Zhao Ziliang did not understand the technology of ironmaking and steelmaking, and asked Liu Hongyi: "Since pig iron has been refined, why should it be refined?" Is it not long before steel is made directly from pig iron? ”

Liu Hongyi explained: "General, steelmaking not only needs pig iron, but also wrought iron, and wrought iron is obtained after pig iron is refined!" ”

Liu Tianci on the side also said: "Yes, general! The steelmaking method adopted by the villain is the steel-filling method, and the raw materials required for the steel-filling method are not only pig iron, but also wrought iron! ”

Zhao Ziliang saw that the craftsmen were throwing all the pieces of pig iron into the iron-making furnace for refining, and asked, "Why do you use the steel filling method?" What are the benefits of the steel filling method? ”

Liu Tianci arched his hand and said: "General, the horizontal knives and Mo knives used by ordinary soldiers are first cast into knife embryos by the method of filling steel, and the blade is hard and sharp. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 The info steel-filling method has several advantages with other steelmaking methods: first, the smelting time is shorter; Second, wrought iron and pig iron have become steel, and production has increased; Third, it can remove more impurities and improve the quality of steel; Fourth, the operation is simple, easy to master and learn. If you want to get steel with different properties, you only need to adjust the ratio of pig iron to wrought iron. For example, the lower the degree of hardness, the better the toughness of the steel contains fewer impurities, the higher the hardness, the lower the toughness of the steel contains higher impurities, the sword used by the general senior military generals are mixed with these two kinds of steel as materials, the sword, the knife caster is then on the basis of the hundred steel-making and local quenching skills, and then forged by the technique of covering the soil and burning the blade and cladding steel and clamping steel, the specific forging of the sword is not our business, but the swordsmith's business, we are only responsible for steelmaking! But the steel billets we make by the steel-filling method only need to be cut to become semi-finished swords, and the foundries can simply put handguards on them, decorate the blades, and add scabbards to become finished swords! ”

Zhao Ziliang thought for a moment and asked: "So General Ben still needs to find some craftsmen who can forge swords and set up an arsenal to obtain finished knives, guns, swords, sticks and other weapons?" ”

Liu Tianci nodded and said, "Yes, General!" ”

Zhao Ziliang immediately instructed Wang Can: "Use the flying pigeon to send a letter to the side of Broken Leaf City, let Fu Kun and his apprentices rush to Xilin to guard and capture, this general will set up an arms supervisor, let him be the general as the chief eunuch, and be fully responsible for the casting of all kinds of weapons in the weapons supervisor!" In addition, some blacksmiths from the mainland will be selected to join them! ”

Wang Can agreed: "Understand, my subordinates will do it later!" ”

The next day, after accumulating enough raw materials, the steelmaking workshop began to use the method of filling steel to make steel, first melt the pig iron, and then pour the molten iron on the wrought iron, so that the carbon impurities in the pig iron penetrate into the wrought iron, the pig iron becomes steel because of decarburization, and the wrought iron also becomes steel because of the penetration of carbon, and the carbon, silicon, and manganese in the pig iron are equal to the oxides in the wrought iron react, remove the impurities, and improve the quality of the steel.

Zhao Ziliang watched pots and pots of molten steel poured into the sand mold to cool, and finally turned into a handle knife embryo, sword embryo, arrowhead, spear head, axe, these are all semi-finished steel weapons, and he was very happy. These semi-finished products are the finished products of the iron and steel works, and they are later sent to the Ordnance Supervisor for further cutting, processing, and decoration, and they will be turned into weapons, which are used by ordinary soldiers and junior officers, and the weapons used by mid-ranking captains and senior generals will be forged by specialized blacksmiths and blacksmiths.

Fu Kun, a descendant of the Han people that Zhao Ziliang met when he went to the Zhaowu Kingdoms, was that he used a piece of Tianshan cold iron and combined the forging techniques of the East and the West to forge a sharp and tenacious chopping knife to Zhao Ziliang. Now he is taking his lands from Shattered Leaf City to Xilin Guard.

Zhao Ziliang was extremely pleased with the arrival of Fu Kun, and these days under his auspices, an armory supervisor was built next to the steel mill to specialize in the manufacture of weapons, bows and arrows, and some blacksmiths and foundries had been recruited from among the Han people who had migrated over, and as soon as Fu Kun and his apprentices arrived, Zhao Ziliang handed over the armory supervisor to him.

Zhao Ziliang's trust moved Fu Kun very much, and he knelt down and said: "General, the villain will definitely live up to the trust and love of the general, and create more sharper and more durable weapons for the general!" ”

"Good! In the future, you must no longer call yourself a villain, for now that you are a prisoner of weapons, you will be a great eunuch, and you are a person of status, so how can you call yourself a villain like everyone else? Zhao Ziliang said and helped Fu Kun up.

"Yes, the subordinate obeys the order!"

"That's right!" Zhao Ziliang nodded and said: "Our forging skills are not passed on, so we must prevent the leakage of forging skills, so on the one hand, you must prevent the infiltration of enemy countries, and always raise your awareness of prevention." At the same time, it is also necessary to divide the forging technology into a number of processes, each person or each group of people is responsible for one of the processes, and no one is allowed to walk around the workshop of other forging processes, so that even if there are fine works to sneak in, it is not easy to learn a whole set of technical processes! ”

Fu Kun thought about it carefully, his eyes lit up, and he said: "General Gaoming, if the forging skills are really divided into several processes, it can not only effectively prevent the leakage of skills, but also improve the forging efficiency and shorten the forging time!" ”

Zhao Ziliang smiled: "I didn't expect you to discover the mystery so quickly, not bad!" By the way, the production of weapons takes relatively less time, but the production of bows and arrows takes much longer, and some bows and crossbows take a year or two to complete, and once the war is fought, the arrows do not require a huge number, and the loss is the most serious, so the general is wondering, is it possible to make a larger number of bows and crossbows every time, and it must be done non-stop every day, and you are also trying to see if you can simplify the manufacturing technology process, arrows due to the huge number of needs, I think we can make the arrow shaft and install the tail feather process to the local people to do, as long as they are given a unified standard, such as the same thickness and length, the people can complete it at night in their own homes, we set up a point here to buy, how much is a qualified arrow shaft, the people can sell it to us after they make it, I used to do this in Hexi, a month to collect hundreds of thousands of arrow shafts, we only need to use the mold to make the arrow to install it."

Fu Kun said: "These ideas said by the general are very good, they can be adopted and used, and the subordinate will definitely follow them!" ”

Zhao Ziliang patted Fu Kun on the shoulder: "Okay, the matter of the weapons supervisor will be handed over to you, and General Ben will rest assured!" Now we have more than 32,000 soldiers in the North Garden, and the weapons and crossbows made this year must be enough to last for two years, and if they can support two years of war, you can calculate how many weapons, bows, crossbows and arrows you want to make! Also, after the weapons bows and arrows are manufactured, it is necessary to pay attention to maintenance to prevent these weapons from rusting before they reach the hands of the soldiers! ”

"Xia Guan understands!"

Fu Kun said: "General, ordinary soldiers, military leaders and junior captains use the steel forged weapons that we have trained ourselves, and the sharpness is much higher than the ordinary weapons of any country in the world today, but if the blades used by our senior generals can use iron as an auxiliary material, the forged weapons will be sharper and tougher!" ”

"Iron? What kind of iron is iron? Zhao Ziliang frowned and wondered.

Fu Kun explained: "General, iron is produced in the northwest of Tianzhu, Popbin, Persia, there are natural patterns such as spiral flowers, sesame snowflakes, etc., more than 100 years ago, the Persians used it to create a kind of scimitar called Damascus, which is extremely sharp and beautiful, and craftsmen often inlay gems on the handle and scabbard!" ”

Isn't this Uzi steel? Zhao Ziliang understood that what Fu Kun said about iron iron was Wuzi steel, and he couldn't help asking: "In addition to Persia and Popbin, is there also this kind of iron in the northwest of Tianzhu?" ”

Fu Kun nodded and said: "Yes, the output is still a lot, but now Tianzhu is in turmoil all year round, chaotic, the output of iron has been greatly affected, Persia has now become a big food country, and the big food country is now in chaos, so the output of iron in various places is declining, and the price is also high!" ”

Zhao Ziliang thought for a while and said, "Since iron can be used as an adjunct for weapons used by senior generals to make weapons sharper and tougher, then we have to find a way to get them." In this way, there are caravans passing by from Xilin Shou all year round, and you can contact the leaders of the caravans and ask them to find a way to get the iron, and we will buy it at a high price! You can just watch and do it yourself! ”

Fu Kun bowed and said: "The general trusts, and the subordinate will not disappoint the general!" However, the general, as far as the lower officials know, the reason why iron is not because it contains something that contains envoys, but because it is smelted from a container called a crucible, but not all crucible steel can be smelted into iron, which requires special smelting skills."

"Oh? I see! Zhao Ziliang was quite surprised, he did not use smelting technology, he always thought that the Damascus scimitar was forged from special steel containing different metal elements, but he did not want to have Uzi steel or iron because of the unique metallurgical technology.

Thinking of this, Zhao Ziliang said to Fu Kun: "General Ben knows about this matter, and General Ben will find a way to get you the method of smelting crucible steel, and let you smelt iron!" ”

Fu Kun was overjoyed, and said again and again: "Thank you general, the next official will wait for the general's good news!" ”

After Zhao Ziliang left the weapons prison, he immediately found Wang Can and instructed: "If you add iron to the weapon and then forge, you can greatly improve the sharpness and tenacity of the weapon. ”

Wang Can said: "In this case, we can send people to the northwest of Tianzhu under the guise of a caravan to conduct business, and secretly buy the local foundry, so as to obtain the method of iron smelting!" ”

Zhao Ziliang thought for a while and said: "This method is feasible, but there must be skilled blacksmiths among the people sent, and they must see with their own eyes how they smelt iron, and only in this way can they learn the smelting skills." At this time, you go and discuss with Fu Kun, and ask him to send a shrewd apprentice to accompany the caravan! ”

Wang Can arched his hand and said: "The last general understands!" (To be continued.) )