After setting up the stove, Fan Jinyan asked the soldiers to knock the stones they had picked up into small pieces and mix them with clay, and after the iron pot was placed, they poured limestone and clay the size of broken silver into the pot and heated it.

After the fire is lit and the iron pot is red, white smoke with a slight fishy smell begins to rise from the pot, which is to remove the water from the clay.

Until he felt the heat wave hit people, Fan Jinyan took the shovel in the hands of his own soldiers, and kept turning the stones in the wok and the clay that had been dehydrated and cracked.

"Can this thing really bake cement?" At some point, Li Yang returned to the courtyard and stood aside to watch Fan Jinyan's clumsy turning of the stones in the wok.

"I don't know." Fan Jinyan shook his head, and said uncertainly: "It's hard to say if the temperature can't be reached, but it's already knocked so small, it should be fine!" ”

Li Yang was full of question marks and puzzled, "You said that the temperature can't be reached, why don't you put the lid on?" ”

Fan Jinyan glanced at him, ignored him, and continued to stir up.

It's such a thin iron pot, if you don't stir-fry, it's strange if you don't burn through.

……

It took a whole hour for the limestone to show signs of cracking.

Fan Jinyan scooped out the cracked stones in the pot, poured them on the ground and hammered them into small pieces, and then poured them back into the pot, stir-fried evenly, and then took the lid on the pot.

Fan Jinyan saw that it was already noon, and then he remembered that he was so involved in the morning that he forgot to eat, "Okay, let's come back after eating!" ”

During this period, the third daughter, who didn't get an answer from Fan Jinyan, still learned about the use of the stones in the pot from Li Yang, and was also very curious, can the so-called cement really be as magical as Li Yang said?

After waiting for an hour, Fan Jinyan asked his soldiers to withdraw the firewood, poured the powdery and gray-yellow cement into the copper basin that had been prepared, and waited for it to cool naturally.

Even at this time, Fan Jinyan still had no place in his heart, after all, he had heard of this thing, but he had never done it himself. Moreover, there is no blast furnace in this era, and the temperature is difficult to reach the standard of decomposing limestone.

It's just that the familiar and pungent smell of cement at least proves that this thing is indeed cement.

In this vacancy, Fan Jinyan was not idle, and sent someone to find more than a dozen green bricks and half a basin of fine sand. He went to fetch half a bucket of water himself.

When it was too soon dark, the hot cement finally cooled down, and with apprehension and excitement, Fan Jinyan mixed the sand and cement together, added an appropriate amount of water, and stirred it into a uniform concrete.

Learning from the way he saw Fan's father laying bricks in his hometown when he was a child, Fan Jinyan put the green bricks together with cement and then plastered the cement on both sides of the brick wall.

When it was done, a brick wall three feet wide and more than a foot high towered over the garden.

The three girls and their soldiers gathered around to look at the brick wall covered in gray-yellow mud, and they couldn't understand what it meant.

Let's say it's beautiful!

It's far from the traditional wall.

Let's say it's solid!

Shake with a slight push......

"Don't push." Fan Jinyan hurriedly stopped Fan Meng, who was shaking the wall, and said with a smile: "It's not firm now, and I won't know the effect until tomorrow morning." ”

……

Early the next morning, a scream resounded over the entire Zhizhou Yamen, coming from the courtyard.

When everyone ran out, they happened to see Fan Meng looking at the cement brick wall in front of him with a frightened expression.

This girl spent the night wondering whether the outside wall would become hard, and she got up at dawn to see it, but she didn't think about reaching out and touching it, and she kicked it, but the wall didn't fall, and her feet hurt terribly.

It's really a god.

After drying, the color of the cement became much lighter than yesterday, Fan Jinyan also tried it, and it was as hard as iron, so he clapped his hands happily, "Now it's okay, let's build houses, fortifications, and docks in the future." ”

Although the cement firing is successful, if there is no high-temperature large furnace, frying in an iron pot is not only time-consuming and labor-intensive, but also cannot form an output, so there is no difference between having and not having it.

In the afternoon, Fan Jinyan asked his soldiers to go to the blacksmith shop in the city to find a blacksmith, and he wanted to build several blast furnaces for burning cement.

When the old blacksmith heard Fan Jinyan finish talking about the size of the iron furnace, he was still taken aback.

Usually these blacksmiths only make a hoe or a rake or something, at most a few swords, which is a big iron furnace as high as a city wall. I don't know if the old blacksmith can't do it or if he is afraid that Fan Jinyan won't give money, but he just doesn't want to do it anyway.

"Are you worried that the official won't give money?" Fan Jinyan said a little unhappily.

"No, no." The old blacksmith saw that Lord Zhizhou's face was not good-looking, so he hurriedly knelt on the ground and explained, "It's not that the little old man doesn't take the job of the adult, it's true, it's really the object that the adult beats consumes a lot of iron, and the little old man really can't make up so much!" ”

This was really unexpected by Fan Jinyan, and he also asked curiously: "Doesn't your blacksmith shop have a place dedicated to supplying pig iron?" Order a batch and you can't get it. ”

The old blacksmith knew that Fan Jinyan had just come and was not clear about many things in Yazhou, so he explained: "Yazhou is not iron-free, it is all in the hands of Lord Tongzhi, and the pig iron we can usually get can only barely be enough to make some small things." Like the adults said, this thing will cost at least several tons, unless the adults go to the Tongzhi master in person. ”

Seeing that He Yi is careful enough, even the pig iron is controlled in his own hands, probably because he is afraid that the common people will build weapons to rebel!

Thinking of this, Fan Jinyan did not embarrass the old blacksmith, and after letting him go, he took his own soldiers to the Li Mansion outside the city.

If Li Tong and Cheng Zhou were fine, they would not normally appear in the yamen. Also, in the Yazhou territory, who dares to point fingers at them

Without a polite sentence, Fan Jinyan explained his intention to a casual home.

Li Tong was also very cooperative, and didn't ask Fan Jinyan what he was doing at all, but after asking Fan Jinyan an approximate number, he asked the servant to go down to prepare, and asked him to deliver it to the door in person.

Fan Jinyan expressed his satisfaction with Li Tong's cooperation, not only wrote another blank check, but also took the initiative to invite him to a gathering in heaven tomorrow night.

Shangguan rarely took the initiative to reveal the meaning of wooing, and Li Tong still hesitated for half a minute, and immediately said on time.

With pig iron, the owner of the blacksmith shop did not shirk it again, and after pretending to shirk Fan Jinyan's deposit twice, he happily accepted the silver and went to beckon the apprentices to come to the yamen to pull the iron, as long as he did this big deal, he would not worry about eating for the next year.

The reason why Fan Jinyan took the initiative to win over Li Tong was not really to win over, but to put a smoke bomb on him, so that he could ambush himself when he didn't have the strength to confront He Yi. What's more, the construction of the factory and the wharf shipyard and many other things can't hide from this small snake in Yazhou. Instead of hiding it, it's better to pretend to cooperate happily