Yang Wenli does have a butt matter, he has been leveling the salt pans on the beach with slave soldiers for the past few days, don't mistake him for wanting to dry salt, of course, salt will also be made by the way, his real intention is to refine nitrate.

To make a cannon, you first had to solve the problem of explosives, and the largest component of explosives was potassium nitrate, followed by charcoal and sulfur, which are the three components of black powder.

On the small island of Changsheng Island, he didn't have saltpeter, so he only used nitrate in seawater to make potassium nitrate.

The function of the salt pan is to use sunlight to evaporate seawater, so as to obtain a relatively high concentration of brine, this brine can not be directly salted, because it has a heavy content of impurities, there are various trace heavy metals, and nitrate accounts for a large proportion.

Nitrate is a toxic substance and cannot be eaten, so salt prepared in modern seawater can only be used as industrial salt.

Salt is a very stable substance, only the brine evaporates to a certain extent, it can be precipitated, but nitrate is more active, in the process of heating the brine and cooling it properly, the precipitated crystals are basically nitrate.

Because he was only doing experiments, there was not much work, and he had already prepared a small amount of nitrate from brine.

Then he dissolved the nitrate with water, then added an appropriate amount of plant ash mixed and stirred, and then used a large piece of wood charcoal specially fired as a filter, that is, the soil method activated carbon filtration, after repeated filtration three times, the resulting dissolved night became colorless and transparent.

The mixed solution obtained by filtration is potassium nitrate solution, which is obtained by replacing the active potassium ions in the plant ash and nitrate ions in nitrate.

When this solution was heated and distilled, the white crystals that precipitated were high-quality and pure potassium nitrate, and at this point, when he wanted to try to make black powder, he found that there was no sulfur.

Since ancient times, China has lacked natural sulfur ore, and there is almost no mining, generally imported from Japan or heated and distilled with alum and pyrite.

Yang Wenli is very pitiful, he doesn't even have alum stone, and he doesn't have pyrite, so he can only go to Japan to buy sulfur.

If you want to go to Japan to buy sulfur and North Korea to buy iron ore, you will definitely not be able to use all the money, he only has so much money in total, and if he uses a little less, it will be spent sooner or later.

So he was forced to re-study and fire bone china and glass, and the glass was used to make glass mirrors and sell as high-end luxury goods.

This time, Yang Wenli changed an assistant again, because he found that Huang Zi'an was a pure nerd who didn't know anything about these strange and strange farts, but Wang Rucheng liked these sideways and had a lot of foundation.

"Ru Cheng, you follow me to do research! If you want to see more and think more and ask more, ask me if you don't understand something, I'll only do it once, I have a lot of other research to do, you have to learn it yourself first, and then teach the slave soldiers to make it in large quantities. And my lab notes, you also have to read and understand.

The furnace I built is called a simple reverberatory furnace, which is improved on the ordinary blacksmith furnace, and there are two specific improvements, the first is to warm the inlet air, so that the fresh air entering the furnace is at a higher temperature, which can significantly increase the furnace temperature.

The second is that a dome cover is added to the furnace, which plays the role of reflecting the temperature into the crucible, and makes the temperature of the furnace not easy to lose.

Because of the lid, I designed a chimney for the furnace, and the waste heat gas in the furnace will flow out of the chimney, if the chimney is built higher, it can effectively speed up the circulation of air, and also increase the furnace temperature. ”

Yang Wenli commanded the slave soldiers to build the stove, and explained to Wang Rucheng at the same time, and now several scholars have officially become members of the Black Armor Army, so Yang Wenli no longer calls Mr. XX, but directly calls him the word.

There were too many new terms in his words, and Wang Rucheng couldn't remember so many for a while, so he listened and took notes at the same time, and he looked like a student who listened carefully and took notes.

To be honest, although Wang Rucheng is also a scholar, he is not a little worse than Yang Wenli in scientific research, and he should be his student.

After a morning's hard work by the slave soldiers, five furnaces were built in a row, and a lot of crucibles and dome covers made of clay were also made, as well as supporting equipment such as floor tongs and iron spoons.

"Alright, let's go back first! Stoves and clay equipment should be dry before they can be used. In the next few days, you will burn more charcoal to prepare, and you will use a lot of charcoal in the future. ”

After the slave soldiers were finished, Yang Wenli arranged for them to do things for the next few days, and he was completely a qualified slave owner.

There was no way to make a crucible out of clay, because he didn't know where to find refractory materials such as graphite, magnesium oxide, and alumina. However, clay is also rich in metal elements such as alumina, and it can also withstand high temperatures, and the effect is similar.

The feldspar and quartz sand used in firing glass and bone china, he still brought it from Dabie Mountain! That's because he had long anticipated that he would not find the same high-quality ore on the Liaodong Peninsula, and he had prepared glass, but now he used it to make bone china and glass as commodities.

In the few days when he was waiting for the stove to dry, Yang Wenli was not idle, he ordered the slave soldiers to find dozens of shipowners and Yang Yiteng, and arranged for them to go to Korea to trade with Japan.

Dozens of shipowners and Yang Yiteng bowed to him together.

"Everyone is exempt" dozens of people saluted together, this scene is very shocking, and what is even more rare is that these dozens of boats have also learned the standard bow salute, so Yang Wenli is very happy, he smiled and said politely with his hands.

Due to the number of people, there were not so many seats in the small hall, so it was impossible for Yang Wenli to let them stand for a long time, he didn't talk nonsense, and directly said the reason why he called them here.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I have called you here today because I have two businesses for you to do, the first is to transport sulfur, lead, and copper back to Dongying, and the second is to transport iron ore back to the Mosan Iron Mine in North Korea.

I will arrange for the army to escort you all the way, and you don't have to worry about safety at sea. However, I can't have so much cash to buy these things, I will prepare two high-end goods, you are responsible for taking them to North Korea and Dongying to sell, and the silver taels obtained will be used for shopping, and the rest will be brought back, of course, you can also buy some daily necessities that we don't have on Changsheng Island, such as needles, threads, brains and other small things. ”

By sea, it is basically to go to a shipload of goods and return to a shipload of goods, so what Yang Wenli said is not a problem if there is not so much silver to buy goods. The problem was that the high-end goods he said made the shipowners present very curious, and one shipowner surnamed Wang couldn't help but ask: "Great Commander, I don't know what kind of high-end things it is." ”

"It is a kind of high-grade porcelain and a very expensive glass mirror, both of which are rare in the world, among which the glass mirror, the people of Xiyi have also sold it to our China and Dongying, but the quality is not as good as my mirror, and the price is very expensive, so I guarantee that it is two very expensive and easy to get rid of the goods." Yang Wenli explained coaxingly.

"In this way, I will thank the Grand Commander for taking care of me in advance." When the shipowner surnamed Wang heard this, he bowed happily and thanked him.

"Don't thank me, I should thank you, we are mutually beneficial, hahahaha!" Yang Wenli shook his hand and replied, and laughed out loud, his words and deeds were arrogant, and he was worthy of being a person who had been in the top position for a long time.

After laughing, Yang Wenli concluded: "Then let's talk about it, you go back to prepare first, and in a few days, you will set off." ”

Yang Wenli gave an order to evict passengers, and dozens of shipowners bowed down and retired.

…… To be continued