|
Ancient fountains ancient fountains, how did they work? As you know modern fountains work by a pump re-circulating the same water over and over again, but what did they do before electricity was invented? Some bright spark realised that if you have a supply of water in a high place and then you build a "pipe" to carry the water from the high point to the desired location, when it arrives it has pressure (depending on various factors such as pipe diameter, height of water supply etc) By conveying the water from the supply, be it a lake, spring or river so long as it runs downwards it then has enough pressure to go up when it arrives at its destination, 1 foot in height produces 0.43 pounds per square inch (P.S.I.) of pressure so a fountain "supply" doesn't need to be all that high to give a reasonable jet. So therefore you can build a fountain that never stops. In Roman times the fountain water then ran off to another fountain and that then ran to another, eventually ending up in the sewer. The Romans obviously could not use pipe from the builders merchant, so they built aqua ducts to carry the water. Must have taken some time ______________________________ There are also illustrations of indoor fountains that used the heat from the sun to heat water and as it expands "shoots" through a small nozzle, all the workings would be behind a wall, but the outer wall would have a window to allow in sunlight Why don't you have a go to see if you can build a fountain as the Romans had? I am sorry this is short, but to be honest the workings of an old fountain are just as simple ___________________________
|
||
|
462 30 10 06 |
