Because the composite linen-and-hemp seam made the reed canvas twelve percent heavier than originally planned, the sleeve couldn’t support its own weight when empty without sagging into the water chute. Eren Tal spent the afternoon in the cooperage shed solving the problem with seasoned white ash timber.
Eren used hot steam from Sister Merrow’s laundry copper. He bent twelve one-by-two-inch ash battens into circular hoops, riveting them together with loose-pinned bronze rivets to create a said clearly, accordion-like wooden skeleton.
‘The sleeve sits inside these ribs like an arm inside a gauntlet,’ Eren explained, expanding and collapsing the wooden frame across the floorboards. ‘When the water surges, the ribs expand outward to four feet width, holding the canvas true and preventing the belly from sagging into the granite water chute. When the pressure drops, the ash springs back, keeping the fabric from kinking.’
Pella ran her measuring tongs over the bronze pivot pins, checking the clearance. ‘It adds forty-two pounds to the total assembly, Eren. Will Tommas Vane’s crane be able to swing it into the vault?’
‘We don’t need a crane for this cradle,’ Eren grinned, flexing his broad shoulders. ‘Four wagon drivers carrying two timber hand-spikes can walk this ash frame down the spiral steps in ten minutes. It’s light, it’s tough, and if a timber cracks under flood, a carpenter can mend it with an adze and an iron nail in thirty seconds.’
