Tu Hu stood in front of the huge factory building with a smile and greeted the two delegations from Hunan and Eyue.

The factory under construction behind him is the first weapons and equipment factory to be built after Li Ze took charge of Chang'an, in addition to manufacturing armor, it also plays another important function, that is, to manufacture artillery. The construction of more than half a year has mobilized tens of thousands of people, and now it is only beginning to take shape, and it will take a long time before it is officially put into production. The factory stretched for several miles, looking at the blue brick factory where the water extended out, not only Qian Biao was dumbfounded, but Ding Jian was also in a trance.

Texas is now the industrial city of Datang, but it has not seen such a huge factory.

"Brother Ding, Brother Qian!" Tu Hu smiled and clasped his fists at the two in salute.

The two of them didn't dare to slack off, but they also dared to return the salute: "Brother Tu, why did you come here in person, you are a busy man!" Ding Jian is more familiar with Tu Hu, "How dare we do this?" ”

"The two governors came to inspect the work in person, how could Tu not come to receive them in person?" Tu Hu laughed. "Both of them are people with eyes like torches, and when they see something wrong, they hope to be outspoken."

Ding Jian laughed, "Brother Tu, you are an expert in this area, Brother Qian and I can only watch the excitement, and today I only brought my eyes over, not only to open my eyes, but also to learn some experience!" Now Hubei is a place, compared with the northern places, the gap is not a star and a half. ”

"The land of the two lakes, the land of fish and rice, that's a good place!" Tu Hu turned around with a smile and looked at the factory behind him, the smug look in his eyes was about to come out.

"Why build such a huge factory, and how many people do you need?" Qian Biao asked.

"Now that the supervisor has introduced a new production method, which has greatly improved the work efficiency, Li Xiang is also very happy after personally inspecting it, and vividly calls it an assembly line operation!" Tu Hu said with a smile: "So this factory is built so big, two governors, let's put it this way, this row of factories behind me is for the production of armor, and from this end, it is fine iron, and when it comes out of it, it is a pair of finished armor." ”

Ding Jian and Qian Biao's eyes widened.

"It sounds very high-end, but when you look closely, it's actually not clever." Tu Hu said: "It is to improve the method of production, in the past, to manufacture a pair of helmets, almost one or two workers from beginning to end to be responsible for a pair of armor to the end, and such craftsmen need to be familiar with all aspects of skills, if you want to train such a craftsman, it will be difficult." Now we divide it into a lot of processes, and a worker only needs to be familiar with the part he is responsible for. And in this way, once there is a product quality problem, we can easily find out where the problem is. ”

Both of them are human spirits, and they already understand it when they hear it.

"It's a good idea!" Both are full of praise.

Ding Jian looked at the majestic factory building and asked: "The factory building is built by the river, and it must use water power, I remember that on this river, all kinds of mills that used to use water power are all over the ......."

"It used to be like this. Those powerful people used their power to build dams on the river, build mills one after another to make money for themselves, so that the river is full of checkpoints and the river is not smooth, how can they still be allowed to be so presumptuous now? Tu Hu sneered: "Now these small mills have all been demolished a long time ago, firstly, to return the river to its original role, and secondly, to ensure that all kinds of large-scale water-powered workshops in the imperial court have enough waterpower." ”

"Demolition?" Ding Jian said with a smile.

"Those who know each other will naturally give a little compensation, but it's not much, over the years, they have occupied this river, I don't know how much black money they have earned? I don't know each other, hehe......" Tu Hu didn't continue, but the two of them also understood.

"The Ministry of Industry and the General Supervisor have formed a joint working group that has surveyed all the rivers around Chang'an, and there is a plan for how to use each river, and there is also a fixed number of factories that can be repaired. Li Xiang also said that these are all national assets, and they must not be allowed to be occupied by private individuals at will! Tu Hu said.

"All the water power factories are run by the imperial court itself?" Ding Jian was stunned.

"Of course not!" Tu Hu said: "There are some industries that the imperial court has not intervened in at all, such as water-powered textile workshops. However, in addition to ensuring that the industries under the control of the imperial court made full use of water power, the surplus positions would be granted to the private sector. ”

"That's another battle!" Ding Jian said with a smile: "I think I can make a lot of money by coming to the imperial court again." ”

"That's true. Elsewhere, there are three other large approved hydraulic workshops on the river before us, each of which costs 10,000 silver dollars a year, and rises at 10% a year. Tu Hu said.

Qian Biao was stunned: "In this way, isn't it only those powerful big merchants who can afford such an expense?" Small businesses are going to be eliminated. ”

"That's what we're trying to achieve." Tu Hu said: "Only large-scale workshops can carry out large-scale production, and large-scale production can reduce production costs, so that higher profits can be obtained, and large-scale production, he needs to recruit more workers, and can solve the employment problem of more people." The two governors, the land in Guanzhong, is far from enough. ”

"But along the way, I have seen a lot of barren land!" Qian Biao retorted.

Tu Hu smiled slightly: "In the past, because of the war, the people were fluent and lost, and there were many deaths and injuries among the young and strong, so there was a shortage of labor, or they were forced to flee because of the war." Now it's different, the war, for the people of Guanzhong, has ended, and now a large number of people who are fleeing the war are returning to their hometowns one after another, just in Lishan, according to the internal security report, there are more than 100,000 people hiding in the war, and now they are trying to find a way to let these people return to their hometowns. What's more, once the world is stable, the population will increase sharply, which has been verified in the north, and the population of the north is increasing at a rate of one percent every year, and Li Xiang is a little afraid of such a growth rate. ”

Ding Jian laughed: "In the past, I couldn't support myself when I was born, I couldn't afford to raise it, who went to Li Xiang to make the people of the Northland so rich?" The Tang people all believe in having many sons and many blessings, and now that they are rich, they can give birth to Luo vigorously! But it doesn't matter, isn't our Datang army expanding its territory? If we don't have enough at home, let's go outside to find it! ”

"Governor Ding, you've changed so much!" Tu Hu smiled: "I still remember when you first arrived in Wuyi, you didn't say that. ”

"I have to keep up with Lee Sang." Ding Jian knocked on his head: "Otherwise, I will be eliminated by the times." The articles written by Li Xiang, the books he posted, and the speeches he made in Di Bao and Datang Weekly were all carefully considered. Now I feel like I should be able to keep up with Lee Sang's train of thought. ”

Qian Biao said: "Take the south as soon as possible, there is still enough land over there." ”

Ding Jian smiled and said: "Brother Qian, you have to study Li Xiang's national theory and national theory, I said that you have to look outside, but I don't mean the south." ”

Qian Biao was slightly stunned: "Don't you mean the south?" ”

"It's a big world." Tu Hu said: "Although the south is our enemy at the moment, Li Xiang said that everyone is a Tang person, and this is a brotherly dispute." That's why Li Xiangcai is not in a hurry to launch a large-scale attack, because Li Xiang doesn't want to kill too many people and make the place a mess. ”

Qian Biao was slightly shocked in his heart, it seems that he has to work hard in the future, even people like Ding Jian are afraid that they will not be able to keep up with Li Xiang's pace, so he will be even worse.

"Let's go, I'll take the two and the members of the delegation from the two places to visit this factory, now it's starting construction and construction, the factory is very messy, don't laugh." Tu Hu said as he led everyone inside.

As soon as he entered, Qian Biao was shocked.

The huge iron hammer was suspended in the air, and the square and red-hot iron billet was hoisted, and as the shirtless man on one side pulled the thin iron chain, the heavy iron billet was lifted into the air, and then moved on the iron felt, with a loud sound, the iron hammer in mid-air fell suddenly, hitting the red iron billet hard.

It didn't take long for the square billet to be formed into a thin iron plate, which was removed from the felt and transported to the next process.

The next process is still to use water to drive the hammer to strike, but unlike the previous one, the hammer is much smaller and hammered many times faster, and the two workers keep moving the thinned iron plates to make them thinner and flatter.

Next, it is cutting, shaping, and dozens of workers are sweating and working in each process.

When I got to the last process, there was already the armor that had already been produced, which was the plate armor that the Tang soldiers were equipped with in large quantities. Qian Biao roughly counted as he walked, and from beginning to end, there were about 20 processes. And the last process is actually all female workers. They were responsible for sewing the lining of the armor, dressing the leather tape, etc., and when they were done, a good pair of armor could leave the factory.

"This factory can produce hundreds of armors every day!" Tuhu Road.

Qian Biao said: "Brother Tu, with such a production speed, our Datang soldiers can't run out!" ”

"Battle damage, elimination, these all need a lot of replenishment, of course, we are still preparing takeout!" Tu Hu smiled: "These things can make money faster than anything else." Now all the costs of making a suit of armor add up to no more than ten silver dollars, but when we sell it, we can sell it for dozens of silver dollars. ”

"Takeaway?"

"Yes, there are many people in Tubo and overseas! As long as we can produce it, we can sell it all. ”

Qian Biao smiled and said: "Let's go, everyone, I'll take you to see our latest things, do you know that this time our sailors bombarded Guangzhou's artillery, right?" Do you want to know how artillery is made? I'll show you there. ”