40d Talk:Aquifer

Toady mentioned somewhere that, at the moment, only subterrainian water sources can grow towercaps. He then explicitly mentioned underground rivers and lakes, but would an aquifer work as well? If so, given the scarcity of underground water sources, this would provide another bonus to having an aquifer.Thexor 20:10, 31 October 2007 (EDT)

I don't believe they count. AFAIK, it applies only to standing water. --JT

My plan for dealing with an aquifer

The DF Map Archive has never worked for me, so I was unable to make use of the link to the example. Also, I was playing on a map entirely covered in a layer of aquifer, so I couldn't mine any stone for mechanism purposes. Fortunately, I had tons and tons of wood (if you're gonna be on an aquifer map, you might as well get a heavily forested one) I discovered that because of the way mechanical buildings are handled, you can use a pump as a pretty reasonable surrogate for gear assemblies - and currently, you don't need stone to make pumps, because wood blocks can be used in place of stone blocks.

So, here's how I dealt with the aquifer:

          
Legend: 

  |
^,V,<-,->: Pumps, oriented to pump from dash to "arrow" point for clarity
|
w: water-filled channel
>: down stairway
<: up stairway
X: up/down stairway
=,ǁ: horizontal axles
#: normal walls
*: banks of waterwheels (with channels dug under them, of course. 
Build the horizontal axle first so they'll hang off it)

A note: the amount of effort it takes to wall off a square with this method 
is pretty much constant with regard to size, which means that it's better to build a great
big aquifer-free area and not need most of it than to build a small one and realize you're 
gonna have to expand it. Also, great big ridiculous projects are more fun!

So, to build one wall of the new floor (I ended up doing both parallel walls at the same time):

##########################
#.wwww>..................#
#.w<-ww->w...............#
#.w<-ww->w...............#
#.w<-ww->w...............#
#.w<-ww->w...............#
.... repeat until you will be clearing out enough space.
#.w<-ww->w...............#
#.w<-ww->w...............#
#.w<-ww->w...............#
#.wǁ..>ǁ.................#     The O-SHID (Occupational Safety and Health Inspection Dwarf) 
#.wǁ...ǁ.................# <== requires that these axles be built last in order to  
#.wǁ...ǁ.................# <== minimize death by drowning, accidental flooding of the fortress,
#.wǁ...ǁ.................#     and carp-related incidents.
#.wǁ...ǁ.................#
#.w^===^==============^..#     
#.w|...|..............|..#
#.wǁ..................ǁ..# <== These axles are a bit important. I didn't use them once 
#.***wwwwwwwwwwwwwwww***.#     but had north-facing pumps, and nearly flooded the excavation room.
#.***................***.#     Also, they're what keeps the waterwheel from collapsing
#.***................***.#
#.***................***.#
##########################

You can easily add more waterwheels to the south if you need moar powah.
If they haven't started yet, you can prime the waterwheels by running 
one of the pumps manually for a few seconds.


Going from left to right (again, I did the two parallel walls here simultaneously):

##########################
#........................#
#..wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.#
#..^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^.#
#..|||||||||||||||||||||.#
#.>ǁwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.#
#.wǁwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.#
#.w|||||||||||||||||||||.#
#.wvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv.#
#.wǁwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww..# <= Even though you can't see it (not even in-game!)
#.wǁ.....................#    there's channels under the axle here and above. 
#.wǁ.....................#    They're fine just hanging out as long as they're  
#.wǁ.....................#    between two mechanisms
#.wǁ.....................#
#.w^===^==============^..#     
#.w|...|..............|..#
#.wǁ..................ǁ..# 
#.***wwwwwwwwwwwwwwww***.# 
#.***................***.#
#.***................***.#
#.***................***.#
##########################

Note that when you rotate 90 degrees and start working on the new walls, you'll almost 
certainly have to re-floor some aquifer channels.

You'll want to make the inside of the pumped out area look like this:

 ###
##<#
#++#
#+X#
#+.#
#+.#
#+.#
#+.#
#+.#
#+.#
#+X#
#++#
##<#
 ###

Which means queue up the up/down stairways and the walls on the left side first, then
the two walls on the right. Water can flow through corners, but dwarves can't build 
through that tight gap. You put in two stairways, one near each end, so that when 
you rotate 90 degrees and do it again in the other direction you'll have a stairway pre-built.

The main benefit of this two-pump system is that, in my experience, it minimizes the
amount of micromanagement you'll be doing. I found that I only had to unsuspend each
wall (that is, the entire thing, not individual segments) four or five times before it
was done, with the most egregious bits being the end walls (which is understandable,
they've got an unpumped area next to them).

It does leak a very little bit; you should expect splatterings of 1 and 2 depth water all 
over the place. If you see anything deeper over a non-channel square, something's sprung a 
leak and it's time to call in the O-SHID and shut everything down.

Note that your re-walling dwarves will be quite happy most of the time, what with all the 
mist they'll be walking through constantly.

Once you've got a square bit of area blocked off, you'll have to shift a bank of pumps back 
one square, dig out all the remaining aquifer tiles in the center, and pump out the remaining 
water. Then dig downward and hope you don't have to do this again!

Anyway, I hope this is useful. I didn't put it this on the main article because it's like four AM here. Tacroy 07:33, 14 December 2007 (EST)

notes from nov1 version

this is a cleaned-up chat log from #bay12games on Nov 01 11:07 (PST). Pasting it here until the information works its way in to the wiki page.

<sinoth> VeryInky: you seem to be the aquifer expert. have you found a way to get around them without magma?

<VeryInky> Pumps. But pumps require stone. If you have access to stone, the aquifer shouldn't be that much of a problem. The key draining the aquifer square, then building floodgate.

<sinoth> so the aquifer has a finite amount of water in it, unlike brooks and rivers?

<VeryInky> Unlimited. It's an infinite water source. It's been sort of fixed in the new version, so getting past the aquifer is much easier.

<sinoth> what changed to make it easier? don't see it on the dev_notes

<VeryInky> Non dirt squares no longer automatically refill. IN other words, it's now possible to make a wall and block the aquifer. So you can build deeper; wasn't possible before.

<sinoth> ah ok, thanks much :)

<VeryInky> It's none the less MUCH easier with magma. Dig channels until you reach the aquifer, then divert magma into it. It turns into solid obsidian and you can just continue on.

<sinoth> i wasn't aware you could build pumps solely with stone. don't you need the screw thing, made out of metal or wood?

<VeryInky> Requires a stone, but you can make the screw and pipes out of wood. The problem is getting that stone. A stone.

Unmarked Aquifer?

Is it possible to have an aquifer if it was not listed on the pick an area screen? Normally if you are going to enter an area with an aquifer, I have noticed that it shows you with a band of blue at the level that it is located, and the game asks if you are sure you want to settle there. In my case, there was no aquifer listed, and I received no warning, but I cannot go below a layer of yellow sand without hitting Damp Stone (actually it is Damp Loam)

The map does have a river, do you get Aquifer with a river automatically?

You only get information on the square that your local area is centered on. Thus you can have an aquifer on part of the map without it being listed. --Ikkonoishi 21:12, 6 November 2007 (EST)

Yeah, I had a section of chalk containing an unmarked aquifer in a mostly igneous area.. luckily I was able to just dig around it. Anydwarf 01:57, 8 November 2007 (EST)

Stone method

Some maps have an aquifer that doesn't span all of the map's biomes, in which case the aquifer is easy to avoid by paying attention to where the different biomes are situated. Is that what this section is referring to, or can there really be "holes" in an aquifer? --Peristarkawan 02:46, 3 November 2007 (EDT)

I have found rock pockets in an aquifer that were dry. They are rare and hard to find, when they are there at all. Geekwad 17:05, 6 November 2007 (EST)

Rumours on the ofurms are that ore squares don't generate water, so if you can find enough in one place you can dig through them. I don't know if this is accurate. --Lacero 05:46, 8 November 2007 (EST)

Cave-In Method

So I read that a cave-in would make the aquifier mineable... Has this changed recently? I setup a cave-in as follows and the water's still flooding. Did I do it wrong?

Legend:
# Natural Wall
. Natural Floor
> Stairs Down
< Stairs Up
~ Water
_ Channel with water beneath

Aquifier level:

#######
#~~~~~#
#~~~~~#
#~~~~~#
#~~~~~#
#~~~~~#
#~~~~~#
#~~~~##
##<<<#
 #####

Aquifier +1:

#######
#_____#
#_____#
#_____#
#_____#
#_____#
#_____#
#____<#
##>>>##

Aquifier +2:

#######
#_____#
#_..._#
#_..._#
#_..._#
#_..._#
#_...*#
#____>#
#######

I then dug out the * tile and caused the cave-in. The aquifier water is still all at 7 depth,
even after Bilging (having dwarves fill a pond elsewhere with the water from here)
was I supposed to hit the walls of the Aquifier level with the cave-in?

--CrushU 10:57, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

AFAIK, the cave-in method is a bug exploit that you use to change the type of tile. You use the cave in to change the some of the aquifer tiles into non-aquifer tiles and then mine through the center. VengefulDonut 11:11, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

Thanks, I'll still try it at some point, but I'll pump out water and make walls to go through it mainly.--CrushU 11:51, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

It worked for me, kind of (the aquifer was two layers deep and there was only enough material for me to penetrate the top layer by this method). Here's a side view of what I did, with # representing non-aquifer soil, = representing the interstitial "floor" material, % representing aquifer soil, and ~ representing open water where I channeled out the aquifer level:

                Surface
 =============
 ### ##### ###  level 1 underground
 === ===== ===
 ###       ###  level 2 underground
 ====     ====
 %%%%~~~~~%%%%  level 3 underground - aquifer
 =============
 #############

After I had this all set up, I channeled out the surface floor material holding that suspended block up and let 'er fall:

                Surface
 ===       ===
 ###       ###  level 1 underground
 ===       ===
 ###       ###  level 2 underground
 =============
 %%%%#####%%%%  level 3 underground - aquifer
 =============
 #############  level 4 underground

The slab of non-aquifer material in the aquifer level could be dug through normally. Perhaps the key is in not just dropping a layer of interstitial floor material, but in dropping an entire level's thickness. The water that had been sitting in the channeled-out portion of the aquifer squooshed up onto level 2, but that was easily dealt with by digging a side chamber to let it drain away into since it didn't replenish. Bryan Derksen 02:40, 15 June 2008 (EDT)

Related threads

More threads on aquifers:

• aquifer pumping?
• How-to: Get past the aquifer with pumps

Conglomerate?

I've never seen a Conglomerate layer without an aquifer in it. Thoughts? Gairabad 20:51, 31 December 2008 (EST)

I have, but it usually requires multiple conglomerate layers. Ie, if you have >2-3 the bottom layers should be dry. Also, if you don't otherwise have an aquifer and have conglomerate.. but that doesn't happen very often. --Squirrelloid 21:15, 1 January 2009 (EST)

Sandy clay

My current map has an aquifer throughout, and there are patches of sandy clay that definitely contain water. InsanityPrelude 21:15, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Fishing

Is it possible to fish in an aquifer? I found one right by a volcano, and I wanna know if I have to brave the fire imps. -Erath (unsigned)

Yes, actually. Erathoniel 23:27, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Aquifer Removal?

If one were to remove all the aquifer tiles (Probably some water pumping would be necessary) would they then effectively remove that part of the aquifer entirely? --Nikayah 20:59, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Hypothetically, yes. But for the undiggable aquifer tiles along the edge you will need to pull off some sort of magic trick. VengefulDonut 13:30, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Involving Bridges, most likely. They can be built up close to the edge to wall it off.--Zchris13 17:12, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Aquifer Drain?

could I drain a waterfall into an artificcial waterfall into an quifer without it floodin my fotress

Assuming your question was meant to be "could I drain an artificial waterfall into an aquifer without it flooding my fortress?", then the answer is "yes". --Quietust 14:09, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

thank you i have wanted to do this for "happiness reasons" in case of flooding has this been tested?

Aquifers are capable of absorbing pressurized water (enough that you can drain an entire ocean into a single aquifer tile in a few seconds of game time), so as long as you have a straight path from the waterfall drain to the aquifer you should be okay. --Quietust 00:30, 4 November 2009 (UTC)