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[ChadSlambody]

I'm having trouble routing power underground to power my magma pump stack.

I want to send power from the surface (combination of waterwheels) down a dozen or so z-levels and then across some distance over to a machine.  I've tried a couple of different setups and I can get power down by channeling, using a gear assembly (z-level n) on a channel, then a vertical axle z-level n-1 right below it...but I don't know how to then get power from that vertical axle connected over to a horizontal axle.

And to be honest I'm not great at  big construction projects so I need painfully specific instructions re: channeling vs floors vs open spaces vs ground and gears/axels. 

Any advice or directions to a tutorial I haven't been able to find on my own would be appreciated!  Oh, and I've heard there's an infinite power trick, but I wanna be old fashioned and route the power the long  way from the surface.

[PatrikLundell]

Initial 2 paragraphs of ramble. Attempts of answers below that...

The main problem with power from the surface, in my view, is that the shaft needed for the axles also provide access to fliers and climbers. Water wheels are also vulnerable to building destroyers, and won't function while the stream is frozen in winter.
It is possible to (ab)use screw pumps to plug the shaft. Since screw pumps can be destroyed by building destroyers, the trick is to build the pump such that there is nowhere for a destroyer to stand (the instruction I received when I tried that with wind mills was 3 levels above ground), and obviously a housing to block access from all sides (only the pump output side is exposed, as well as that tile's top).

I've used water wheels a number of times, but I've then had them in the aquifer using a trick to induce flow in aquifers. I could have just channeled a flow from the aquifer to the edge and driven the wheels the normal way, but since flowing water has a negative FPS effect I use the trick, which probably is more work than the straightforward method anyway.

- You have to use a gear (or a machine) to change power transmission direction, so the same logic you used at the top is used at the bottom. So you build a horizontal train of axles from the water mill up to a gear and then build a vertical section (and a new gear everywhere you want to change direction).
When building the vertical section, you can only place axles either suspended from the top or supported from beneath, which means you can build at most two sections at a time (or use tricks with side supported gears midway). For the vertical section I build a staircase beside a shaft, to allow access to each tile for the building of the corresponding axle segment.
A gear at the top is supported if there is at least one horizontal axle (or machine/gear) beside it that's on solid ground/floor. If it's not supported, it will collapse immediately when the building finishes (such as building a floor from a bridge). Of course, the gear is also supported if hanging from something supported, but then it wouldn't be the top one...
- Note that a gear beside (horizontally or vertically) another gear can transfer power just fine if you need to bridge a single tile distance.
- Also note that magma pump stacks suffer the same support issues that axles do. It LOOKS like each pump is supported by a floor, but actually the whole pump is supported by the tile that has a hole under it for power distribution. So again, you can build from the top and bottom simultaneously if you've made sure the top is supported (typically a gear supported by a horizontal axle on ground/floor). The bottom is supported naturally, since you don't channel out the floor below the lowest pump (only the tile beside the pump where you get the magma) [which ought to be secured from access by magma sea creatures].

[Uggh]

You could also send the water down where you need the power and place the water wheels deep down. This mightvsave you some hassle with the axles but will introduce the risk of flooding.

[Montieth]

If you have water under ground, you can channel out a path for the water to flow off the map. Then use a water wheel system to tap power for that.

[gestahl]

It also might be worth noting that pumps ar LIFO, the most recently built one pumps first. This means either your whole stack has to prime before use or that liquids will damn near teleport up the chain and not even need walls around the stack as long as the top output tile never fills (so surface magma tower)

[PatrikLundell]

Although it should be a rare occasion where the pump speed upwards is an issue as the flow is the same, and it tends to be significantly less important than the halved building rate (building from one direction only). Building a stack with no walls is playing with fire (potentially literally)

[gestahl]

Building a stack with no walls is playing with fire (potentially literally)

Dwarves lost in the pursuit of a better understanding of game mechanics never died in vain.  That and sometimes you just need to literally rain fire and brimstone on the enemy.

[ChadSlambody]

This is all very helpful, thx!

When building the vertical section, you can only place axles either suspended from the top or supported from beneath, which means you can build at most two sections at a time (or use tricks with side supported gears midway). For the vertical section I build a staircase beside a shaft, to allow access to each tile for the building of the corresponding axle segment.

So...here's my test rig:



Ignore the windmills.  So, if I'm understanding this, and I'm probably not, you can't dig a great big open-air hole and then send power down.  You have to do it step by step to make sure things are supported correctly?  So, if I want to send power down from a water wheel, I could:

send a horizontal axle out a ways
channel next to the axle end
put a gear over the channel
go down 1 z-level
(channel down again?)
put a vertical axle below the gear
repeat with more v-axles?

Dwarves lost in the pursuit of a better understanding of game mechanics never died in vain.  That and sometimes you just need to literally rain fire and brimstone on the enemy.

This is so very, very true.

[PatrikLundell]

Doing it that way would work, but there are simpler ways:
- Dig a shaft with staircase beside it (all the way).
- Build your horizontal axle from the water wheel.
- Build the gear
- Build the gear at the bottom
- Build one vertical axle segment hanging from the gear at the top and one vertical axle segment standing on the gear at the bottom.
- Once an axle segment is finished, add the next one below/on top of it (obviously, the first axle segments should not be built until the gears are finalized).
- Eventually you'll join the ends in the middle and that part of the power distribution chain is done.

(You still have the flier/climber access issue, of course).

You can't stand in the shaft you're building the axle in, I think, but have to stand in the staircase beside it (I'm not 100% certain, though).

Edit: There isn't much point in standing in the shaft anyway, since you need to have access to the next level when bringing the next axle segment, so you need to provide an access to each level.

[celem]

For security reasons I vastly prefer moving the source of the power.  I'd dig a shaft to drop the water and flow it through a map-edge fortification, put my water wheels down by the pumpstack.  This also has the advantage of you being able to have a powertrain as long as you like, you are no longer limited by the topography of the natural river and can cut a massive switchback powerplant if desired.  Flyers that want to drop 40z in a vertical river are welcome to try.

[PyroTechno]

For security reasons I vastly prefer moving the source of the power.  I'd dig a shaft to drop the water and flow it through a map-edge fortification, put my water wheels down by the pumpstack.  This also has the advantage of you being able to have a powertrain as long as you like, you are no longer limited by the topography of the natural river and can cut a massive switchback powerplant if desired.  Flyers that want to drop 40z in a vertical river are welcome to try.

This method is usually quite laggy, though.

You could try a Dwarven Water Reactor. The idea is, a screw pump to pump water in a circle takes less power than is generated by a water wheel somewhere in said circle.