At this time, the smelting of iron ore was already underway in the mine.

With the help of explosives and blasting teams, the entire iron ore mine was mined smoothly.

The hardest work has been done by a dozen craftsmen from the blasting team, and the rest of the miners are more of ore carriers.

The entire mine is also starting to run at full capacity.

There was a little hiccup in between.

That is, the molten iron smelted by the newly built blast furnace has too many impurities to forge.

So Lin Chuan analyzed the problem with the craftsmen and continuously improved the blast furnace, and finally the molten iron smelted by the blast furnace finally reached the minimum standard that could be forged.

Among them, it is worth mentioning that Lin Chuan also arranged a part of the manpower to mine an open-pit coal mine marked on the distribution map of transported minerals.

The reserves of this open-pit coal mine are not very large, but it is the closest to the mine in Hanzhong City, so Lin Chuan did not arrange large-scale mining.

If it weren't for the fact that there were too many impurities in the molten iron smelted by the charcoal in the blast furnace, Lin Chuan would not have the desire to mine that small open-pit coal mine.

However, after the use of coal, the new blast furnace not only smelted molten iron that could be used for forging, but also greatly increased the output compared to the previous one.

The miners are also full of energy every day, and they don't have to dig stones and meat to eat every day, how could there be such a relaxed miner before?

After Lin Chuan was able to carry out the mine blasting operation proficiently and relatively safely, Lin Chuan no longer supervised the blasting operation every day, but returned to the city mansion.

Because Chen Yuan, who was in charge of the production base, told him that the clay movable type used in movable type printing had been fired!

So Lin Chuan, who answered that the mansion in the city had a short rest, set off for the production base outside the city.

After Lin Chuan came to the production base, Chen Yuan had been waiting for a long time with the successfully made clay movable type.

"Lord Hanzhong, please see, this is the clay movable type fired according to your requirements!"

Chen Yuan handed the clay movable type to Lin Chuan.

Lin Chuan looked at the clay movable type in his hand, it was indeed made according to his previous requirements, and then said to Chen Yuan:

"Master Chen, have you already done a printing experiment?"

"Lord Hou of the Han Dynasty has already done experiments with straw paper, but the printing effect is not very good, and the handwriting is relatively blurry."

After Chen Yuan finished speaking, he handed the previously printed straw paper to Lin Chuan.

Lin Chuan looked at the straw paper soaked in ink, and it was indeed as Chen Yuan said, the printing effect was very poor.

"It seems that we should try the printing effect with rice paper."

After Lin Chuan finished speaking to Chen Yuan, he asked one of the guards to go back to the study of the Hou Mansion to get some rice paper.

There is currently only one production workshop for straw paper, and the rice paper was brought back from the secret workshop in Xuchang before.

The guards who went to fetch the rice paper quickly brought it back, and Chen Yuan printed it again with straw paper.

"This rice paper is really better than straw paper, not only does the ink not smudge the paper, but the words are extremely clear!"

Chen Yuan sent the printed rice paper to Lin Chuan for display, and said very excitedly.

Lin Chuan, who saw the obvious improvement in the printing effect, finally nodded with satisfaction, and then said:

"Okay, in the future, this movable type printing will use rice paper!"

"Master Chen, I'll send the production process of rice paper to the production workshop later."

After solving the problem of paper for movable type printing, Lin Chuan went on to look at the glass production workshop and the explosives production workshop.

At this time, the glass workshop was able to produce glasses of various formats, but large pieces of glass were still not successfully developed.

Under Lin Chuan's strict requirements and Chen Yuan's careful supervision, there have been no production accidents in the explosives workshop.

After encouraging Chen Yuan, Lin Chuan could finally return to the Hou Mansion to take a good rest.

Now that Chen Yuan is in charge of the production base, Deng Ai and Jiang Wei are in charge of the mine, and Cao Jie is in charge of the Hou Mansion, Lin Chuan plans to spend a few days in the house.

When Lin Chuan was resting in the mansion, he received a letter from Cao Cao.

Cao Cao first said in the letter that he had not seen him for a few months and missed Mr. Lin very much.

Then he said that the rice paper made by Mr. Lin was very easy to use, and Cheng Yu, Jia Xu and others, who had been accustomed to writing on straw paper before, now looked down on straw paper.

In the end, Cao Cao mentioned in his heart when the Hanzhong Chamber of Commerce could set up branches in Xuchang and Yecheng, and if Lin Chuan had time, he could take Cao Jie to live in Yecheng for a while.

After silently reading Cao Cao's letter in the study, Lin Chuan was shocked that time passed quickly, and then began to reply to Cao Cao.

In his reply to Cao Cao, Lin Chuan mentioned movable type printing and explosives, and wrote down the production method and recipe along with the letter.

After Lin Chuan replied to Cao Cao's letter, he got up and came to the courtyard, and found that it was the rising moon of tomorrow at this time.

Every time he looked up at the stars and moon in the sky, Lin Chuan would get a deep peace of mind.

Early the next morning, Lin Chuan, who had slept beautifully, woke up just when the sky was bright.

After Lin Chuan had breakfast, he called the guards to send the reply letter to Cao Cao to Yecheng.

Not long after the escort who delivered the letter left, Deng Ai and Jiang Wei came to Lin Chuan's study.

"Old, old, teacher, the first batch of iron ingots has been produced at the mine!"

As soon as he heard that the mine had produced iron ingots, Lin Chuan suddenly came to his senses!

"Good! What is the quality of the iron ingot? ”

Lin Chuan then asked, and Jiang Wei replied to Lin Chuan:

"Teacher Hui, the material of the iron ingot is relatively average, and it cannot reach the level of 100 refined steel......

Hearing Jiang Wei's answer, Lin Chuan laughed, and then said:

"Shizai, Xiaowei, don't worry that the quality of this iron ingot is not as good as that of a hundred refined steel, and the master didn't plan to use this iron ingot to make blade armor!"

Deng Ai and Jiang Wei heard Lin Chuan's words, and looked at Lin Chuan in surprise at the same time.

"Teacher, if you don't build blade armor, won't this iron ingot be wasted?"

Jiang Wei couldn't help but ask the doubts in his heart.

So Lin Chuan explained the reason for Jiang Wei and Deng Ai.

"The teacher knows that the quality of this iron ingot is not as good as that of Bailian Refined Steel, but the output of this iron ingot is higher than that of Bailian Refined Steel, and it is much higher!"

"Shizai, Xiaowei, you have also gone to see spring ploughing with Weishi, I don't know how you feel in your heart?"

Lin Chuan first mentioned the output of iron ingots, and then looked at Deng Ai and Jiang Wei and asked.

"Old, old, teacher, spring ploughing is going well, and all kinds of crops are growing very well!"

Deng Ai was familiar with farming, so he spoke first.

After listening to Deng Ai's answer, Lin Chuan looked at Jiang Wei again, and did not comment on Deng Ai's answer.

"Teacher, I think that although the spring plowing is going well, the people are really hard!"

After listening to Jiang Wei's answer, Lin Chuan finally showed a smile.