"Archduke Franz, there is unfortunate news for you. The rubber you ordered, the Brazilians can't deliver it on time. The situation of the civil war was very unfavorable for them, and the rebels occupied part of the rubber production area, and even used the felling of rubber trees as fuel.

But our rubber gap is also getting bigger. The production of rubber tires for civilian use had to be stopped, and the concentrated materials fulfilled the orders for deliveries by the army. ”

Adjani is worried, as there is a rubber crisis in Austria almost every year.

Although Brazil has been expanding its production capacity since 1839, rubber is not something that you can expand immediately if you want to expand production capacity, even if you invest more money, you need to wait for it to grow slowly, and this is 8-10 years.

In the coming years, Brazilians only found some wild rubber forests, but the total production did not reach 700 tons, while the actual demand for rubber in Austria was more than 1,000 tons per year.

It seems that in order to deliver the order of the military, Franz could only make pneumatic tires come out in advance.

It's just that this time Franz was wrong, pneumatic tires are a big step forward in tire history, but if you only consider durability, solid tires are actually better.

Pneumatic tires are more shock-resistant and less labor-saving, which successfully improves the efficiency of transportation and makes riding a car a pleasure.

In fact, before the invention of pneumatic tires, the inside of horse-drawn carriages was very bumpy. In order to sit comfortably, the aristocracy of the time was often equipped with expensive carriage shock absorbers.

And pneumatic tires are actually more adaptable and maneuverable than solid tires, because solid tires themselves have the characteristics of high elasticity and high wear resistance, which makes it more difficult to control in the face of complex road surfaces, and even prone to the danger of rollover.

But after this operation, the rubber gap in Austria became bigger and bigger, and in order to improve their feelings, the dignitaries threw orders to Franz's factory, and some even started the idea of the army.

To get back to the point, Franz also knew about this situation, but the problem of rubber was really unsolvable, and he even came up with the idea of synthetic rubber in order to solve this situation.

However, the "artificial rubber" project has been like a stone sinking into the sea for several years, after all, the pre-technology is a little worse, but it has played a role in promoting the development of material chemistry.

All Franz can do now is to further expand the area under rubber cultivation, at least to prepare for the future.

At the same time, due to the more and more extensive application of electrolysis in industry, the problem of power shortage is becoming more and more serious, and the traditional hand-cranked generator simply cannot meet the growing demand.

Franz also invested a lot of money in research, but the result was nothing more than a hand-cranked power to a steam lever, which was still very inefficient.

But Nikola Tesla had not yet been born at this time, and even the electromagnetic principles that supported him to complete the alternator had not yet been perfected, and Franz could only use this stupidest way to increase the power.

But fortunately, the invention of the steam turbine did not make the cost of electricity too high.

Of course, Franz did not reduce his investment in the study of electricity, after all, the second industrial revolution was the so-called electric age, and this period was the best opportunity for the Austrian Empire to overtake in the corner.

Adjani then gave some updates on the situation in the Near East.

The Ottoman Empire borrowed heavily and seemed to be preparing to rebuild its navy, but it was still building traditional wooden sail battleships and the artillery was intended to be imported from the British.

But it is worth noting that the wood they used did not come from Russia, but from faraway Spain. It is not known what kind of relationship between the countries is revealed, and how many unknown deals there are behind the scenes.

Egypt's Pasha Muhammad Ali abdicated, passing the Pasha throne to his eldest son, Ibrahim, and successfully abstained from opium.

This came as a surprise to Franz.

But while Mohammed Ali abdicated and passed the place to Ibrahim, Franz was certain that the tyrant must have something planned.

If he really gave up on himself, or if he saw it, how could he quit opium?

Muhammad Ali is indeed a generation of heroes, but even if he has ambitions in the current situation, I am afraid it will be difficult to change the situation.

To the west of Egypt, the Karamanli family's grip on Tripoli has become more and more secure, with the exception of two tentative attacks by Tunisia, where no move has been made.

But since the end of the slave trade, Tripoli's economy has been in a difficult situation, earning mainly from fishing, dates and wool, and the main trade partner is Austria.

However, they did not find oil, but found many other deposits, but at this time Tripoli was extremely poor in infrastructure and there were no precious metals, so it was of no value to mine.

Tunisia is in crisis, as it seems to be the only country in the world that remains independent. But the Tunisian maharaja, known as "Ahmed Bey," like all reform-minded monarchs of his era, trained a Western-style army of more than 20,000 people all year round.

At the same time, a navy of eighteen warships was formed to keep the enemy out of the country, but the largest of them did not exceed 600 tons, and the firepower was even inferior to the armed merchant ships of the great powers of this period.

In the past, Bey did not hesitate to demolish the temple in order to reform, burned the head of the sect who opposed him, and even his eldest son was executed.

But reality dealt him a heavy blow, and that was the defeat of Muhammad Ali. Egypt was far superior to Tunisia in both army and navy, but it lost in the face of the great powers.

Now Bey is in deep proximity every day, often making strange remarks, and diplomatically sending envoys to Britain, France, Austria, Russia, and Turkey to form alliances everywhere.

Opposition to reform grew louder and louder in the country, but they were brutally suppressed by his new army, one of which slaughtered a city of 16,000 people to the point of a blind old man.

Algeria and Morocco were being invaded by France, and the French army was unable to stabilize the situation, despite repeated victories.

However, Algeria and Morocco were also helpless against the French, and the casualty ratio was usually more than seven to one, and what was worse was that France sent warships to blockade the coast, making it impossible for them to continue to buy weapons from Britain, Austria and other countries.

There have even been cases of British merchant ships forcibly breaking through the blockade and being sunk by French warships.

The British Government then sent a note to the French ambassador hoping that he would give a reasonable explanation, but only one person was awarded a compensation of 100 francs.

In the face of the intransigence of the French, in the end the British government had to inform its own merchants not to continue to provoke French warships.

Of course, this was not what Guizot meant, but the French military, controlled by the Bonapartists, who had had enough of the shamelessness and contempt of the British.

This was also recognized by King Louis Philippe, who considered North Africa to be his own as much as Spain. And now the power of France has penetrated into Spain, and even the self-righteous regent has been emptied.

(End of chapter)