Go back in time and be a chaebol

Chapter 262 Sky-high Price Invention (Fourth update, please subscribe)

In the early morning, Li Yian woke up to bursts of thunder.

Not thunder, but the sound of cannon blasting through the mountains.

The sound of gunfire came from the construction site, which is also a special situation of this construction site. Although the rock foundation is strong, the foundation cannot be dug and can only be blasted. So the explosion was inevitable.

After having a simple breakfast, Li Yian went from the dormitory area to the factory area. The factory area looks busier during the day than at night. Large cranes are lifting and installing large equipment parts. Under the command of Italian and German engineers, complete sets of metallurgical equipment have taken shape.

Soon Li Yian arrived at the steel rolling center. In the capped steel rolling workshop, engineers were making final production adjustments to the steel rolling equipment. Qiu Yuchi, the general manager of the factory, was also discussing something with several German engineers in the workshop.

Li Yian did not disturb them. It was not that he liked private visits incognito, but that in his opinion there was no need to greet them.

Because not only will it take a lot of time to welcome and send you off, but you will never see the truth.

He looked no different from an ordinary employee. He just watched from a distance as fiery red steel bars were spit out from the running steel rolling mill. The steel bars as thick as a thumb looked as soft as noodles.

According to the principle of production while construction, the steel rolling workshop is the first workshop put into operation by the steel company, not only because it only needs to install steel-making electric furnaces and rolling mills to produce, but because the construction of Borneo requires steel, whether it is a factory or a city Construction is inseparable from steel for construction. When formulating the construction plan of the steel company, the principle of rolling first and then refining was adopted. The rolling mill was built first, and then the steelmaking plant was built.

After the red steel bars were cooled by the cooling water, Li Yian noticed that the steel bars seemed different from those seen in later generations. He stretched out a steel bar that still had residual heat and said to himself.

"How could it be round steel?"

A clerk next to him explained it to him casually.

"Of course, round steel. The equipment for producing bamboo steel is larger and more complex, so this is the second phase of the steel rolling project. Round steel requires less equipment, and the amount of round steel is larger. Bamboo steel is about one inch. Square steel can only be used to build large buildings, not factories and other buildings.”

The young man's explanation made Li Yian stunned and said in surprise.

"Bamboo steel... is it square steel?"

No, why is there no rebar?

Soon from the young man's explanation, Li Yian figured out that the current steel used in construction is either square steel with bamboo-like protrusions on the surface, that is, bamboo steel, or round steel with smooth surface.

As for rebar, that doesn’t exist.

“No rebar!”

Just when Li Yi'an's eyes lit up, Qiu Yuchi, who had been accompanying the engineer to test the equipment, didn't notice him at all at first, until he glanced at him when he passed by. Only then did he notice who the young employee was, so the general manager of the steel company hurried over.

"I didn't know that Chief Li was coming. I am not able to greet you because of my humble position. Please forgive me, Chief Li..."

Before he could apologize, Li Yian waved his hand and said.

"The most important thing now is to meet the deadline. It's only right not to be disturbed by trivial matters such as the arrival and delivery. We don't do that here, so Manager Qiu doesn't think I'm intruding."

The general manager of the company was a metallurgical talent recruited by Li Yian from China. During the Anti-Japanese War, he not only successfully trial-produced pure tungsten, but also used the crucible method to smelt gun steel, high-speed steel, mold steel, stainless steel, magnetic steel, etc. Strong support for military production.

A few months ago, when he and several colleagues were sent to the United States to purchase metallurgical equipment, Li Yian intercepted Hu halfway. Of course, he had to thank his cheap father-in-law for this. If he hadn't helped, Qiu Yuchi wouldn't have been able to do so. Will come.

In fact, even when he came here, he came with a learning attitude. In his opinion, the purpose is to learn the management of large modern enterprises here so that he can manage domestic factories when he returns to China in the future.

Well, this place is for practicing.

"Our workshop produces round steel?" Qiu Yuchi quickly explained.

"Yes, Chief Li, the amount of round steel is the largest in Borneo right now. It is indispensable for building factories and buildings, so we produce rolled steel first. As for the scrap iron smelted by electric furnaces as raw materials, in terms of production cost , more than 40% cheaper than imported ones.”

Li Yian said with a slight nod.

"What about bamboo steel? I heard someone else explain just now that its production equipment is more complicated, right?"

"Yes, Chief Li, the tonnage of square steel rolling is larger, and the equipment is naturally more complex. Whether it is factory construction or installation and debugging, it will take longer. Considering the current demand, we have temporarily put it on the second phase of the project. Now our first phase project has been 30% completed, and it is expected..."

Just when Qiu Yuchi wanted to report on the construction progress of the steel company, Li Yian changed the topic and asked.

"Let's talk about this first."

Picking up a round steel, Li Yian said.

"Bamboo steel is square steel with bamboo-like protrusions on the surface, but it is specially used for large-scale buildings. Otherwise, it is this kind of round steel. I have an idea..."

Looking at Qiu Yuchi, Li Yian explained.

“Can we combine bamboo steel and smooth round steel bars?”

"combine together?"

Qiu Yuchi said in surprise.

"why?"

"It can save steel materials."

Li Yian said directly.

"Can we appropriately modify the mold of the rolling mill to roll spiral-like threads, which can increase the friction between the steel bars and the concrete and make them firmly and tightly bonded together. The surface of the round steel bars is smooth and the bond with the concrete is not strong enough. , not only is it easy to fall off, but also uses more amount. If rebar is used, the amount should be reduced a lot."

A seemingly random suggestion, in fact, is the direction of development of the steel industry after World War II. Although bamboo steel existed as early as the late 19th century, due to the high processing cost, it has been used for thick steel bars of more than one inch. Ordinary steel bars are still round steel with a smooth surface.

It was not until after World War II that a large amount of steel was needed for post-war reconstruction. In order to reduce costs, British companies invented threaded steel bars. Compared with smooth round steel bars, the use of threaded steel bars can save about 15% to 20% of metal. This figure looks like It may not seem very eye-catching, but in post-war reconstruction in European countries, millions or even tens of millions of tons of steel are used for construction every year. Saving about 20% of steel is a sky-high price.

Because of this, in just a few years, threaded steel bars quickly became popular all over the world and quickly became the mainstream steel used in construction. The British steel company that invented rebar made a lot of money just by licensing patents. Even because Soviet Russian factories misappropriated its patents, instead of fighting a lawsuit for several years, it was of course just a lonely fight. At most, it was just a ban on the import of "pirated goods" by the signatory countries through the Tariffs and Trade Organization. In fact, even this did not prevent the Sudong Group from exporting rebar.

Although I don’t know the story behind these rebars, since there is no rebar now, let’s just plagiarize them. Even the tried and tested ones definitely have their merits.

Don't underestimate a simple "combination", but this is definitely an invention that will generate billions of dollars!

It may not sell for that much, but it could save the world tens of billions of dollars in the next few decades.

"This... seems okay!"

As a metallurgical expert, Qiu Yuchi just thought about it for a moment and knew that it was indeed feasible, and it was also very simple to modify the equipment. He just asked the tool shop to reprocess a few sets of rolls. After determining the specifications of rebar with reference to the specifications of bamboo steel, it only took one day to replace the new rolls for rolling rebar. At ten o'clock that night, after the first batch of rebar was produced, When sending it to the laboratory for testing, Li Yian did not forget to register the patent. The patent still needs to be registered, not only the rebar but also the air-jet textile machine.

We must learn to use the laws of Western countries to protect ourselves, and not be like many companies in the early days of reform, which had no patent awareness and were defrauded of a large number of technology patents by European and American patent thieves. They even countersued in European and American courts and demanded compensation from domestic companies.

The patent laws of countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States still have certain effects. For Li Yi'an, who has his own team of lawyers in the United States and the United Kingdom, he really doesn't worry about someone infringing on his patent. As long as he has a strong team of legal lawyers, if there is an infringement... it will be all money!

(End of this chapter)