Chapter 1286 Changhua Industrial Zone
The purpose of Yu Xiaobao and his party coming to Shilu Mine was to inspect the operation conditions here and understand the current production level. However, they did not arrange any publicity activities here. After all, the audience in this place is quite special, so there is no point in holding publicity activities. Not big. So after seeing the mine, the mission was completed, and it was time to take the afternoon train back to Changhua. Qiao Zhiya did not intend to let them stay overnight at the mine. The accommodation conditions in the mountains were relatively simple, so it would be better to go back to Changhua to rest.
So everyone returned to the train station outside the mountain and took the same bus they came from. But when they arrived at the station, the train was completing a U-turn through the curved track laid at the west end of the station. They waited on the platform for about a cup of tea before boarding the train.
Needless to say, there was no need to say more about the return trip. Everyone in the inspection team had completed another task, and they were all in a relaxed and happy mood. Only Liu Shang had been secretly thinking about the steam excavator that he had not been able to observe closely. Although he was far away, he had watched the excitement for so long and roughly understood its operation process, but he still lacked observation of details.
If this kind of excavator is really widely used by Haihan, the speed of mining mineral deposits will inevitably increase by leaps and bounds on the current basis, and what will follow will probably be a further increase in Haihan's steel production. What does more steel resources mean? That means Haihan can build more steam engines, arm more troops, and even build the legendary iron-clad giant ship. This is definitely not good news for Ming Dynasty, which is adjacent to Haihan and has complicated interests.
Liu Shang stayed in Haihan for more than a month and was exposed to so much information that was considered confidential to the outside world. Naturally, his vision was much higher than before coming to Haihan. He had realized that the influence of this thing was not only It will be limited to the mines here. If it is allowed to develop, perhaps the scale of steel smelting in Changhua will continue to increase in the near future, and the strength comparison between Haihan and Daming will continue to change in a direction that is unfavorable to Daming. .
The most ideal solution is probably to try to destroy the only steam excavator in the world to slow down Haihan's development in the mining field. However, the Haihan mine is located in an inland mountainous area and is heavily guarded by military and police. It is undoubtedly a foolish dream to break into this place and destroy it by personal force. Unless there is a way to pull an armed force to attack here, but doing so would be tantamount to officially starting a war with Haihan, which was not Liu Shang's original intention of sneaking into Haihan incognito.
The more Liu Shang thought about it, the more he felt that this hidden danger would have far-reaching consequences. He was not in the mood to chat with the people next to him. He just kept looking out the window, pretending to look at the scenery to hide his deep thought state. However, everyone was a little tired after walking around for a day, and no one noticed anything unusual about his state. The old scholar next to him who was responsible for serving as a clerk in the inspection team even simply lay down on his seat. He fell asleep on the small table in the middle.
There was no talking all the way, and everyone returned to Changhua County smoothly by car. It was already dinner time. Qiao Zhiya naturally wanted to show his loyalty as a landlord and set up several banquets to entertain everyone. Liu Shang was too lazy to think too much about things he couldn't change, so he simply put down his burdens and ate and drank with everyone.
According to the schedule, the inspection team's work arrangement for the next day is to visit the local smelting industry. Although Qiao Zhiya had said kind words before that there was nothing to see in Changhua, Changhua was originally the industrial center of Haihan, so there was no reason to skip here. Not only did Yu Xiaobao and others have to understand the local production conditions, but they also had to convene local grassroots officials in Changhua to conduct propaganda activities as planned. However, the propaganda content Liu Shang is responsible for is about business, and there is no audience in Changhua, so he no longer has a preaching task at this station, so he can rest assured.
The next day, everyone gathered in the guest house early. Although Liu Shang has no mission, he will never miss this opportunity to get a glimpse of Haihan's industrial strength. Although he didn't know what the concept of industry was, he always heard Yu Xiaobao and others talking about this word these days, and Qiao Zhiya also called the local area "Changhua Industrial Zone", so he naturally wanted to change it. Comprehensively understand what is the "industry" that Haihan's population center is thinking about.
The first thing Qiao Zhiya took them to visit was the largest iron-making blast furnace in the area. However, Liu Shang felt a little frustrated that due to safety reasons, everyone could only stand about ten feet away from the blast furnace to watch the operation. This distance Apart from seeing workers filling the furnace with ore and coke under the command of the furnace head, there are no more details that would allow him to understand the structural principles and smelting process of the Haihan blast furnace.
Qiao Zhiya had been introducing the operation of the blast furnace to Yu Xiaobao and others, but what he said was like a heavenly book to Liu Shang, and he could not understand the content at all. For a moment, Liu Shang even doubted whether all the books he had read in the past were in vain. Why, even though he was familiar with the Four Books and Five Classics and had no language barrier, could he still not understand the explanation of this Haihan man? Could it be that he had too little education and was completely Can’t keep up with the Shanghai Han people?
This indeed breaks Liu Shang's own understanding. He considers himself to be fairly knowledgeable in astronomy and geography, and he has never seen charcoal-making and iron-making. However, when it comes from Haihan's mouth, he can understand every word. But I have no idea what it means to be together.
After listening carefully for a long time, Liu Shang finally roughly understood that the numbers Qiao Zhiya repeatedly emphasized should be a unit of measurement for temperature, and the internal structure and operation methods of this blast furnace seemed to be based on the measurement of temperature. Based on precise control. But how the Haihan people did this, Liu Shang couldn't figure it out.
Regarding the concept of temperature, Liu Shang only knows the range of temperature differences expressed by words such as cold, cold, cool, warm, hot, and hot. This description is extremely subjective and does not have a definite standard. Most of the time Body temperature is used as a standard to measure the temperature of the surrounding environment. Even skilled blacksmiths engaged in the smelting industry can only judge the approximate temperature by observing the color of the flame based on experience. There is no accurate unit of measurement such as pounds or dimensions. It seems that this is another unique invention of the Haihan people. If the Haihan people can really control the temperature accurately, then they must have surpassed the Ming Dynasty in terms of smelting technology.
In fact, the first gas thermometer in the West was made by the Italian scientist Galileo at the end of the 16th century. It was not until 1641 that the first thermometer using alcohol as a working substance appeared. In the following decades, Scientists continue to refine this thermometer and try to mark the scale to measure temperature changes. By 1742, the mercury thermometer made by the astronomer Celsius used the temperature difference between the boiling point of water and the melting point of ice as a reference standard to define the measurement unit of temperature. It was not until 1750 that a formal unit of measurement was established. Celsius temperature scale. It is only 1635. At this time, the only people in the world who can establish an accurate measurement unit for temperature are the Haihan people who have traveled back from the future. Naturally, Liu Shang didn't understand the twists and turns in between. He only knew that the Haihan people's invention was enough to throw Ming Dynasty back some distance. He could clearly hear the data Qiao Zhiya said, but even remembering these numbers would have no effect because he didn't know how the temperature was measured. Naturally, he couldn't apply and copy this iron-making method to Go somewhere else.
Liu Shang was unwilling to accept this, but at this moment he heard Qiao Zhiya calling everyone to retreat again. It turned out that the furnace was about to be opened to release molten iron. The golden molten iron is poured into a huge crucible. The filled crucible is controlled by workers using iron chains and winches, slowly moving it to a row of arranged molds, and then tilting the crucible to allow molten iron to be poured into it. Liu Shang knew that this was casting pig iron ingots. This was nothing new. However, the capacity of Haihan's blast furnace was terrifying. It took several times to load the large crucible. The iron ingots poured out of the furnace at one time were terrifying. It weighs several thousand kilograms.
After the casting operation was completed, the furnace head directed the workers to start filling the blast furnace again, mainly coke, iron ore and limestone used as a flux. The furnace has been running day and night since it was built and ignited, and will only be shut down when maintenance on the furnace body is required.
Although they were far away from the furnace, the temperature in the smelting plant made everyone's clothes soaked. It has already entered summer, and the temperature is already relatively high. You can imagine the feeling of having such a big stove here. Probably only Liu Shang wanted to stay here to watch for a while. The others were eager to go out and get some fresh air.
Qiao Zhiya thought that everyone might not be adaptable to the hot environment here, so she had already specially prepared herbal tea to relieve the heat, so that everyone could drink it by themselves whenever they felt thirsty. After finally seeing the production conditions here, everyone had to wait respectfully for Qiao Zhiya and Yu Zhang to leave first, and then followed them to the next stop.
Walking out of the factory, Liu Shang noticed the piles of pig iron ingots next to him. Qiao Zhiya introduced to everyone that part of the pig iron would be transported to make various cast iron parts, while the other part would be transported to the steelmaking workshop for further processing. .
Liu Shang's understanding of steel smelting was extremely limited, and it was even more difficult to understand Haihan's various professional operations in this steel-making workshop. As for Qiao Zhiya's explanation, it seemed that it only made him feel more dizzy. He couldn't understand what kind of smelting method it was about decarburization, dephosphorization, deoxidation, and desulfurization, so he could only act as a spectator and stand aside. It’s fun to watch.
Compared with what he visited in Shilu yesterday, Liu Shang only felt that what he saw today was not very interesting. Of course, there is actually no shortage of applications of steam engines here. For example, small trains driven by steam locomotives are used to transport various materials and iron lumps between factories. However, in front of large and small smelting furnaces, manual work is still mainly relied on. Perform operations. However, this relatively superficial application of steam engines is no longer enough for Liu Shang. He would rather see new and unheard-of things like crushers and excavators with more ingenuity.
But that afternoon he saw such new equipment, a rolling mill for rolling steel, a steam hammer for forging steel, and machine tools that can cut metal parts. Liu Shang was finally completely dumbfounded by these various types of steam machinery with different functions. Being able to knead hard steel and cut it like dough is something that only the Haihan people can do. This method of making steel items, like the machinery here, is a new thing that he has never even thought of before. .
When Qiao Zhiya took everyone to see the rail processing process, Liu Shang's mind could no longer keep up with the influx of information. He saw the red-hot steel billet passing through the rollers repeatedly, but what he was thinking about was that he had foolishly thought that Haihan relied on countless blacksmiths to slowly build the track for the train. How could he have imagined that he could have such a clever idea? With this method, we can create this long and straight track hundreds of times faster than manually. From this point of view, the railway that took the Haihan people several years to build might have taken the Ming Dynasty several times as long to complete. As for the additional expenses incurred, I don’t know how to calculate it.
After visiting the steel rolling production process, Liu Shang finally found a new focus, because next, Qiao Zhiya took everyone to see gun steel - steel specially used to make artillery.
It is a well-known fact that Haihan's weapons are sharp. Liu Shang certainly wants to see how the Haihan people create such invincible artillery on the battlefield. But when he got there, he was greatly disappointed, because Qiao Zhiya only showed them the inventory of gun steel—a large pile of cylindrical steel materials of varying thicknesses. After Qiao Zhiya explained the situation, Liu Shang realized that the Haihan people's artillery was not produced here, but came from Tiandu Industrial Zone in Sanya, which was just the origin of raw materials.
In fact, due to cost reasons, artillery that is actually made of steel is rarely equipped in the Haihan Army. The Executive Committee also believes that there is not much need to spend a lot of resources to update the current weapon level when it is ahead of the times. A generation of weapons. In this era when cast-iron cannons have not yet become popular, Haihan's existing heavy weapons are enough to gain a clear advantage on the battlefield, and this advantage will continue to be maintained for a foreseeable period of time.
These gun steels are mostly used for military scientific research. On the one hand, they are used to improve steelmaking technology. On the other hand, the military industry department will continue to trial-produce new weapons to ensure that Haihan's weapon research and development and manufacturing levels continue to be ahead of the times. Liu Shang wanted to get a glimpse of the secrets of Haihan military industry from the gun steel, but his plan was completely in vain.
(End of chapter)