Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[milaga]

So I started building my first megaproject. A giant tower of solid obsidian. It's built to golden rectangle proportions: 13x21 and 34 stories tall. Iron girders will support the structure consisting only of melted orc and goblin armor. Once complete, I will dig into the HFS to attract the king and hopefully survive long enough to get him to live in the tower.

Oh yeah, and I planned to do this with only seven dwarves.

Fortunately, this is a dream of a site ... while digging into the magma pipe I found a layer of bauxite. So I've got more than enough stuff to make mechanisms and floodgates to move the magma around. It's taken 8 years but the dwarves finally started pouring the foundation. This is when I realized I should have asked these questions about magma I had before I started the project.

It moves so slowly! I have a hard time filling up a 13x21 area without losing a lot to evaporation. The building site is quite a distance from the magma pipe so i have a long 1 tile wide channel funneling magma to the pumps. I then pump it up to the top of the tower scaffolding into a tube where I can choose which floor it's deposited on via floodgates and levers.

It looks like I need a large resevoir of magma beneath the pumps but how can I fill this resevoir up without it all evaporating before it's filled?

Also, how much magma do I need in a tile to make it solid obsidian? How much water needs to be added to said tile? Basically I want to know, given a 13x21 area, how much magma and water to be in the feed pipes so I can make a solid block of obsidian with no leftover water. I know there will be some evaporation on dispersal so I can add that to the fudge factor.

[Shakma]

2/7 of each is plenty.  For the reservoir, I would look for a narrow section of magma pipe over a wide section and instant reservoir.  Just cut a hole over one square in the top of the wide portion and install a pump.

If you are pumping to the top, you don't need to worry about levers and FGs for each floor.  Just drop the magma in until it's 2/7 on the bottom.  Then have a water pump tower at the top.  Shut off the magma, turn on the water.  Keep the water on until it's obsidan and you have a 2/7 later of water on top of that.  Shut off water and pour magma.  Keep going until you are done.

[Hyndis]

2/7 or 3/7 is enough. Then just pour water on it. Its helpful to have an overflow mechanism so you don't really have to be careful with the water. Just dump water on it until the steaming stops, then let it dry a bit and pour more magma.

To increase magma flow rates build a wider channel. I use at least 4 tiles wide myself. Its also helpful to have a staging reservoir. Fill this directly from the magma pipe, and make it huge. This way even when you're not actively pumping magma, its still filling up so that there will be plenty of magma to pump.

[milaga]

2/7? good to know

I forgot to mention my dwarves are living in some of the levels. I probably made the design overly complicated.

I cut off the main magma source so it should be dry soon. I'll try to increase the main channel width and see about building a reservoir.

[GladHelm]

1 water dropped into 1/7 of standing magma will make obsidian.

1 magma dropped into 1/7 water will make steam.  It takes 1 magma dropped into 2 water for obsidian.  Just be sure to have enough extra to account for evaporation.

Also, you can drop the water/magma from the top of the tower.  That way you'll have a pool of magma, pour in water, and have a floor of obsidian built, with a pool of water on top for the next magma pour.  More efficent.

(I'm doing something similar)

[Quietust]

Increasing the channel width shouldn't be necessary if you are using a pump to fill the channel, but it's always an option to widen the channel and add pumps, since that'll let you pull magma out of the channel at a much higher rate before it goes empty.

[milaga]

Well, that was "fun".

So a quick backstory: I started with seven dwarves, all novice wrestler/axe/armor/shield with various metalworking skills. No stone or non-moodable skills. But I can't keep my pop capped at seven. I always get migrants to bump me up to nine, despite what I have in my init.txt. So it's nine dwarves. It was the original seven and a pair of bodyguards but every few years my trader seems to die. Ambushes, caveins (only this fort did I realize why I'm such an idiot about mining), etc.

I stationed my two axedwarves in steel plate by the pipe. They are only axedwarves. I start channeling, get the new fortifications and floodgates built and then I start rebuilding the wall to keep the magma nasties away.

Fwooosh!

Both my axedwarves are on fire and start running away. There is only a one tile  pathway so they plow through the founders who were dragging limestone to make the wall. I recruit all my dwarves and managed to wrestle the imp to death. One of my founders is badly burnt and crawls away to bed. The two burning soldiers die. I activate my two reserves and send them to the front. Unfortunately my founders get to the wall before the reserves do.

Fwooosh!

Another fire imp. Again I reactivate my founders. My new trader (the 3rd!) leaps into the (fortunately empty now) channel and, stunned, lies there burning to death. Again we wrestle the imp to death. Finally my soldiers arrive and we resume building the wall, ignoring the dead and dying.

Fwooosh!

Another fire imp. One of the reserves is instantly killed and the other reserve is gone somewhere (I don't think I had them carrying food/water.) Once again, i reactivate my founders. See, this is why they all have novice wrestling. Fortunately they are all legendary or close to legendary miners, so their bronze pickaxes aren't bad for wrasslin'. Still another dwarf gets badly burnt before we kill the imp.

We finally get the wall in place. There are only five dwarves left. Two are bedridden with multiple red wounds, but they are superdwarvenly tough so I'm expecting a reasonable recovery time.

Nine dwarves who've known each other for eight years and four die in a day? How are they not tantruming? I have no meeting areas and no one is ever idle. They are all still dabbling conversationalists. Also, all their clothes are rotting off so when someone dies they all make "satisfying acquisitions."

Okay, lets see if your suggestions are worth the blood ...

[milaga]

Ugh, and then DF crashed on my for the first time ever. All that fun for naught.

Nevermind, I had forgotten I saved before I posted. Yay! Dead dwarves!