Hi all,
Been trying the last few embarks to get a handle on magma and how to use it effectively. Mostly I've been tampering with magma pistons - but my frustration with these always boils down to finding a clear vertical path cavern-free that I can use to construct the piston... seems nearly impossible to get a clear path through 3 cavern layers to the magme, 150z levels or so below.
Anyway, I decided to take a chance on my last embark - part of my desire to harness magma comes from my desire to break my dependance on wood, so I tried a no-wood embark zone (taking with me a bunch of logs to see me through for beds, etc until traders show up...)
To my pleasant surprise, the embark has a magma pool, about 35 z levels down, and a little easier access than my normal go. I set out setting up a magma pistong - then realized that (because of how I tend to make the piston) I'd only be lifting the magma up to lvl -10 or so; still fairly deep in the fortress and only really lifting the magma up 20 levels or so.
So, with this in mind, I thought maybe this would be the embark I could look into pump stacks with. I built a test windmill, discovering that windmills on this embark produce the full 40 units of power, annd got ready to go. My questions:
1) I've got the windmill over a gear assembly, linked to a lever so I can turn on/off the (eventual) pump stack. Is this proper construction technique? (I seem to remember reading somewhere that I should actually have not linked the lever to the assembly directly under the windmill; something about them disassembling when they're not powering the gear...)
2) On the pump stacks... I'm a little confused. I'm doing this because I don't have wood, and want magma forges/kilns/smelters. But a little research says I need to make 35 pumps for this - so, 35 enormous corkscrews, each needing to be magma safe, so iron or glass - for which, I'll need to use a kiln/smelter/forge.... so I guess I'm at a loss on how folks tend to build these 150 z-level stacks I keep reading about; if youre building the stack to get the magma, how do you forge all the parts to GET the magma, before you HAVE the magma? (I do have obsidian, and was excited - thought I'd build it all out of obsidian, but unless I'm missing something I'll need more than just magma safe rock to get the project underway...)
3) A subjective question.... is this worth it??? It occurs to me that I could just create a forge facility down next to the magma, 30 levels below my main fortress - but this seems a little less aethesticly pleasing to me... Is this typically what those who are wise in the ways of magma do, just build forges/smelters where the magma is, or do most bring it close to the surface (and the main fortress) to be worked?
Right now I'm considering doing both - a temp facility down in the depths to create the equipment for the pump stack, then get the stack going to power the larger facility above. Does this sound reasonable?
Also, since I have yet to successfully harness the power of magma, any suggestions or pointers would be helpful. (Just remember, I'm extremely wood limited!)