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    Canonfire :: View topic - Dredging or Deepening Rivers?
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    Dredging or Deepening Rivers?
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    Apprentice Greytalker

    Joined: Mar 05, 2010
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    Thu Mar 11, 2010 12:21 pm  
    Dredging or Deepening Rivers?

    Do they manage the various waterway trade routes in Greyhawk?

    Given the magical\medieval\fantasy setting what do you think would be the efficient cheap way to do it?

    I imagine they could have constructs or something suited to the work underwater?

    I imagine they could have some intelligent mud to rock casting or vice versa.


    I'm trying not to resort to undead slaves because a) thats been done and b) it doesn't suite much of Oerth.


    I'm really concentrating on the Selintan (Between Hardby and Greyhawk City) but I'm curious what people think in general.


    Sigurd
    Grandmaster Greytalker

    Joined: Nov 07, 2004
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    Thu Mar 11, 2010 4:42 pm  

    I figure the Selintan is wide enough and deep running enough that it wouldn't need any help. At the mouth there are probably enough deep channels that if one silts up it's most likely not a problem to use another. And then there's always the tidal exchange to consider. It would make having knowledgeable pilots a necessity though, and probably a pretty lucrative profession too. The only obvious place to me that might need help with dredging would be at the two fords. The Romans primitively dredged some waterways, though on what scale I'm not sure, but passage of medieval ships - the only example I could find of the draft and beam of a carrack is about 8 and 28 feet respectively - probably wouldn't require a great deal of dredging to allow passage. Given the setting, if dredging is necessary, man or ox-power would still be the way to go by my thinking, but I take a low magic approach with most things. I'm thinking a barge with kind of a conveyer-belt of scoops that can be raised and lowered going down through the deck at an angle, turned by an ox or teams of men on each side in treadwheels. As the scoops are raised they are dumped at their apex into another barge that holds and transports the spoils. They had stuff like this by the 1600s.

    Edit Sounds like the perfect trade for a bunch of mechanically-minded gnomes living along a river that's a main waterway. We've got Hobloggers, why not Navvygnomes?
    Black Hand of Oblivion

    Joined: Feb 16, 2003
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    From: So. Cal

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    Thu Mar 11, 2010 8:54 pm  

    Magic is not so prevalent on Oerth than it replaces technology. They will probably do things using simple tech- a series of diving bells to provide air for workers, buckets to scoop up muck, and a belt system to take the buckets up to the surface to be dumped. Most rivers don't have to be dredged too deeply after all, as they mostly cater to vessels with shallow keels.
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    Journeyman Greytalker

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    Fri Mar 12, 2010 10:51 am  

    Dredging is the method most used and the easiest one to do with any level of technology. Also don't forget the use of locks and dams as a way of managing the waterways. Again it is something that is a pretty easy thing for most levels of technology to do and has been done for quite a long time in our world.
    Apprentice Greytalker

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    Fri Mar 12, 2010 9:18 pm  
    'Sludge Dragons'

    Sludge Dragons - Gnome Construct

    Sludge dragons are gnomish gear works taking the form of large brass cylinders mounted on specialized dredge barges. The largest of these tubes are 30' long and 4 feet wide. The cylinders are hollow except for a turning screw that digs into the silt of the river bed. The head of the tube is driven down into the muck. Debris then travels up the inside of the 'dragon neck' until it is deposited into a hopper on the barge. The hopper allows the excess water to drain and the damp debris is dumped onto another barge.

    These turning screws, archemedes screws, are powered by water wheels turned by the passing river or by treadmills with walking gnomes.

    I picture a big brass sewer pipe driven by a nightmare of gears.



    Sigurd
    GreySage

    Joined: Oct 06, 2008
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    From: South-Central Pennsylvania

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    Sat Mar 13, 2010 6:19 am  

    Nice, Sigurd. An interesting use for the Archimedes Screw. Cool

    Modern day dredging -- as is done on the Mississippi River in the New Orleans area -- mainly "throws" the sand and mud into the "open" river itself to be washed down stream.

    Some of the mud does need to be hauled out, of course, but most is simply "washed away" by the current. The purpose is to maintain a "ship channel," which does not encompass the entire width of the river, thus we have "channel markers." Wink

    I can imagine a similar method being used on the Selintan and your idea of using the Archimedes Screw would prove extremely useful in such an undertaking. Cool
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    Sat Mar 13, 2010 2:06 pm  

    Thanks. I learned more than I thought I would about dredging :).

    The romans used a method called "spoon and bag" for dredging. It was basically a wide ring with a pole attached at 12 o'clock and an anchor at three and nine o'clock. The anchors were attached to a large winch by chains or ropes or whatever and the ring was pushed into the mud by the pole. The ring would cut off sections of bank into a trailing bag.


    I like the archemedes screw idea. I think its very gnomish. I think they'd use the above method too but they'd probably hire someone big and beefy to stand in the river directing the ring\bag. They'd work the winch.
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