From Weishan Lake to Li Guojian, there is only a short waterway, but this section of the road is like a quagmire, which makes it extremely difficult for Qin Mu to move forward.

Because he was a little afraid from the bottom of his heart to go to the Li Guojian. This feeling of fear is something Qin Mu has never had since he came to the Great Song Dynasty. Now, for the first time, he felt it.

Why are you afraid? Afraid of unfamiliar places? Are you afraid of meeting a home? Or are you afraid that the rice in that place is not delicious?

Of course not, that's all.

What really scared Qin Mu was that as long as he arrived at the Li Guojian, it would be the real opening of an era.

Qin Mu was afraid that he would fail, and he was afraid that he would be crushed by this burden.

The beginning of the industrial age was due to the advent of the steam engine. But the real crushing of the industrial age compared to the agricultural age was not because of a steam engine, but because of the huge amount of steel.

Qin Mu now knew very well how the steelmaking mills of later generations would operate, and he also asked Director Jiang to design a steelmaking plant for him that met the conditions of this time and space.

But even if he streamlined and streamlined, Qin Mu found that he still faced countless problems.

So far, Qin Mu has actually not gnawed on the real hard bones.

For example, Qingzhou Petroleum. The core equipment of drilling wells is all pulled from later generations, and the process of oil refining is only a little stronger than that of later generations of clay workshops. It is not at all the nature of a petrochemical enterprise in the 21st century.

This is also related to the characteristics of the oil industry. To put it simply, Qin Mu obtained various petroleum products just through fractionation, even if the quality was not comparable to that of later generations, but it was absolutely usable.

Let's talk about Weishanhu Coal Mine. The output of this coal mine has increased tenfold or dozens of times, but the technical content has not been substantially improved.

It is only because Qin Mu brought the necessary power source from later generations, greatly expanding the working area, and at the same time, because of the use of electric lights, the production time was greatly extended. And the basic labor of the workers is still the same as before, bending over to dig stones.

There is no real essential improvement with scientific and technological content.

It is precisely because there is no essential improvement at every point of Qin Mu that Qin Mu has gone all the way so smoothly, almost easily.

But all this is constantly accumulating, a little bit of quantitative change, a little bit of oil, a piece of coal or two pounds, a pound and two catties of grain. As the accumulation became more and more, Qin Mu found that he had to walk in front of that door.

Iron ore is the last link in this reaction chain, as long as the iron ore is added to its own industrial circle, then the industrial revolution will inevitably come.

None of this could be stopped by him. Quantitative change will inevitably lead to qualitative change.

Therefore, Qin Mu's heart was extremely heavy, he was afraid that once this iron ore joined his link, it would trigger a fierce reaction, and not only might it not be able to start the industrial revolution smoothly, but it would become the last straw that broke the camel's back, and everything he did was broken.

Iron is basically not directly usable in later generations. Because it's so brittle. But it can still be used in this plane.

Because the craftsmen of this time and space have no theoretical guidance, coupled with the backwardness of their craftsmanship, it is a very difficult process to change from iron to steel. This also led to the high and scarce scarcity of steel, which was used to make weapons and armor, and the common people did not even have a good kitchen knife.

The so-called "hating iron does not make steel" is an intuitive portrayal of this difficulty.

Ironmaking and steelmaking are two completely different chemical reactions.

Iron smelting is a reduction reaction. It is to separate the iron element from iron ore. The iron-making of the ancients and the people of the 21st century is the same, and the chemical reaction remains the same.

But because the ancients didn't know the chemistry of the whole reaction, that is, they didn't know what actually happened to the transformation of iron ore into iron, so they couldn't get better iron.

At least they didn't know how to make coal into coke first.

The people of this plane have always used coal to make iron. As a result, the iron produced was very brittle and of little use – it could not be used as a farming implement, so iron had to be turned into steel.

The coke ironmaking method that Qin Mu has adopted greatly reduces the carbon content of molten iron, and such a product is close to the steel of this time and space, so it can be used to make steam crossbows and steam engines.

But this thing is still iron in essence, just better iron, and it is not steel at all by the standards of later generations.

Steelmaking is an oxidation reaction. To remove the carbon element in pig iron, to meet a standard, that is, the carbon content is 0.04%-2%. In this way, it can be counted as steel.

Of course, the ancients also wanted steel, but they didn't know about iron or carbon, so everything relied on the techniques that craftsmen had figured out.

It can be said that I don't know why I know it.

For example, the frying steel method. It uses pig iron as raw material, heats the pig iron to a liquid and semi-liquid state, and uses the oxygen in the blast to decarburize the pig iron into the composition range of steel and wrought iron. During the smelting process, the metal should be constantly stirred.

But do the craftsmen of this plane know what oxygen is? Definitely don't know. They only know to do so. As for why? I don't know. All they know is that they can get steel with a bit of an operation.

The quality of the steel depends on the craftsmanship of the steel craftsmen. This pot and the next pot cannot be the same at all.

But Qin Mu knew that the purpose of this operation was to remove the carbon in the molten iron as much as possible, so as to obtain qualified steel.

Because the people of this time and space are blind people touching elephants, they go forward; And Qin Mu is according to the map, and he can build the factory completely according to his own ideas, so the gap between the two cannot be calculated.

That's a thousand-year-old gap.

But this gap also shackled Qin Mu.

The practice of the blind man touching the elephant is actually a small workshop to make steel, and there is no large-scale assembly line production - everything depends on the craftsmanship of craftsmen. How can this extreme reliance on individual technology be industrialized and replicated in large quantities? It's simply impossible.

That's why in ancient times, there were one swordsmith after another—in fact, they were extremely good craftsmen. And they are not reproducible, who is different from whom.

There are so many celebrities in thousands of years, which obviously shows the same problem, that is, this method cannot be industrialized.

Qin Mu's industrial production, compared with the handicraft workshop, is different in that this is a complete system. The system was so complex that it was far beyond his current capabilities.

In later generations of steelmaking, the basic process was two. First, the blast furnace makes iron, and then, the molten iron goes directly into the converter, and then the converter makes steel.

It's a process that can't be stopped. Once the furnace is opened, it has to go all the way.

In this way, the problem faced by Qin Mu is very huge. If nothing else, we must first build a blast furnace, the blast furnace must have refractory bricks, and then there must be stable iron ore, coke, and limestone as raw materials, so that blast furnace ironmaking can be carried out.

Once the ignition starts, then the molten iron cannot be released once, and then there is no raw material to rest for two days, and then continue to dry when the raw material comes. Then the stove is finished.

Therefore, Qin Mu must prepare sufficient raw materials. That's why he has been running the Weishanhu Coal Mine with all his might, just to obtain a sufficient amount of coke.

Coke is only one type of raw material, but iron ore and limestone are also essential. The collection of limestone has been going on, and for the time being, it seems that there is no shortage of it, but iron ore is not good.

The current output of the State Supervisor is not enough to feed the blast furnace in Qin Mu's plan. If iron ore is not available, then blast furnace ironmaking is finished.

Therefore, Qin Mu had to prepare enough iron ore.

At this point, it is still within the technical scope of this plane, and it can be solved by relying on the craftsmen of this plane.

But then there's a whole new process. Converter steelmaking is a precise reduction reaction that requires the use of pure oxygen to remove carbon from molten iron.

However, in the Great Song Dynasty, how Qin Mu made pure oxygen was completely impossible. At least not now.

Therefore, he is ready to use air directly, without pure oxygen, which can barely be said in the past, just because the air contains a large amount of nitrogen, which not only cannot participate in the reaction, but also takes away the heat, so that the temperature in the converter cannot reach the desired height.

At the same time, nitrogen is deposited in the molten steel, which inevitably causes small bubbles.

This will definitely affect the quality of the tapping, but Qin Mu can still accept it. This kind of steel is not good compared with later generations, and compared with this time and space, it is very good.

But there is a problem here, that is, blast furnace ironmaking and converter steelmaking are complete processes. When the hot molten iron comes out, it will enter the converter and continue to practice.

It is equivalent to saying that this assembly line has become longer. Moreover, a lot of power is needed here.

The converter converter needs to be turned up. Dumping molten steel waste slag cannot flow out like a blast furnace. Such a heavy guy was going to spin, if there was no steam engine, Qin Mu wouldn't dare to think about it.

The molten steel flowing out of the converter must continue to be processed in order to obtain truly usable steel.

This set of processes will require a large number of industrial workers and precise control of each link in later generations to be realized.

Is Qin Mu used in this time and space? It can be said that there is not a single one.

Now Qin Mu has thoroughly understood the thirst for workers in New China. Without real industrial workers, you can't really play industry.

It does not mean that farmers are pulled from the fields into the factories in the morning and can go to work in the evening.

In addition to causing serious production accidents and even injuring human lives, there is no second possibility at all.

But where are Qin Mu's industrial workers? Not really. Now the ones who can barely be regarded as workers are the miners of the Weishanhu Coal Mine.

But they are just like workers, not real industrial workers. In fact, what they did was pure manual work, digging stones with rattan baskets on their backs.

The preparation of science and technology is very lacking, but this can be barely solved, and it is really impossible to pull equipment from later generations. But there is really no way to solve the shortage of workers.

Universalizing compulsory education is by no means a play with feelings and shows humanity. This is necessary for the development of society!

Qin Mu couldn't help but think of the university run by Jiang Yuenu.

At present, those who can barely train to become industrial workers are the students in schools. If you don't use them, you can only use the Guards regiment.

But to turn the Guards into workers can only be an emergency, not long-lasting.

In the long run, it is still necessary to set up night schools, recruit workers, and train them in order to get real industrial workers.

It's going to take time! A lot of time, and Qin Mu really doesn't have much time.

But no matter what, you must go on your own path.

Qin Mu walked up to the bow of the boat, looked at the river, and fell into deep thought.

At this time, a gust of river breeze blew, and Qin Mu couldn't help but look up into the distance. On the bank of the river, the maple forest was like fire, which instantly ignited his fighting spirit.

Qin Mu suddenly rose with a kind of pride of "independent cold autumn". What are you afraid of, "If you are confident that you will live for 200 years, you will be hit by water for 3,000 miles!" ”

Li Guojian, I'm here!