clipka <ano### [at] anonymousorg> wrote:
> I think this is one of the most ingenious canal lock designs to date:

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falkirk_Wheel

> Virtually all you need to do is overcome some friction (note that the 
> thing does not dip into water at the lower basin, otherwise energy would 
> be needed to displace water in that position). And there's no risk of 
> breaking of any cables or hydraulic pipes.

  Somewhat similar ingenious engineering tricks were, in fact, quite common
in antiquity. Nowadays we are too used to everything being done with
electricity, fuel-based motors and the likes, so much that it often feels
that most of humanity has forgotten all the clever tricks that people in
the past had in their sleeves.

  For example, a farmer wants to build an irrigation system which takes some
water from a nearby (large) river to his crops. Problem: The crops are 10
meters higher than the surface of the river. How to lift the water to the
crops?

  In today's dumbed-down lazy society most people just use some electrical
or fuel-based water pump to lift the water, which consumes energy,
pollutes the air, is expensive, and whatnot. Few people realize that
this problem was very ingenuously solved *thousands* of years ago. The
solution is completely automatic and self-supporting (ie. doesn't require
any external power source, besides the flowing river itself), and can be
constructed from cheap basic materials. It's very environment-friendly
because it causes zero pollution and doesn't consume any energy.

  Can you figure out this clever solution?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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