Whether it is hard work or not is a small matter, the key is that the things should be easy to sell.
There are many fishermen and shipping in Jiangdong, and there is also the North-South Grand Canal built by the former Sui Dynasty.
Even though maritime trade is not yet developed these days, shipbuilding has always been an urgent need.
Shipbuilding is a critical need, and wood is undoubtedly a critical need as well!
although……
Some time ago, Li Sheng discovered that there was a shortage of wood across the country, and high-end, top-quality wood had even become a limited-edition luxury product similar to that of later generations, with no price at all.
but……
Except for the century-old sacred wood used for masts, ordinary wood can still be found as long as it is of good variety, and there is no shortage.
It's just that the top-quality lumber was suddenly out of stock across the country, resulting in some price increases.
But overall, it is still not expensive and within a reasonable range.
Therefore, although Li Sheng planned to start some side business to generate income, he also knew that ordinary wood would definitely not be profitable.
After all, Jiangnan is adjacent to Lingnan, and Lingnan has a lot of good timber.
Li Sheng's goal is directly to produce top-notch high-end wood.
That's right...
First of all, the first sequence is the wood he used to build the ship this time.
Ironwood!
…
In the ancient wooden age,
Shipbuilding materials have always been an important strategic resource.
In order to prevent other countries from building powerful military equipment, such as stealth fighter jets, future technological powers will strictly restrict their exports of some special rare earths, one of which is metal gallium.
How exaggerated is the value of gallium metal?
The most difficult difficulty in building an aero engine is that it requires a lot of design and manufacturing experience, otherwise the process limitations will be too great. Late-developing industrial countries lack process experience and their processing capabilities are always limited, so no matter how powerful the designer is,
To design a powerful aircraft engine under such conditions, not only the head will be bald, but the hair all over the body will be bald.
On the other hand...it's the fan blades.
When it comes to the deficiencies in aircraft engine technology, it is actually mainly due to deficiencies in the technology for manufacturing fan blades.
The performance is not in place and the design is extremely difficult.
but!
If this industrial country has sufficient metal gallium resources, the situation will be different.
Without such a high level of craftsmanship, it is possible to design fan blades with extremely superior quality and ultimately provide powerful performance for the engine.
At that time, China's industrialization had already deepened, but in order to save the rarest metal gallium as much as possible, we still had to focus on low-gallium and low-performance materials.
Some small congresses, due to political reasons, pile up metal gallium and build one or two powerful aviation engines just to show their strength. In contrast, China Aviation Industry is indeed very hard-working and even ridiculed from time to time.
But it can also be seen that if there are large reserves of gallium metal, or overseas minerals...
What a huge improvement it will have to the aviation industry!
Now when it comes to shipbuilding, top quality wood is the same.
During the Age of Discovery, Switzerland even had a grand plan to allocate national funds to send 100,000 troops to the colonies in Africa to plant hundreds of thousands of oak trees.
The importance of materials is evident!
And now...
Li Sheng remembered exactly which wood to choose.
——Whether it is historical data from past lives, animal and plant data, or even the price trends in the timber market,
Ironwood!
They are undoubtedly the highest quality hardwoods.
This is different from various kinds of sandalwood and various kinds of pear, which are specially used for making furniture.
The reason why hardwood is called hardwood is because it has strict physical performance standards, and it is really meant to be used for shipbuilding.
Whether the built ship can save the lives of the captain and sailors really has strict requirements on the performance of the wood.
The concept of hardwood is definitely not created because of the impression of furniture collection, but has real objective needs!
And ironwood can stand out from all kinds of different hardwoods, and its performance is no joke.
Li Sheng's impression of the current distribution of ironwood is among the 100,000 Mountains in China, as well as in India and other places.
Li Sheng plans to keep India's ironwood resources as a backup.
But in front of me...
Naturally, we want to develop China’s ironwood resources!
If nothing else, just by looking at the name, you can tell how incredibly hard and strong this thing is.
The same top hardwoods include lychee wood, etc., but these are not as good as ironwood.
As for oak, which was once the mainstream wood in Europe, it is definitely not as good as ironwood. Its widespread use is mainly due to the composition of navigators.
The national atmosphere in Great Britain at that time was actually not much different from that in China's late dynasty.
On the one hand, there are zombie noble lords who eat land rent everywhere, on the other hand, there are landless peasants and bankrupt gentry running around everywhere.
Of course, these people cannot be very rich. Many of them even borrowed loan sharks to buy boats. So if they want to go abroad to seek the opportunity to get rich...
Naturally, it is impossible to buy a high-quality boutique ship, so of course, more economical oak ships are chosen. After all, oak, in addition to providing wood, acorns are also an important economic crop, and are regarded as an important economic crop in many places.
Crops are grown.
I have to say that China is really a good place, and it is really rich in products.
Even developed agricultural societies often exploit forestry resources in large quantities due to large-scale construction projects, war needs and other reasons.
But even so, hardwood stocks are still extremely high.
In addition to the wood that was recently quietly bought up by a mysterious rich man, Li Sheng could also name at least a dozen different wild hardwoods whose value has not yet been discovered.
These hardwoods, even except for ironwood, are also good materials for shipbuilding.
This is exactly what Li Sheng wants to do!
certainly……
At present, Li Sheng is not sure when the steel battleship will be available——
It is estimated that even if it comes out, it will be expensive for a long time.
The fubo men among the people want to run business to make money, so naturally they cannot buy expensive steel ships, even if they can be built. In this regard, China's starting point is not much better than that of Europe.
Therefore, for a long time, hardwood has remained and will continue to be the main material for sea trade ships.
certainly……
It's also for this reason.
Li Sheng did not dare to use up all the iron wood stocks on a large scale at once.
After all, since this thing is the best hardwood, of course a considerable part should be reserved for future military use.
Besides, apart from ironwood, it’s not like China doesn’t have good timber. It’s true that ironwood is not necessarily needed to open up the first road to maritime wealth.
Therefore, Li Sheng’s specific plan is to develop multiple hardwood resources in parallel.
Among them, ironwood is used as a signboard and store product to promote as much as possible.
Strictly control the production of ironwood and market it as a luxury product.