Zheng Sen muttered: "It seems that Hongmao is going to connect with the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and what he is doing is an abusive deed for his assistants. ”

Guo Xu was suddenly shocked and said: "The Manchu Qing that Gongzi said is the inextricable Jiannu who fought with the imperial court outside the border wall. ”

Zheng Sen was awakened by Guo Xu's words, and said with a smile: "I didn't expect you to know about Jiannu." ”

Guo Xu said casually: "The small one has only been mentioned by the big shopkeeper." ”

"Oh, what did your big shopkeeper do to mention the Manchu Qing, could it be that your trading company and Jiannu also have no trade?" Zheng Sen was a little suspicious, after all, the merchants on the southeast coast had nothing to do with the Manchus.

Guo Xu scratched his head and said: "It is the workshop of the trading company that makes the bird gun, and it is said that the rule set by the big shopkeeper is that the bird gun made by the trading company can be qualified through the construction of slave Bai A 100 steps away." The younger one had two friends, who were apprentices in the workshop, and asked the big shopkeeper what kind of armor the white armor was.

The big shopkeeper can't say it, but he just said that Jiannu selects strong and fierce people, wearing heavy armor, called white armor soldiers, and is the vanguard when fighting, wearing two layers of armor, up to three layers, arrows can't penetrate, although the number is small, but the Ming army can't be defeated. ”

Zheng Sen was dumbfounded, he suddenly remembered that when he was in Guangzhou, he talked about the world with Li Zhaoji, that is, he talked about the current situation, at that time, Li Zhaoji said that the thieves and the slaves were both big threats to the imperial court, and Zheng Sen talked about them, it was the head and the way, and now it seems that he is just talking on paper, and Li Zhaoji has begun to plan.

Zheng Sen immediately said to Guo Xu: "Guo Xu, your big shopkeeper has the world in mind, and he will not want to see Hongmao and Jiannu snakes and rats in a nest, you go back to Tamsui and inform Li Zhaoji in detail about Dongzhen, and I will also repair a letter to explain my attitude."

I'm here, looking for an opportunity to pull the red hair. ”

Guo Xu was naturally happy, the moment he heard about Treasure Island, he thought that Fries knew where Treasure Island was, and he wanted to immediately inform the big shopkeeper of Tamsui of the news. It's just that Guo Xu's joy was not shown, he said: "The eldest prince's orders, the small ones dare not disobey, but the little ones have a mission to escort Chen Sigongzi to Fujian to meet Lord Zheng and buy the water flag." ”

Zheng Sen immediately said: "Leave this matter to me, what you do is in line with the rules of my Zheng family, and the Lingqi will naturally give it." This matter is up to me, and this section can also be said to be with the shopkeeper Li, I Zheng Sen will never break my word. ”

That's what Guo Xu wanted, he immediately nodded and agreed, and went to explain to Chen Huaiyu.

Freshwater, arsenal.

He Liangtao was busy during this time, and his heart was even more up, because his nomination for the first-class shopkeeper failed again.

He Liangtao's promotion is completely linked to the contribution of the arsenal, so this is not to embarrass him.

Lee set three goals for him - mass production of long-barreled naval guns, production of army bronze cannons equipped on portable gun carriages, and mass production of muskets.

Originally, He Liangtao was the most sure of the first task, after all, the group of people he brought under his command were themselves good hands of the Bugarao Artillery Foundry, and because the requirements for the artillery truck proposed by Li Zhaoji were somewhat high, the army artillery was still being debugged, and the mass production of muskets was approved with Li Zhaoji's personal inquiry and support.

However, no one thought that in the mass production of naval guns, the craftsmen repeatedly failed to sink into the sand, and the fortress guns made for the Tamsui Fort and the naval guns for the newly launched ships were also missing, and there was no way, Li Zhaoji could only order 20 guns of various types from the Bugarao Cannon Foundry on behalf of Liu Li in Macao, but because of digging the corners of other people's walls, the Bugarao Cannon Foundry increased the order price.

If it weren't for the fact that there were no orders, they wouldn't have cast artillery for the trading company.

Failure in the most confident thing was something that neither Li Zhaoji nor He Liangtao expected, but Li Zhaoji would not make any counteroffensive against He Liangtao because of this, but took the initiative to help him.

Invited all the craftsmen in the cannon casting workshop to the canteen of the arsenal, and everyone sat around the big table, Li Zhaoji glanced at He Liangtao, whose eyes were red and his eyes were black, and said to everyone: "Everyone is called here today to find a solution, not to pursue responsibility.

No matter what people outside say, no matter what you people think, no one in my place will be held responsible. I don't believe you can't do what you used to do. ”

When the craftsmen heard this, they were a little relieved, but in fact, everyone was very worried, at first they were afraid that they would be said to be in vain, and then they were worried that they would be swept away by the trading company and go back to Macao to live a hard life.

You must know that this time is different from the past, at the beginning, everyone still doubted the strength of the Oriental Trading Company and Li Zhaoji's sincerity, but after coming to Tamsui, what they experienced and saw told them that there was a lot to be done here, so they brought their families one by one, and even sold the properties of Macau.

"Today, I ask you to forget your opinions, put aside your personal grievances, and talk openly and honestly with all of you, in my witness. You are the best gunsmiths in the East, and it is impossible for you to fail to solve this problem. Li Zhaoji said again.

Everyone nodded one after another, starting with the eldest, and reviewed the casting process of a cannon to the extreme.

Li Zhaoji demanded that the naval guns must be made of iron cannons, which was also what this group of masters who used to be the Bugarao Cannon Foundry was best at, and in order to seek stability, they did not come up to improve the process like the gunsmith workshop, but chose the attitude of 'the modification of the original design should be cautious', and continued to use the mud fan cast cannon, that is, the lost wax method to cast the cannon.

This is the main cannon casting technique of this era, and the specific method is to make a cannon mold with wax, and then use mud seal to make a clay model.

After the mud fan is dry, melt the wax inside, pour in molten iron, and after cooling, break the mud fan to get a cannon.

Of course, this process sounds simple and clear, and it seems that there is no technical content, but in fact, it is full of secrets that ordinary people cannot grasp, especially the manufacture of mud fans.

The mud can not be too coarse, too coarse it is easy to collapse, but it can not be too fine, if the mud is too fine, the water vapor can not be penetrated, not only the mud fan dries very slowly, but also the cast iron cannon bubbles are more.

Although even apprentices know that it is yellow glue mud mixed with fine sand, and the sediment is eighty-two open, but what soil is used, what water is used, and what time is blended, but only a few masters can master it, and different inheritances have different proportions and techniques, which have never been passed on.

Although He Liangtao didn't know how to cast cannons, he knew the tricks, so he dug up two of the four craftsmen who were the best at making mud and mud at the beginning.

Facts have proved that He Liangtao's good intentions are really precautionary, to Tamsui, the two masters did not find a suitable yellow clay in the short term, it is precisely because of the mud brought that they can directly start to make mud fan.

But the problem is that the most important thing in the mud fan is the dry fan, and the iron cannon of the Oriental Trading Company's arsenal cannot be cast, so the problem lies in the dry fan.

This is the most energy-consuming thing for the gunsmith, because the mud fan needs to be evenly dried inside and outside, which is easy to appear, and the outer layer dries too quickly, but the inside is not dry, so the mud fan may crack, so the mud fan should be ventilated and dried.

If the time is tight, or the weather changes, it is necessary to make a fire to dry, but the use of fire is also very particular, if the fire is hit, the wax in the mud will melt first.

Even if there is no problem technically, the time is very tiring, and with the eight-pounder cannon cast by the current gun factory, it will take at least three months just to dry the fan, and this is still winter.

Therefore, the casting of cannons depends on the weather, but the problem is that all the craftsmen of the cannoncasting factory are freshwater in the first year, and they don't know the local weather at all, especially since the arsenal is close to the big river and not far from the sea, and it often rains and fogs, and the dry fan has become much slower.

He Liangtao had authorized them to dry over fire, but this would melt the wax somewhat, which would significantly increase the rate of scrap guns.

The weather restricts the dry fan, which leads to a large number of clay fan cracks, and each crack of the clay fan can declare a cannon casting failure, and a new clay fan will need to dry for several months.

He Liangtao once patted his chest and promised that before the fleet went north to Nagasaki to do business, the cannon casting workshop could equip each armed merchant ship of the trading company with its own cannons, but now with the scrapping of a large number of mud fans, it is obviously impossible.

"If we were in Macau, there wouldn't be such a thing, it's cloudy and sunny, and we're not familiar with it."

"That's it."

The two masters in charge of the mud fan neatly put the responsibility on God, as if they could not take responsibility and keep their craftsmanship and reputation.

"It's not all because of that." A voice rang out from the corner.

Li Zhaoji craned his neck to look, and the person who spoke was at the bottom of the table, a blond and blue-eyed young man, Li Zhaoji thought carefully before remembering that this young man named Martinez was a Swede, who had been captured by the English fleet, and worked as a blacksmith on the Tamsui, not only making iron parts, but also repairing all kinds of firearms.

It was sent to the arsenal to provide technology for the manufacture of artillery carriages for field copper cannons, because Martinez had made artillery carriages for field guns in Europe, although there were some differences from what Li Zhaoji wanted, but at least he knew how strong the artillery carriages needed to be and what general structure they used.

"Martin, what else is the reason, here you can speak freely." He Liangtao said.

He knew that because of race, most of the rest of the people rejected him, so in front of Li Zhaoji, He Liangtao needed to show more encouragement to him.

"In fact, you've made more than a hundred clay models in the cannon foundry, and I've found that a craftsman can only take care of six or ten of them." Martin said.