Is the smelting process of the Great Sui really as backward as Yang Ming saw in Shimen Village?

No, far from it.

In fact, the craftsmanship of the Great Sui Dynasty was inherited to the Northern and Southern Dynasties, and the iron casting technology and carbon steelmaking technology have matured, and it is completely possible to create high-quality products.

The process that Yang Ming saw yesterday, after repeated forging, extrudes out the impurities in the knife blade to improve the texture of the knife blade, and then repeatedly throws it into the charcoal fire to heat, so that the carbon element penetrates into the knife body and increases its hardness, which is called carbon steelmaking.

Carbon steelmaking is currently the most common weapon material in the Great Sui Army, and civilian tools and instruments are also carbon steelmaking.

The cast iron technology is to start the blast furnace and burn it into molten iron and pour it into the mold, because the cast iron is hard and brittle and cannot be forged, so it can only be made into castings and connectors.

So what is a real boutique?

It is the combination of cast iron technology and carbon steelmaking technology, and the fusion of pig iron and wrought iron, which is steel filling.

It is impossible for this thing to be mass-produced, a real steel-filled treasure knife is extremely labor-intensive, and it can't be made in ten days and half a month.

Many of the real sharp weapons are supplied to the nobles, even if they are for funeral goods, they have to be high-quality products, but ordinary soldiers want to have a treasure knife made of steel, which is a fool's dream.

Therefore, more than half of the current Wenxi smelting furnaces produce the most backward carbon steelmaking.

Pei Zhuang next door to Shimen Village is a blast furnace, and the fired molten iron is pig iron, and the molten pig iron is poured into the wrought iron after firing, and the two are fused to form high-carbon steel, which is a fine product.

The blast furnace set up by Dugu Huaien in Peizhuang is specially used to create high-quality products, and after such a long time, the steel weapons have been added up, but there are only about 100 pieces and 20 pairs of armor.

He is using this place as a testing ground, only seeking refinement, not quantity.

But what is lacking in the army at the moment is quantity, and the gap is very huge.

Yang Ming inspected several villages one after another, and found that it was not a way to go on like this, except for Pei Zhuang burning pig iron in the blast furnace, other smelting kilns were burning carbon to make steel, the weapons made of this thing were very easy to wear, basically cut a few pairs of armor, the blade was almost unbearable, and the soldiers couldn't let the soldiers kill the enemy empty-handed, right?

So Yang Ming planned to open up a new site and integrate all the processes to form a huge production line.

To set up a factory, the first thing to do is to select a site, and there must be water around the site, because it is necessary to use water power.

Peizhuang is the best place, and seven or eight miles outside Zhuangzi is the Shushui River, a tributary of the Yellow River.

So Yang Ming took people to the Shushui River to open up a new site.

Once the new site was chosen, the drawings of the plant were drawn up, which required the involvement of all master craftsmen.

There are eleven craftsmen from the Taifu Temple here, more than 30 people under Dugu Huaien, and 20 people from the Pei family, forming the Wenxi smelting expert group.

These people are all high-level craftsmen who are experienced, skilled in craftsmanship, and proficient in smelting techniques.

In ancient times, craftsmen and masters had apprentices, and their apprentices were either their own children and grandchildren, or the younger generations of relatives and friends, and generally did not accept outsiders.

After all, this is the craft of eating, and if the relationship is not in place, it will not pass on the art.

Under the more than sixty senior craftsmen, there are four or five hundred apprentices alone, and these people are all treasures.

Yang Ming gathered all these craftsmen and discussed the start of the factory in the hall of Wenxi County.

Until now, basically all the craftsmen are complaining about Yang Ming, thinking that this prince is simply playing the piano, you have only been here for a few days, and you plan to abolish all the current refining kilns and reopen a new field, are you playing with us?

Dugu Huaien kept nagging, saying some complaining words in a weird way, and after being reprimanded by Yang Ming, he shut up with a dissatisfied face.

When Yang Ming squatted down and began to draw left and right on a pair of blank oiled paper laid in the lobby, everyone present knew that things were not simple.

Yun Dingxing was also full of complaints at the beginning, but he didn't dare to say it, after all, the refining kiln belongs to someone else, and the family is a prince, which onion am I to give advice to others?

Right now, he was staring intently at the drawings on the ground, his eyes not blinking.

Yang Ming first drew the first step simply, and then looked up and explained to everyone:

"First of all, we must open up a flat land outside the refinery for stacking, screening and crushing ore, and then set up more than ten low-cost furnaces next to it to burn refined iron."

Then, Yang Ming pointed to a position on the drawing and said: "This place is going to have a blast furnace, used to turn refined iron into water, our current blast furnace material is not good, the fire is not well mastered and it is very easy to collapse, you collect some thrushes, silica, pine oil, fire oil, the more the merrier, among them, I will say hello to Yongfu Gong (Dou Qing) and ask him to transfer some, and other things are not difficult to find, so I want to use these things to transform the furnace body." ”

The furnace must withstand high temperature in order to fire molten iron, the furnace body can not withstand the temperature collapse, because of the material problem, the blast furnace of Dasui, often the furnace body collapses, that is, the material is not good, once the collapse will basically die.

The purpose of the blast furnace is to provide wind power, as long as the oxygen supply is sufficient, it can help the fire rise, and the temperature will naturally rise.

Blower equipment also needs to be improved to help increase temperature quickly.

He Yan of Taifu Temple was stunned and said:

"Dare to ask the prince, where did you come up with this method?"

Yang Ming said: "Don't ask too much, according to what I said, go and collect them immediately." ”

He Yan knew that he couldn't ask if people didn't want to say it, so he nodded and ordered his subordinates to immediately start working on these materials issued by Prince Luo.

He Yan is the younger brother of He Chou, who is the same as He Chou, and is now a master smelting master of Taifu Temple, two brothers, one is proficient in smelting, and the other is proficient in porcelain burning, which seems to be not the same thing, but in fact there is not much difference, they are all playing with fire, just like chefs are playing with salt.

These materials are relatively easy to find, among which the thrush stone, that is, graphite, this thing in ancient times, is a kind of pigment used by women to thrush, and wealthy families have it.

Silica is easier to find, that is, quartz sandstone, there is it in Zhongtiao Mountain, pine oil is also easy to find, Zhongtiao Mountain is full of pine trees.

It is that the oil is a strategic material and has to be allocated from the Weiwei Temple, but in the treasury of Hedong, there must be some stocks, and the Weiwei Temple must approve the strips before they can be moved, and Yang Ming's approval of the strips is more effective than the Weiwei Temple, so you can directly let Dou Qing take things out.

Next, Yang Ming began to explain the transformation of the blast furnace.

How high and wide the furnace is, there is a special aspect.

First of all, the height determines the uniformity of the heating of the ore in the furnace, if it is too high, the iron ore below has been melted, but there is no movement above.

Width is the space where the wind force is increased or decreased, so that the ore accumulated above the middle of the furnace can receive high temperatures, which promotes the melting process.

Another advantage of blast furnaces is that they have a large number of shipments.

Among the materials listed by Yang Ming, thrush stone and silica need to be fired, and the temperature of the stone is secondary, as long as it is fired long enough, it can turn into ash.

Therefore, it is necessary to add a few more ash furnaces, first burn the stones, and after the ashes of the thrush stone and silica are cooled, then pour the fire oil and pine oil into it and stir well, as for the proportion, Yang Ming does not know, so he can only let them watch it.

Kerosene and pine oil are binders, the main material is thrush, and the auxiliary material is silica.

The last step is to mix in refractory clay, which is the main material of the current furnace body, that is, bauxite, which the Great Sui calls bauxite.

When He Yan saw this step, he knew that the prince was not joking, this Nima was clearly an unknown craft? Where did the prince learn this?

Yang Ming put down the pen in his hand and said, "The new smelting kiln still needs to take its time, let's shape the blast furnace first." ”

Yun Dingxing was also excited at the moment, because he knew that the prince was not the kind of person who messed around, so in the following days, he asked people to speed up the collection of materials, and five days later, he personally commanded the construction of a new blast furnace on a vacant land that had been consolidated at the new site.

According to Yang Ming's method, Yun Dingxing led people to make several attempts, determined the proportion, and then mixed the ash made of thrush stone and silica with fire oil and pine oil, and then mixed a large amount of bauxite, and began to shape the new furnace with this stone slurry.

Seven days later, the blast furnace was up, eleven meters high and five meters wide.

The new blast furnace looks dry on the outside, but not on the inside, so you need to heat the furnace on low heat to get used to the temperature of the fire.

After three days of baking, it was ready to test the furnace.

First of all, a large amount of chestnut charcoal is added, then refined iron ore is added, and then the air is supplied by a huge blower after Yun Dingxing's transformation.

This time, the main test is the high temperature resistance of the furnace body, to see how high the temperature of the new blast furnace can withstand.

In just one hour, the temperature of the furnace has risen rapidly, and as time goes by, the heat wave can be felt from more than ten meters away.

Yang Ming's method is actually a very simple graphite crucible, limited by the current conditions, so the overall material of the refining furnace is definitely not good, but compared with the original refining furnaces, I don't know how many times stronger.

Testing the furnace is a very dangerous thing, after all, it is a new furnace, and the degree of high temperature resistance is not at the bottom of anyone's heart, and Yang Ming has no bottom.

Such a large furnace, there is a fire watching on the stove table erected next to it, and the vent in the middle of the furnace body is responsible for the fire, that is, to avoid the wind backlog on the bottom of the furnace, it is necessary to keep poking left and right with an iron rod, and there are also operating blowers to send fire, a total of 178 people.

Once the furnace collapses, the lives of these people are in danger.

Except for these people, everyone else is far away, for fear that once it collapses and a little spark splashes on their bodies, they can't stand it.

Time passed little by little until the night was full of stars.

On the high platform in the distance, a craftsman shouted excitedly to the crowd:

"Turning water, turning water."

At this point, it is at least proved that the blast furnace made by the prince's method is no less heat-resistant than the original blast furnace, and it seems that it can be stopped.

But Yun Dingxing was not sure, what he wanted to test was how high the temperature of this furnace could withstand.

According to his past experience, after the blast furnace is turned into water, it is necessary to stop the blast, immediately open the furnace, and draw the molten iron out to reduce the temperature of the furnace body and avoid its collapse.

"Don't stop, continue to supply air," Yun Dingxing took the risk, stepped forward alone, and went around the circle to observe the furnace up close, judging from the fact that the surface of the furnace body was not reddened, it should be able to continue to withstand the high temperature.

Experienced craftsmen also saw that the fire was coming, and ventured forward to see the furnace body.

The timid can't do technical work, as has been the case in ancient and modern times.

After a long time, the craftsmen on the high platform were dried as soon as the sweat came out, and they could no longer bear it.

Yun Dingxing wanted to continue, but Yang Ming stopped him, he didn't want to cause trouble, so he said:

"Let's open the furnace."

Next, several craftsmen opened the bottom of the furnace, and a pool of boiling hot water bubbled out and entered the storage tank that had been dug underneath.

Yun Dingxing was embarrassed, his old face had been smoked like a monkey's ass, he trotted all the way back, knelt down towards Yang Ming, and cried with joy:

"It's done, the prince's method is ingenious, and this skill will be with the prince, for the ages to be admired and worshiped by future generations."

This sycophant, I just transformed the blast furnace, and it will be immortal? You're running out of words, huh? So what other adjectives can you use for what I'm going to do next?

Dugu Huaien stood in place in a daze, looking at the molten iron, stunned, after a while, he let out a long sigh, damn, he even knows better than me?

The craftsmen present were all full of suspicion at the moment, and secretly looked at Yang Ming from time to time, could it be that the palace really hid some secrets of the smelting process?

Otherwise, how would the prince know how to use these materials to build a blast furnace?

But now, no one doubts that the prince is Hu Lai, everyone is convinced, and then people will do whatever they want them to do, and they will definitely not regard Yang Ming as a layman anymore, and they are clearly an expert.

Yang Ming looked around, the new site was still laying the ground, laying a solid foundation, and it was impossible to build a field house without ten days and half a month.

So he took Yun Dingxing back to Wenxi County, planning to think about what to do next.

Dugu Huaien now regards Yang Ming as an idol, people don't call him, he also follows him, he plans to learn from a teacher, or call it stealing.

Wenxi County Ya has been cleaned up, the county magistrate and a Ying official are all working in the county magistrate's home, and his county magistrate was requisitioned by Yang Ming.

In the hall of the county government, Yang Ming frowned and said:

"It's still too long, and it took a whole day to burn molten iron with charcoal, all because of the lack of firepower, and coal should be used instead."

Yun Dingxing frowned and said: "There are many impurities in the coal, which is afraid of polluting the molten iron material. ”

Yang Ming said: "White coal (anthracite) is used, and it is not used in the blast furnace, but in the low furnace where the refined iron ore is used to take its refined iron ore from the miscellaneous ore, the purer the refined iron from the low furnace, then the blast furnace firing time will be greatly shortened." ”

After listening to this, Yun Dingxing frowned and thought for a while, then nodded with a serious face: "You can give it a try, the minister has opened his eyes today, and how to build the kiln in the future is only the prince's order." ”

"What? Listen to me in the future? Yang Ming asked.

Yun Dingxing was stunned for a moment, and hurriedly said: "No, no, no, in the past, now, and in the future, all take the crown prince as the head." ”

My son doesn't have a fever anymore, but he sleeps and snores for several nights, opens his mouth to breathe, and his nose is not breathable.

(End of chapter)