I want to be emperor

Tangshan, Kaiping Zhongtunwei during the Ming Dynasty, was just an ordinary guard during the Ming Dynasty, and because it was close to the Great Wall, it was often invaded by Mongols or captives in the late Qing Dynasty, so the development was not good.

After the Great Chu Empire pacified the land of Hebei, Kaiping Zhongtunwei was changed to Kaiping Town. Because it was close to the border, a lot of troops were stationed here. As the rear of Shanhaiguan, it was also an important passing point of the supply line.

It was not until after the Dongyao and the Mongolian tribes were pacified and all the military threats around Hebei disappeared that many places near the Great Wall ushered in gradual development.

And because the local area has abundant coal resources, the coal resources mined in the Kaiping area are nearby and supplied to the Tianjin area. This was the initial development, and then a number of factories were established relying on the coal resources.

With the gradual development of the place, Kaiping Town was upgraded to Kaiping County, and became famous for Kaiping Coal Mine.

After developing step by step, Kaiping has more and more factories, and has gradually become an important industrial area in the northern region except Tianjin. In order to further coordinate development, the empire merged several surrounding counties together and upgraded it to Tangshan Prefecture. It belongs to the Hebei governor's yamen, which is the province and the state.

The first railway in Hebei is the Jintang Railway. The core purpose of this railway is to connect the two important industrial areas of Tianjin and Tangshan, and to facilitate the transportation of coal from Tangshan to Tianjin.

After the opening of the 100-kilometer Jintang Railway in Chengshun in 23 years, it has brought greater development opportunities to the local area. Tangshan Machinery Company has also achieved further development in this wave.

As a typical government-run enterprise, Tangshan Machinery Company was invested and established by the Hebei Provincial Department of Industry. At first, it was only a small supporting factory for Kaiping Coal Mine, producing and repairing some mining equipment. Later, it gradually developed and produced other machinery and equipment, and finally produced agricultural machinery and equipment. And famous.

The series of water power, power storage threshers, power storage harvesters and other agricultural products they produce have a high market share in Hebei.

And many years ago, they thought about developing agricultural machinery powered by steam engines.

And after the patent authorization of low-pressure steam engines was released, they obtained a series of patent authorizations for low-pressure steam engines at a relatively cheap price, and became one of more than 100 steam engine manufacturers in the Great Chu Empire.

Of course, the steam engine technology they produced was not good, and the patented technology of the steam engine was purchased only to pave the way for the development and production of steam engine plowing machines.

However, the power of the original low-pressure steam engine was too small and the weight was too large to be used as the power of the plow.

In this case, they once used other methods, such as placing a steam engine at the head of the field, and then pulling the plowing mechanism through a steel cable... This method is very unreliable, so The market response was very poor, and ultimately failed to get a large-scale promotion.

This made Tangshan Machinery Company a little desperate for agricultural machinery powered by steam engines.

After the high-pressure steam engine was developed, Tangshan Machinery Company saw the hope of applying the steam engine to agricultural machinery.

For this reason, they began to engage in steam plowing machines again.

This time they didn't try to make a high-pressure steam engine by themselves... well, they didn't have that technology, let alone that patent.

Today, in the Great Chu Empire, there are only three technical routes for the patented technology of high-pressure steam engines, which are respectively controlled by Guangzhou Machinery Company, Tianjin Machinery Company, and Dangtu Machinery Company... Well, in fact, these three technical routes are similar, and strictly speaking, only Guangzhou The technical route of the machinery company, the so-called independent technical route of the other two, just bypassed the patent restrictions of the Guangzhou Machinery Company.

In addition to patent restrictions, what is more important is that the production technology of high-pressure steam engines is very high. Unlike low-pressure steam engines, many medium and large machinery factories can make them after pondering... This is why there are hundreds of steam engines in China. Manufacturer's sake.

However, high-pressure steam engines have very high requirements for materials, processing and many technical details. Ordinary machinery factories can’t make them at all, or they can barely make them. There are many problems. Not to mention competition, daily use is very difficult Danger.

The power source of the high-pressure steam engine relies on the high-temperature and high-pressure water vapor heated by coal. Once the high-temperature and high-pressure steam leaks due to poor technology, the power is no less than that of a bomb.

The more advanced the industrial equipment, the higher the technical requirements, and the higher the threshold. This is why although there are more than 100 factories in the Great Chu Empire that can manufacture low-pressure steam engines, there are only three that can manufacture high-pressure steam engines. for the sake.

Tangshan Machinery Company didn't think about making any steam engines by themselves. Their solution was to directly order a special steam engine from Tianjin Machinery Company next door, and then use it as a power source.

However, Tianjin Machinery Company is able to produce a steam engine, but such a steam engine alone is not enough.

It also needs a car body loaded with a steam engine, a transmission structure, a walking structure, and a series of mechanical structures that drive the plowing structure.

When all the systems are combined, it is a complete steam plow machine, but it is easy to say to design and assemble these systems, but it is very difficult in practice.

There are too many problems to be solved here. After several years of tossing, Tangshan Machinery Company has finally solved a series of important problems, and designed and assembled each subsystem.

In the autumn and October of Chengshun's 25th year, the weather was extremely cold, but the factory of Tangshan Machinery Company was full of enthusiasm.

A group of technicians is doing final inspections around a huge steam plow.

This is also the first time for them to actually assemble the prototype, and looking at the assembled prototype, they are both joyful and worried.

The joy is that years of hard work finally paid off: they managed to get the first prototype out.

The worry is that they have no idea whether this steam plow machine can successfully meet the design standards.

At this time, a middle-aged man in a robe said: "Now that the inspection is completed, let's start it!"

"No matter what, this is the result of our ten years of research and development. Even if there is a problem, it can be regarded as being exposed in time, so that we can solve it in a targeted manner!"

When this person was instructing the technicians under his command, a middle-aged man wearing a Confucian robe beside him said, "Brother Qian, don't worry too much, your company's design this time should not have any problems."

Wallet nodded slightly, and then stepped forward to continue to direct the technical staff under his command to prepare for the start-up test.

Sun Qi at the back was standing, looking at the testers with anticipation and worry.

Sun Qi is not from Tangshan Machinery Company, but from Tianjin Machinery Company. He is the main person in charge of the cooperation between Tianjin Machinery Company and Tangshan Machinery Company.

Tangshan Machinery Company wants to develop and produce steam plowing machines, so it is inseparable from miniaturized high-pressure steam engines. They do not have this ability to solve it themselves, so they can only find three major machinery companies.

And Tianjin Machinery Company also wanted to let its steam engine enter the agricultural machinery industry. For this purpose, it specially dispatched technicians to develop a special high-performance steam engine according to a series of performance requirements of Tangshan Machinery Company's steam plow machine.

The performance index of this steam engine is even higher than that of other high-pressure steam engines being produced by Tianjin Machinery Company.

This small steam engine seems to be developed for steam plowing machines, but in fact it also bears the heavy burden of Tianjin Machinery Company to develop and test a new generation of high-pressure steam engines.

This new type of steam engine can not only provide greater water vapor pressure, but Tianjin Machinery Company has also adopted a new technology they have developed for many years for this new type of steam engine: multi-expansion technology.

The power source of today's steam engine is to rely on high-temperature and high-pressure water vapor to push the piston to reciprocate, and the researchers of Tianjin Machinery Company found that the high-temperature and high-pressure water vapor of the steam engine still retains a considerable amount after the first cylinder does work. A part of the energy, if this part of the energy can also be utilized, then the power of the steam engine can be made larger and more efficient at the same time.

Therefore, the theory of secondary work is proposed.

This theory is also very simple, that is, after the high-temperature and high-pressure steam engine does work through the first cylinder, it does not directly discharge the car body, but flows into the second cylinder through the pipeline.Do the second work.

After doing work twice in a row, the water vapor loses most of its energy before being discharged.

This also means that the same batch of water vapor does work twice in a row, and then the two pistons are linked through a series structure, so the power of the steam engine can be increased.

Finally, according to this theory, the latest steam engine product of Tianjin Machinery Company appeared: the double expansion steam engine.

It's just that this kind of high-performance steam engine seems to have a bright future, but the technology research and development is more difficult.

Tianjin Machinery Company has actually been researching this project for seven or eight years. In the era of low-pressure steam engines, they hoped to further improve the performance of steam engines through this technology.

And after Guangzhou Machinery Company came up with high-pressure steam engines and Tianjin Machinery Company fell behind in the field of high-pressure steam engines, they pinned their hopes on multi-expansion steam engines.

It is only now that the initial results have been obtained and applied to this high-performance steam engine.

When they tested the steam engine before, the effect was very good. In the early stage of controlling the volume and weight, the power has been greatly improved, and the calorific value efficiency has also been greatly increased.

However, this is only the data in the laboratory after all, and it is difficult to say whether it is reliable after installation and use.

Sun Qi also expects that his company's new steam engine can drive this plow machine. Once it is successful, it will not only open up a new market for Tianjin Machinery Company's agricultural machinery and equipment, but Tianjin Machinery Company will also be able to apply the multi-expansion technology to Other areas of steam engines.

Such as shipboard steam engines, steam engines for trains, and industrial steam engines.

In order to completely reverse the backward situation of Tianjin Machinery Company in the field of high-pressure steam engines.

Speaking of which, Tianjin Machinery Company has been very aggrieved in the past four or five years. In the past, it was extremely brilliant in the field of low-pressure steam engines. No matter in terms of technical level, market share, revenue or even Lilan, it has completely surpassed it. Dangtu Machinery Co., Ltd. and Guangzhou Machinery are firmly seated as the number one steam engine manufacturer in China.

Because I took the wrong technical route at the beginning and focused on developing a multi-cylinder super-large steam engine, but did not invest enough in the field of increasing steam pressure, I was finally caught off guard by Guangzhou Machinery Company...

High-pressure steam engines have come out. Although there is still a market for low-pressure steam engines, many people would rather wait for the release of high-pressure steam engines... Therefore, in order to survive, Tianjin Machinery Company can only sell low-pressure steam engines at a large price reduction. Don't talk about making money, it's good to lose less.

And you still have to lose money, because once the order is completely gone, the factory will shut down... At that time, Tianjin Machinery Company will be completely finished.

During those two years, in order to maintain the operation of the factory, Tianjin Machinery Company invested a huge amount of money in the research and development of high-pressure steam engines. Everyone was dumbfounded by the money they lost every month!

Even their high-pressure steam engine research is actually just to bypass the patent of Guangzhou Machinery Company... But the patent is so easy to bypass, if it can be easily bypassed, there will not be only three high-pressure steam engine manufacturers now , but dozens of high-pressure steam engine manufacturers.

Therefore, the research and development investment to bypass patents is still very large.

Because of the huge losses in those two years, they had to seek help from the governor's office in Hebei, and asked the government to come forward to seek financial support.

Whether it is the governor's office in Hebei or the prefect's office in Tianjin, naturally they will not just watch the largest enterprise on their own land fall into difficulties and completely collapse, and they will try their best to provide support as much as possible.

Special tax rebates, low-interest loans, matchmaking to contact cooperative partners, etc., the local government paid a huge price for the survival of Tianjin Machinery Company, the largest machinery company in Hebei and even the entire northern region.

In the end, Tianjin Machinery Company spent countless funds on research and development, and they even acquired three other companies wholly, just for the sake of several patented technologies that can be used in high-pressure steam engines in the hands of others, and finally bypassed Guangzhou Machinery Company. Constructed high-pressure steam engine patent restrictions.

And then launched its own high-pressure steam engine.

However, in the field of high-pressure steam engines, they have been two years behind, and it is not easy to catch up in time. As a last resort, they can only adopt a low-price strategy to compete for orders.

Even so, the market share of their high-pressure steam engines is not large, and Lilan is not high, especially in the field of train steam engines, they basically have no market share.

Because Tianjin Machinery Company has not been doing well in the miniaturization of steam engines, they are good at medium and large steam engines, especially super large steam engines.

So they are also good in the field of ship-borne high-pressure steam engines. This is not because of their technology. Sell ​​it.

Although the Great Chu Empire is now in a period of steamship explosion, the navy has hundreds of ocean-going warships and thousands of various offshore, inland river warships and auxiliary ships waiting to be steamed and refitted. Warships need at least thousands of shipboard steam engines of various types.

The two major armed trading companies are no exception, and they need hundreds of steam engines for refitting ships.

In fact, the needs of the navy and the two major armed trading companies are only urgent, but not the biggest. In fact, the biggest demand is still in the ordinary shipping market of the people. The huge inland shipping market in the empire requires hundreds of thousands of steam ships. calculated...

The Great Chu Empire currently has a lot of inland river sailing ships. Not to mention other things, there are as many as 5000 sand ships of various types moored on the Huangpu River in Songjiang Prefecture and Shanghai...

Note, this is only one place, one type of ship!
In fact, there are as many as tens of thousands of ships traveling to and from Shanghai every year, not including those small sampans... those small ships were not included in the statistics.

A large number of inland river and offshore ships travel between various inland waterways, lakes, and offshore waterways, transporting various goods and passengers.

It can be seen from this that the scale of inland water and sea transportation in the Great Chu Empire is huge, and inland water and sea transportation is also the shipping market with the highest acceptance of steam engines.

For ocean-going voyages, the steam engine is only an auxiliary... What is more important is the military value, and the economic value... At present, the steam ships on the ocean-going ships are all motor-sail ships. When sailing, the steam engine is only an emergency power And just use it when entering and leaving the port.

Not to mention any economic value!
However, the inland and offshore markets, especially the inland waterway shipping market, are different.

The advantage of steam ships in sailing against the current gives steam ships a huge unique advantage in the inland shipping market, and once this advantage is converted into ship orders, it will be very terrifying.

It is also under this market demand that the high-pressure steam engine produced by Tianjin Machinery Company can occupy a certain market share.

But to be honest, the same shipboard steam engine, the orders for large steam units with hundreds or even thousands of horsepower used by warships, in terms of price and benefits, are not comparable to steam engines on inland and offshore boats.

The Navy's latest design, the new-generation iron-ribbed wood-hulled battleship Hantian under construction, has a standard displacement of more than 500 tons and uses a set of [-]-horsepower steam engine units.

For this set of steam units alone, the asking price of Guangzhou Machinery Company reached a full 23 Chu Yuan, which is a sky-high price!

Tianjin Machinery Company sells a hundred sets of small and medium-sized shipboard steam engines, and the money they earn is not as much as buying a set of steam engines for warships!