three aluminum veins.
If you mine all six aluminum veins in Excavator Power Armor, that should net about forty-eight aluminum ore. Smelt that down at a chemistry workbench while running the Super Duper perk card, and you’re looking at about forty-two aluminum scrap.
Conclusion
With just these three locations, you should easily be able to maintain a significant aluminum scrap stockpile. The only one that required any significant combat was Big Bend and those we just Scorched.
If you found this useful, be sure to check out the other guides that I have on this site and check back often for more.