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[Makray]

So, I've only made one foray into magma territory once before. The results were just fine.
Just made 8 magma workshops and dug out tunnels for the magma underneath, with a cutoff floodgate leading back to the main magma pipe.

Now, however, I want to have a bit more control over the flow.

I'm thinking about the previous setup, but I don't know if there's an effective way to drain the magma out of the tunnels beneath the furnaces.  If I understand correctly, you can't make a full floor out of floor grates or bars, and I'm assuming the same could be said about hatch covers.

Would it be prudent to make say, 6 level controlled hatch covers to drain the magma into a large cistern below, just in case I'd want to go back and expand the tunnels for more furnaces?

Also, instead of just tapping into the pipe, I'm thinking I'd try to pump it right from the top of the pipe (which doesn't go to the surface) for better control.

So I guess I'm just wondering if anyone with good magma experience could give me a few tips about pumping and draining it without raining fiery death upon my dwarves?

[XSI]

The lever controlled hatches may work very nicely, but I feel floodgates are more classic for use with levers and magma. Whatever you end up using, make sure the cistern is large enough, magma will not evaporate when there is more then 2/7 on a tile. The most effective way would probably be to let gravity do the work.

Pumping from the top of the pipe leaves your dwarves vulnerable to the fire imps, fire men, etc while building, but if using mechanisms and power to keep the pump going it will in the end be just fine. And you don't have to use extra pumps to get the magma to the forges..usually the forges are below the top of the pipe.

The hatches may end up using a lot of bauxite/other magma safe materials, so if you're low on that, consider using a pump to get it out.

[Goldsie]

I think it would be prudent to make say, 6 level controlled hatch covers to drain the magma into a large dining room below, just in case I'd want to go back and have some fun?

[Makray]

The hatches may end up using a lot of bauxite/other magma safe materials, so if you're low on that, consider using a pump to get it out.

That's what I wanted to do originally, even though I have at least 500 bauxite in a natural deposit.
I didn't want to use a pump, because honestly I wasn't sure it would pump it all out.  Would it pull all of the magma out effectively? Or would it leave 1 stacks all throughout the chambers beneath the forges?

Also, would having one or more hatch covers drain the magma completely? Isn't a stack of one magma just a small covering on the floor, or would it flow to one of the open hatches, leaving it empty in the chambers?

[Lord Dakoth]

Bauxite usually isn't a problem for me. I just get it from the caravans, if it's the only import request (highest priority) I believe you can get 40 to 50 bauxite in one visit.

[dragon0421]

Pumping from the top of the pipe leaves your dwarves vulnerable to the fire imps, fire men, etc while building, but if using mechanisms and power to keep the pump going it will in the end be just fine.

Traps and/or marksdwarfs work fine as a counter measure.

I highly recommend pumps to speed up magma.

[Starver]

Or would it leave 1 stacks all throughout the chambers beneath the forges?

AIUI, 1-deep magma evaporates into thin air, much the same as water.  If this is the case (I'm an "all or nothing", person, so 1-depth magma is usually only an issue for me at the forefront of a new route being flooded into) then as long as you can drain one spot of a magma-filled area, for long enough, any other 'column' of lava will redistribute itself around within the same area until it too finds itself drained (up, or down), and the process continues.

If you don't have an "infinite dumping ground" (or at least large enough to drain it all and let it settle into 1/7ths and less) I would personally try (for laughs, at the very least) a pump (or hatch) with a magma-sensitive pressure plate on the 'dumping' point that activates it only when there is no magma on that spot, to draw up/dump as much magma as available (the full 7/7ths of the one spot being drained) in the first instance, and with at least 7 squares of 'evaporation chamber' (but make it two or three times as many, to make sure) for this to level out into and dissipate.  Immediately the dunmping starts it'll shut it off, but when it's gone from the plate-top (noting that it might still be 1/7 or even slightly more in the other spots, as well as a delay in reaction, hence the multiplication of the space you make available) more comes in and redistributes accordingly.  It'd also be more efficient in its evaporation if it "spreads", rather than flows along a tunnel.

I'd probably try one of the following solutions (first for a pump from a channel, second for a lower-level cistern centred below a hatch, other variants are possible for same-level pump/floodgate/doorway control methods).

Code: [Select]

######
#++++#
#++++#
#+++^<<_
#++++#
#++++#
######

#######
#+++++#
#+++++#
#++^++#
#+++++#
#+++++#
#######

I think that floodgates also "chomp" anything that is flowing through them when they close (as my concern is usually preserving liquid water on maps with too little available, I try to avoid this situation, as well as 1/7ths evaporation, and without checking the wiki I can't be sure this is the case for magma), so maybe this could be developed into a method of getting rid of excess fluids.  I'm also not sure if you can Atom-Smash a flooded area free of its liquid (a 1x10 tunnel, or even a 10x10 cavern, with a bridge (suitably magma-proofed if necessary) lowering from the far end when a 1x1 alcove at one side detects the presence of the liquid), but something like that might be worth a try, if there's nothing on the Wiki or here that gives a definitive no!

[milaga]

Bauxite usually isn't a problem for me. I just get it from the caravans, if it's the only import request (highest priority) I believe you can get 40 to 50 bauxite in one visit.

!!!

Maybe I should stop telling the liason that everything is critical to the forts survival. Then I wonder why they bring nothing but billon.

[Makray]

Or would it leave 1 stacks all throughout the chambers beneath the forges?

AIUI, 1-deep magma evaporates into thin air, much the same as water.  If this is the case (I'm an "all or nothing", person, so 1-depth magma is usually only an issue for me at the forefront of a new route being flooded into) then as long as you can drain one spot of a magma-filled area, for long enough, any other 'column' of lava will redistribute itself around within the same area until it too finds itself drained (up, or down), and the process continues.

If you don't have an "infinite dumping ground" (or at least large enough to drain it all and let it settle into 1/7ths and less) I would personally try (for laughs, at the very least) a pump (or hatch) with a magma-sensitive pressure plate on the 'dumping' point that activates it only when there is no magma on that spot, to draw up/dump as much magma as available (the full 7/7ths of the one spot being drained) in the first instance, and with at least 7 squares of 'evaporation chamber' (but make it two or three times as many, to make sure) for this to level out into and dissipate.  Immediately the dunmping starts it'll shut it off, but when it's gone from the plate-top (noting that it might still be 1/7 or even slightly more in the other spots, as well as a delay in reaction, hence the multiplication of the space you make available) more comes in and redistributes accordingly.  It'd also be more efficient in its evaporation if it "spreads", rather than flows along a tunnel.

I'd probably try one of the following solutions (first for a pump from a channel, second for a lower-level cistern centred below a hatch, other variants are possible for same-level pump/floodgate/doorway control methods).

Code: [Select]

######
#++++#
#++++#
#+++^<<_
#++++#
#++++#
######

#######
#+++++#
#+++++#
#++^++#
#+++++#
#+++++#
#######

I think that floodgates also "chomp" anything that is flowing through them when they close (as my concern is usually preserving liquid water on maps with too little available, I try to avoid this situation, as well as 1/7ths evaporation, and without checking the wiki I can't be sure this is the case for magma), so maybe this could be developed into a method of getting rid of excess fluids.  I'm also not sure if you can Atom-Smash a flooded area free of its liquid (a 1x10 tunnel, or even a 10x10 cavern, with a bridge (suitably magma-proofed if necessary) lowering from the far end when a 1x1 alcove at one side detects the presence of the liquid), but something like that might be worth a try, if there's nothing on the Wiki or here that gives a definitive no!

Brilliant! Detailed! Not just a bit intimidating!  Probably going to do a combination of the hatches and the pump for a couple of different cisterns.  I also want to create an obsidian room along the same magma channel.