After knowing more knowledge, he immediately felt that his previous ideas were a little naïve, such as the understanding of industry, which is the most obvious example, at least so far, Li Xiang still thinks that he has eaten the essence of industry thoroughly. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 However, after many years, Li Xiang recalled this incident and felt how naïve he was at that time, because although he knew the most advanced technology in the world and mastered the most perfect concepts in the world, he ignored one of the most important factors.

On this day, Li Xiang found Lu Wenxin and prepared to discuss the matter of building a steel ocean-going ship.

Li Xiang said: "Lord Lu, please also tell us in detail about the current shipbuilding and navigation capabilities of the Great Song Dynasty. ”

When Lu Wenxin heard this, he hurriedly told everything he knew, but he wondered why Li Xiang was suddenly interested in the ship. Of course, he knew that Li Xiang had built steam-powered ships when he was in Sichuan.

Because of the four Ming Dynasty of the Song Dynasty, navigation technology entered the maritime age. Merchant ships that usually sailed to the seas had six masts, four decks, at least twelve large sails, and could carry more than a thousand people. It was with such capable ships that the merchant ships of the Southern Song Dynasty sailed all over the world, as far as East Africa.

Li Xiang was silent for a long time, thinking to himself that I already knew what Master Lu said, and it seems that what is recorded in the book is correct. He asked, "If a ship is at sea, how can it be determined?" ”

"Normally, it is mainly determined by the compass, as well as the angle and position of the celestial body and the earth's plane. ”

Li Xiang nodded, and asked in detail about the ship's structure, navigation, load and other details, and Lu Wenxin answered them one by one. A smile gradually appeared on Li Xiang's face, because in his opinion, the current ships of the Song Dynasty were not only much larger in size than those used by Columbus in the New World hundreds of years later, but also had to be superior in navigation. If a sextant or even a gyroscope were to be made, and then the ship would be powered by a steam engine, it would not be a problem to sail across the oceans.

The more Li Xiang thought about it, the more excited he became, and suddenly asked, "Lord Lu, how many shipyards are there in the Great Song Dynasty?" How far is the nearest shipyard from this? ”

Lu Wenxin thought for a moment and said: "There are shipyards in Lin'an Mansion, Jiankang Mansion, Pingjiang Mansion, Yangzhou, Huzhou, Quanzhou, Guangzhou, Tanzhou, Hengzhou, etc. At present, there are three shipyards in the Great Song Dynasty that can build large ships, one of which is in Lin'an, and the other is far away in Guangzhou and Fuzhou. ”

Li Xiangxi said: "Since this is the case, let's go to see the Lin'an Shipyard today!" ”

The shipyard is built along the coast, a long way from Lin'an. It was nearly afternoon when Li Xiang and Lu Wenxin arrived. The two got out of the car, and Li Xiang looked from afar, only to see that the shipyard was very large, and there were large tung oil trees and palm trees planted around it, which were the best timber for shipbuilding.

The person in charge of the Lin'an Shipyard is named Zhao Hun, and he has already reported that Master Li and Master Lu are going to come to check, and they have been waiting for a long time, so they happened to accompany Li Xiang to make some introductions.

At this time, a big ship was launched, and Li Xiang and Lu Wenxin obviously came at the right time. Zhao Hun said: "Lord Li, this ship has 12,000 materials, the length of the ship is 26 zhang, and the ship can also open a garden to grow flowers and vegetables, there are hundreds of sailors alone, and the ship can store a thousand people's food and water for nearly four months." ”

Li Xiang was taken aback when he heard it, in his memory, it was not until the Ming Dynasty that there was a twenty-five-zhang boat, could it be that he remembered it wrongly, or that the size unit conversion was wrong? Although I can't figure out some of the weight units of shipbuilding, I remember the length clearly.

Lu Wenxin whispered on the side: "My lord, the carrying weight of this ship is about one million catties, that is, about four hundred tons. ”

Li Xiang was shocked again, although he had already known these data, but now that he heard someone say it himself, he felt something else, and hurriedly asked, "Lord Zhao, how long will it take to build a ship like this?" ”

Zhao Hun said: "It will take about two years to build a ship like this. In the case of warships, it will take longer to install weapons such as trebuchets and fire crossbows. However, because there are many shipyards in the Great Song Dynasty that can build this kind of ship, and each shipyard has multiple ships being built at the same time, nearly 100 such ships are launched every year. If you include the other smaller ships, a total of nearly 10,000 ships can be built every year. ”

Li Xiang hurriedly said: "Lord Zhao said in more detail. ”

Zhao Hun nodded, thought for a moment, and continued: "My lord, in fact, more than a hundred years ago, the shipbuilding capacity of my Great Song Dynasty was far ahead of other countries. At that time, in order to transport a large amount of grain from Jiangnan to Kaifeng through the canal, the court built a large number of boats, which had a dynamic load capacity several times more than that of Fu ships. Known for their sturdiness and capacity, the Great Song Dynasty was able to withstand the waves of the deep seas thanks to improvements in the design and construction of its vessels. Today's sea ships are the best in Fuchuan, and the reason why Fuchuan gets its name is precisely because of the high-quality shipbuilding wood that is abundant in Fujian. Since the court moved south, because the Jin Kingdom was eyeing the north, a large number of warships were built every year to guard the river, that is, the Yangtze River. ”

Li Xiang said: "In this way, there should be many ships built by the court every year. ”

Zhao Hun said: "What my lord said is that the court builds nearly 3,000 warships of various types every year, and of course some warships withdraw from the army. Wherever the waterways were convenient and timber was abundant, the court would set up official shipyards. For example, several shipyards on the Jianghuai Fourth Road are capable of building more than 2,000 ships every year, and some shipyards are even larger, such as the three shipyards of Hongzhou, Jizhou, and Ganzhou, each with more than 200 soldiers, and can build one warship a day. In addition, the private shipbuilding industry is also quite advanced, and the technology used by it is not inferior to the official one, so that some people say that official shipbuilding is not as refined as that built by private people. ”

Li Xiang nodded slightly, thinking: Since the Southern Song Dynasty wants to carry out ocean-going trade, there will naturally be no shortage of ships. However, there are not many ships that actually arrive in Africa for the so-called ocean trade, and it is estimated that most of them are active in South Asia. In this way, no matter how many ships there are, if they do not have the ability to go to the sea, they are not very useful, and he asked: "I don't know what about the kind of lucky ship that Lord Zhao said, or even a larger ocean-going ship?" ”

Zhao Hun said: "In fact, the Fu boat is not a certain kind of ship, but the wood used in it is produced in Fujian. However, most of the ships are large boats, and some small boats, even if they are still made of wood from Fujian, are not classified as lucky boats. The ocean-going ships that the adults just mentioned are actually much larger than the smallest lucky ships. At present, shipyards across the country can manufacture more than 200 large ships of more than 5,000 stone per year, of which half are more than 10,000 stone. The sharp bottoms of these boats allow for a very deep draft, which in turn increases the boat's ability to resist wind and waves. In addition, seagoing vessels adopt a compartment design to reduce the danger caused by the cabin entering the water, and its long-distance sailing ability is naturally also good, so most ocean-going merchant ships use this kind of sharp-bottomed lucky ship. As for the routes of these merchant ships, there are currently more than 50 countries such as Champong, Chenla, Sriwijaya, Kelantan, Boni, and Balinfeng, and the farthest of these countries can be realized in less than half a year. (To be continued.) )