To the east of Hexi is Tianjin, which is close to the sea, to the north is the major mines near Baiye City, to the west is not far from Tongzhou, and to the south there is the Grand Canal to connect all places.

It can be said that this place is a rare and good place with developed water transportation, convenient transportation and prosperous commerce.

Whether it is the raw materials needed to produce glass products, such as sand, lime, alkali and other products, or the fuel coke or charcoal needed for glass calciners, they can be purchased nearby in Hexifu.

As for the technical process of making glass products in this era, it is actually not very high-tech.

It's just that Emperor Chongzhen, a traveler, knows very little about the technical aspects of later generations, and at best he only knows a little bit about it.

He knows a rough idea of the raw materials and furnace temperature for refining glass solutions, but for the ratio of various raw materials, it can only be a secret that can only be mastered by veteran craftsmen who have been engaged in this work for many years.

If you're a novice, you really don't know how many experiments you have to go through, how many failures, and how much time you waste to figure it out.

Of course, Emperor Chongzhen also thought about not relying on any Portuguese or other Western missionaries to promote these technical products, but after thinking about it, he still gave up, after all, your identity is the emperor of the Ming Dynasty, born in the deep palace, grew up in the hands of women, what books you read every day, who you have come into contact with, and even what you have said, are all recorded.

If you have never been exposed to this aspect of things since you were a child, but now you are suddenly able to guide a group of craftsmen to research and manufacture unprecedented modern craft products in the Ming Dynasty, will it seem too demonic?

In any case, now the Chongzhen Emperor would rather give these foreign devils a little bit of profit, and use their hands to gradually promote and popularize some of the industrial technologies of the Taixi countries in this era that are ahead of the Ming Dynasty, and he can't add countless troubles to himself and leave countless troubles.

Located in Hexi, Tianjin, the glass products factory of Luoge United Company began to start the furnace in late May, and at the beginning of June, the embossed glass fired by the first furnace, after polishing and smoothing, was transported to Beijing and the palace by Founder and Zhu Jialiu, the son of the East Factory who was sent to Hexi to be the treasure and the company's resident deacon.

At this time, the flat glass products could not be compared with the flat glass of later generations.

The float glass of later generations did not need to be polished to be as smooth as a mirror, and no one in this era until the manufacturing method of float glass, even in Europe in this era, glass products are first melted with high-temperature glass, poured on a high-temperature plate, while cooling, while flattening and flattening.

In the process of pressing and grinding, there will be a lot of wrinkles and ripples on the glass, and the larger the glass, the more wrinkles and ripples will be.

Therefore, after it has cooled completely, it needs to be carefully sanded, on the one hand, to smooth the surface as smoothly as possible, and on the other hand, to reduce its thickness through continuous sanding.

In particular, in addition to the wrinkles and patterns generated during cooling and rolling, it is sometimes necessary to add various shapes of metal wires, such as gold wire, silver wire, copper wire, and even iron wire, to the glass melt of seven or eight hundred degrees to increase its firmness.

Because for the manufacturing process of glass products of that era, if metal wires were not added to them, large pieces of glass could easily shatter.

Among the metal products of gold, silver, copper and iron, silver has the lowest melting point, but its melting point is still higher than the temperature of the glass melt, so it will not be melted out because it is added to the glass melt.

However, once gold and silver wires or even copper wires are added, the price of this glass product becomes very high.

This is the type of stained glass that is commonly used on doors and windows.

As for glassware for making small mirrors, it is much easier.

Because of the small area, the folds and patterns caused by rolling are easy to be smoothed, and there is no embossing and grain at all.

As for the small pieces of glass required for the production of monoculars, in addition to maintaining purity and transparency, it is especially easy to produce and polish.

This time, the glassware that was transported to the Forbidden City and dedicated to the Ming Emperor included large pieces of embossed glass that could be used on doors and windows, small mirrors without embossing, and simple monoculars and binoculars.

The current Emperor Chongzhen has been accustomed to bright glass windows in later generations, and after arriving in this time and space, even if it is as noble as the Forbidden City, no window has used glass products.

Although in Europe at this time, glass products used on doors and windows have long been popular, but in the Eastern world, large pieces of glass products are rare luxury and rare things, and there is no chance to be used on doors and windows.

Therefore, seeing that Fang Zhenghua led Gotinho and Rodriguez to the palace to transport the large pieces of patterned glass, Emperor Chongzhen immediately decided to purchase this large piece of embossed glass with various patterns and shapes of iron wires from the company in which he was a shareholder, and replaced all the window screen paper on the doors and windows of several major palaces in the Forbidden City with glass windows.

People who visited the Forbidden City in later generations know that the doors and windows of the palace in the Forbidden City were replaced with flat transparent glass, which only started during the Qianlong period, and all of them were imported from Western countries at that time, and the price was very expensive.

Now, not only is it more than 130 years ahead of the original history, but it is also extremely cheap to counterfeit.

Not to mention that Gotinho and Rodriguez originally wanted to open up sales for their glass products by dedicating the manufactured glass products to His Majesty the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, simply saying that the Ming royal family's shareholding in this glass products company has reduced the cost of renovating glass doors and windows in the Forbidden City to the cost price.

Of course, since Emperor Chongzhen wanted to "attract investment" and encourage the development of industry and mining, he could not adopt the method of killing chickens and taking eggs, so he still spent his own money to convert the three major halls, the cabinet, the military aircraft department, the Wenhua Palace, the Wuying Palace, the Qianqing Palace, the Kunning Palace, and the palaces where the concubines lived, such as Cining Palace, Chengqian Palace, Changchun Palace and Chuxiu Palace, etc., into flat embossed glass windows.

The first order of Rogo United Company was from His Majesty the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, and it was 500,000 silver dollars, covering the renovation of glass windows in almost the entire important buildings of the Forbidden City, which made Carlos Gottinho, a Portuguese businessman who came to the East with the dream of making a fortune, and Joe Rodriguez, who had been in the East for a longer time, ecstatic.

In addition to the emperor's own order, after trying out the binoculars offered by Rodriguez, Emperor Chongzhen also asked the Armament Institute to order a batch of monoculars and binoculars from the Rogo United Company, and after the production was completed, it would be equipped as soon as possible with the generals and colonels of the Beijing camp, the guards and the border army of the towns and towns on the nine sides.

In addition to the glass products of the Rogo United Company, the Dias Gunpowder Factory, which is specially produced for the Daming Armed Forces, was also put into operation in Tongzhou Baliqiao a few months ago, and the high-quality granulated black powder produced in full accordance with the standard process of the Portuguese has now become one of the main suppliers of gunpowder required by the Daming Armed Forces.

Without exception, the Baohe Company, which belongs to the royal industry, also holds a large number of shares in the Dias Gunpowder Factory, including the land purchased by the Baohe Company and the factory buildings built, plus the principal invested, the cumulative shares held account for 40%.

The other two major shareholders are Antonio de Capo, a retired captain of the declining aristocracy of Portugal, and Juan Dias, a retired veteran and sailor and veteran gunpowder craftsman.

It's not that the gunpowder factory of the Armament Institute cannot produce high-quality fine granular black powder, but since His Majesty the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty named the granulated black powder produced by the Dias superintendent as Dias gunpowder, Antonio de Capo and Juan Dias, who had long been accustomed to the patented commercial operation of Europe, were soon not satisfied with the positions and high salaries arranged by the Armament Academy.

The purpose of their coming to the East is to make a fortune, and since there is an opportunity to make a fortune, they naturally will not miss it.

It's a pity that Daming is not Portugal, nor Europe, the production of high-quality black powder is now a monopoly of the imperial court, and they just opened the Dias Gunpowder Factory, which is also conditional, that is, all the high-quality black powder produced must be sold to the Ming Armament Institute first.

It cannot be sold to a third party unless it is approved by the Daming Military Institute.

If the quality is not up to standard, the Ming Armament Institute will not purchase it, and at the same time will not allow it to be sold to a third party, then they can only destroy or remix, grind and sift.

For these unofficial or semi-official arms manufacturers, whether in terms of institutional regulations or joint venture equity control, the current Emperor Chongzhen must ensure that they cannot be used by the enemies of the Ming court.

Of course, the high-quality black powder produced by Antonio de Capo and Juan Dias at the Dias Powder Factory in Baliqiao, Tongzhou, is in short supply, and there are no third-party buyers other than the Daming Arsenal.

However, in the near future, there will be more and more third-party buyers, and Emperor Chongzhen let the royal Baohe company take a stake in this small gunpowder factory, of course, it is precisely because of the bright future of the arms business.