The red fire reflects the dark face of the craftsman in front of the furnace. The sweat of the craftsmen was dripping, but there was some expectation in their eyes, which was the expectation of the fruits of labor.

"There's a big man here!"

The sharp-eyed craftsman saw the approaching group, and saw the old man wearing an official robe, and was about to kneel down and bow down, but Zhu Mingzhong hurriedly helped up the leading craftsman.

"Can Zhu Mouyan be a big gift?"

Picking up the craftsmen, in their doubts, Zhu Mingzhong said.

"In the fourth year of Hongwu, Emperor Gao ordered the officials and the people to bow down. The ritual of kneeling is actually Hu Feng, Jiashen Qing captured the Kou, stole my Chinese artifact, changed my Chinese clothes, changed my Chinese customs, the Manchu Qing Dynasty took the enslavement of our Chinese as the foundation of the country, this ritual of kneeling is actually set up for the enslavement of our Chinese, today I Qingjiang has been restored, the officials and the people perform the ritual of worship, I have no Yuan in China, the worship of the slaves of the Qing Dynasty, my Chinese boy, there is gold under my knees, you must not perform this humiliating Hu ceremony again! ”

However, in just 15 years, it has changed to Chinese customs!

Looking at those submissive craftsmen, kneeling or standing there, Zhu Mingzhong's mind sank, and his hatred for the Manchu Qing deepened. After coming to this era, he learned that the "kneeling" in the braid play was simply formulated by the Manchu Qing Dynasty in order to enslave the Han people and humiliate the Han people.

Fifteen years!

In just fifteen years, the Manchu Qing Dynasty used a butcher's knife and a simple "kneeling", a ubiquitous kneeling, to easily extract the backbone of this nation!

What the hell......

He scolded hatefully, took a deep breath, and Zhu Mingzhong, who had this debt in his heart, came to the furnace, even if he was three feet away, he could still feel the scorching heat coming from his face, which was the heat wave emitted by the iron-making furnace. The craftsmen in front of the furnace all looked at the old man nervously.

In front of this iron-making furnace that is no more than a zhang high, Zhu Mingzhong's eyes are always a little curious, the fire of the furnace rises and falls from time to time with the bellows, and the bellows is a piston bellows pulled by manpower, and three or four people pull it at the same time. This is a typical iron-making furnace in the Ming and Qing dynasties.

There is an iron factory in Qinghe, which is completely unexpected by Zhu Mingzhong, after all, this place is not close to the iron mine. After hearing that there was an iron factory here, he went to the iron factory near the river, where there were several iron-making furnaces, large and small, and most of the blasts were made of water.

"Where did this iron ore come from?"

Pointing to the iron ore next to the furnace, Zhu Mingzhong asked with some curiosity, there is no iron ore near Huai'an in the future.

"Back to the scriptures, the ore of the Qinghe Iron Plant is from Xuzhou Liguo, before the Song and Yuan Dynasties, Liguo was a millennium iron smelting location, the Song Dynasty produced no less than one million catties of iron every year, after the Mengyuan Dynasty until our dynasty, due to the decreasing ore on the ground, coupled with the gradual formation of Weishan Lake, the mining cave and smelting furnace were also flooded by the lake, so that the smelting industry of Liguo has been declining for hundreds of years, and the mining and smelting industry of Liguo has basically stopped in the Apocalypse Dynasty, but even so, in the area of Liguo, there are still a few exposed ore seedlings, which can be used for ore ......"

Dai Cang, who was the head of the industrial camp, listened to the question of the envoy and hurriedly explained.

"Although Liguo iron smelting has stopped, Qinghe is an important shipbuilding town, and tens of thousands of catties of iron are needed every year, so when the Cao boat returns every year, it will be transported by the Cao ship to transport Liguo ore and Xuzhou coal to Qinghe for ironmaking for shipbuilding......"

Qingjiang Shipyard builds hundreds of boats every year, coupled with the maintenance of boats, naturally needs a large amount of wrought iron, and ironmaking is naturally a natural thing, but it relies on coal and iron ore transported from Xuzhou.

"Oh, I see......"

Nodding slightly, Zhu Mingzhong looked at the mountains of iron ore in this iron factory, which should be no less than hundreds of tons, and according to the scale of the iron factory, it should barely be enough for a year.

"This ironworks use coal?"

The answer is yes, after all, there are no mountains near Qinghe to provide wood, and coal is naturally used for iron smelting. After the Song Dynasty, most of China's ironmaking was based on coal. The use of coal to make iron is a major advance in ancient Chinese smelting technology, because coal is stronger and more durable than charcoal, and can get higher temperatures, but the ancients did not find the impact of coal on ironmaking, when using coal to make iron, the sulfur contained in the coal will enter the molten iron, so this kind of cast iron has a high sulfur content, and sulfur will cause steel to become brittle, thus affecting the properties of steel.

"By strategy, this Qinghe Iron Works can produce more than 150,000 catties of iron every year, if they are all used to cast jack cannons, there are no less than dozens of cannons per year, of course, if you collect scrap iron, you can cast more cannons......"

In Dai Cang's words, Zhu Mingzhong shook his head and said.

"Casting cannons need to use high-quality iron, and you can't use ordinary scrap iron!"

Looking at the iron-making furnace, Zhu Mingzhong said again.

"The iron made from coal in this iron-making furnace is not suitable for casting cannons!"

Although he doesn't know much about cast artillery, Zhu Mingzhong knows very well that before the middle of the 19th century, the army field guns were mainly bronze, although the cost of cast iron guns is low, but the life is lower, but a large number of cast iron cannons are used in the navy, and the cast iron cannons of the navies of various countries are best with the cast iron cannons of the British Navy, because the cast iron used in the British Navy cannons are all from Sweden, and the low-phosphorus iron of Sweden is still the necessary material for high-pressure artillery in European countries until the 20th century. Having the most advanced cast iron artillery is one of the reasons why the British Navy was able to run amok across the oceans, compared to the French Navy, which did not pay attention to the quality of cast iron, artillery explosions were endless.

"Scrap iron is not suitable for casting cannons?"

Dai Cang looked at the envoy in surprise, who had presided over the casting of cannons in the Ministry of Industry, and immediately asked.

"Junmen, as the following officers know, this scrap iron is the most suitable for casting cannons, because its price is extremely low, and the quantity is sufficient, if it is made from an iron factory, it can only be cast to dozens of cannons this year......"

Regarding Dai Cang's rhetorical question, Zhu Mingzhong didn't explain anything, there are many things that don't need to be explained, even if he explains, how can he understand?

Walking in front of a coal mountain several feet high, Zhu Mingzhong picked up a piece of coal, since he didn't pick it up, he could also see that these coals were bituminous coal, if it was anthracite, the surface luster would be shiny and white under the sunlight, and as for this bituminous coal, there was no luster at all.

Through the sunlight, it can be seen that these coals contain a lot of impurities, and Zhu Mingzhong pondered for a moment.

"As mentioned in the artifact spectrum, the making of guns needs to be based on Fujian iron, because Fujian iron is smelted with charcoal, and the iron smelting of the national dynasty is mainly coal, only Fujian Province is based on charcoal because there are many forests on the mountain, and there is no coal, and more charcoal is used to make iron, so Fujian iron is of high quality, and it is the most suitable for making guns, as for this coal, do you see the impurities in this coal?"

Pointing to the exposed impurities in the coal pile, these coals contain coal gangue and slag and ash, of course, what is more harmful is the sulfur, phosphorus and other impurities that cannot be distinguished by the eye, and because of this, after the coal is mined in later generations, it will go through a coal washing process to wash away the impurities.

"The impurities in this coal will seep into the molten iron during ironmaking, which will affect the quality of the molten iron, so it is naturally not suitable for casting cannons."

"Omitted, this ...... This Qinghe is located in the plain, surrounded by no mountains, if charcoal is used to make iron, where does this charcoal come from? Even if there are several charcoal factories in this Qinghe, the wood used to make charcoal is only old ships and shipyard scraps, which is definitely not enough for ironmaking every year......

Dai Cang's tone looked a little helpless.

"Throughout the ages, the Central Plains ironmaking originally used charcoal, and later switched to coal, all because of the lack of charcoal, so the use of charcoal, if there is no coal, I am afraid that this iron plant can only stop production."

"So, after all, you still have to use coal to make iron! Coal is stronger and more durable than charcoal, and can reach a higher temperature, so it can be said that it is more suitable for ironmaking, but ironmaking with coal still requires several processes, and it cannot be directly ironmade. Is there an iron pot? Find some iron pots! ”

Soon, several large iron pots were set up by the river, buckets of river water were poured into the pot, in the confusion of Dai Cang and others, Zhu Mingzhong ordered people to pour baskets of coal into the iron pot, and then instructed the craftsman.

"Stirring with a shovel, it's like stir-frying, yes, that's it......"

In Zhu Mingzhong's explanation, those craftsmen kept stirring the coal in the pot, the water in the pot became more and more turbid, and then it was poured into another pot and continued to stir, this is the soil method of coal washing, for this primitive coal washing technology, Zhu Mingzhong just once saw some record photos on the Internet, in the northern mining area of the 21st century, there are hundreds of thousands of coal washers, they are often composed of two people, three or four large iron pots, stirring with shovels, sieving and fishing, separating coal gangue and slag from raw coal, and washing out high-quality coal cores, Through this manual operation, the dark ugin is washed out of the large amount of raw coal. The washed refined coal is sold to smelters at a higher price. Although in the 21st century, large mines have built automated coal washing plants, eliminating the original soil coal washing. This industry has become a sunset industry. But it is this kind of primitive manual work that almost supports half of China's metallurgy in later generations. And now this kind of local coal washing can naturally support the metallurgical industry of this era compared with later generations.

At the edge of the river, several craftsmen repeat the same action over and over again: fill the cauldron with water, stir with a shovel, and sift out the coal. Compared to the previous coal, which contained a lot of impurities, these coals seem to be much cleaner, and not only can the dust that can be seen by the eyes, but also reduce the ash and sulfur content, which is the refined coal that can be used for metallurgy.

"Now, can this coal be directly used for ironmaking?"

Looking at the thousands of catties of refined coal that had been washed out, Dai Cang asked with some doubts. It was the first time he had heard that coal needed to be cleaned, but it seemed to make some sense after listening to what he had said before.

"Not yet......"

Shaking his head, Zhu Mingzhong asked again.

"Jia Mei, you said before that there is a charcoal factory in this Qinghe? Where is this charcoal plant? ”