The Tang Dynasty court quickly seized most of the crotons in Chang'an City with the momentum of thunder, which made many businessmen who took the opportunity to hoard croton suffer a lot of losses, and at the same time, it also made everyone more determined that croton is the core ingredient of black powder, and without croton, black powder cannot be configured. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 ｉｎｆｏ

Of course, there are some guys who think they are smart, and they begin to speculate about the role of croton, and proudly tell others that because croton is strong, it can make black powder produce great power.

As soon as the listeners thought of the pain of diarrhea after eating croton, they immediately nodded in agreement, and praised the other party for their cleverness with great admiration, which made the self-righteous guy more narcissistic, and at the same time, further deepened the world's misunderstanding of the ingredients of black powder, which was conducive to the secrecy of black powder in the Tang Dynasty.

In the following days, Li An went to the black powder workshop every day to inspect the construction progress of the workshop, and emphasized some important places many times, so that the people in the Ministry of Industry must not make mistakes.

In addition, since the workshop is only five miles away from the courtyard, Ang Lee will also go to the courtyard for a walk and sit in the vegetable greenhouse for a while to feel the smell of fresh melons and fruits.

Seeing the melons and fruits grow day by day, Ang Lee's mood is very wonderful, just like watching his children grow up, and from time to time he will personally water and fertilize and take good care of these little guys.

The coexistence of busyness and leisure is Ang Lee's favorite way of life, and it is also the most reliable way of life, both ancient and modern, Chinese and foreign.

In the past few days, the focus of the work of the imperial court, only the construction of the black powder workshop and the implementation of the two tax laws, other things are slowing down, and when the construction of the black powder workshop is completed, the next step will be to consider spring ploughing, which is a major event related to the country, and at the same time, the re-counting of the number of acres will also be carried out at the same time as spring ploughing.

Of course, there have been some episodes in the past few days, which are not very important, but they have attracted a lot of attention, for example, some people, who have not been able to defecate all the year round, have saved more than three taels of croton at home, and were denounced by neighbors and almost punished for treason, or Li Longji asked the minister to find out the reason, and then carried out an amnesty, and announced to the world that if you need to prepare more crotons at home, you must explain the purpose to the court in advance, and the vendors who sell them must also report their own inventory and how much each business has sold to the court truthfully, otherwise they will be punished.

This is actually a kind of court control, croton has become a controlled commodity, however, this is not harmful, the court management is stricter, on the one hand, it can continue to mislead the world, so that people with a heart can not configure black powder, on the other hand, it also greatly reduces the behavior of those who use croton to harm people, which is conducive to maintaining social stability.

Although the price of various Chinese herbal medicines has increased a lot, because the imperial court is not in a hurry to purchase, the price is gradually maintained at a level of fifty percent higher than the original price, and the price of mung beans and soybeans has doubled at first, and then, with the development of the situation, it has gradually fallen, which is only one percent higher than the original price, and has not had much impact on the lives of the people.

In addition, after a few days of construction, the craftsmen of the processing plant built the rails according to Ang Lee's requirements, a section of the track is five steps long, a total of 20 sections, because the rails need to be laid with two lines, so each line is only ten sections, that is, fifty steps.

The manufacture of sleepers is relatively simple, and a lot of them have been made, as well as the transformed iron-wheeled carriage, which has long been formed, parked in the shed of the processing plant, waiting for Li An to come and give instructions.

"Li Shilang, this iron-wheeled carriage looks weird, can it really go smoothly?"

Duan Xiushi has been around Ang Lee most of the time these days, and he is also familiar with Ang Lee, so when he encounters some doubtful questions, he will boldly raise them.

Li An touched the iron wheel on the carriage and nodded: "This iron wheel is much stronger than the carriage walking on the road of Kenkeng Wow, after the rails are paved, you will know the comfort of the train." ”

"Li Shilang, we are all ready, where to start."

A craftsman walked up to Ang Li and asked.

"Start laying from outside the south gate of the processing plant, all the way to the south, go, and the official will teach you on the spot."

After Li An finished speaking, he led a group of craftsmen to the south gate of the processing plant, and put down a large number of sleepers and rails, ready to start laying the rails.

"First lay the sleepers, the distance between them should be the same, the distance between the two rails should be the same as the distance between the two wheels of the carriage, it must be paved firmly, and the foundation must be stable."

Li An instructed the craftsmen to work, and at the same time used the instrument in his hand to measure the accuracy of the craftsmen's work, however, the iron wheels of the carriage are relatively wide, as long as the error is not very large, walking on it will not fall, but the more accurate the better, this will never be wrong.

The laying of the sleeper is not too difficult, and it is not difficult for the rail to be fixed on the sleeper, but the position of the two sections of the rail joint needs to be well handled, and the height must be kept consistent, and at the same time, the gap should be controlled, the gap is too large, which will cause the bump of the vehicle, if the gap is too small, when it is hot, the rail will be bent and deformed because of thermal expansion and contraction, and even break directly.

At the moment, the temperature is relatively low, so the gap between the rails should be slightly larger, so that when the summer comes, the rails will not be scrapped due to thermal expansion and contraction.

Laying the railroad track is a very hard job, in addition to the craftsmen, Li Ang transferred the manpower of the vegetable greenhouse and the construction of the other yard to ensure that this small section of the track can be laid successfully as soon as possible.

The hard work pays off, after nearly two hours of hard work, the fifty steps of the length of the track was officially completed, however, this is not the end, because the sleepers are directly laid on the flat ground, the stability will certainly not be very high, in order to prevent windy weather, causing the displacement of the rails, the sleepers must be sprinkled with gravel blocks.

The work was not difficult, and besides, the gravel blocks had already been prepared, and with the efforts of everyone, the gravel blocks soon filled between the sleepers, so that the sleepers and the rails could be fixed steadily, and in order for the horses to walk smoothly between the two rails, the top of the gravel blocks was covered with a layer of loess that was not too thick, so that the horses walked between the two rails as if they were walking on flat ground.

Looking at the short section of the railway, which had been completely completed, Ang Lee stretched out his hand and asked the craftsmen to transport the iron-wheeled carriage to try the effect of the rails.

The carriage was quickly pushed onto the tracks, and a sturdy stallion was pulled over and tethered to the front of the carriage in preparation for the experiment.

Ang Lee was confident in his experiment, rolled up his sleeves and prepared to test drive it himself.

"Li Shilang, the railroad track has just been built, and the safety cannot be guaranteed, so let's let the humble post try it first!"

Duan Xiushi was worried about Ang Lee's safety, prevented Ang Lee from experimenting in person, and volunteered to sit in the test driver.

Li An thought for a moment, nodded and said, "Okay then!" Lieutenant Duan wanted to be the first to drive the iron-wheeled carriage, and the officer agreed. ”

Duan Xiushi glanced at one of the soldiers behind him and asked him to take charge of driving the horses, while he himself jumped into the carriage and sat in the carriage.

"Driving ......"

This soldier of the Yulin Army, obviously drove a car before, his movements were extremely skillful, without the slightest sense of rustiness, and the carriage was also under his control, slowly moving forward, and the whole process was very smooth.

"A sh......hh

Towards the end, the soldiers of the Yulin Army stopped their horses, and the iron-wheeled carriage stopped steadily at the end of the tracks, and the whole process went very smoothly without the slightest accident.

"Captain Duan, how do you feel?"

Li An looked at Duan Xiushi with a smile and a proud expression on his face.

"Li Shilang, this iron-wheeled carriage walking on the railroad tracks is indeed much more stable than an ordinary carriage walking on flat ground, but it will be slightly bumpy every other distance, but fortunately it doesn't feel too much."

Duan Xiushi answered truthfully and told his experience.

Li An didn't take the train much in his previous life, so he naturally understood the feeling of taking the train, but because the train was too fast, the small gap between the rails would cause a more obvious vibration feeling, and the iron wheel carriage at this time was very slow, even if there was a little gap between the rails, he couldn't feel much vibration, it was almost negligible, but Duan Xiushi felt sensitive, so he could notice this small vibration.

"Push the carriage backwards, you've all worked hard, let's experience it separately!"

Li An looked at the craftsmen and servants, and gave his own order, in this way, he wanted to verify the durability and reliability of the rails and the iron wheeled carriages, and these people were obviously the best people to test, and they were very happy, and felt that this was a benefit that Li Ang had given them.

The iron-wheeled carriage was pushed back again and again, and after it was full of people, it drove fifty paces away again and again under the pull of the horses, and ran back and forth dozens of times, without the slightest failure, which shows how mature and reliable the rails and iron-wheeled carriages designed by Ang Lee are in terms of technology.

However, this is only the most preliminary technology, and the ultimate goal is to build a train with a large capacity, but watching the horses pull the car and run on the tracks, Ang Lee actually thought of the braided dynasty of the later generations.

The pigtail Chao Gaocai, actually in the era of mature train technology, with horses to pull the cart on the tracks, the Western friends were stunned, of course, people also put forward their own reasons, that is, the train emits black smoke, will pollute the environment, and the carriage is more environmentally friendly, in order to protect the environment and abandon the locomotive, should be able to award a Nobel Environmental Protection Prize.

At the thought of the old man with big braids and standing on the podium of the Nobel Prize, Ang Lee couldn't help but feel the urge to laugh.

"Li Shilang, I think that it is indeed very comfortable for the iron wheel carriage to walk on the rails, but the rails consume too much iron, I am afraid that it will be difficult to promote, and besides, just to be comfortable, I am afraid that a lot of iron is consumed, which is only a little inappropriate."

Duan Xiushi is getting bolder and bolder, and he actually dares to point out his doubts in person, of course, this is also related to the fact that Ang Lee has always been kind to him, making him more and more unseen.

However, Ang Lee likes Duan Xiushi's character when he has questions, of course, except for Duan Xiushi, everyone will have this kind of doubt, feeling that Ang Lee's construction of railroad tracks and iron-wheeled carriages is a kind of local tyrant behavior, and there is no possibility of promotion at all, which is a waste of resources.

Of course, people of their time can only have such an understanding, after all, they don't know what a train is, let alone think of the strong capacity and fast speed of a train.

Li An didn't explain too much, but just told Duan Xiushi that when the technology matures in the future, the iron wheel carriage will become very long, and it can transport a large number of goods at a time, far exceeding the transportation volume of the carriage, and the speed will be much faster, which will greatly change the current circulation speed of goods in Datang and benefit the people of Datang, and pointed out that with black powder, the mining speed of iron ore will increase exponentially, iron material is not a problem, and developing higher technology as soon as possible is the real problem.

By laying the rails and running the iron-wheeled carriage, Ang Lee's first step plan was a complete success, which was a good start, and then he only needed to study various gear structures and steam engines, and Ang Lee has been trying to recall, recalling a lot of knowledge he had learned in his previous life, especially about the steam engine, which was the key to successfully building a train.

When leaving the courtyard, Li Ang told the craftsmen to step up production and make all the remaining iron into railroad tracks, so as to lay a fifteen-mile-long iron track road, so that it would be cool enough to go to the end at one time.

After returning to the mansion, Li An began to design the iron wheel carriage and the iron wheel locomotive, the structure of the carriage is very simple, that is, a rectangular wooden box, with iron wheels at the bottom, which is similar to the rear carriage of later generations, but part of the material of the carriage is wood, and the proportion of iron is very small.

The structure of the iron wheel head is more complicated, Li An thought about it for a long time, and he didn't know how to make this iron wheel head, so he fell into anxiety for a while.

"Husband, as soon as you come back, you will be in the house to draw, and you will sigh for a long time, what the hell is going on?"

Seeing Li An's long sigh, Yan Ruyu walked over distressedly, stretched out her pink little hand, and massaged Li An's frowning forehead.

Li An touched Yan Ruyu's pink little hand and gently kissed it.

"Husband, what's wrong, you look unhappy."

Yan Ruyu asked with concern.

Li An took a deep breath, stood up, held Yan Ruyu in his arms, pressed it on the table, and said badly: "My husband was indeed in a bad mood just now, but it is much better to see my wife, come, let my husband be pampered." ”

"Husband, let go, what are you doing in broad daylight!"

Yan Ruyu was shocked, Ang Li is always like this, suddenly going crazy for no reason, this is not the first time, she is helpless about it, and she secretly likes it.

And Ang Lee himself has no intentions, let alone the slightest premeditation, it's just that when he saw Yan Ruyu coming over, he made a temporary decision, which should be an occasional crime. (To be continued.) )