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[Gus Smedstad]

Up until know I've been using water wheels in a way that I consider slightly exploitative - the perpetual-motion dwarven reactor.  Today I finally built my first "legitimate" water wheel in a brook.

Where it did nothing.

I suppose it's sort-of logical, since brooks are sort-of shallow.  Dwarves can walk across them, even though they have a 7/7 water level that would normally drown them.  Still, I was kind of surprised.  So water wheels only work or rivers, or situations where the water is moving from high levels to low (absurdly slowly)?

 - Gus

[Quietust]

You need to channel through the surface of the brook before the water wheel will actually work.

[FallingWhale]

Brook floors are basically grates, so wheels need those gone.

[Hyndis]

Channel out the brook. Build some gears on the side to anchor the waterwheels, then build your waterwheels across the brook. Since brooks are about 4 tiles wide you can pack in a huge number of waterwheels, assuming the brook is relatively straight in direction. If not, just reroute the brook.

Be sure to protect it with constructed walls and a ceiling once you're done. You don't want a building destroyer to wander by and wreck your waterwheels.

[Eagle_eye]

Be sure not to protect it with constructed walls and a ceiling once you're done. You don't want to overburden your poor dwarves, do you?

Oh wait, of course you do

[Gus Smedstad]

Channel out the brook.  That is the strangest thing I ever heard of, but it makes sense in a twisted, DF kind of way.  Many thanks.

 - Gus

[Reese]

Channel out the brook.  That is the strangest thing I ever heard of, but it makes sense in a twisted, DF kind of way.  Many thanks.

 - Gus

Actually, it sorta makes sense in an IRL way, too.  Real useful water wheels IRL often require earthworks/construction to create enough of a water flow to turn the wheel (though in that case it's usually damming to create an artificial lake or digging a spillway at a point where a river changes elevation rapidly)

[smigenboger]

If a brook is, say, two feet deep, It makes sense to clear the debris before you can put a water wheel there.

[Kidiri]

Channel out the brook.  That is the strangest thing I ever heard of, but it makes sense in a twisted, DF kind of way.  Many thanks.

 - Gus

Actually, it sorta makes sense in an IRL way, too.  Real useful water wheels IRL often require earthworks/construction to create enough of a water flow to turn the wheel (though in that case it's usually damming to create an artificial lake or digging a spillway at a point where a river changes elevation rapidly)

Especially considering that this is a brook.

[smigenboger]

That's a pretty brook

[Hyndis]

Brooks in real life are shallow enough to just walk across. Most brooks only have a few inches of water in them. Certainly not deep enough to build a waterwheel unless you dig out the bottom of the brook to make it a lot deeper.

[Kazang]

Yeah brooks in DF are effectively a small river running through loose stone.  So you need to removed the stone first if you want the waterwheel to work.  The confusing part is that it still lets you build the wheel above the brook while not channelled, and hovering over it reports it as brook and/or open space. 

This also perplexed me for a while when I first discovered brooks.

[Bronze Dog]

Definitely important for me to remember the channeling, since I'm planning on making my own giant array of waterwheels to power my pumpstacks. Covered with green glass walls so that the elven caravans can see their precious wood being dedicated to the dwarven task of obsidian casting.

[CognitiveDissonance]

Yeah brooks in DF are effectively a small river running through loose stone.  So you need to removed the stone first if you want the waterwheel to work.  The confusing part is that it still lets you build the wheel above the brook while not channelled, and hovering over it reports it as brook and/or open space. 

This also perplexed me for a while when I first discovered brooks.

A little bit off-topic, but I used to build large bridges over brooks. Whoops...

[Hyperturtle]

Yes, in a recent fort, the brook was just a small curve on my map, like a ( .  In the space to the right of it I figured ok great I can make a defended spot and not have to worry about anyone getting at me.  I dug down on that island area and made the fortress down a few z levels and over, digging under the brook, and started to build defensive structures around the brook and was going to have a bridge when I realize wait, I could just walk across it... thats how I was able to dig over there in the first place...