In an instant, Song Yi realized that he was talking nonsense, don't look at Wu Yuan's identity is not secret, but what is the purpose of he, a good student, who comes here every day to tutor, is very interesting, listening to his grandfather, at that time, it was Wu Yuan himself who came to ask to change the credits, and he participated in the make-up class in a good name, such an abnormal behavior is associated with some rumors in the officialdom, if you don't find that there is a problem here, it can be judged as a lack of heart. However, Song Yi didn't show his face, he was talking about an ordinary student. But Jiang Tian doesn't think he's ordinary, in this era, "fake prince" is not a nickname that can be used casually to joke, so since even the serious Song Yi will acquiesce to this title, it only proves two situations, either this person is indeed the illegitimate son of the current emperor, or he has been extraordinarily favored by the heavenly family, so that his status is second only to the genuine prince. In either case, it can explain the reason why these gentlemen walk around him like a plague god, many times people who are too high in status are easily alienated, and everyone is respectful to you but will not treat you as equals. So that's why he's going to bring his cousin to class, who came to visit his family? Just because such a young child doesn't have too many thoughts, can he still meet him as a brother?

He couldn't figure out this question for a while, Jiang Tian, who thought he could take a break for lunch, was immediately blocked by Liu Baokai who drove him back, this kid rushed back to the Academy of Sciences to report the situation, and the old man Song instructed him to quickly prepare the carriage and send him to the workshop at any time, the old man's idea at this moment is very simple, that is, to race against time to be able to offer the telescope as a gift on the queen's birthday, this is not that he wants to pat the emperor's ass, but for the purpose of consolidating the status of the Academy of Sciences in the central system. Don't look at the emperor now quite important to him and allocate a lot of money from the not rich treasury for his own use, in fact, the traditional six departments have long looked at him unpleasantly, the Academy of Sciences is now a gold-swallowing monster, only to see a large amount of investment and not much direct output, even if a lot of new things have been invented before, but that is mainly to supply the army's arms and equipment, no one will complain about this during the Northern Expedition, no matter how stupid the nerd knows that if you want to do a good job, you must first sharpen your tools, but now you have initially achieved peace, In order to cope with disasters and restore production, you need money everywhere, can you be more important than the people in the world? Therefore, in order to maintain the existing budget, Old Man Song must develop something new that can be transformed into civilian commodities, so as to block those traditional officials who are ready to stumble at any time.

"I've got all the blueprints, what are you looking for me for?" Jiang Tian couldn't help but protest: "If you still can't make that kind of picture, it's your problem." ”

The pervert didn't expect him to be so uncooperative, and what people said was right, that kind of design can be understood even by a layman himself, and it would be a real shame if so many skilled craftsmen in the courtyard couldn't do it. But the order he got here was to let him participate in the development, although he said vaguely, it seemed that there was really no such person, so he understood the old man's intentions when he thought about it. On the surface, he was unwilling to buy a picture for five hundred taels of silver, but in fact, he couldn't make a picture with it.

"Brother, what are you talking about, your design is naturally best known to you, how can I fully understand, you should come with me." Without waiting for refusal, he pulled Jiang Tian into the carriage.

Although it is a carriage, and it is driving in good road conditions in the city, it still turns Jiang Tian upside down, it is really hard for the ancients to endure such a poor means of transportation, it seems that the Ming and Qing dynasties are completely popular sedan chairs are not without comfort considerations. To say that the carriage of this academy is already very good, don't look at it is still a two-wheeled carriage, but the axle has been deliberately lubricated with grease, and the necessary shock absorption treatment has been carried out under the seat. If you want to improve it further, you have to wait for the steel plate to be able to smelt a moderate elasticity. Without the development of materials, it is impossible to build suitable shock absorbers in these years. Just like this, under the bumps along the way, the carriage passed through the Dongzhi Gate out of the city, on the way at the strong request of Jiang Tian bought two catties of buns and brought them to the car, he just ate while looking at the scenery on the road, to the city gate The soldiers guarding the city did not even check, as soon as they saw the car, they were directly released, until a courtyard not far outside the city stopped the car. Jiang Tian got out of the car and moved his waist and legs, and almost fell apart all the way, and then looked at this courtyard, except for a lot of soot, it was no different from other courtyards in North China.

Song Yi didn't seem to care about the fatigue of the journey, took Jiang Tian's hand and walked inside, and when the gatekeeper saw him coming, he hurriedly came over to greet him: "The villain has been waiting for a long time, do you want to rest first or go to the workshop to have a look?" ”

"Okay, let's go to the workshop." Song Yi didn't even look at this person, he still couldn't wait to pull Jiang Tian away, and followed Liu Baokai behind: "This was originally a landlord's house, and there were not many people living in the whole village in the past few years due to the continuous military disasters, so the Holy Lord issued a decree to move the remaining people to other places, and this is the place of the Academy of Sciences." ”

Jiang Tian thought to himself that it was no wonder that he could find a place to be a studio not far from the city, even the city of Beijing in the late Ming Dynasty was no longer limited to the space in the city walls, and there were many villages around the main roads outside the city, these villages were either surrounding peasants or shacks built by people who came here to make a living, as long as there was a place to work, this kind of settlement would be formed spontaneously. Originally, according to the rules of the Ming Dynasty, these displaced people could never form a scale, but by the end of the Ming Dynasty, the state's management capacity had fallen to a dangerous point, and the growth of the population had broken the original production order, and the more economically developed the area, the more common this phenomenon became. But not only is the mountains and rivers beautiful not far from the city, but also the inhabitants are pitiful, except for some people who work in the fields, there are not many urchins and old people in the households, it seems that the Academy of Sciences has recruited some tenants to work here after getting this land, but these outsiders have not yet formed a climate.

As soon as he entered the courtyard, a wave of heat came to his face, a group of shirtless workers were busy, Jiang Tian took a closer look, this is not only the assembly workshop of various craftsmen, it seems that there are several small kilns working, I just don't know if they are making steel or burning glass, anyway, there must be a glass kiln here.

Seeing this kind of scene, Song Yi couldn't help but feel a little proud: "Brother Song, look, this is only one of the smaller workshops under the Academy of Sciences, and if it is compared with the General Institute in Hangzhou, it is really not worth mentioning." ”

"Hmm...... Sure enough, it lives up to its name. Jiang Tian thought politely, looking at this scale, there should be at least three courtyards, and the room of the kiln should be rebuilt, otherwise the original wooden structure will be burned down, this scale is definitely more than the studios of many scientists in the world, this is still small, so what should the general courtyard of Hangzhou look like? No wonder Old Man Song has a lot of money, and he can offer a reward of five hundred taels without hesitation. He continued to walk inside with Song Yi, just in time to see a furnace worker taking out a large crucible from the mouth of the kiln to check the fineness of the liquid glass inside. Jiang Tian didn't know how to fire glass, so he didn't care.

After passing a shadow wall, I saw a group of people knocking and beating in the courtyard, judging from the shape of the parts, it should be a trial production of telescopes, Dean Song's own grandson arrived, and it didn't interfere with the work of these people, Song Yi just casually picked up a wooden shell, compared it to the design and handed it to Jiang Tian.

"What does Brother Muhua think of the workmanship?"

Jiang Tian took it and looked at it, and then picked up another shell made by a carpenter and compared it: "The craftsmanship is no problem, but this tolerance is too big, right?" ”

"Tolerance" Song Yi didn't understand for a while, so he had to compare it too: "Are you saying that they are different sizes?" ”

"That's right! If it is only a trial production, there is no problem, but if the size of the shell is different, the lens must be ground separately, and the size must be uniform in mass production in the future. ”

The pervert, who had been idle, also came to his senses when he heard this: "Yes, my father said that the size difference between the musket made in the south and the one made in the north is much different, and sometimes the lead bullet in the south can't even fill the chamber in the north, so what's the difference in tolerance, right?" ”

Jiang Tian nodded, this is also a major feature of ancient Chinese products, I don't know why, the Qin Dynasty began to carry out standardized production, but the successive dynasties of later generations have regressed, even if there is a detailed number of jù marking, but the more complex weapon parts are not universal is also a common problem, which has brought considerable trouble to generalized production.

Song Yi nodded thoughtfully and then shook his head: "The world is so big, the craftsmanship of craftsmen is uneven, how can it be completely consistent." ”

Putting aside this question, Jiang Tian saw several workers polishing the lenses, they glued the shaped glass blank to a movable wooden board, and then an apprentice turned the wooden board to make the glass rotate rapidly, and then a splint glued with abrasive material was aimed at the surface of the glass for grinding, which looked like grinding glass on a turntable for making ceramics, but the plate was relatively small. There are special people responsible for each process from coarse grinding to fine grinding, but looking at the waste materials at their feet, it is obvious that most of them are unsuccessful.

Jiang Tian, who saw the doorway, asked knowingly: "It's well organized here, what do you need me to do?" ”

Song Yi smiled bitterly, and then walked to the scrap pile and randomly picked out a broken lens: "Brother Jiang, look, this kind of pure glass without bubbles is very difficult to make, and there may not be one furnace available in the ten furnaces, even so, as long as it is polished, it will be broken with a little force, and it is not as durable as Xiyi glass at all, these are all discarded in the past few months, and we have not been able to produce qualified lenses until now, and now you see that those that are being polished are all Xiyi glass in stock, if it is not successful this time, we will have to ask His Majesty Xià for guilt." ”

If the glass is not qualified, it's useless for you to look for me! Jiang Tian shouted in his heart. At most, he has seen similar glass kilns in popular science programs or history programs, but he doesn't know anything about real manufacturing technology, but he can't show his cowardice in front of people now, otherwise he won't be able to get five hundred taels of silver, and he may make his escape plan fall short. Since you can't start with glass, let's start with the lenses you already have.

"In that case...... From now on, you will have to do your bidding! He pretended to be calm and gave the order: "First of all, stop grinding lenses!" ”

"Why?" Not to mention Song Yi, even those craftsmen who were indifferent to the leader's inspection stopped their work and looked at him.

Jiang Tian picked up a design diagram nailed to the wall: "This can only be regarded as a sketch, you can only start manufacturing without even figuring out the basic process, this can only be a waste of time." The most important thing for a telescope is the lens, and without a qualified lens, you can't determine the next specifications, and the grinding error of your piece will obviously be greater, so I ask for a pause in grinding. ”

It took Jiang Tian a long time to make Song Yi understand the necessity of the shutdown, you don't even have basic spherical knowledge, and you don't have the minimum measuring tools, so start grinding the lenses! In this way, if it can be successfully developed, it will be called hell.

"I understand what you said, it's just ......" Song Yi was still a little hesitant: "If you do what you say, this construction period is ......"

"That's better than not being able to do it, right? If you have to ask me to help, you'll have to do what I say. ”

"Okay!" Song Yi gritted his teeth: "Then stop first!" ”

Jiang Tian didn't talk nonsense, and quickly began to lay out the new production process, he asked the glassmaker to pick some existing blanks of the same size and glue them together with fire paint to form a cylinder, and then let them cut the cylinder to ensure that all the blanks were circles of equal diameter. Others, whether carpenters or blacksmiths, could not be idle, and had to carry out equipment transformation according to Jiang Tian's instructions, first of all, to ensure that the power of the rotating pallet was stable, so Jiang Tian designed a crank that was shaken by manpower and transmitted by hardwood gears. Then the abrasive is graded, in the finest level to screen out the finer abrasive, the existing sieve obviously can not complete this task, he only needs to use dense cotton cloth instead of sieve, pick a large wooden box when screening, with the cloth to cover the coarse material in the box and beat hard, so that the finer material will be shaken out and fall into the box, but the worker must also do a good job of protection, otherwise it will not take long to get pneumoconiosis.

By the time he had finally arranged the work and explained the dimensions of each part in detail, the sun was already in the west. Seeing that it was about to get dark, Jiang Tian let out a sigh: "I really don't know how you all study things, you don't even have standard measuring tools, okay, I'll talk about what to do next after the machine is transformed." ”

Song Yi and the pervert listened to each other for an afternoon, different from Liu Baokai's drowsiness, Song Yi was very glad that Jiang Tian could come to this workshop at this time, he understood the benefits of these transformations just after listening to the beginning, don't look at the level of these craftsmen are quite good, but they can only do it by one person to complete all the processes, and the products of two people are not common at all. And Jiang Tian's method ensures that the things they produce are all carved out of a mold, and they are definitely not at the same level in terms of efficiency. Besides, the machines he painted are also better than the traditional methods, let's just say this grinding, originally the masters had to grind the arc little by little by hand, but now he first asked people to make a fixed angle clip, and then made an iron arc splint like watermelon skin, and the lenses ground out with this splint are absolutely at the same angle! Why can't you think of these solutions that work on your own?

On the way back to the city, the pervert couldn't help but ask Jiang Tian: "The equipment that my brother said can't be made in a few days, so it won't delay a lot in this progress, right?" ”

Jiang Tian smiled when he heard this: "If you have the tools in hand, you can build a telescope within a few days, and whether it can succeed depends on whether the equipment you supervise can be used, and then ......."

He didn't continue, but Song Yi had already understood that the other party was inviting credit for himself, and whether he could go along with it in the future depended on how sincere he was.