nsformation The first flow-meters were used on large distilling devices such as the Huanui, used m the death-reclamation ceremony Later on, others were modified slightly to accept water from a tunnel instead of a catchtube This model was mounted at the nm of every sietch's reclamation catch basin to record "deposits ' into the tribal repository of wealth Standard catchtube accepting meters, between windtraps and catch-basins, were also mounted in the sietch and stopover megabasms The flowmeters provided progress reports on the amount of water accumulated along the way to planetary reclamation In a funnel-accepting flowmeter the catch-funnel is at the top Most are about 50 cm m diameter, with a turned lip of about 1 5 cm to prevent splashover The funnels are of plasteel, and have been found to have been surfaced with the friction release substance found m watertubing (Two examples of funnels made of a melange-based substance have been uncovered Melange compounds do not respond well to laserdating, but rough holo carbon techniques show these specimens to date back to perhaps 7000 ) At the vortex of these catchfunnels is a dilating, pressure-actuated diaphragm valve As the water nses in the funnel, the calibrated valve releases and lets the funnel-full "drop into the flowmeter's measuring cylinder The cylinder and its own pressure valve, the technological core of the flowmeter, come as a unit The valve, taking up the bottom half of the cylinder, is of the dilating leaf type It has two appendages, a switch triggering cable and the threaded casing of a ten-tooth bevel gear FLOWMETER 223 FREMEN AGRICULTURE The control cable is triggered by a tab on the back edge of one of the flowmeter valve's dilating leaves When tripped the cable sig nals the valve at the base of the funnel (above the flowmeter itself) to close This interconnection prevents both the funnel valve and the flowmeter valve from being open at the same time The casing and bevel gear mesh with a complementary arrangement at the dial As the valve's dilating leaves open out, the gear spins at up to 1,000 rpm When die valve is at maximum dilation (10 cm), the mechanism clicks the dial pointer to its next position The meter valve closes, the funnel valve opens, and the cycle repeats The flowmeter's accurate recording pro ceeds almost automatically until the end of a measuring cycle When the funnel is partly full, its valve can be opened manually (as long as the meter valve has closed) The water enters the meter cylinder, whose valve can be spun manually This rotation eases or increases the tension applied to the leaves' spnngs The precise amount of tension necessary to reach the point af water release is recorded accurately on the flowmeter's dial The dial itself reveals a fascinating inconsistency It records m liters and drachms (to the l/32nd drachm) The "later" is a Galactic standard, and has been for millennia The drachm, however, is even more ancient, a holdover from a "halving" system of measurement The flowmeter's analog recorder converts the metric and halving systems with no difficulty, s& using the two approaches made no difference as far as absolute amounts of water were concerned But the inconsistency is dramatic confirmation of Fremen-Zensunni residence on Sahisa Secundus, whose records show continued use of the premuumtc Inglo system of vol"metrics well into Imperial times (The basis of the Inglo system was the "gal" One ' gal" = 4096 drachms 1 drachm " 3 696 ml) The flowmeter seldom varied from the design outlined above Older models show some minor variations, by the tune of the Fremea Jihad the design was standardized and mass-produced to service the increasing numbers of windtraps and megabasms installed at even minor stopovers The differ- ence between lip-mounted meters and the wmdtrap/Huanui type involved the substitu tion of a catchtube for the funnel above the diaphragm valve At the downside end of these models there was a twist-tab mount for a hterjon s spout tube or a simple watertube adapter From today's vantage point it is possible to speculate about ways the Fremen might have improved their meters Holtzman elec tromcs, for instance, might have been adapted to replace many of the cumbersome moving parts However, such suggestions seem to many scholars close to the scene to ignore die Fremen principle J L C FREMEN AGRICULTURE.