Chapter 60 Saltworks Commune
In the first three days after moving into the salt farm, members of the Crossing Organization cut down bamboo trees on the nearby hillside and built a row of temporary homes on the site of the original salt farm village. As for the brick house, I am afraid we will have to wait for a while, because it requires a large amount of power supply. The United Brick Making Machine cannot be officially put into operation until the hydropower station is completed, and the bricks produced must also be given priority to the camp and factory buildings near the No. 2 Base. , it will be at least several months before it is the turn of the Saltworks Commune. Fortunately, these members of the Mingren Society are used to hardship. Nowadays, they no longer have to worry about food and clothing, which makes them feel very satisfied. It doesn't matter if they live in a simple way for the time being. Anyway, Mr. Haihan has said that as long as they work hard, they will be able to make a living. Within two years, everyone will be guaranteed to live in brick houses, which is a good life that they could not even dream of in the past.
Considering that the living conditions here in the salt field will be more difficult, the Executive Committee arranged for the Ministry of Construction to build a set of prefabricated houses for several stationed soldiers here. It also has a supporting solar power supply system and introduces power from nearby mountains. Spring water allows solar water heaters to be used. There are only four members of the Chuanchuang team stationed here, one is responsible for technology, one is responsible for civil affairs management, and two people from the military and police department are responsible for public security and defense. If only calculated on a per capita basis, their living conditions have far exceeded that of the base camp. It's just that this place is a little far away from the base camp, and there are mountains and seas in between. The WIFI signal cannot be relied on, and even the PHS cannot be used. Normally, we can only rely on a military radio for communication.
The Ministry of Agriculture sent people over to guide the members to cultivate more than ten acres of land near the camp, plant some vegetables and fruits, and arrange for the members to plant some tea trees in the mountains in the future. All the food consumed by the Saltworks Commune will be transported from the headquarters. The reason for cultivating only this small amount of land is not to save trouble, but because the salt content in the soil here is too high, making it impossible to plant crops on a large scale.
Anxi is 26 years old. Before the crossing, he worked as a civil engineering technician in the Geological Drilling Brigade of the Sichuan Salt Administration Bureau. After participating in the crossing, he was naturally recruited into the Ministry of Construction. In the past, he only dealt with well salt and had almost nothing to do with the Haiyan Saltworks. However, after the establishment of the Saltworks Commune, he was temporarily designated by the Executive Committee as the technical guidance expert of the Commune Management Committee and was transferred from the hydropower station construction site to the Saltworks Commune. From now on, Will be fully responsible for the technical guidance and production planning arrangements of the salt field.
The executive committee originally decided to let the Ministry of Industry appoint someone to be responsible for technology, but it was also very careful. When things happened, it was discovered that no one at the Ministry of Industry had ever engaged in industrial salt production. Ning Qi looked through the personnel files and finally found out Anxi is a talent who has been hiding in the Ministry of Construction. There is no way to rush the ducks to the shelves. Who knows that Anxi, the only one among the more than 400 people in Chuanchuang, came from such a professional place as Sichuan Salt Industry School?
Anxi actually felt aggrieved. He was a civil engineering major, but his organizational connection was still in the Ministry of Construction. Why was Mao now changing his career to salt production? Not all people who graduated from salt industry schools knew the salt production technology! Speaking of which, Anxi had quite a plan before crossing over - with his civil engineering expertise, there will definitely be endless projects in the empire under the executive committee's rule in the future, and he will be able to complete one by then. A large multinational contractor, wealth, beauty, and prestige are all indispensable!
But now Anxi was transferred to the front line of salt production by a transfer order from the Executive Committee. Looking at the stone salt troughs scattered throughout the valley, he could only sigh heavily. Salt production is actually pretty easy to say. Although I didn’t major in salt production at school, I did take a few professional classes. Now I temporarily retrieved relevant information from a large database to make up for it. The basic principles and technological processes of seawater salt production are generally summarized. Still know. But Anxi had no idea what kind of production organization structure the commune system was. In the era before time travel, the commune had been transformed into a township before Anxi was born. In fact, his understanding of the commune was not much better than that of the members who had just moved here. Fortunately, most of these Mingren knew how powerful the Travelers were, and after careful screening, there were no thorns in the side, so it didn't take much trouble to command them. The only problem still lies in the language. Several time travel members can only communicate with these members by speaking half-familiar Hainanese Mandarin and gesticulating.
In addition, because the executive committee announced the work arrangements of Anxi and others at the forum, Anxi soon got the nickname "coach" - even though he is not fat at all. The young people who are familiar with Anxi now all smile and call him "Coach Anxi" when they see him. Some even shout "Coach, I also want to learn how to make salt", which makes these unclear members also He followed the coach and shouted. Anxi planned to teach these arrogant guys a lesson several times, but in the end he could only deal with it with a cooperative "hehehe" - after all, he also knew that his body of just over 1.700 kilograms was difficult to compete with those of the Military and Police Department. A guy with big arms and round waist plays real PK.
Because the modernization of the salt field has not yet begun, Anxi can only let the members work according to the ancient method of drying salt. Three days ago, they had begun to introduce tidal water into the salt pan through the tidal channel, allowing the seawater to fully soak the soil in the salt pan. In the past few days, the members of the commune used multi-tooth rakes to carefully rake the salt mud several times from different directions in the dried salt fields to make the salt mud softer so that it can absorb more seawater. Then seawater is introduced from the ditches surrounding the salt field over and over again, and this process is repeated many times to ensure that the sea salt components absorbed in the salt mud have reached a saturated state.
Now Anxi directs the members to collect the dried salt mud and pile it into a filter next to the salt field. The bottom of the filter is paved with thin bamboo sticks or straw mats to serve as a filter. The members stirred the salt mud in the filter and then stepped in to compact it, allowing the high-salt brine to pass through the filter and then flow from the outlet at the bottom into the brine storage tank next to it. This process lasted for three hours. It was not until Anxi confirmed that there was almost no water left in the salt mud in the filter that the exhausted members got his approval and stopped to rest.
At this time, the concentration of the brine in the brine storage tank must be tested once to determine whether the next step can be carried out. The Ministry of Chemical Industry does have a lot of acid-base test paper available, but considering the demand in the salt field, their reserve of test paper is obviously not enough. If brine samples are collected and sent to the base camp for testing, the timeliness is too low. Anxi had a simpler way to test this. He picked a leaf from the bushes by the pool. This kind of shrub is called yellow croaker. Anxi pinched off the leaves and threw the small leaf stem into the brine pond. Seeing that the leaf stems did not sink into the water, but floated on the water, Anxi nodded with satisfaction. If the leaf stem sinks directly, it means that the concentration of the brine is not high enough, and the brine must be dried again until the concentration reaches the standard.
"Fetch water!" Anxi waved his hand, and the members who had almost rested stood up one after another and began to pick up wooden buckets to fetch water from the pool.
The next step is to have the members use wooden buckets to pick out the brine from the pool and pour it into the shallow stone salt troughs scattered throughout the valley. The large area of these salt tanks is more than ten feet, and the small ones are about the size of a washbasin and less than half an inch deep. After the brine is placed in a salt tank and dried for a day or two, large white grains of sea salt will crystallize. If further refining is required, the sea salt must be melted into water again and the brine should be vacuum evaporated. However, this is not just a production task of the salt farm commune, but must be transferred to the production process of the Ministry of Chemical Industry - vacuum evaporation. Most of the concentrated solution produced during the process will be used as chemical products or semi-finished products, and only a small amount will be sold on the market as refined table salt.
This manual method of making salt by leaching brine has been going on for hundreds of years. Due to the technological level of this era, it is difficult to make major improvements in the process. This is obviously not the production level that the Executive Committee hopes for. After Anxi's theoretical knowledge and practical operations over the past few days, Anxi has a clear understanding of the efficiency shortcomings in the salt field production links such as tide collection, brine production, crystallization, and salt collection. However, it is necessary to improve the existing To improve the production efficiency, it is not enough to rely on the salt farm's own efforts. It must be achieved with the full cooperation of other departments.
The production link that is relatively easy to improve at present is probably crystallization. Those large and small salt tanks are too much of a hindrance to Anxi. In the future, large and uniform salt drying ponds and crystallization ponds should be the symbol of the salt field. But to build these ponds on a large scale, the Ministry of Industry must first provide enough cement. As far as Anxi knows, the cement kiln of the Ministry of Industry is still in the trial production stage, and no one can say clearly when it will be officially put into production.
What Anxi doesn't know is that the cement kiln of the Ministry of Industry has now encountered major technical problems. Several heads of the executive committee who understand industrial technology are gathered around the cement kiln for an emergency on-site meeting.
Previously, the mining department successfully found limestone and gypsum mines in the Tiandu Valley area based on the information prepared in advance, which made the executive committee think that it was only a matter of time before cement production was put into operation. But when the cement kiln was completed and started trial operation, the relevant responsible persons discovered that there were major loopholes that had been overlooked.
The calcium silicate in Portland cement, which is common in later generations, is made by calcining and melting calcium oxide and silica at high temperatures, while calcium oxide is made by calcining limestone. Limestone is available now, but the most important thing is calcining. Calcium oxide requires a large amount of anthracite or coke, which is a problem for the Executive Committee - let alone anthracite, even if it only requires ordinary bituminous coal, the Executive Committee doesn't have much available now. (End of chapter)