stubborn thief

Chapter 531
Liu Chengzong can always come up with some effective but weird ideas.

For example, the track carriage, but how to build the track?Liu Shizi didn't know that this great task fell on Liu Chengyun's shoulders again.

This hurt Chengyun's little brain, he didn't understand it even with his second brother!

Thousands of years later, no one knows what the track of the Qin Dynasty was, but Liu Shizi conservatively estimated that with this track running through Hehuang, their food consumption should be reduced by half.

Chengyun laughed when he heard this, and he said, second brother, you are too conservative, as long as you want to solve the problem of road consumption in Hehuang, even without this track, you can still reduce the road consumption by half.

Chengyun has been in charge of the grain collection, transportation, production and construction of the five towns of Hehuang. No one in the entire Marshal's Mansion knows better than him what problems exist in the Hehuang Valley.

Nowadays, it has become a common policy to average land and buy taxes in the Hehuang Valley. The production capacity of this land has also been fully developed. The melted water from the snow-capped mountains can guarantee the harvest from drought and flood. The grain harvested every year has been set. Ten thousand stones make food.

If raw grain is expropriated, it will be 37 shi.

Among them, 28 stones are fixed and come from [-] hectares of fertile land in the Hehuang Valley, and the remaining [-] stones come from [-] hectares of soil fields in the Hehuang Mountains.

Although more and more indigenous people living in mountainous areas are registered as householders, the output of mountainous land itself is very low, and even less can be exchanged for commodity grain for daily use. Therefore, although there is more land, there is still less output, but on the other hand, the mountain people are not restricted in planting crops, so it is also an important source of materials such as horse grass, medicinal herbs, and timber in the Marshal's Mansion.

There is a lot of empty consumption of these grains in the process of collecting them into the warehouse and making them into military rations. This is a historical problem brought about by Liu Chengzong and others.

The predecessor of Marshal's Mansion was a lone army wandering to Qinghai, occupying a barren land with nothing, facing the enemy's environment, everything had to be planned from scratch.

Under the environment they faced at that time, cost was not an issue they had to consider at all, and the cornerstone of all production construction and planning was safety.

The government office and market in Xincheng, the Riyueshan Iron Works, the Juerwan Baigong Bureau as a handicraft base, the Xincheng Academy, the warehouse in Xining City, the Naval Yamen Military Food Processing Factory on the north shore of Qinghai Lake, these military fortresses All lands are built on the westernmost side of the Hehuang Valley.

After all, at that time, no one dared to put the warehouse on the bank of the Yellow River in Lanzhou, or the Nianbosuo, which was not under their control at all.

The policy of equalizing land and buying taxes in the entire Hehuang Valley also revolves around these places. The money comes from the Marshal’s government office, and the daily necessities are produced in the Baigong Bureau. After the grain is finished, there is a small road consumption for transporting the grain and grass to the five towns.

The five towns then transported the grain and distributed the daily necessities of the Baigong Bureau back to the warehouse in Xining for storage, and then sent it to Qinghai Lake for processing in Xining. It was not a big problem in the past. When the army rations arrived at the Naval Yamen, the army was not going to the Heka grassland. It is to go to the east of Hehuang to fight, and it is very close to transport grain back and forth.

But it’s different now. To the west of Xining, there is no need to transport food. Even if they go on an expedition to Yarkand or support the Tianshan Mountains, they will not be able to transport food. Lintao Gongchang thousands of miles away.

Take Dongguan Town at the easternmost end of Hehuang as an example. It takes five hundred miles to transport a grain of grain from here to the Navy Yamen; it takes another five hundred miles to process it into military rations from the Navy Yamen and transport it back to Lanzhou. Nothing happens. Just go out for a thousand miles.

This is also the reason why Chengyun only talked about building roads in Hehuang and not Qinghai Lake. He suggested that Liu Chengzong split up the Navy Yamen and leave only a department for handling salted and smoked fish. Other personnel and technology for processing military rations should go east. move.

Liu Chengzong considered this suggestion very carefully. He proposed to build the Xilan track. It was indeed a whim, but after listening to Chengyun's analysis of the Hehuang Road consumption, he was really firm in his idea of ​​​​building the track.

The administrative system of the Marshal's Mansion must be moved to Lanzhou. Some things, such as government officials and official documents, are easy to move; but some things, such as iron factories, mines, and military bureaus, are not easy to move.

But if these departments don't move eastward, all the military supplies of the Marshal's Army will have to be transported thousands of miles away, and the price will be too high.

But if you really firmly believe in the idea of ​​building a track, all the difficulties in front of you.

Leaving aside the track for the time being, even if the Marshal's Mansion repairs the track, no vehicle can run on it except the cannon carriage.

Because Liu Chengzong is a scavenger, whether it is a chariot or a baggage cart, military or civilian, he picked up all the vehicles except the artillery cart.

The cannon carriage with only the jack cannon was made by the Marshal's Mansion itself, but even for the cannon carriage, the wheelbase, wheel width and carrying weight did not have uniform specifications.

This is really a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Liu Chengzong did not expect that he would start from the step of designing the vehicle when he casually mentioned the construction of the track. This is a very professional matter. I invited the teacher to become me.

He and I are both laymen in carriage design, but what they both have in common is that they both know the importance of design in terms of creation.

Liu Chengzong is a person who is good at using knives, and he is also a person who likes to hide knives. Almost every time he fights, he will choose a few good knives from the trophies and send them to the marshal's mansion for hiding.

But the saber he carried on his body, even though he had changed to better equipment, the blade would always be the standard Yanling official saber made of ordinary materials.

The quality of the standard blade is very average, and the processing technology of the blade blade is also very common, but it has an advantage that the technology and material can never be replaced, that is, the design is reasonable.

The most important thing about a weapon is the center of gravity. Only when the center of gravity is right can you use it in your hand, and you can kill people when you use your hand, and to kill, you only need a knife.

A good carriage is like a good knife. The material is important, but the design is more important. A good design can run faster and farther without adding extra load to the horse. Only when this step is done well , are qualified to talk about materials and quality.

Designing a general-purpose two-wheeled carriage chassis, Shicheng, I was overjoyed when I heard about it—thanks to Liu Chengzong who said it early!
The Armament Bureau under the Marshal's Mansion is currently doing this job. Ever since I received that the caravan sent by Oirat from Tianshan is already on the way, Shicheng and I have received complaints from Liu Chengyun and others about the lack of vehicles in the Marshal's Mansion.

The Marshal's Mansion uses troops everywhere, and the level of mules and horses is very high, and they don't build carriages. It's no wonder that the vehicles are enough just by capturing them!

Not to mention that before Liu Chengzong's expedition to Gansu, he gave Gongya an order to move the rocket launcher box to the chariot, saying that he would deploy the whole army. More than 100 of them were originally ready, because the carrier had to pull the goods, and he Remove the rocket launcher and get rid of the cargo.

Shi Cheng, I originally wanted to design a two-wheeled carriage that could carry guns, transport artillery, load rockets, transport supplies, and even install baffles in the field to temporarily modify simple fortifications.

Now that Liu Chengzong mentioned this matter, it is nothing more than a number of wheel width and axle length. For Shi Cheng, I just opened my mouth and said: "Back to the commander, the work has already been done, and the axle is four feet three Inch, but the wheels are different now, there are wooden wheels and iron wheels, and wooden shafts and iron shafts, it is completely possible to set a rule for the wheels."

Liu Chengzong knew that the iron shaft and wooden shaft and iron wheel and wooden wheel were all prepared for the cannon.

The iron shaft is a forged iron shaft, but the iron wheel is not pure iron, it is wrapped with an iron sheet around the wheel. At present, the weight of their jack cannon is not as high as that of an iron wheel made of pure iron.

Liu Chengzong nodded and said: "It will be much simpler in this way, and the wheel width regulations suitable for various occasions can be made, and the experimental track can be put into use. A single carriage carries [-] to [-] kilograms, and a double carriage carries [-] kilograms." to [-] catties."

Cheng Yun and Shi Cheng, I heard this number, and both of them couldn't help frowning slightly.

Carrier asked: "Brother, is this the most you can carry?"

In fact, this number is not small. A single-horse carriage with a load of [-] catties is the specified cargo capacity of a single-horse carriage currently in service in the Marshal’s Mansion. Of course, it can carry more cargo. The heavy soldiers who drive the carriage often sit on the carriage, but the horse must be more tired. .

As for what Liu Chengzong said about the two-horse carriage weighing [-] catties, the Marshal's Mansion would not normally carry such a heavy load except for pulling cannons.

Chengyun felt that Liu Chengzong's statement was low because this number was the cargo capacity of a carriage traveling on dirt roads and grasslands.

He doesn't know rail carriages, but he knows horse carriages very well. The weight of horse-drawn goods is not constant, and it has a lot to do with the towed vehicles, mileage, and road conditions.

A long-distance march in the field, without rest for days, is considered a lot if the horse-drawn cart and mule cart can pull [-] catties of goods, especially when traveling in a hurry, it is considered heavy duty to carry [-] catties on the cart; but for short-distance freight, it is considered heavy duty to pull [-] catties. Grassland and land conditions.

If it is changed to a hard road, although it is not good for the horseshoes, the vehicle will travel briskly without the bumps. On the contrary, it can pull heavier loads and travel longer distances.

There is a section of gravel road in Xining Fucheng. On such a flat road, let alone horses, the chieftain soldiers of Bajiao City chieftain Chen Shiwen can drag seven to eight hundred catties of grain all over the ground alone with a flatbed cart tied to a belt, but in exchange for On the dirt road, three people had to push and pull to get back to the chieftain's territory.

The wooden track they want to repair now, in the understanding of the carrier, is to use limited costs to follow the ruts and repair the road conditions for horse-drawn carriages to the best condition-they are all paved with elm rails, so smooth.

Not to mention the wooden flat road, even if it is an official road, it is still a variety of small soil slopes and pits with potholes. If you walk outside, you will never meet a flat road.

In the understanding of this kind of road, once it is paved, a Hexi horse should drag two thousand catties of goods out no matter what.

"Of course it's low."

Liu Chengzong explained with a smile: "If our track is only a dozen miles long, and it is covered with iron sheets, I think it will be fine even if a horse pulls three thousand catties, but it needs to be repaired for four hundred miles. If the horse runs for an hour and a half, it will lose its strength, and if it loses its strength, it will have to change horses."

"This track is for transporting armaments. We can build more cars if we transport less. We have no shortage of horses or cars, but slow transport will not work."

Liu Chengzong waved his hand to the east on the map as he said: "Once the war started over there, the goods would have to travel four to five hundred miles to cross the Yellow River. They were all heavy vehicles. What if there are not enough front-line vehicles?"

Carrier suddenly realized that he didn't want to fight the war, he was only thinking about transporting goods, but then he asked: "Then the two sides of the Yellow River should also build a wharf together. The track is completed and the cargo can be transported quickly. The small wharf is not enough right now." make."

As he spoke, he tilted his head: "Do you want to build vehicles in Lanzhou? If not, you can build heavy vehicles in Hexi to transport goods on rails; and light vehicles in Hebei to supply military supplies. Anyway, when the goods reach the shore, they have to be unloaded and loaded on ships. Just two sets." What are the rules?"

"That's what you said."

Liu Chengzong nodded slowly, but then he shook his head and rejected the suggestion, and said with a smile: "It's still a set of rules. If the track in Hehuang is good, we will build the track wherever we go in the future! When Hehuang really becomes After the rear, it is not too late to build another set of heavy vehicles under the regulations.”

"That's a lot of money."

Chengyun clicked his tongue secretly, took out a small abacus from his waist, and began to fight, saying: "For four hundred miles, there should be two north and south, one from west to east, and one from east to west, otherwise the carriage will crash; The Riyueshan Iron Works has the ability to connect the strips together, but there are too many uses for the iron materials at the moment, and it cannot be laid on the ground."

"Only the elm rail that the second brother said is based on one material and one square foot, and it is calculated as one mile and eighteen materials. If a road of four hundred miles is paved, it will be 40 materials; Waterproof and anti-corrosion, this is just labor and materials, and work food is counted... It is estimated that such a large project will consume [-] manpower."

40 workers, Liu Chengzong pondered: "The total amount is not bad, what is the calculation?"

A worker works one day for one job, and 40 jobs sounds like a huge amount, but in fact, after one year, the cost of work and food is equivalent to the cost of raising soldiers for a thousand headquarters.

But in fact, Liu Chengzong's Marshal's Mansion didn't have such easy-to-support soldiers. After all, hired workers didn't need to raise war horses. For Liu Chengzong, there was nothing more expensive in the world than feeding a huge army.

Of course, the cost of raising soldiers was never paid by him. The wool came from the sheep, and he was a sheep brain if he died. The soldiers were raised by nearly a million people in the Second Mansion of Xikang.

Chengyun finally checked the calculation on the abacus and confirmed that the calculation was accurate, so he said confidently: "500 people, four hundred miles, one mile in two days."

"It's a little slow, but it's faster."

Liu Chengzong secretly calculated in his heart that according to this progress, the road would take more than two years to build. Anyway, the total amount of work is the same, so he opened his hands and said, "2000 people, four hundred miles, two miles a day."

"Hehuang has heavy agricultural work, and the winter is too cold. The whole road starts from Xining and ends at the mouth of the river. There are twelve sections in the middle. Ten horse stations are set up in the five towns of Hehuang. There are responsibilities for changing horses and repairing cars, and at the same time. It is also used as a market town market for five towns and twenty township protections."

Although the load capacity of the wooden carriage track is far less than that of laying sleepers, it is also impossible to travel the [-]-mile long track in one line. After all, the four-hoof engine is not a steam engine, and the steam engine can run all the time, but the horse will be tired.

Firstly, there is a need to change horses, and secondly, there must be time and place for loading and unloading goods and cleaning the track, so no matter how long the track is, it must be repaired section by section.

"Even with 2000 people, this road will definitely not be available until next winter or even next spring."

After saying this, Chengyun sighed and said, "At present, the Shuai's mansion does not have enough materials in stock, so we can only do a section of [-] to [-] miles first, and try the situation."

"What's more, brother, I think we still need to find a special person for this matter. I am in charge of the household office. This is a matter for the work office. Why not set up a special department in the work office and appoint a chief envoy."

Liu Chengzong nodded slowly, then said: "In this case, according to what you said, set up a road policy department under the Gongya, and find a reliable person from among the few students who built the reservoir to take charge of this matter."

Speaking of this, Liu Chengzong suddenly became interested, and said to Chengyun and Shicheng: "Now that my brother has gone to Tianshan, there is no one to take care of the military affairs for the time being. Besides, there is no one in the ceremonial office. What do you want to do about this matter?" Think about it, who is right for you?"

Shi Cheng, I thought about it for a while, but I couldn't figure out a suitable candidate, until I saw Liu Chengzong's eyes looking over me, and then I asked: "Marshal, how about that Bai Yiqing from Gansu?"

"That guy is chanting scriptures in the Ganzhou Temple. He must be strong enough, but this will make him the head of the ceremony. It doesn't matter what happens in the marshal's mansion. It's a one-off when it comes to the court. Find a chance. If you let go, you may even write a book about escape from danger in Beijing."

After Liu Chengzong finished speaking, he quickly waved his hands: "No, no, think about it again. If you want to be able to receive vassal envoys, take charge of internal and external rituals and music, and understand the affairs of the imperial court and the peasant army... huh?"

Before he finished speaking, he heard Chengyun say: "Brother, I think of someone, see if it's okay."

"Who?"

"Zhang Xianzhong."

　good afternoon!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)