Wu Hanlong secretly muttered, what's so good about this furnace room? The dignitaries want to see this thing, it's so novel!
Now let the person in charge step aside and he will lead the way himself.
The Wu family's furnace room, like most of the furnace rooms here, does not make iron itself, but uses purchased iron materials for production and processing. Therefore, there are only a dozen or so 1-meter-high iron furnaces in the open space.
It looks like a large rough water tank. Although Xi Yazhou doesn't understand metallurgy, he can see that the structure of this furnace is very simple. It is not a reverberatory furnace widely used in Lingao Metallurgy. Except for the push-pull bellows, there is nothing else that can be seen.
special structure.
Looking carefully at the stove, it was made of mud. Mud can also be used as refractory material? Xi Yazhou was slightly confused and asked Wu Hanlong.
Wu Hanlong quickly replied: "This is the best pure yellow mud. It is first mixed with salt and hammered in a pit for more than half a year before it can be made into a stove. After it is hammered, there should be no cracks, otherwise the stove will crack when it is turned on."
Xi Yazhou vaguely remembered that when Ma Niao's steel plant built the blast furnace, the refractory bricks did contain some kind of salt sent from the salt field. It seems that the ability of certain chlorides to withstand high temperatures has been known in ancient times.
The outside of the stove is tightly wrapped with thick rattan, and the surroundings are supported by thick hardwoods such as ironwood and rosewood. It can be seen that although the stove is not big, once it starts to melt iron, the amount of iron fuel loaded into it is quite astonishing.
of.
These iron-forming furnaces are arranged in a semicircle, with brick flow channels under the outlet. But at the center of the semicircle is a large pit, two to three meters deep, and empty inside.
Wu Hanlong said that this pit is used to cast large castings, such as bells, tripods, cannons, etc. The mold is placed in this pit and filled with soil on all sides. Because large castings use a lot of materials, a single furnace cannot produce enough material, so it must be
Molten iron or copper can only be cast by releasing molten iron or copper from multiple furnaces. After the casting is completed and cooled, it is dug out manually and the castings are lifted out.
This process is very familiar to Xi Asia. When the Fubo Army first started casting artillery, the process was actually almost the same as this. To be advanced, it is nothing more than Lingao's large-capacity and high-efficiency reverberatory furnace, which can cast artillery in batches at one time. The other thing is
Iron mold technology.
From this point of view, there is no technical difficulty in organizing the local production of barrels for various smoothbore artillery used by the army in Foshan. Of course, it would be better to make technological innovations, but there is no problem in directly using local equipment and workers. The only major equipment missing is
A boring machine for boring the barrel of a gun.
The reason why Xi Yazhou needs to consider the issue of artillery casting is because the smoothbore guns used by artillery are almost all made of pig iron. The life of the barrel is far less than that of the bronze barrel. It needs to be replaced every 200 to 300 shots. If it can be done on the spot in Foshan
By organizing production, the artillery can repair and supply nearby. And with the expansion of the occupied area, the number of fortified cities increases, and more artillery is needed. In many cases, as long as the sound of a cannon is enough to destroy a weak will to fight.
The rebels and bandits.
He looked around, and his eyes lit up. It turned out that there were several red cannons laid out under a reed mat shed not far away.
The Red Barbarian cannon is actually the European half-snake gun or big snake gun. The casting technology is not much different from that of the Napoleon cannon. Since this furnace can cast the Red Barbarian cannon, there is no problem in casting the barrel of the Napoleon cannon.
When Wu Hanlong saw the change in the face of this "true Kun" when he saw the Hongyi Cannon, he couldn't help but feel secretly worried, and quickly explained: "This Ming Dynasty cannon was pressed down by the yamen to be cast by Xiaopu. Xiaopu originally didn't want to take it...
"
These cannons were assigned by Xiong Wencan to the "compradors" of the furnace households in Foshan. The furnace households were not willing to accept this kind of business. Although they were not working for free, according to the regulations, the government had to pay according to the labor price and materials.
But in fact, either the price is very low and the cost is lost, or the payment is delayed, dragging on for a year and a half, and finally nothing is done.
However, no one dared to say no to the governor's apportionment. After some bargaining in the Furnace Industry Association, it was finally decided that each furnace household would share the cost of labor and materials according to size, and the largest furnace households would be responsible for the casting. If the government
If you can pay some money, it will be returned according to the proportion shared by each family.
"This is nothing," Xi Yazhou said in a good mood, "You are all ordinary people, how can you still say no?"
"Yes, yes, the chief is right!" Wu Hanlong breathed a sigh of relief and said quickly, "Young men, I originally sent all these cannons to serve the Senate."
Xi Yazhou said: "Your attitude is good. But I am marching and fighting now, so I can't accept it anymore." He turned to Lin Ming and said, "You take charge of this matter. When the people from the Planning Institute arrive, bring them here."
Receive these artillery pieces."
Lin Ming quickly responded: "Yes."
Xi Yazhou saw that under the thatched roof of the furnace room, there were piles of iron pots. There were thousands of large and small ones. After asking, he found out that these iron pots were all ready for export. The iron pots were the largest and the largest in Foshan in this time and space.
The most famous product is not only sold domestically throughout the seven southern provinces, but also exported throughout East and Southeast Asia. In particular, foreign ships sailing to the Western Ocean almost always carry iron pots. Even European traders will purchase large quantities of iron pots through Portuguese merchants in Macau.
Used in Southeast Asian trade.
There are many types of pots, the big ones include Tangwei, deep seven, deep six, Niu one, Niu two; the small ones have Niu three, Niu four, Niu five. There are also three mouths, five mouths and the earless pot Niu Kui, which is from the Qing Dynasty.
There are various sizes and forms. In addition to being used for cooking, they are also used to boil sugar and cocoons.
In addition to the iron pots, there were many other large round iron plates. Xi Yazhou could not see any use for them, but after asking, he found out that they were used by seaside kitchen households for frying salt.
Now that the traffic was interrupted, these pots and pans were so well cast that they could not be transported out, and they were already rusty in the hay shed. Wu Hanlong sighed again.
In the yard, there were piles of pig iron ingots, charcoal and furnace ash, but no coal. After asking, I found out that coal was not used in the local smelting industry.
"It's not that there's no coal. In fact, it's cheaper to buy and use than charcoal. But smelting with coal is dirty, and the iron properties are not good." Wu Hanlong said that in any furnace that uses coal, the iron will become brittle and the quality will decrease.
Over and over again, everyone would rather use expensive charcoal than use coal.
"...Everyone says that Guangzhou Railway is good, and most of them say that iron sand is good. In fact, from a small perspective, Guangzhou Railway is good because it uses charcoal for smelting instead of coal."
Xi Yazhou was a little surprised: Coal contains sulfur. If it is used in smelting without coking and desulfurization, it will indeed make the iron brittle. However, this was only known in modern times after chemical analysis and metallography. Many ancient people could not understand it, even ancient scientists like Song Yingxing.
, they only know that Guangzhou Railway is good, but they have not analyzed why it is good. Some people even attribute it to the theory of Yin and Yang and the Five Elements. But this person knows "why Guangzhou Railway is good" based on experience.
It seems that ancient China did not lack technical talents. What it lacked was people who could record, summarize and disseminate these technological discoveries. In this context, Song Yingxing, who wrote "Tiangong Kaiwu", can be regarded as a great
"Strange man" - thinking of Song Yingxing, he couldn't help but think of something, and whispered a few words to the messenger, who immediately ran out.
"All you have here are castings!" Xi Yazhou said, "Why don't you make other things?"
Wu Hanlong hurriedly said: "Skills have specializations. The young ancestors have been handed down to specialize in making bells, tripods, incense burners, cannons, iron pots... these clumsy things. If they are various farm tools, mulberry shears, kitchen knives, there are also shops making them.
.Although we all belong to the same group in the furnace room, the objects we build are different.”
He introduced that the so-called Furnace House Guild in Foshan actually includes many industries, including iron pot shops, casting shops, steel frying shops, iron wire shops, iron lock shops, farm tools and miscellaneous equipment shops, iron nail shops, etc. As long as it involves smelting
Those who process iron and metal are all considered to be in this industry. There were originally three to five hundred companies in the industry.
"...In recent years, it has been in trouble, and many peers have collapsed -" At this point, he swallowed the following words hard, because the reason for the collapse was the influx of "Kuntie", wouldn't it be wrong to say it?
Are you going to offend this "true Kun"?
Xi Yazhou suddenly didn't realize it and asked: "Why did it fall?"
Wu Hanlong complained secretly, but had to answer, hesitatingly saying: "...It's always the case that their craftsmanship is not good and they can't compare with imported goods...the price is also high..."
"Because of Australian iron?"
Wu Hanlong kept laughing and dared not speak.
"If they are not good at craftsmanship, our Senate can teach them." Xi Yazhou said, "Your production technology and equipment are so backward!"
Wu Hanlong hurriedly said: "Yes, yes, yes. Young people are short-sighted and only know that the skills of hundreds of craftsmen in the Song Dynasty are all superb."
"I will send a few people to guide your production in the future!"
Wu Hanlong was stunned and thought to himself, what kind of idea is this? If he sets his sights on their property, for him as a "veteran", it is really just a matter of words. What kind of "guidance" is needed?
But he didn't dare to respond, so he had to say "yes" several more times.
Seeing that pig iron ingots were piled up like mountains here, some were round cake-shaped and some were square-shaped, Xi Yazhou asked about the origin of these iron ingots.
"It is produced in all parts of the province, with Luoding and Dong'an producing the most." Wu Hanlong said that the best pig iron is Luoding's Datangji Furnace Iron, which is so-called "Kail Iron" with a "smooth" color and flexible iron properties.
, that is, it is used for drawing iron wire, and it is also good for casting pots.
"Does this pig iron need to be taxed?"
"Why not?" Wu Hanlong said, "Just outside Guangzhou City is the Guan Iron Works. Anyone who wants to mine or smelt iron must go to him to get a ticket before entering the mountains to mine."
The iron merchants first went to the iron factory outside Guangzhou to collect the tickets. With the ticket from the Chief Secretary of Guangdong, they went to the mountains to mine and smelt iron. After the pig iron was smelted, it was transported to the factory for inspection and tax filing.
The tax rate is not high. During the Hongwu period, the tax rate was "two out of thirty". Now the tax rate is 2 taels of silver for every 10,000 kilograms of pig iron delivered to the factory. After paying the tax, you will be given a ticket, and the goods can be sold with the ticket. When buying, the local
The yamen also had to check and declare taxes according to the ticket plate: for every ten thousand kilograms of pig iron, the tax was eight yen, and for every ten thousand kilograms of wrought iron, the tax was one liang and two yen.