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Noria
Brief description
A hydropowered water-raising machine consisting of a large vertical wooden wheel fitted with paddles around its rim and a series of buckets or earthenware pots attached along its perimeter. Driven solely by the kinetic energy of a flowing river current, it automatically scoops water from the river, lifts it as the wheel rotates, and empties it into an elevated aqueduct or trough.
Use / Function
- Primary Use: Continuous agricultural irrigation of elevated crop fields and terraces without requiring human or animal labor or fossil fuel.
- Secondary Uses: Supplying clean river water to village aqueducts, public fountains, and storage cisterns.
- Scale: Community irrigation networks, riverbank agricultural estates, and municipal waterworks.
Operating principle
- Hydraulic Thrust: The river current strikes flat wooden paddles attached around the wheel’s outer rim, providing continuous torque.
- Water Scooping: Submerged buckets or clay pots mounted at an angle along the rim submerge completely at the bottom of the rotation, filling with river water.
- Elevation: As the wheel turns, the filled pots are carried upward along the ascending arc of the wheel.
- Gravity Spill: Near the top apex of the rotation, the tilt of the pots causes water to pour out into a stationary wooden trough or head aqueduct positioned alongside the wheel hub.
How to create it
- Construct the Axle & Support Piers: Build two sturdy stone or heavy timber piers in the riverbed and mount a thick oak or iron axle horizontally across them on bearings.
- Assemble Spoke Wheel Framework: Build a large rimmed wheel (typically 5 to 20 meters in diameter) using triangular wood trussing radiating from central axle hubs.
- Install Drive Paddles: Attach broad, flat wooden boards radially around the outer rim at uniform intervals to catch the stream current.
- Attach Water Containers: Secure open-mouthed clay pots, hollow bamboo tubes, or wooden buckets along the rim, tilting them slightly so they fill quickly when submerged.
- Erect Aqueduct Receiving Trough: Position a elevated wooden flume or stone channel right beside the top of the wheel arc to catch the spilling water stream.
Materials needed
- Wheel Framework & Paddles: Rot-resistant timber Wood (oak, cedar, or cypress).
- Water Containers: Fired Clay pots, wooden buckets, or hollow bamboo.
- Axle & Reinforcements: Forged Iron axle pins, bands, and bolts.
- Bindings & Fasteners: Tarred Rope or leather lashings to bind pots securely to the wooden rim.
Variants and improvements
- Pot-Rim Noria: Classic design where earthenware jars are lashed directly around the outer wheel rim.
- Box-Rim Noria: Wooden compartments are integrated into hollow rim boxes, reducing weight and eliminating fragile ceramic pots.
- Geared Animal Noria (Saqiya): Uses a horizontal animal-gear drive (ox or donkey) to turn a vertical bucket chain when flowing river current is unavailable.
Limits and risks
- Seasonal River Flow Dependency: Requires a steady river flow velocity; flooding can tear away paddles, while dry seasons stop operation.
- Structural Weight & Bearing Wear: Large wooden norias are extremely heavy and require continuous axle lubrication to prevent grinding wear.
- Fragility: Ceramic pots can crack from debris floating in the river current; timber framework requires periodic rot maintenance and re-tying.