"In terms of profits, the raw silk business of the foreign firms and compradors in Shanghai was purchased from Suzhou or locally at a price of about two taels per catty, and then sold to foreign merchants at a price of two taels and five cents per catty, and each bag could earn more than forty taels of silver, that is, about sixty yuan.

According to my estimation through the customs declaration data of the Shanghai consulate, in 1844 there were about 6,000 bales of raw silk declared for export, and the total trade volume was more than 2 million yuan.

Of course, this is only the raw silk that is normally declared, and there are many raw silk that are not declared, and you should understand what I am talking about.

However, in the case of Collis, buying at a price of 300 yuan per pack and then selling it at a price of about 400 yuan per pack seems to be too little profit in the middle.

I have inspected in Guangzhou, there are some local silk reeling factories, the raw silk reeling, stretching four or five times and then selling, the weight of the unit price can be increased by more than 50%, that is to say, now selling 400 yuan per pack of silk, after rewinding can be sold for about 520 yuan to 650 yuan, which can be called a huge profit.

Therefore, I would like you to help me build a factory in Shanghai that can rewind raw silk, sell more raw silk at a higher price, and alleviate the financial difficulties encountered by the college and the commercial bank. ”

Of course, Zhao Dagui's above words have a lot of reservations, the price of going to Huzhou to directly buy Jirisi is only one hundred and fifty or sixty yuan per pack, if the Jilisi is rewound and stretched three or four times, it can be sold for a high price of five or six hundred yuan, and it is also easier to sell, and the windfall profits are enough to make people crazy.

Zhao Dagui told the story, but it brought a lot of confusion to the listeners.

Most people have never been involved in the raw silk business, and it is the first time they have heard of the export profits of raw silk, but they are still shocked by the huge profits involved.

It's just that these people are either shipyard workers or academy scholars, and they really don't know what the meaning of Zhao Dagui telling them about this business.

"Brother Zhao wants to buy a special silk reeling machine from a foreigner and set up a reeling factory, right?" Wang Zichao asked uncertainly.

Wang Zichao is also a scholar of the Oriental Academy, and was personally recruited by Wang Tao, and it is said that the two families are still relatively close.

Zhao Dagui secretly observed Wang Zichao and felt that he was smart and studious, but he was very steady in his work, so he hoped to recruit him into this raw silk reeling project team, cultivate him well, and also borrow his ability.

"I have already booked the machinery and equipment for rewinding with foreign companies, and entrusted them to transfer a batch of special machines for rewinding from England or France.

However, everyone knows the current shipping situation, and it will take at least a year and a half to bring the machine back when the news reaches Europe, and it may not be possible to get it in two years if you are unlucky.

So, I mean waiting for the machine to come is one thing, let's not be idle, we should build our own machine for reeling, and deal with it first. ”

As soon as Zhao Dagui's words fell, the conference room was lively on the spot, and the big guys whispered to the people next to them, and the scene became extremely chaotic for a while.

Zhao Dagui let them talk to each other, and after a while, he patted the table and asked everyone to be quiet.

"These Western machines are very complicated, and they are all made of iron, can we imitate them?" Wang Zichao asked in disbelief.

"What's the matter, aren't foreigners' machines also built by hand, why can't we imitate them?" Sheldon became excited, and said loudly: "What foreigners can do, we can definitely do."

Oh, by the way, how do you make this machine?"

This enthusiasm is very good, but the next sentence began to leak out, Zhao Dagui shook his head and turned to another person at the conference table: "Engineer Chen, what do you think?"

This engineer Chen is naturally an engineer promoted by Zhao Dagui recently, surnamed Chen, called Chen Fan, and has the style of the protagonist in Xianxia novels.

Chen Fan was originally from Wangxia County, Guangdong, and his family was good when he was a child, and he studied in a private school for three years.

Chen Fan has worked in the shipyard for more than 20 years, because of his literacy and hyphenation, he is regarded differently by the shipyard owner, and he usually learns Portuguese or something, and often helps the shipyard's Western engineers to draw design drawings and manage Chinese workers.

Before the Opium War, Chen Fan's monthly salary reached five yuan, and he was still a small foreman in a shipyard, which was quite respected, but after the war, the shipbuilding industry in Macao was sluggish, and more foreign ships went to Hong Kong for maintenance rather than in Macau, so he was especially worthy of being laid off by the boss.

After Zhao Dagui bought all the shipyards where Chen Fan worked, he found that Chen Fan was very proficient in all the metal processing machine tools and woodworking machine tools involved in the shipyard, and could also draw and understand design drawings, and was familiar with ship repair and shipbuilding.

Among the Macao shipyard workers recruited by Zhao Dagui, there are as many as eight workers like Chen Fan who can draw design drawings, but only three of them have read books when they were children like Chen Fan and can understand design drawings to some extent, while the remaining five are illiterate, so they can only rely on years of experience and practice to draw design drawings, but they do not understand the content of design drawings.

Now is the time when talents are in the most scarce, Zhao Dagui promoted all three people who can make design drawings to engineers, among which Chen Fan has the highest level, the most qualified and prestige, and is also recognized and respected by the other two engineers, and has the taste of chief engineer.

"If we had a design for the reeling equipment, we might not be able to build a machine using existing lathes and drilling machines.

It's just that we used to build ships and never made this kind of machine. Chen Fan thought for a moment and said to himself.

"Well, here's the trouble. Zhao Dagui suddenly became embarrassed and said: "I don't have a complete design drawing of the reeling equipment in my hand, so I have to design a set of equipment by myself?"

"Ah, how do you do that?" Chen Fan couldn't help but exclaim.

With his ability, as long as he has a design drawing, he can make things step by step, but without a design drawing, it is equivalent to designing a new set of things by himself, which is difficult for a strong man.

"I used to go to the reeling factory in Guangzhou, so I probably knew how it worked, and besides, I had been collecting books about raw silk reeling, and the books I got from the American minister Gu Sheng also had descriptions of modern silk reeling factories.

We should be able to build a usable reeling machine by flipping through the books ourselves.

This reeling equipment is not too difficult, soak the cocoon with hot water from the boiler, and then use the steam engine to reel the silk, there is nothing too difficult.

Our Huzhou silk reeling machine is made of wood by rural idlers, and then it can also be sold with silk, I believe that no matter how complicated this thing is, it is not complicated, we should be able to drive out. Zhao Dagui said with a smile.

"Brother Zhao is right, everything in the world is made by people, as long as you know the general principle, it is not difficult to do, not to mention that we still have a lot of books to learn from. Sheldon is particularly fond of Western machinery, and he couldn't help but be happy to know that he had the opportunity to make a Western machine himself.