The Great Industrial Ming Dynasty Started from Beiping

Chapter 140
Two two-wheeled carriages were driving on the road, and Zhou Shifeng took several stewards from Beiping to Miyun.

Gao Changzhen, Wan San and other shopkeepers and craftsmen met them in Miyun and led them to see the iron mine and iron factory.

"Ding ding ding dong."

People are on a mountain, digging the mountain with pickaxes, and what they dug out is iron ore.

"Miyun Iron Mine deserves its reputation."

Zhou Shifeng, the treasurer of China Heavy Industry, sighed after watching the scene.

Iron ore craftsmen hold blueprints, and according to the above drawings, the miners dig along the ring.

Hollow out the mountain, and then dig down to form a huge pit above the ground.

Then continue digging from the side.

"How much iron ore has to be dug out?"

The attendant who accompanied him read the drawings, his face full of disbelief, and he also understood why the little prince wanted to monopolize the Miyun Iron Mine.

The mineral situation here is too unique.

It is equal to the legendary cornucopia.

This drawing is dug to the end, isn't it just a pot.

While digging around the mountain, the miners used bucket carts and mule carts to transport the ore to the iron factory, dug a layer on the top of the mountain, and then continued to go down.

It's like peeling dough, and finally leaves a wide circle of downward roads on the mountain.

Miyun Iron Works is the iron smelting workshop of a large steam engine factory.

But more new workshops.

Stone crushing workshop, mining workshop, sorting workshop, smelting workshop...

A wooden frame with a height of several people is built on a wooden frame, and a huge iron block is suspended from it, which is pulled up with a winch.

On the right side of the wooden frame is a steam engine with a height of one and a half people.

The steam dish is heated, the piston moves up and down, and the power provided is through the traditional invisible rotating winch, which pulls the iron block to the highest point and fixes it with a bayonet.

Then put large stones on the iron platform directly below the big iron block, and when the workers are settled, they will knock down the mechanism to loosen the bayonet and let go of the rope. The big iron block falls quickly, and the stone is smashed into pieces by its own weight. gravel.

Generally, it can be successful once, and if it fails once, you need to do it again.

The bucket truck next to it carried away the gravel, and then the workers continued to break the larger gravel into smaller gravel with chisels and hammers.

"This is a new technology." Zhou Shifeng said curiously.

"The research and development department has adopted nine iron-making processes, and the iron crank and flywheel made by the steam engine are installed on the steam engine, which retains more power, which is enough to eliminate hydraulic power. Not only can it be used anywhere, but it does not stop all year round. It is more powerful than hydraulic power. Bigger."

"It would take a day to excavate these large stones into gravel by hand, but now it only takes a quarter of an hour."

Wansan smiled from the side.

The principle can be understood at a glance.

The steam engine is the water drain and the pressurized well, the crank, the flywheel, the winch and other components have existed since ancient times, but all of them have been replaced with iron.

Most of the workshops either rely on water power or use all manpower, so wood and stone are mostly used for parts.

For example, the ancient water row, the upper and lower flywheels, and the crank in the middle are mostly made of wood.

Compared with iron materials, wood and stone materials can be obtained locally, which not only meets the needs of workshop production, but also costs less.

Household workshops naturally have no motivation to change to iron.

When a factory was established to replace the family workshop, the huge output made the machines that could only satisfy the family workshop no longer suitable for the factory.

Then more expensive machines, such as all-iron water drains, came into being.

This is the difference between a factory and a family workshop, just as the workshop can only accept less than ten taels of silver for the cost of the machine.

Then the factory’s price for the machine, as long as it is more efficient, can accept more than ten taels of silver,
Iron drains are several times more expensive than wooden drains, but they are also more efficient and can withstand high-intensity operations.

The first technological revolution.

It can be seen as a factory replacing a family workshop, changing machines made of materials below ten taels of silver into machines made of better materials worth more than ten taels of silver.

Countless inventions, most of which are wooden and stone tools in the firewood era, are changed to iron tools.

Not just that.

Coal replaced firewood as fuel, solved the production bottleneck of iron smelting, and led to a drop in the price of iron materials, etc.

The United Kingdom has abundant coal resources, while countries such as France and Italy are not rich in domestic coal and need to purchase coal from the United Kingdom.

So the Industrial Revolution happened in the UK, that is, a change in technology.

So is the forge.

A machine for crushing stone, with minor modifications, can be used for forging iron.

on the countertop.

The whole piece of bright red iron was struck one by one under the huge hammer, which was ten times and a hundred times higher than the traditional manpower.

"There are countless cheap ores from Miyun Iron Mine, coupled with new technologies, the cost of iron ore has been reduced by at least three times compared to the past."

"With these new technologies in iron smelters, coupled with assembly line operations, the cost has been reduced by at least one time, and the output has been increased by more than several times."

"On the market, iron is one cent and six cents per catty, but our cost is less than two cents per catty, and the fixed price is one cent."

"By next year, the price of the iron factory will continue to decrease."

The output of civilian iron in Quanbei is more than [-] million jin. If this market is monopolized, even if it is only one yuan per jin, it will be a profit of more than [-] taels of silver.

"No wonder the little prince can build all the railways in Beiping."

Zhou Shifeng smiled and said, "Thanks to your iron factory, the cost of each catty of iron is less than two cents. If it is the traditional cost price, the price of the railway track alone will be many times that of the little prince."

Wansan had a complacent expression on his face, without the slightest hint of modesty.

"The next workshop is the forging workshop that specializes in the production of rails. I'll take you there to have a look." There are more than a dozen forging workshops.

Each forge hammers and irons machines differently.

The workshop for the production of rails uses pig iron, which is poured into molds and poured, which belongs to the casting process.

A long grooved embryo mold, which uses a 7-shape.

Last year's rails were originally concave, and the wheels stuck in the grooves, but after half a year of use, many disadvantages were discovered.

The grooves of the rails are too prone to fall into stones etc., causing the wheels to get stuck easily.

After research, the 7-shaped rail was adopted, and the iron wheels of the four-wheeled carriage were also changed to a 7-shaped outer shape to solve this problem.

Zhou Shifeng and others stretched out their hands to touch the rails formed in the workshop, and they felt a cold and heavy feeling.

The next workshop is where the wheels are forged.

The workshop for forging wheels belongs to the miscellaneous workshop. I don't know if it is forging wheels, and there are various other small parts.

Includes cranks, cassettes, irons and more.

These parts, including the wheels, are all made of nine-smelting iron, which is commonly known as steel in later generations, and are forged.

In the firing process, various miscellaneous materials such as grass ash are added to decarbonize.

In ancient times, frying iron was almost the only way to get wrought iron from pig iron.

However, the method of using pig iron to make wrought iron described in "Huo Gong Xi Yao" and "Shen Qi Pu" is not the same as the traditional iron frying process. The method of refining wrought iron is the pig iron decarburization steel making process without frying .

The purpose of not going through frying and refining is to obtain purer wrought iron. Firearms forged with such wrought iron will not burst when fired. This is a craft that appeared in the Ming Dynasty.

This craft is also recorded in Tiangong Kaiwu.

At the end of the [-]th century, the stirring method invented in Britain, which became the mainstream steelmaking method in later generations, is also this kind of process theory.

The next workshop is the pipeline workshop.

The wrought iron machine here is no longer a large round iron block, but a long iron block.

"In the past, the iron was divided into eight pieces, which were shaped like tiles, one foot four inches long, one foot one inch wide, thick in the middle and thin in the sides, and it took craftsmen a day to build one piece."

Wansan pointed to the large iron plate under the machine.

Everyone looked over curiously.

"The whole piece of iron is clamped by the workers with iron tongs, and the edge is gradually thinned by the machine from the inside to the outside, saving ten times the time and manpower."

"Boom."

With one hammer, the edge of the whole piece of iron is dented visible to the naked eye, and this is repeated until the required forged iron piece is obtained.

"These iron sheets are forged in a double-layer composite method, and finally two iron plates are used to make a section."

Wan San sighed, and introduced to people: "Just this pipe, how many craftsmen used to forge it to get it."

"Besides, each craftsman's craftsmanship is different, and the pipes obtained are also slightly different. Now it is a complete piece of iron forging, and the number of times of forging is also fixed."

"The craftsmen only need to apply force to the thin vertical edge of the iron plate to facilitate the forging and joining of the two edges, and slightly forge the thinner edges at both ends of the iron plate to connect two tile-shaped iron pipes in series. "

Zhou Shifeng stared at these iron pipes and wrote them down vigorously.

As the leader of China Heavy Industries, he knows more information than others. These iron pipes can be used to make firecrackers.

However, the little prince does not allow the iron factory to propose such an idea, so as to avoid arousing the suspicion of outsiders, but the research technology still needs to be studied.

As long as there is an order one day, these iron pipes can become a mass of firearms.

As far as he knew, the little prince and Xiao Jiu had also discussed the development of firearms, and they had some ideas for a lighter, more powerful, and more convenient firearm.

Zhou Shifeng memorized all the things that needed to be remembered in his mind.

The big treasurer of Nakato Heavy Industries came to Miyun.

Although he is white, he can manage tens of thousands of people, which should not be underestimated, and there is the Yan Palace behind him.

Zhou Shifeng was the host, and specially set up a banquet, and invited several officials from Miyun.

Whether others look down on him or not, and whether they are willing to show him face is their business, but whether he invites guests or not is his problem.

He should first make his own affairs irreproachable to others, and he doesn't care what others do.

But it is true that no one gave him face. The few officials invited were all at the banquet, and they were very polite when talking and laughing.

After inspecting Miyun, all the people who had changed met, and then Zhou Shifeng left Miyun with a few stewards.

Then I went to inspect the railway construction sites in various places, and also visited the briquette workshop that joined the briquette chamber of commerce.

It took a month to take a look at the flowers and returned to Beiping Mansion.

Zhu Gaochi and Xiao Jiu looked carefully at the blueprints brought back by Zhou Shifeng, such as iron pipes and iron plates.

In the office, there are also some firearms.

Hand guns, bowl mouth guns, large guns, etc.

"These firearms are slow to fire, short in range and low in power. Little Jiu, you should do more research on how to improve these shortcomings."

"Start from the airtightness and materials." Zhu Gaochi pointed out.

If the flintlock can't reach it, the bird gun is still no problem.

As an arquebus gun, the bird gun showed its superiority and was widely prepared in the southern army.

The flintlock gun is called a self-generating fire blunderbuss, and there is no problem technically. It is rare that the Ming Dynasty did not have a high-quality flint source, so this problem cannot be solved, and the flintlock gun cannot be used in the army.

Ten blows can only reach less than [-]%, how to equip the army?

With a thousand self-generating guns, with one order, less than a hundred shots can be fired smoothly, so it cannot be equipped at the end of the Ming Dynasty.

There is a large amount of high-quality flint in the west, and the imperial court bought it from Portugal in the late Ming Dynasty, but they used inferior flint to make Ming a fool.

The flint used by folks is fine as long as it can light a fire. As for how many hits, it's just that skill anyway, so I don't care much.

But the army's intensive shooting is different, the pursuit is efficiency, and the most lead bullets are fired in the shortest time.

Otherwise, the enemy will rush to the front, and the musket has lost its advantage.

"With the new machine, the gun barrel is no longer a problem. You can also try to use rifling on the inner wall of the gun to see if there is a better effect."

Xiao Jiu carefully wrote down the ideas provided by the little prince, and started to study back.

"And these iron plates can also be made into plate armor in large quantities. What kind of assembly line is used to produce them, you have to find out the most efficient process."

"However, try it within the R&D department and try not to spread it," Zhu Gaochi explained.

Don't be afraid even if someone knows.

He is the eldest son of King Yan.

However, these heavy military weapons are likely to attract the attention of the court. As a trump card, Zhu Gaochi will have to wait at least three years before starting to promote it in Beiping.

With the speed of information dissemination at that time, it would take half a year to go back and forth. By the time a decision is officially made, the sky has changed.

"Ammonia water has proved that it can fertilize the fields, and this thing is of great benefit." Seeing that the little prince had no follow-up explanation, Xiao Jiu closed the notebook and brought up the effect of ammonia water that he had recently studied.

"However, add water to dilute it, otherwise it is easy to burn the crops."

"There is also ammonia water that is not easy to store and loses its effect easily."

"As for the little prince's method of distilling it into fertilizer, I have also tried it, and it can indeed solve this problem. It is not only suitable for storage, but also convenient for transportation."

Zhu Gaochi was not surprised by Xiao Jiu's discovery.

Ammonia and chemical fertilizers, as well as tar, are the easiest products. The technical content is not high, and large-scale production is not difficult.

"Let's go to the coke oven together, let's take a look with you."

Zhu Gaochi got up, and he had a recipe for future generations, so he didn't need to hide it, just call it out, and there were still people who were greedy for his things.

He is the only one in Peiping who has a coke refinery.

The roof of the coke kiln is a blast furnace, and there are exhaust outlets on both sides.

"There are many kinds of air. Ammonia is produced by the combination of ammonia gas and clean water. The smoke is exhausted from the chimney, and the dense gas is exhausted from the exhaust vent."

"Is it possible to build a pipeline directly at the exhaust outlet, and these dense gases enter a large sealed iron cylinder through the pipeline."

"A large amount of hot gas enters the sealed iron tank. Water pipes are built to introduce cold water into the iron tank. One side is the water inlet and the other side is the water outlet, which can accelerate condensation."

Zhu Gaochi gesticulated and explained in the open space next to the unrefined empty coke kiln.

Xiao Jiu became even busier, flying around in the notebook.

　The company worked overtime last night, and there is only one change today.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)