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[Tacomagic]

Ahh, there's the issue.  When you hit granite, you found yourself a non-aquifer layer, which is why it isn't draining.

but I realise now that was confused by your description of how to tell if there's another level of aquifer (sorry) and still don't know or understand that bit as well as I first thought, now that I've watched the video.

Pretty much this is where you went wrong.  It's really hard to explain in words, and even difficult to do it in a video because you can't see exactly what my keyboard is doing.

Essentially the test works like this:  When you find your aquifer and before you've actually dug into it (it is ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL that you haven't dug into it yet), you designate a deep staircase of 4x3 starting with that first level of untouched aquifer.  In my case, I always do a 4x3x10 designation of up/down stairs.  When your miners make that first dig into the aquifer, you will either get a damp stone cancellation (Digging Designation Cancelled: Damp Stone Located) or you will get nothing. If you get that damp stone cancellation, then that means the layer UNDER the one you just dug (the layer that now has 1 tile revealed) is aquifer.  If you do not get the damp stone cancellation, then it is non-aquifer.

Also, knowing what can and cannot be aquifer is extremely handy.  You can find a list of those here:
http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Aquifer

Knowing your valid aquifer layers remove a LOT of the guesswork in determining if you're at the bottom or not.

The thing you ran into here is that you have a 1 level aquifer, which means you needed to have gone to doing the hatch-trick as soon as you finished digging out the first level.  At this point you could actually salvage it based on your setup.  Turn those pumps on on the east side (which are pumping from the west into the drain, right?).  Once they're pumping out, do the hatch cover trick to the top-right square.  Do a side drain as normal from there and you'll be golden.  Just make sure to get the drain in place before trying to finish digging out that granite layer AND the layer right below that granite layer, otherwise you'll be sunk again.

[Thisfox]

Okay, sort of understand where I'm meant to be now, and I can make another (this fort was founded essentially to teach me how this is done, I didn't expect to get it first time) but I'm still confused, so before I try again:

Which level would I have been meant to put the floor hatch on?

Thankyou so much for this. It's one of those "steep learning curve" moments.

[Tacomagic]

Okay, sort of understand where I'm meant to be now, and I can make another (this fort was founded essentially to teach me how this is done, I didn't expect to get it first time) but I'm still confused, so before I try again:

Which level would I have been meant to put the floor hatch on?

Thankyou so much for this. It's one of those "steep learning curve" moments.

In this case, you needed to put the floor hatch on the aquifer layer (the layer directly above the granite).

[Thisfox]

Hmm. Evidently I'm not "getting it" in other ways too then. It's full of water, which the dwarfs won't build in. I've made two more. The first is also full of water at the level you are recommending I build a floor hatch. Despite the pump, yes.

In another attempt...I finally got the easterly pump working, and it's grinding away (I don't know why it took so long to take off) and I've put a floor hatch where you recommend... and it is endlessly suspended. It also appears to be a rather knee deep place to put a floor hatch.

Is it the efficiency of my water pumps? Is it something else?

I've made a third place for this to happen, but not yet dug or set things in motion. I'd better make some snapshots...



As you can see, I've been busy doing some learning, trying again and again. Same thing happened back when I did the bigbadaboom method of aquifer piercing. Yeah, I know I could do that as well, but I want to learn how to do this way.

Also, to my delight, the lake unfroze for exactly one month in the height of summer. That aquifer is very useful if anyone gets injured, with no other water supply most of the year! If only I could get through the darned thing...

[Tacomagic]

Your problem on the east pumping attempt (pink arrow) is that you're trying to put the hatch-cover too far in.  You have to put it on the tile that is directly being pumped dry, you can't fudge that in a space because the water just flows too much.  You might be able to eventually build it there, but it would take hundreds of un-suspends. 

To get through on that side, you need to remove the northern ramp, dig downward stairs in on that tile (Do not dig below the tile, just put downward stairs in the floor), and then put the hatch-cover there.

If you're still having issues, go ahead and upload your save to DFFD.  I can work the pierce up to the next step and re-upload it.  Maybe just seeing where things should be going would help.

Actually, now that I think about it.  A template save for the various steps of the method might be worthwhile.  Create several pits, each at a different stage of the pierce to give an idea of how it should look.

Hmm, project for tomorrow, I think.

[Thisfox]

Well, that fort, fascinating as it was, died of undead goblin attack because I was too distracted by drilling the aquifer to set up more than a rather notional army. I sem to be getting it right with the new fort, again situated on an aquifer for specifically to get it darn right. This one is deeper, but I still seem to be able to pump it better. Thankyou for helping me out.

[Tacomagic]

Well, that fort, fascinating as it was, died of undead goblin attack because I was too distracted by drilling the aquifer to set up more than a rather notional army. I sem to be getting it right with the new fort, again situated on an aquifer for specifically to get it darn right. This one is deeper, but I still seem to be able to pump it better. Thankyou for helping me out.

Awesome, let me know how it turns out.  I'm currently working on that embark of staging examples.  Should hopefully have it done by the end of the night.

I am a great proponent of the aquifer, so anything I can do to spread the joy of in-ground water .

[khearn]

Thanks for all the work you're putting in to make this tutorial. It is indeed appreciated.

   Keith

[Tacomagic]

It's a labor of love, at least.

Taking much longer than anticipated because I want to maintain a linear chain of events, which is giving my dwarfs a long way to walk as I get further along in the progression.  Even so, it's making it more clear what is going on.  Granted, all the dwarven water reactors that are running aren't being kind to my FPS, and my next pit has a murky pool right over it so I'll have to drain that out and pave it before I can continue.  Still, should have it ready over the next couple of days.

Even so, I'm at a point where the first vertical drain has been dug out and now I'm into the walling off phase.

...

And now that I'm thinking about it, I can always seal up shortcuts after the fact... I'm an idiot sometimes.

[Billy Jack]

While I haven't tried your solution, I did read about some of the previous descriptions to see what I could figure out.  Before I started the project though, I used DFHack to reveal the map and then discovered that the aquifer was 6 levels deep and covered the entire map.

So I used DFHack drainaquifer instead  (may not be the correct name of the script.)  If it had been one layer, I would have given it a try.

[Finndibaenn]

actually the whole advantage of the method taco is describing is that it's pretty fast and easy to pierce all layers but the last. so you  could have gone with your 6 layer aquifer

[Tacomagic]

actually the whole advantage of the method taco is describing is that it's pretty fast and easy to pierce all layers but the last. so you  could have gone with your 6 layer aquifer

Very true.  For a 1-level aquifer, the absolute best method is proably just channel out 2 single-tile holes separated by 2 tiles.  Pump out of one hole into the other and wall off the hole that's being emptied.  Boom, pierced.

[Tacomagic]

Finally finished the sandbox map for the aquifer pierce.  Grand total of 27 steps, 23 dwarven water reactors, and 132 pumps.  My FPS holds at about 40 with all that going on.

Next to do the write-up and then get the save up on DFFD.

As much as I love aquifers, this was one hell of a tedious project .

[Tacomagic]

Now I'm completely done with the sandbox embark.  Whew, glad that's over.  Here's a link if anyone wants to play with it.

http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=9881

Of note, there is a readme file that goes through all the steps, as well as a map to how the steps are arranged.  The readme is not as exhaustive as the wiki or video tutorial, but rather is meant to serve as a supplement to those sources.

I added a link to the file on the wiki tutorial.

[Thisfox]

SUCCESS!!!!!!

I made it. I know it was only a two level aquifer, and not particularly spectacular in any way, but it's a great sense of achievement. A personal best. And as a reward on the underside: two more levels down and it's limonite mixed with bituminous coal! My dwarves are going nuts digging that stuff out. We're going to have some serious armour soon as I can find some goddamn marble or something.

Stuff that scared me the hell out: (And stuff I did/assumed wrong)

1. When the aquifer drained, it filled that drainpipe 7/7 all the way out, and I honestly thought it was going to fill, and start bubbling up, like it stormwater out of a drain. Terrifying! Also, it took an amazing number of cancellations to get the walls done on the lower level of the staircase. I don't really know why. Was I meant to turn off the pumps? I thought that might be it. Anyhow, I took that as PROOF that the WATER WAS RISING! 

2. Taking down the waterwheel. There are plenty of tutorials explaining how to build a waterwheel. There are none explaining how to take it DOWN, more than a brief warning that it can fall. So I tried to stop it spinning first. That... that didn't work out too well, but no one was actually injured, as my hospital is still empty. So yeah. I think next time I'll try deconstructing it whilst it is spinning. Oops.

3. I didn't realise that I couldn't dig out the layer below the aquifer. I almost did, due to sheer exuberance at getting there. Um. Warn people. The result is flooding. Got it all fixed up now. Looks like that's why you said to make the drain a few levels lower than the aquifer.

Right. Now I'm off to make a dining hall, bedrooms, and lots and lots of smithy areas. Plus I want to totally rearrange the single level my poor dorfs have been living and working on until now.

THANKYOU!!!