Early the next morning, Lao Li got up early, first washed the horses pulling the cart, and then wiped the carriage clean as new, and then ate with other people.

So Lao Li soon drove the carriage around the front of the gate!

After a while, I saw Song Chaojiang striding out with a leather briefcase, and after getting into the car, Song Chaojiang said: "Let's go!" ”

Shanghai Shipyard is large in scale, with many employees, and limited by historical factors, there are two factories in Shanghai Shipyard, one is the main factory area located on the north bank of Suzhou Creek, which is also the headquarters of Shanghai Shipyard, and the second is located in Baoshan Branch near Songhu Fort, also known as North Shore Dock and Baoshan Dock.

The North Shore Dock is the main shipbuilding base of the Shanghai Shipyard at present, with four large-tonnage dry docks, small and medium-sized docks and slipways, in addition to the construction of warship accidents, in fact, the North Shore Dock builds the most is all kinds of civilian ships, the factory basically covers half of the domestic ocean-going freighters, passenger ships.

Baoshan Dock is just in the construction stage, its first dock was completed last year, and the future dock is also a large tonnage, its intention is more obvious, that is, to build large-tonnage ships, including 10,000-ton ironclad ships and follow-up civilian large-tonnage ships.

Whether it is the main factory or the Baoshan branch, it is huge in scale and covers a vast area!

After crossing the Suzhou Creek Bridge, the carriage of the Song Dynasty River went all the way north, and then continued along the road along the river, passing through most of the industrial area on the north bank before entering the factory area of the Shanghai Shipyard.

After entering the factory, Song Chaojiang first went to the office and summoned several of his subordinates. Now the construction of the new warship is about to begin, and Song Chaojiang, as the general manager of the project, has too much work to do.

In the morning, he met with people and held meetings, and in the afternoon, Song Chaojiang personally led people to the No. 2 dock for inspection. The main thing is to understand the affairs after the expansion of the dockyard, and there are some new large-scale equipment.

Immediately afterwards, he left the factory directly, and then went to Jiangnan Mining Company.

The headquarters of Jiangnan Mining Company is not located in Nanjing or Dangtu, but on Bund Avenue, where it has a five-story brick and stone building, next door to the Shanghai branch of the Royal Bank on the left, and the new headquarters of Xinde & Co. on the right.

The nearby section of Bund Avenue is densely packed with twenty or thirty large enterprises and government administrative agencies. All the large enterprises that can be called in China are always headquartered here, even if the headquarters is not here, but there must be one of the most important branches here.

This stretch of the Bund Boulevard, which is one or two kilometers long, stretches on both sides with the former British Concession as the core, bringing together most of the deadly enterprises of the contemporary empire.

Unlike the Shanghai Shipyard, which is headquartered in the North Shore Industrial Zone, Jiangnan Mining Company is a national mining enterprise with large and small mines across the country. So when it comes to choosing a corporate headquarters, there's no better place to do it than Shanghai.

Song Chaojiang came to Jiangnan Mining Company. Naturally, it was not because the headquarters building of the Jiangnan Mining Company was on his way home that he would stop by, but he came this time with a very targeted goal, mainly to talk to the people in the coal and iron department of the Jiangnan Mining Company about iron and steel for shipbuilding.

The wrought iron and steel used in shipbuilding are not only in large quantities, but also have relatively high quality requirements, and the steel produced in those small workshops cannot be used at all. Now the best quality steel produced in China is naturally the product of Jiangnan Mining Company.

However, the steel output of Jiangnan Mining Company is also limited, because the output of raw steel is only tens of thousands of tons, and there are more places waiting for steel to be used throughout the country.

If the new warship is forced to stop work due to a shortage of steel during the construction process. But it's not a good thing, so this time Song Chaojiang came over to talk to a few senior officials of the Jiangnan Mining Company, so that they could ensure the steel needs of the new warships as much as possible.

"It's easy to say that this wrought iron is more and more, although there are other orders pressing, but squeezing it, it can still be squeezed out for you!" The person who spoke to Song Chaojiang was the deputy manager of the steel sales department of the Jiangnan Mining Company, an old man in his fifties and sixties.

"But steel, I'm afraid it's a little troublesome, you know, now not only our Jiangnan company, but also several other companies in China produce not much raw steel, the whole country adds up to only tens of thousands of tons, and now there are many companies that use steel, I'm afraid it will be a little difficult at that time!"

Song Chaojiang secretly said in his heart, this is not nonsense, if it is not difficult, I will come and talk to you in person!

The domestic raw steel production of the empire is not high, well, to be precise, the output of raw steel is not high on a global scale, as strong as the United Kingdom, it is only a few hundred thousand tons of raw steel production a year, except for the United Kingdom, other countries are basically less than 100,000 tons.

And the benefits of steel are known to everyone, and everyone wants to use it!

Now the empire uses steel mainly in the defense industry and machinery manufacturing, in warships, artillery and even rifles, steel can be seen, in addition to these, there is also machinery manufacturing, for example, some machines are parts that require high strength, when wrought iron can not cope, only steel can be used.

There is a lot of demand, and now the output is small, so the price is expensive, not to mention, and many times you can't use it if you want to!

And most of the steel used now is related to the military industry, the warships manufactured by the Shanghai shipyard cannot be towed, but the artillery and guns and other weapons produced by the Royal Arms Company can also not be delayed!

In the face of this situation, Jiangnan Mining Company is a royal enterprise on the one hand, has an unshirkable political task, on the other hand, it is also driven by profits, you must know that the price of steel is so expensive now, and being able to produce more steel represents more profits.

Therefore, in recent years, Jiangnan Mining Company has been trying to introduce or independently improve technology to expand the output of steel. For example, the alkaline open-hearth steelmaking method has been tested and studied, but the French are unwilling to sell technology patents, and Jiangnan Mining Company can only conduct its own experiments, constantly try and find out the best method.

Although the current test has not been fully completed, but the ambitious Jiangnan Mining Company is already planning to invest in the construction of a large-scale plant in Dangtu, and is expected to use the alkaline open-hearth steelmaking method, if it can be successfully put into production, not only can Jiangnan Mining Company obtain a lot of profits, but also will allow the empire's raw steel production to be greatly increased, to solve the current shortage of steel.

However, this is all in the future, and now, the raw steel production of the empire is still relatively low, so Song Chaojiang still has to spend a lot of effort if he wants to obtain a stable supply of steel. (To be continued.) )