Posted: March 21, 2000 at 08:55:51: by shadowfax
: : even the largest of the Pyramids could have been built in about 20 years by a number of people under 300. : Just out of interest... How? :
: : Now of course Moria did not take up the whole of the mountains under which it was built. Only a faction I would say, with the gates of east to west mainly linked by long boring passages. therefore can it really be much bigger? : The mines were apparently vaster and more intricate than anything Gimli had seen.
: Given the state of things in middle earth, they must have been fairly large ( understatement?).
: Think how long it took the channel tunnel ( that's between England and France for all you Americans) to be built using the boring machine.5-6 yrs according to my fellow civil engineers.That's just under 25 miles of rock, and only two 'passages'.Don't forget, these borers were state of the art as well.
: 25 miles of rock, assuming the tunnel to be 10m high ( don't know how high it is!) and them to be circular, equates to 12,566,370 cubic metres of rock.In 6yrs.Using the best technology we have.
: The dwarves would have used pick axes and shovels.
: I think from this you could say: A bloody long time with one shed load of dwarves.
: :) Yeah, I haven't got the book to hand to check, but believe the crossing of Moria took several days, walking, not clambering, and the road quality was good. I would estimate the total distance travelled underground as being considerably longer than the Channel Tunnel, which i would guess can be walked in a little over half a day. And the party travelled on only one route of a vast labyrinth on different levels.
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