I've seen quite a few suggestions for aluminium, but none have really seemed to be fun or have added anything new to TPT. Here's my take, which I hope interests you all.

Added Elements

Name: ALMN

Description: Aluminum. Can be alloyed to gain new properties.

Melting point: 660 C

Name: CRDM

Description: Corundum. Gemstone that can take on the color of other elements when melted.

Melting Point: 2050 C

Name: BALM

Description: Broken Aluminum. Formed when heavy particles strike ALMN at high velocities.

Melting Point: 660 C

Aluminum would be a light silver-grey colored, solid, conductive element. Aluminum would block pressure, like TTAN, providing a low melting point element that can also retain pressure, something I think would be useful in many cases. However, ALMN would also be breakable. While this might seem contradictory, due to it also blocking pressure, it would not break from pressure; instead, it would have properties similar to WOOD and how it breaks into SAWD. When a heavy particle hits ALMN at high speeds, it would break into BALM. Currently, only GLASS and WOOD have this property, and combined with ALMN's ability to block pressure, I think that it would be pretty cool.

ALMN could be mixed with several other elements in order to form alloys. Alloys would be designated by giving ALMN the ctype of the element it had been mixed with, and each alloy would have different properties. I don't think that each alloy is worthy of its own element, which is why I think that it would be cool to have a single element that could take on severel different properties through alloying. I imagine that players would build numerous devices to create alloys, as well. When broken (if possible for the specific alloy), the BALM would retain the properties of the solid alloy.

ALMN + TTAN = Dark metallic grey ALMN, melting point of 1800 C, blocks pressure like ordinary ALMN

ALMN + BRMT or BMTL = Bluish-grey ALMN, melting point of 1150 C, does not block pressure

ALMN + BREL = Light grey-brown ALMN, conducts SPRK quickly like GOLD, melting point of 800 C

ALMN + BCOL or COAL = Grey ALMN, unconductive, melting point of 1100 C, blocks pressure

ALMN + GOLD = Light gold colored ALMN, blocks PROT, acid resistant, melting point of 900 C

ALMN + CRMC = Whitish-grey ALMN, transparent to NEUT, melts at 2200C, unbreakable and blocks pressure
ALMN + IRON = Pearl grey ALMN, melting point of 1300 C, blocks pressure

ALMN + TUNG = Pitch black ALMN, barely visible, melting point of 2800 C, but can be broken more easily than normal ALM and does not block pressure

Of course, all of these alloy properties are not set in stone, as most of them probably aren't suited to the game, but I think that the idea of an element that can form varied alloys, as aluminum can in real life, would be a great thing to have in TPT.

BALM (Broken Aluminim) would be light and silvery, like its solid form, and could be melted back into ALMN. When heated very quickly, it would not melt, but would instead burn into a very hot plasma flame. Only a small amount of it would burn, however, as the rest would quickly melt. When mixed with BRMT, ALMN would become THRM. I know that BREL already does this, but I suppose that that reaction could be left in TPT to not break saves.

Aluminum in its solid state would react with OXYG to form corundum (CRDM). Aluminum oxide in real life can form corundum if it's heated into the proper crystal state, but I don't see any other uses for aluminum oxide in TPT, so it would skip that step. Only the outer layer of ALMN would react, so melting would be neccesary to form a proper crystal anyway. Normally, CRDM would be a darkish grey solid slightly darker than ALMN, but, when melted and mixed with another element, it would take on a darker tone of that element's color, similarly to how FILT works with deco. I imagine that the data for CRDM's color would be stored in the ctype value, similarly to how PHOT works. The little spectrum thing that appears in the element info for PHOT would also appear with CRDM. Flammable elements might have some trouble, but some would probably get mixed in before it melted. This would emulate, in a fun way, how corundum is different colors in real life based on impurities in the gemstone. When melted, the ctype would be cleared, something that's already neccesary for how LAVA handles ctypes, but I think that it would be nice anyway, adding a way to reset CRDM's color. When PHOT passes through CRMD, it would take on the color of the element that had been mixed with CRDM, and also be bent in the same way GLAS bends PHOT. I imagine that this would be very useful for mass spectrometers, where a sample would be melted and then mixed with molten CRDM, and then have a light beam shined through it and ran through FILT to determine color. Another fun property of CRDM is that it would shimmer slightly, similar to EXOT, using its tmp value. Similarly to GRAV in the recent update, occasionally pixels of CRDM would flare up in the shiny way everyone loves with GRAV. I imagine that this "sparkle" in a gemstone would find many uses by artists, but in any case, it would look neat. CRDM would also be useful as an unbreakable, high temperature GLAS for lasers and other optical devices, or even decoration.

All in all, I think that there is a huge potential for ALMN. The alloying property alone makes it worthy of addition, in my opinion, and CRDM could make numerous devices with PHOT, or even decoration alone. I hope that you all think that this would be a good addition to TPT, and hope even more that it actually makes it in. :P

Jacob1, if you're reading this, please consider adding these suggestions to your mod, as you have snapshot elements in the past, if only to see how they would work out and how players use them.

EDIT: After getting some feedback, I believe that it would be better if CRDM formed with hot ALMN (> 200C) and OXYG.

zaccybot2:

Changing the melting points with the ctype would not be possible (easily, at least), so the alloys would have to be other seperate hidden elements. Other than that, this is a reasonable suggestion.

 LAVA already does it with the solidifing points. LAVA(TTAN) reforms into TTAN at a higher temperature than LAVA(BMTL).

Ben_Ger:

The thing with the alloys is:
where are the allow partners going to disappear to?
Are they getting absorbed into the Aluminium so it changes the Ctype of it?

 Yes, the other material being alloyed is consumed. You can see something similar if you mix BCOL with molten IRON.

Update: After getting some feedback, I believe that it would be better if CRDM formed with hot ALMN (> 200C) and OXYG.