Due to the natural conditions of Mawei, the future development of the shipyard is greatly restricted. In the long run, Lin Shuo has targeted the construction of shipyards at the seaside. The coastline of Fujian is complex and winding, surrounded by excellent harbors. It can be said that the coast of Fujian
It is the coast with the most natural harbors in the world.
Luoyuan Bay, less than 50 kilometers north of the mouth of the Minjiang River, and Sanduao further north are both natural deep-water harbors.
The closed water area of Sanduao is more than 700 square kilometers, but the forces of various countries are entangled there, and they all want to swallow this piece of fat. The Italians first proposed to the Qing government to rent Sanduao by force, and threatened to use force. Fortunately,
After comparing the naval strength of the two countries, Ye Zugui, the commander of the navy at the time, wrote to the imperial court that the Qing Dynasty Navy could fight with the Italian Navy, but the Italians failed. This was the only time the Qing Navy did anything to save face for the Qing Dynasty.
Later, after the Germans forcibly leased Jiaozhou Bay, they asked the Qing government to lease Sanduao to Germany. Since the Japanese regarded Fujian as their sphere of influence, the Americans also wanted to lease Sanduao as a naval base.
The Qing government had no choice but to declare Sanduao "open to the outside world" in 1898.
Lin Shuo turned his attention to Luoyuan Bay.
Luoyuan Bay is located in the north of the Minjiang River estuary, about 70 kilometers away from Fuzhou. The entrance is narrow and the water is deep. There are mostly hills and beaches on both sides of the bank. It is a natural closed sheltered bay. Its sea area is 220 square kilometers, and the inner sea of the bay
With wide water and deep water, it is one of the rare deep water harbors in China.
Lin Shuo's report on converting the Mawei Shipyard to a commercial operation also included the plan to open a new port and build a new shipyard in Luoyuan Bay. After receiving Lin Shuo's money, Prince Qing, who controlled the government, approved four
The words: "According to the approval".
The "Luoyuan Port and Shipyard Construction Plan" is a huge industrial and commercial plan with a total investment of more than 40 million taels of silver, which is equivalent to one-third of the Qing Dynasty's annual income.
Countries took action after hearing the news, but Lin Shuo finally gave all the contracts to the Germans. Germany's largest supplier of machinery and weapons in China, Lihe & Co., joined forces with Deutsche Bank to provide Luoyuan Port and the shipyard with the equivalent of 120 million marks.
An unsecured commercial loan of 30 million taels of silver. This contract has been re-guaranteed by the German government.
The Germans offered preferential conditions of 5% annual interest and repayment of principal and interest starting from 5 years after the loan, just to obtain the entire port and shipyard construction project and the supply of all machinery and equipment. The contract stipulated that this loan would only be used to pay the German company
project payment and purchase of machinery and equipment from Germany.
Originally, Lin Shuo preferred German machinery, not only because of the precision workmanship, but also because the Germans use the international standard measurement system. Compared with the British standard used in mechanical processing in countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States, he is more accustomed to international standards. Otherwise
He would feel awkward when he saw 1 and 4/5 feet on the drawing all day long and had to think about how many centimeters it was. Lin Shuo had been forcing the use of international standard measurement units in his factory. The Shanghai in his hands
The measuring tool factory is also famous for producing international standard measuring tools, meters, decimeters, centimeters, millimeters, silk meters, grams, kilograms, and metric tons. These things are gradually accepted by people and become habits.
The most important thing is that the loan and repayment amounts in the contract were settled in Reichsmarks. I started repaying in 1913. The European War would break out in 1914, and repayments were temporarily suspended. After the war, the German mark depreciated significantly, and it was impossible for me to actually pay.
One of the three persons who is less than the total amount of the loan.
At first, Lin Shuo was afraid that the Qing government would intervene in his "traitorous" behavior, but in the end there was no turmoil at all. After thinking about it, he was relieved. In the original history, Sheng Xuanhuai sold the entire Daye Iron Mine to Japan with a mortgage.
People, nothing is wrong?
You need to be bolder and move faster.
Lin Shuo was delighted. The factories and mining assets he owned totaled no less than hundreds of millions of silver dollars. If he mortgaged these assets, wouldn't he be able to obtain much-needed funds for development? In this era, imperialist countries have accumulated a large amount of surplus capital.
Eager to export overseas, they sometimes even resorted to force to provide railway loans to the Qing government, unlike later generations who had to give kickbacks to middlemen when introducing foreign capital.
In Dangtu County, Caishiji stands in the middle of the river, with soaring cliffs straddling the Yangtze River. The water flow here is rapid and the terrain is dangerous. Not far away, the famous Taibai Tower stands along the river, with green snails on its back and surrounded by ancient trees.
Yueyang Tower and Yellow Crane Tower are collectively known as the "Three Towers of the Yangtze River".
At this time, a group of people were marching hard along the rugged mountain road in Xiangshan, which was more than ten miles away from the river bank.
This group of people is an exploration team sent by Lin Shuo. The purpose of this trip is to conduct a relatively comprehensive survey and census of the mineral resources in southern Anhui. Since this is the first time such a large-scale mineral census has been conducted in China, Lin Shuo
Although the several mining engineers hired by Shuo worked very hard, they were still full of enthusiasm.
Although Duan Fang, the governor of Liangjiang, was a Manchu, he was a very enlightened reformist bureaucrat. Moreover, Duan Fang was a new family member of Yuan Shikai. Naturally, Duan Fang would strongly support Lin Shuo's mining activities in southern Anhui.
This geological exploration team is led by two middle-aged men in their forties, wearing brown dresses and British top hats. The one with a fake braid on the back of his head has just returned from the UK.
Zeng Pu, a geological expert. The other one was dressed in a lavender gown, a black mandarin jacket, and a small melon cap on his head. He looked like a standard country rich man, named Liang Puzhao. He was invited back by Lin Shuo from the Kaiping Coal Mine in Beiyang.
expert.
Like Luo Guorui, the General Office of the Fujian Railway, and others, they were among the "young children studying in the United States" sent by Li Hongzhang back then, but now they have been recruited by Lin Shuo.
Behind the two old gentlemen were three young men in work clothes. These three were mining students Gu Lang, Shen Zongwen and Xu Jianzhu who had just returned from studying in Japan. All three of them carried some simple survey tools.
The remaining thirty or so people are all civilians employed by the ironworks. In addition, there are about a dozen security guards drawn from the mine protection team, plus a dozen mules and donkeys used to carry loads. This is the entire property of this exploration team.
.
The prospecting methods of this era were extremely rudimentary. There was basically no specialized equipment. They were nothing more than some compasses, and some were optical instruments such as contour mirrors and levels for drawing. The method of prospecting was to let civilians use shovels, probes, etc.
Someone takes out some samples from under the soil layer, and then relies on the naked eye to distinguish the mineral composition and content. At this time, each person's experience becomes the main factor.
The most commonly used tool here is the Luoyang shovel, the most commonly used tool by tomb robbers. This cylindrical iron tool tied to the head of a bamboo pole or wooden stick can sometimes take out soil samples nearly 20 meters underground.
Of course, if something is discovered, civilians will have to use tools such as shovels, iron picks, and steel drills to dig out some deeper pits to further determine the reserves and mineral composition of the deposits.
The Luoyang shovel hit a rock after being inserted more than one meter into the ground. "Mr. Zeng, come and take a look at this thing." Gu Lang squatted on the ground, looking at the samples that had just been taken out from under the soil layer, and said with some excitement.
After hearing this, Zeng Pu and Liang Puzhao also squatted down and carefully distinguished the soil samples they had just taken out.
"Dig down from here!" Zeng Pu said without even getting up.
Three days later, as migrant workers used bamboo baskets to pick out loads of iron ore from an exploration pit more than ten meters deep underground, these people became more and more excited. Now it can be concluded that there is basically a
Large iron ore deposits.
In the following more than a month, this group of people dug prospecting points in more than ten locations to determine the scale of the mineral deposits. As the scale of exploration expanded, a very large iron mine was slowly marked on the map.
In the following months, the exploration team used the same method to identify the Gushan Iron Mine and two large copper mines in Tongling and De'an, as well as associated lead, zinc and other metal resources.
"This mineral survey in southern Anhui and northwest Jiangxi found a total of three extra-large iron mines, two large copper mines, and 16 other small and medium-sized metal deposits. As far as the current situation is concerned, Taochong in Fanchang and Xiangshan in Dangtu
Both Hegushan and Gushan are very large iron mines, while the Dagongshan Copper Mine and De'an Copper Mine in Nanling are both of great mining value. However, the overall taste of these iron mines is not high, and the average iron content is estimated to be
Between 30% and 45%, there are very few rich iron ores." At the summary meeting, Zeng Pu first introduced the overall situation of this mineral census, and then mentioned the development of these minerals, "According to the current situation, Fanchang Tao
The iron mine is the first choice because there is a ready-made dock in Diggang and the traffic conditions there are the best among the three iron mines. The second is the Xiangshan Iron Mine, which is only a dozen miles away from the river, but a dock needs to be built.
and railways to transport the ore to Wuhu Iron Works. According to Mr. Lin's request, if an iron mine with an annual output of 500,000 tons is built, Taochong Iron Mine will require an investment of 1.6 million taels of silver, while Xiangshan Iron Mine will require an investment of 1.6 million taels of silver.
It requires about 2.3 million taels. Due to transportation problems, other iron ore mines will not be considered for the time being."
After saying that, Zeng Pu glanced at Lin Shuo who was sitting next to him. Lin Shuo said: "Funds are not a problem. The two iron mines can be started at the same time, but they must be completed and put into production within three years."
Due to transportation and open port reasons, the iron factory was located in Wuhu. Lin Shuo could only secretly regret that Ma'anshan, a famous steel city, would never appear in this world.