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[Quicunque]

Like most dwarves, I have an atom smashing bridge with which I eliminate garbage. I have used it dozens of times, without incident, in the past. Today I pulled the lever on a particularly large pile of trash from a recent goblin siege. Something odd happened. The bridge came down, then snapped back up (after the subsequent lever pulls). Instead of smashing the trashing into oblivion, it flung garbage far and wide (about 40 tiles wide) in every direction, a horrible mess. The only unusual item in the dump was a still living goblin in a cage.

Any ideas as to what caused this catastrophe?

[Leonidas]

It sounds like the bridge was down when you thought it was up. The flinging you describe would be normal in that situation.

[Quicunque]

That was my first thought, Leonidas, so I checked the lever & bridge status. The bridge & its corresponding lever are in the proper position (bridge up, lever right) for loading garbage after pulling the lever twice, so I don't think I made the mistake you described. It was as if the dropping of the bridge did not smash the trash, but passed through it, leaving it sitting on the bridge when it then came up, scattering the garbage everywhere.

[Luriant]

http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Lever#Multiple_Uses

The Bridge have some "cooldown" time between changes. If the Dwarves pull the trigger more fast, the bridge ignore the up order.

Some Dwarf put garbage in the "Bridge Off, Lever On" Bridge

The next time a Dwarf change the lever to Off position, nothing move because the bridge is already down. No Atomsmashing. And the second pull ON, the bridge Raise, sending all garbage in the aire.

===================
Wait some time between pull orders, or make a 2x1 bridge to see the real state. If the bridge is 2x1, is OFF, if 1x1, is ON.

[Loci]

If you place your garbage on top of the bridge tiles that turn into "walls" raising the bridge will smash the trash instead of flinging it everywhere. When the bridge is up your dwarves won't be able to dump garbage on it directly, and any garbage dumped from above will simply remain suspended by the "wall" and fall down into smashing position when the bridge is lowered. A 1x1 raising bridge works great--there is no chance of garbage flinging since there are no non-wall bridge tiles.

Using the top of the bridge also allows you to automate a garbage disposal pit (using standing orders or a dumping minecart stop) without any risk of a "garbage flinging event". You can even link the bridge to a pressure plate in a random hallway for automatic operation.

[Quicunque]

Loci, that system is pure genius! My garbage problems are permanently solved.

I believe Luriant described what happened to me. The order to raise the bridge was given immediately after the lever was pulled the first time. The second pull was very soon after that; too soon it seems.

[nuget102]

I'm curious, why do you guys prefer Bridges over magma? Get a minecarts of magma,  dump it in a hole anywhere, and you have a incinerator anywhere you like. I find it works better (in my opinion) then bridges. I always manage to kill dwarves with my bridges...

[PatrikLundell]

There are a few reasons I use bridges rather than magma:
- I play in very metal poor worlds, so getting iron for a magma safe cart typically takes someone to come and donate iron to me (my house rules forbids buying of useful metal from caravans. Metal purchased is only for mood usage, and it shouldn't be weapons grade).
- I may have need for elimination before I've explored the depths and set up my magma facilities, and once I have a working smasher I won't bother with a refurbishment.
- I have a locked door at the bottom of my smasher pit. That way I can retrieve the corpse of Urist to put it in a coffin if needed. Magma leaves no room for second thoughts...
- I've had issues with salt contaminating the magma in the past, leading to magma mist appearing, which is a safety hazard. That can probably be dealt with by using a deeper pit, though.

[Leonidas]

I'm curious, why do you guys prefer Bridges over magma? Get a minecarts of magma,  dump it in a hole anywhere, and you have a incinerator anywhere you like. I find it works better (in my opinion) then bridges. I always manage to kill dwarves with my bridges...

I find minecarts to be a complete PITA. I do one track per fort to get some magma forges going near the surface, and nothing more. I hate learning that somebody abandoned a full minecart halfway along the track, so one of my dwarves has spent the past two months hand-placing it at the next stop.

Drawbridges are completely safe if you build them right. Just enclose the bridge so that no one can possibly get near it. If you want a bridge that dwarves need to walk over, such as a bridge that can seal your depot away from the rest of your fortress, then build doors around the bridge, so that nobody can reach it while the doors are locked.

And don't forget that a water-smashing bridge can make an excellent drain.

[PatrikLundell]

:
And don't forget that a water-smashing bridge can make an excellent drain.

Deployable Drains (mine cart dumping into a wall in the drain tile) is a lot easier to make and operate than water smashing bridges...

[Bumber]

I have a locked door at the bottom of my smasher pit. That way I can retrieve the corpse of Urist to put it in a coffin if needed. Magma leaves no room for second thoughts...

Linking a lever to a track stop allows you to disable dumping. The route settings also let you limit what types of items can be dumped.

It's only too bad you can't filter out fort corpses from invaders. (Personally, however, I cremate and engrave my dwarves.) Also, you can't destroy stuff made from magma-safe stone.

[PatrikLundell]

I have a locked door at the bottom of my smasher pit. That way I can retrieve the corpse of Urist to put it in a coffin if needed. Magma leaves no room for second thoughts...

Linking a lever to a track stop allows you to disable dumping. The route settings also let you limit what types of items can be dumped.

It's only too bad you can't filter out fort corpses from invaders. (Personally, however, I cremate and engrave my dwarves.) Also, you can't destroy stuff made from magma-safe stone.

Yes, provided you realize the corpse was doing to be dumped before being hauled off to a coffin... I simply remove the stockpile link from the dumping minecart when I think there's a risk to dump the wrong thing, so the locked door is a backup, and I don't have to wait for the dorfs to pull the lever...

I certainly would like the corpse stockpile to be updated to have sub sections at least for citizens, residents, pets, and others so you can control what goes where.

[Saiko Kila]

I'm curious, why do you guys prefer Bridges over magma? Get a minecarts of magma,  dump it in a hole anywhere, and you have a incinerator anywhere you like. I find it works better (in my opinion) then bridges. I always manage to kill dwarves with my bridges...

One reason (but sufficient) is that magma doesn't destroy everything. I use both systems, and both are potentially dangerous, but ultimately my build involves the same precautions for both. So the main difference is that bridges eradicate items (particularly stone ones) which magma don't. Also it is easier to make a retrieval system for smasher than for magma (and I pull the switch after confirming everything is in order). I rarely uses retrieval, but it happens, when dwarves throw away something I want to keep.

By the way, ma favourite disposal room includes both magma and bridge. Magma is used only rarely, to decontaminate the room.

I don't remember last time I killed my dwarf with a bridge. It was probably during a siege, when some enraged soldier was slower than others in retreating, but it doesn't happen during peaceful times.

[Leonidas]

Thinking about it, here's another reason to favor bridges over magma for garbage disposal: Bridges are more fault tolerant than open magma.

I use mass dumping for both garbage disposal and quantum stockpiling. If I'm careless, then something that I intend to keep will end up getting dumped into the garbage disposal. With a bridge system, I can review everything in the garbage disposal one last time before I pull the lever.

You could do something similar with magma, by covering it and tying it to a lever. But by that point you've already built a bridge system, so the magma is superfluous.

[PatrikLundell]

I'd say the big benefit of magma is when you actually want to get rid of everything but iron, assuming, of course, you have a way to retrieve it with a reasonable effort. I suspect artifact books may survive (burning) as well (a surprising number of my books have been found on quester infiltrators after neutralization).