"Is this the third version of the steam engine?"

On October 17, the eighth year of the Apocalypse, Zhu Youjian's voice sounded in the Military Academy. The originally empty Military Academy was now filled with courtyards.

There were originally only three major courtyards, but now they have been carefully expanded into more than a dozen research institutes, occupying most of the military academy city.

Zhu Youjian was in the courtyard of the Industrial Department.

In an open square in the courtyard, a huge and clumsy machine attracted everyone's attention.

This machine is one foot high, one foot five feet long, and five feet wide.

It stood quietly in the square, surrounded by hundreds of doctors from the Military Academy and Zhu Youjian, Lu Wenzhao and other five people who came to watch the excitement.

"Your Highness, this is the third version of the steam engine improved by Dr. Wang Zheng!"

When Song Yingxing's voice sounded, Zhu Youjian looked in the direction he pointed and saw a man in his sixties bowing to him.

This man was Wang Zheng, who improved and manufactured the third version of the steam engine, and Zhu Youjian also thought of him on the way.

Speaking of him, many people don't know much about him, but if you mention a book, many people will think of him.

"Illustrated Description of Strange Weapons", a book written by Wang Zheng, played an important role in the introduction of Western science and technology into the Ming Dynasty in the late Ming Dynasty. What Zhu Youjian remembered was that the book described a lot of scientific knowledge, including the geocentric theory, the center of gravity And its solution, finding the volume of water, volume of floating body, specific gravity, simple machines and their combined use.

As for the current Wang Hui, he had developed water power, wind power and load-bearing machinery during the Wanli period, and wrote "Illustrated Notes on Newly Made Various Equipment".

Because of this, Sun Yuanhua recommended him, and Zhu Youjian obtained the third version of the steam engine several years in advance.

"Reward! Get reward!"

Zhu Youjian took a deep breath, and then said to Lu Wenzhao and Wang Chengen:

"Shang Shu, please invite Wang Zheng, Bi Maokang, Song Yingxing, and Sun Yuanhua to be awarded the title of count!"

"Earl?!" Upon hearing this, everyone's eyes widened.

In their opinion, it is too exaggerated to confer Wang Zheng and others as earls even though the steam engine has not done anything useful.

"Your Highness, you can't..."

Hearing Zhu Youjian's words, even Bi Maokang and the other two were somewhat flattered and stopped Zhu Youjian.

In their view, Zhu Youjian gave them official positions, asked them to concentrate on research, and provided gold and silver. This was the greatest reward for them.

Nowadays, just for developing a steam engine, he is actually being awarded the title of earl. This is really shocking.

Not only them, but also Wang Chengen and Lu Wenzhao dissuaded them: "Your Highness, if you develop a steam engine and be rewarded with the title of earl, it would be a bit too much. It is probably difficult for civil and military officials to convince the public..."

"Your Highness, this reward is indeed too heavy." Wang Zheng couldn't help but speak. After all, he had also been an official.

"Please take back your life, Your Highness!" Song Yingxing and Sun Yuanhua bowed respectively, but Zhu Youjian couldn't bear it.

"You have made contributions to the imperial court, and you deserve this reward. What's more, you haven't read the topics I wrote?"

"Don't you know what the steam engine represents after it appears?"

"Of course we know, but even so, directly conferring a knighthood is too far-fetched. If we develop steam locomotives and overcome various problems, it would not be too late to confer a knighthood..." Bi Maokang persuaded. .

"Your Highness, please think twice..." Song Yingxing and others began to jointly advise.

"You guys...Oh!" Zhu Youjian looked at them and was speechless.

I have only heard of people being glad to receive a knighthood, but I have never heard of anyone refusing a knighthood.

However, their actions also taught Zhu Youjian a solid lesson, that is, no matter how advanced the technology is, if it does not show great value in the eyes of the world, the world will not praise the inventor.

"Four of them, Song Yingxing, Wang Zheng, Bi Maokang, and Sun Yuanhua, were promoted to senior political officers. The rest who participated in the steam engine project and those who participated in the mercury fulminate gunpowder project were all promoted to senior political officers."

"Thank you, King Qi, for your kindness..."

When Zhu Youjian sighed and announced the new promotion, Bi Maokang and others finally bowed and rewarded him.

The senior official is a civil official of the second rank, and the official rank of Fengzheng is a civil official of the fifth rank.

Although it is a casual rank, the salary is still paid normally. Taking the "Official Officials' Dinglu" which has not yet been decided and issued as an example, the annual salary of senior government officials is 2,000 taels of silver, and that of serving government officials is 500 taels of silver.

Although such an award is somewhat humble compared to their contribution, they already feel flattered.

Throughout the ages, I have never heard of anyone being rewarded with the rank of Second Grade or Third Grade just because they participated in the development of equipment.

They were happy, but Zhu Youjian felt a little worthless.

"We must change the concept of strange, obscene and skillful skills..."

Thinking about it, Zhu Youjian was ready to continue asking about the power of this steam engine. However, before he could speak, Bi Maokang brought another good news to Zhu Youjian.

"Your Highness, you may also need to commend the more than 80 PhDs in the military industry, iron metallurgy, and civilian engineering departments..."

"What? Is there any breakthrough?" Zhu Youjian subconsciously thought of the firing gun, but it turned out that he thought too much.

"Back to Your Highness, the thing is like this..." Bi Maokang explained:

"It started from the Iron Smelting Department. They conquered the crucible iron-making process that His Highness mentioned."

"They use crucibles to make the melting temperature high enough to meet the requirements of the carburizing process. At the same time, they can pour out the produced molten steel evenly and cool it to produce high-quality steel."

"After streamlined smelting according to a fixed proportion and time, a more stable steel will appear."

"As soon as this kind of steel appeared, doctors from various research institutes came to observe. The military industry department was the first to believe that using steel instead of pig iron to cast artillery might improve the performance of the artillery."

"So they used the clay molds in the military academy to build a crucible, poured molten steel into the clay molds, and after cooling, they obtained a new type of artillery."

"The Yanshan five-pound steel cannon of the same size weighs more than the iron cannon, but its range also exceeds the iron cannon's two miles, reaching two and a half miles."

"After that, the Military Industry Department began to reduce the size of the gun body, and finally reduced the weight of the five-pound cannon to 700 kilograms. After adding part of the mercury fulminate as a priming charge to the black powder, the range of the five-pound cannon also reached two. Half a mile."

"After that, they successively used ten-pound cannons and twenty-jin cannons for experiments. The range of the ten-jin cannon reached three miles, and the weight was reduced by 20%. The range of the twenty-jin cannon reached three and a half miles, and the weight was also reduced by 20%."

Bi Maokang is in charge of the military industry. He is naturally very happy that the military industry has achieved such results, so he reports on his work.

Although it only reduces the weight of each gun by a few hundred kilograms, you must know that the disappearance of these several hundred kilograms of weight will greatly reduce the transportation pressure of the Ming army.

What's more, cast steel cannons are more tolerant than cast iron cannons, so they can withstand new types of gunpowder, and their range is naturally improved.

Although this is only an improvement of one or two hundred steps, one or two hundred steps is enough to cause the enemy to pay more casualties.

"The equipment can be iterated. Maybe it would be a good deal to sell the old equipment to the vassals...but we still need to wait."

When he heard about the achievements of the Military Industry Department, Zhu Youjian subconsciously thought of this, and then shook his head.

On the current basis, Daming can directly add a certain amount of manganese to the crucible steel to obtain manganese steel with better strength and comprehensiveness.

Once manganese steel is available, it is much simpler to use it as a broach to draw the rifling of a crucible steel rifle.

Now that we have steam engines, we have manganese steel, or we can further search for tungsten ore and obtain tungsten steel. Even if the output of tungsten steel in the Ming Dynasty will be very low, if it is used for broaches and hydraulics, it can be used for both civilian and military purposes.

progress.

Thinking of this, Zhu Youjian did not arrange it directly, but asked Bi Ziyan:

"Has Minke made any breakthroughs?"

"Minke's power looms and textile looms have been developed. Relying on them, only a skilled weaver is needed to supervise and use them to weave three times the textile output of previous water-powered looms!"

Bi Maokang said excitedly, while Zhu Youjian was only happy for a moment, and his expression turned ugly.

Steam-powered textile machines and looms are naturally better and can free up more labor force.

But the problem is that Ming Dynasty is not yet ready to release a large number of labor forces.

If power looms were used rashly, it would certainly allow the Royal Horse Inspector to make more cotton cloth, but a new problem would also arise.

What should we do now with the nearly 200,000 textile workers in the South Field of the Royal Horse Guards?

The hydraulic looms currently used by textile workers can weave one piece of cloth a day, with an output of 70 million pieces every year.

Cao Huachun of Nanchang wrote a handwritten letter to Zhu Youjian, which specifically described the output and sales of Nanchang weaving fabrics, as well as market issues.

First of all, in terms of market demand, the textile factory mainly supplies Nanchang directly, and then Nanchang supplies Tianxiahuangdian. The people of the Ming Dynasty are conservatively estimated to be about 150 million people. One piece of weaving cloth is used to make a complete set.

Three sets of clothes can be made.

In other words, even if the people of the Ming Dynasty purchased three sets of clothes per person per year, they would only consume 150 million pieces of cloth.

In fact, 90% of the cloth in the South Field was sold domestically, and only 10% was shipped to the Old Port and sold to Ottoman, Persian, and European merchants.

Now that manpower is sufficient, what will happen if a power loom with a production capacity three times the efficiency of the previous loom appears?

Even if the Huangdian monopolized the entire Ming Dynasty's cloth business, it would still have to lay off one-third of the textile workers, and this would change the Ming Dynasty's small-scale peasant economy in which men farmed and women weaved.

Originally, the efficiency of water-powered looms was five times that of other common looms used by ordinary people in the Ming Dynasty. Once power looms were popularized, there might be millions of unemployed weavers.

Because there are enough pieces of cloth on the market, and a piece of cloth worth 300 yuan is already cheap enough. If the imperial shop lowers the price in order to retain the weavers, it will force everyone to follow suit.

The people have made a profit, but the millions of textile workers and major textile factories will also be consumed in the long-term protracted war and eventually withdraw.

At that time, Zhu Youjian had to figure out a way to give millions of textile workers a place to go, otherwise he would have to face the situation of textile workers smashing up textile factories during the British Industrial Revolution.

This is the drawback of large-scale dynasty, and it is also its advantage.

Just like why later generations don’t promote large farm economy and intelligent engineering.

It's not that I don't want to do it, it's that I can't do it.

Once it is promoted, a large number of low-educated workers will have no choice but to return to their hometowns and face their own bits of land.
To be continued...