Hi, so I have a problem in my SSP world. It's a great seed with tons of dungeons and terrain I really love, but the only problem I have is that there is so much lava underground. It seems that everywhere I look, there is lava where I try to mine. I started one mine but ended up dying in the lava. I tried clearing it out with sand but it took forever and I still didn't get all of it. Every direction I try to branch mine has lava. It's completely prevented me from mining at all and I've only gotten about half a stack of iron in this world from caves near the surface. It's seriously hindering my progress and I would really like to play this world, so I'm asking if anyone has any suggestions for me on how to get rid of this lava and the best ways to mine while avoiding it. Thanks!
I would, but lava pools are almost always several blocks deep. I'm not just talking about me stumbling across the surface of a lava pool where I would use water and just walk over it, but I keep running into the middle of the pool where there are multiple levels of lava.
I guess that's probably the best way, I usually have two or three layers to my mines though, but I'll settle and get rid of the lava once I get fire resist potions. Thanks
In my opinion, your an idiot to mine anywhere deeper than layer 11-12
OT: If you see lava, and it annoys you, place a cobble where it was, then walk away
Why? There's layers full of resources below that. I know most people mine at those levels, but what I usually do is mine at 5, then make more branches at 10, and then 15. I find plenty of diamonds by going below 12, but the risk of course is the lava.
Anyway, the point of this topic is to ask people for the most effective ways of getting rid of lava. Simply blocking it off is not a solution, and you clearly don't understand my situation which I explained. If I took your suggestion, I wouldn't have a single direction to mine in.
I guess that's probably the best way, I usually have two or three layers to my mines though, but I'll settle and get rid of the lava once I get fire resist potions. Thanks
Why? There's layers full of resources below that. I know most people mine at those levels, but what I usually do is mine at 5, then make more branches at 10, and then 15. I find plenty of diamonds by going below 12, but the risk of course is the lava.
Anyway, the point of this topic is to ask people for the most effective ways of getting rid of lava. Simply blocking it off is not a solution, and you clearly don't understand my situation which I explained. If I took your suggestion, I wouldn't have a single direction to mine in.
If you insist on mining below Y=11 then the best way to deal with breaking into lava is to pack a stack of ladders and place one on the side of a block in the hole then try to place blocks above through that hole to fill in the space so you move forward some then repeat if more lava. Lava overhead is the biggest obstacle, whereas lava from the side or below can usually be dealt with more easily.
Another option is to pack a lever and piston. When you break through into lava, quickly fill the hole back up with a block. Then move back 2 or 3 blocks and see if you can remove a block from the ceiling with no lava above it, then place the piston facing the way you want to go in the hole. Place lever on ceiling behind the piston and activate it to push the blocks in front of the piston forward into the lava, turn lever off, place another block and activate lever once again. Repeat until the piston won't push blocks anymore.
I tend to do the same... mine the 5-6 level for those extra ore/gems so lately I've taken to farming obsidian to make use of that lava in a positive manner. It takes time but drag along a couple buckets of water as well as buckets for lava.. make use of the tunnel your working and pour out 5 lava sources in a trench then set a water source on the first stone block to get the obsidian , pick up the water source and mine out the obsidian.. repeat. It does take time which I don't mind but some might get tired of the monotony.
I often mine below y=11, and my normal method of dealing with a pool of lava in my path is this:
1) Use ladders to stop the lava from pouring into your tunnel.
2) Set up a piston tunnel extending machine. This is six pistons, one on the ceiling, one on the floor, and four on the sides, with two buttons to activate the pistons. After they've extended and retracted, put cobblestone in the gap, and press the button again. Rinse and repeat until you can no longer extend the pistons anymore.
3) Remove the lava inside the extended tunnel, either by using a bucket to scoop out the lava, or dirt to destroy the source block.
4) If the extended tunnel hasn't reached the other side, repeat steps 2 and three. Be careful while doing so if you don't want to lose your pistons to the lava.
Why? There's layers full of resources below that. [...] If I took your suggestion, I wouldn't have a single direction to mine in.
The Minecraft world is practically infinite. Not technically infinite, mind, but for all intents and purposes, it might as well be. You're never going to reach the edge of the world without teleporting there. Once you've cleared out an area of all resources in the 11-12 layers, just go somewhere else and mine 11-12 there. The diamonds are roughly evenly distributed among layers 6-13, I think it is, so going any deeper won't get you any more diamonds, just more lava. Why risk the lava? Just go next door, as it were, and mine over there.
The Meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything.
Location:
Eastern USA
Join Date:
4/21/2013
Posts:
450
Location:
Eastern USA
Minecraft:
Aurelium
Member Details
Honestly, I know there are tons of resources below layer 11, but mother minecraft is a **** because whenever i find diamond down there it involves lava cascades, so dig at layer 11 if you dont want lava in your tunnels, and just build over the lakes you will seldomly find with cobble, and watch out for lava drips.
The Minecraft world is practically infinite. Not technically infinite, mind, but for all intents and purposes, it might as well be. You're never going to reach the edge of the world without teleporting there. Once you've cleared out an area of all resources in the 11-12 layers, just go somewhere else and mine 11-12 there. The diamonds are roughly evenly distributed among layers 6-13, I think it is, so going any deeper won't get you any more diamonds, just more lava. Why risk the lava? Just go next door, as it were, and mine over there.
I don't know about others, but when I'm mining below y=11, it's usually because I want to stay in the general vicinity of something I want to keep loaded. Usually, I'll be mining below one of my bases, where I'll have calves maturing, chickens laying eggs, crops growing, cobblestone being smelted into stone, etc.
Granted, I could simply AFK while waiting for that to happen, but personally I think it can be fun to mine below y=11. The possibility of digging into or below a lava pool gives it a bit of zest that mining safely above y=11 lacks.
Often lava will generate in large lakes and pools all connected. This means that if you find some lava, there is probably more nearby.
The best thing to do is either be on edge, always ready to block it off with cobble or some other block or you could just find somewhere else to mine.
I would say that you should forget about getting rid of lava as a whole because it is just one of those things that are there and you can't do much about it unless you want to waste a LOT of time.
Thanks for all the tips, everyone! I think I might try the ladder idea to block off the lava.
About mining below level 11, I usually do it because I like to try to get an area dry of its ores before moving on to another place. A minecraft world is pretty big, but I don't want a mine stretching forever because its kind of annoying to walk down ( a minecart would use a ton of iron too).
According to the handy resource altitude chart on the wiki, level five is the plateau of lava lakes. And assuming you want diamonds the most, it's a lot easier to mine above level 5 but under 16 for them as their occurence does not change between levels 6 and 12. And the ideal level for other resources found really deep (lapis, redstone, diamonds, etc.) averages to 16.5, but lava lakes are only commonly found up until level 10, so you might as well mine at around level 13. Mining anywhere near wear bedrock starts to appear is far from practical, and I am not surprised at your lava problem one bit because of this.
ComputingAgentX - Enjoy humorous let's plays, reviews, tutorials and more at my awesome channel. Check me out here, you'll be pleasantly surprised! Subscribe today and get a complimentary stone hoe!
Im surprised noones chimed in about gravel. What I do, is dig a long tunnel at level 11. When I find a lava lake, I dig around the sides of it, till its fully exposed, and fill it in with gravel. Then, later, I will go back to the beginning of the tunnel, dig down four blocks, and tunnel underneath the original tunnel. That usually takes care of any lava, aside from the occasional lava spot below level 10.
Computing Agent: Thanks for the info! At first I thought I just got unlucky with this seed, and that it naturally spawned a ton of lava. After playing Minecraft for a while, I've used various types of mines and done quite a bit of work under level 10, but never actually ran into so much lava in every direction.
horaholic: I actually used sand for my first mine (the one I died in) but the lava pool was just so big, there was lava hidden under blocks and corners and I never got all of it, and there were more pools too, so filling it with sand just became too much work.
While exploring on level 5 I came across a large cavern and two pools of lava, one abutting a large area of obsidian, the other off to the left. Within the cavern, and near the obsidian, was flowing water, coming from above. I dug my way up to the water source and collected it in a bucket. Stopping the water flow allowed me to explore the cavern a bit more only to find the lave which was the source of all the obsidian. I also noticed another water flow further on in the cavern. Where I found the first water source was another area in the opposite direction, which, it turned out, ended in a lava pool. I bucketed some lava from this last pool and discovered it had covered a block of redstone; the lava had not backfilled this one spot. Also present was two blocks of lapis, which I was determined to get.
Slowly I begin trying to place cobblestone where edges of stone were visible within the lava. I'd then move to the next spot and repeat the process. After placing the second cobblestone I'd back up one block, behind the fist block I placed, and know it out to see if any lave existed. If no lava showed when the first block was removed, I'd take out another block one block deeper. If no lava show I'd fill in those two removed blocks and move on to the next lava spot. Following this routine I clear this entire are of lave, and started digging extension tunnels.
During the dig of the second extension tunnel I hit water, which I blocked with a couple of cobblestone blocks. I kept blocking and moving until I got close enough to throw a cobblestone block into the water source. I then dug out this last block to make sure no water existed and suddenly realized I was seeing black beyond the last block removed. I'd come back into the cavern, only further into the cavern. From this point I saw the lave pool and a water flow, one of two as it turned out.
I stair stepped up to the water source, blocked it, and the second one I found, and went back down to the cavern floor. Going further into the cavern revealed another water flow which I blocked off until I got close enough to the source to block it. Then I headed to the lava pool, which turned out to be one of two in that area.
This first pool was blocked by a good size obsidian field, with lava beneath some of the obsidian blocks. Because of my previous experience getting rid of lava I decided to try the same method here. I stood two blocks behind a block of obsidian and dug out the block directly behind that block. If no lava was found I could remove that block of obsidian. If lava was present I then tried to place a block of cobblestone, or gravel, or dirt, directly under that block of obsidian. Sometimes I'd end up putting two or three blocks before the lava was removed, but in this way I ended up removing all the lava and removing all of the obsidian.
While in this area I took out several blocks of redstone and coal, a few lapis blocks, and heard the sound of more lava just beyond a wall I was about to tear down. I built a ramp to get high enough to peer over this wall and was surprised to discover I'd reached the same lava pool I saw from the mouth of the cavern. To make this story shorter, wash, rinse, repeat, and I was able to remove the lava and mine the obsidian. Between these two areas I mined over 100 blocks of obsidian.
The store gets better, and shorter. The lava pool that was to the left of the cavern entrance was also removed, same manner, and I found an abandoned mine. A lava flow was plugged and another lava/water area discovered. Cleared blocks to get to the lava/water area and in plugging both water and lava flows, discovered another room full of obsidian. Followed the same process as before and after clearing this room of obsidian I'd mined in all three areas over 150 blocks of obsidian. And 5 diamonds to boot.
Clearing lava can be done, if slowly, but it can be done. When lava flowed after a block was removed, I'd back up and throw down a block to stop the flow until I could build a dam. Once the dam was build I'd break the blocking block and try to place another block directly into the opening the lava was coming from. As I said, it's slow work, but can reveal a vast hoard.
OT: If you see lava, and it annoys you, place a cobble where it was, then walk away
Why? There's layers full of resources below that. I know most people mine at those levels, but what I usually do is mine at 5, then make more branches at 10, and then 15. I find plenty of diamonds by going below 12, but the risk of course is the lava.
Anyway, the point of this topic is to ask people for the most effective ways of getting rid of lava. Simply blocking it off is not a solution, and you clearly don't understand my situation which I explained. If I took your suggestion, I wouldn't have a single direction to mine in.
If you insist on mining below Y=11 then the best way to deal with breaking into lava is to pack a stack of ladders and place one on the side of a block in the hole then try to place blocks above through that hole to fill in the space so you move forward some then repeat if more lava. Lava overhead is the biggest obstacle, whereas lava from the side or below can usually be dealt with more easily.
Another option is to pack a lever and piston. When you break through into lava, quickly fill the hole back up with a block. Then move back 2 or 3 blocks and see if you can remove a block from the ceiling with no lava above it, then place the piston facing the way you want to go in the hole. Place lever on ceiling behind the piston and activate it to push the blocks in front of the piston forward into the lava, turn lever off, place another block and activate lever once again. Repeat until the piston won't push blocks anymore.
by c0yote
I tried it with terrible results. I gave my wife my glasses for a second, a creeper showed up and now my wife is pregnant.
Stupid 3D..
1) Use ladders to stop the lava from pouring into your tunnel.
2) Set up a piston tunnel extending machine. This is six pistons, one on the ceiling, one on the floor, and four on the sides, with two buttons to activate the pistons. After they've extended and retracted, put cobblestone in the gap, and press the button again. Rinse and repeat until you can no longer extend the pistons anymore.
3) Remove the lava inside the extended tunnel, either by using a bucket to scoop out the lava, or dirt to destroy the source block.
4) If the extended tunnel hasn't reached the other side, repeat steps 2 and three. Be careful while doing so if you don't want to lose your pistons to the lava.
The Minecraft world is practically infinite. Not technically infinite, mind, but for all intents and purposes, it might as well be. You're never going to reach the edge of the world without teleporting there. Once you've cleared out an area of all resources in the 11-12 layers, just go somewhere else and mine 11-12 there. The diamonds are roughly evenly distributed among layers 6-13, I think it is, so going any deeper won't get you any more diamonds, just more lava. Why risk the lava? Just go next door, as it were, and mine over there.
Village Mechanics: A not-so-brief guide - Update 2017! Now with 1.8 breeding mechanics! Long-overdue trading info, coming soon!
You think magic isn't real? Consider this: for every person, there is a sentence -- a series of words -- which has the power to destroy them.
I don't know about others, but when I'm mining below y=11, it's usually because I want to stay in the general vicinity of something I want to keep loaded. Usually, I'll be mining below one of my bases, where I'll have calves maturing, chickens laying eggs, crops growing, cobblestone being smelted into stone, etc.
Granted, I could simply AFK while waiting for that to happen, but personally I think it can be fun to mine below y=11. The possibility of digging into or below a lava pool gives it a bit of zest that mining safely above y=11 lacks.
The best thing to do is either be on edge, always ready to block it off with cobble or some other block or you could just find somewhere else to mine.
I would say that you should forget about getting rid of lava as a whole because it is just one of those things that are there and you can't do much about it unless you want to waste a LOT of time.
About mining below level 11, I usually do it because I like to try to get an area dry of its ores before moving on to another place. A minecraft world is pretty big, but I don't want a mine stretching forever because its kind of annoying to walk down ( a minecart would use a ton of iron too).
Edit: Kinda got ninja'd
horaholic: I actually used sand for my first mine (the one I died in) but the lava pool was just so big, there was lava hidden under blocks and corners and I never got all of it, and there were more pools too, so filling it with sand just became too much work.
Slowly I begin trying to place cobblestone where edges of stone were visible within the lava. I'd then move to the next spot and repeat the process. After placing the second cobblestone I'd back up one block, behind the fist block I placed, and know it out to see if any lave existed. If no lava showed when the first block was removed, I'd take out another block one block deeper. If no lava show I'd fill in those two removed blocks and move on to the next lava spot. Following this routine I clear this entire are of lave, and started digging extension tunnels.
During the dig of the second extension tunnel I hit water, which I blocked with a couple of cobblestone blocks. I kept blocking and moving until I got close enough to throw a cobblestone block into the water source. I then dug out this last block to make sure no water existed and suddenly realized I was seeing black beyond the last block removed. I'd come back into the cavern, only further into the cavern. From this point I saw the lave pool and a water flow, one of two as it turned out.
I stair stepped up to the water source, blocked it, and the second one I found, and went back down to the cavern floor. Going further into the cavern revealed another water flow which I blocked off until I got close enough to the source to block it. Then I headed to the lava pool, which turned out to be one of two in that area.
This first pool was blocked by a good size obsidian field, with lava beneath some of the obsidian blocks. Because of my previous experience getting rid of lava I decided to try the same method here. I stood two blocks behind a block of obsidian and dug out the block directly behind that block. If no lava was found I could remove that block of obsidian. If lava was present I then tried to place a block of cobblestone, or gravel, or dirt, directly under that block of obsidian. Sometimes I'd end up putting two or three blocks before the lava was removed, but in this way I ended up removing all the lava and removing all of the obsidian.
While in this area I took out several blocks of redstone and coal, a few lapis blocks, and heard the sound of more lava just beyond a wall I was about to tear down. I built a ramp to get high enough to peer over this wall and was surprised to discover I'd reached the same lava pool I saw from the mouth of the cavern. To make this story shorter, wash, rinse, repeat, and I was able to remove the lava and mine the obsidian. Between these two areas I mined over 100 blocks of obsidian.
The store gets better, and shorter. The lava pool that was to the left of the cavern entrance was also removed, same manner, and I found an abandoned mine. A lava flow was plugged and another lava/water area discovered. Cleared blocks to get to the lava/water area and in plugging both water and lava flows, discovered another room full of obsidian. Followed the same process as before and after clearing this room of obsidian I'd mined in all three areas over 150 blocks of obsidian. And 5 diamonds to boot.
Clearing lava can be done, if slowly, but it can be done. When lava flowed after a block was removed, I'd back up and throw down a block to stop the flow until I could build a dam. Once the dam was build I'd break the blocking block and try to place another block directly into the opening the lava was coming from. As I said, it's slow work, but can reveal a vast hoard.
Nice amount of content there! So true.