I want to be emperor

Chapter 189 Rich and Willful

If the business of Fenghe Commercial Bank and the Baoxiang Army were exposed, the two principals, the uncle and nephew of the Li family, would definitely have their homes ransacked and exterminated, and the other shopkeepers in the commercial bank, the fellows, would most likely die as well.

And the many local officials bribed by Fenghe Commercial Bank in order to open up channels, there is a high probability that they will be punished by dismissal, imprisonment, exile, etc., and even beheaded in severe cases!

Even if he brought his own elder, he would probably be implicated. Of course, as the elder of the Li family, even if he was implicated, he could still protect himself, but it still required a huge political price.

Considering the fact that the security thieves have already stolen the Nanyang Basin, when the news reaches the capital in a short period of time, it is estimated that the Ming court will be shaken, shouting that the security thieves are more harmful than the Eastern captivity...

Under such circumstances, all kinds of strategic materials were sold to the security thieves. The owner’s house was ransacked and his family was wiped out, which was just a guarantee of treatment. Other related personnel could basically escape being dismissed from office, imprisoned, exiled, beheaded, and family ransacked according to their degree of participation or status. .

Its risk cost is very high, which also leads to very high cost of transportation channels.

Under such circumstances, if the Rural Protection Army does not raise the price to a certain level, no one will risk being ransacked and exterminated to sell these things to the Rural Protection Army!

This is the same as Fenghe Commercial Bank. If it is not supported by high profits, they can't afford to take such a big risk to do business with the Township Protection Army.

And if there is no high profit, they will not be able to maintain the same high channel cost!
In this regard, Luo Zhixue is also very clear, even if Fenghe Commercial Bank does not want profits, the cost of channels cannot be saved...

If you don't pay a high price, this material will not come in!

This has led to the commercial firms represented by Fenghe Commercial Bank. After secretly transporting the materials, in order to spread the cost and make high profits to offset their huge risks, they often directly sell the price double or even several times to Baoxiang. military.

It can't be said that they are too black-hearted, but that the risk of this matter is too great. Once it is leaked, it will basically end in ransacking the family...

At the same time, the cost of transporting these sensitive materials to Xiangyang is also very high.

Don't feed the relevant officials along the way, even Fenghe Commercial Bank with a deep background, don't expect to be able to transport these sensitive materials to Xiangyang!
This also led to an interesting imagination. As the Township Protection Army continued to purchase all kinds of high-priced strategic materials, the relevant officials of the Ming Dynasty were also full of food.

The real big boss of Fenghe Commercial Bank, the master of the Li family, has already started spending money on operations and went to work in the capital. The operation is really successful. It may be a little bit short to be a left servant, but a right servant is still qualified.

The magistrate of Hanyang prefecture, who controls the main channel of the Hanshui River entering and leaving the Yangtze River, has sent two groups of people back to their hometown with a large amount of money to buy land in just one month...

These circumstances led to the extremely high prices of the materials purchased by the Ministry of Industry, but they had to bear it. Who told the Township Protection Army that there was not even a single iron ore... let alone saltpeter and sulfur.

In order to reduce the cost of raw materials, the Ministry of Industry has already started to make nitrate by itself through various local methods.

Among the three major costs of the Ministry of Industry, one is construction costs, the other is raw material procurement costs, and the last is personnel expenses.

The expenses of technicians and ordinary workers in various factories are also very high.

Among them, the technicians, that is, the craftsmen are generally treated better according to their positions. After all, they have skills and it is difficult to train them.

A formal salary system is adopted. The monthly salary of junior technicians is more than five or six taels of silver, while the monthly salary of senior technicians can reach more than ten taels or even more than 20 taels of silver.

However, there are relatively few technical personnel, and the expenditure per person is large, but in fact the total amount is not large.

The really large personnel expenses are actually tens of thousands of ordinary workers. Even if the treatment of ordinary workers is poor, the number cannot be supported.

The factories under the Ministry of Industry all use assembly line production in a narrow sense, and the requirements for ordinary workers are not high. The operation of most of the processes can be done after a few days of personal training...

Therefore, when the Ministry of Industry recruits workers, it does not recruit ordinary people, but mainly recruits refugees and extremely poor children.

And the system adopted is similar to the recruitment system, that is, no official salary is paid, and a small amount of pocket allowance is adopted in addition to food and housing.

It is better to say that they are hiring workers, rather than using work for relief. Since it is a work-for-relief model, don't expect much good treatment, and it is considered good to be able to support yourself.

If this operation was performed in later generations, it would be a typical black-hearted capitalist, but in this era, it can make tens of thousands of homeless refugees and poor children survive.

However, the factories under the Ministry of Industry, like the Rural Protection Army, are in a state of large-scale expansion, and the demand for various technical personnel is endless.

As for the technicians in the factories under the Ministry of Industry, in addition to being converted from various traditional craftsmen, most of them were actually trained from ordinary workers themselves.

For ordinary workers, as long as they have a flexible mind and are good at learning, it is easy to get ahead. I dare not say how high they are, but it is still possible to be a junior technician, so that they can get a formal salary.

The huge various expenditures of the Ministry of Industry also have to be included in the military expenses to some extent, so the monthly military expenditure at this stage can reach about 30 taels, and it will increase as the size of the rural protection army continues to expand.

The reason why the military expenditure of the rural protection army is so high is that it continues to carry out wars. The expenditure during the war is much higher than the expenditure for maintaining the army in normal times.

As soon as the cannon fired, there was no ambiguity about the golden ten thousand taels.

----

After the money and food meeting was over, and after learning that the financial system was operating normally and there was no financial pressure in a short period of time, Luo Zhixue sent Chen Xingkai and Huang Chengxuan away.

Next, an industrial and commercial meeting was held. The participants were mainly Yuan Gaofeng, Minister of Industry, Shi Wenbin, Minister of Commerce and Trade, Ding Gangyi, supervisor of Liqingdian Arsenal, and more than ten other relevant personnel.

At the beginning of the meeting, Yuan Gaofeng, Minister of the Ministry of Industry, began to introduce the recent construction and production status of various factories to Luo Zhixue.

"Currently, the Xiangyang Arsenal has started small-scale trial production. However, due to the tight time for construction and training of workers, although trial production has already started, there are still many problems."

"But now the ordnance production task is heavy and tense, so the Xiangyang Arsenal will enter the emergency mass production stage on June [-]th, and will continue to solve various problems while mass production will continue. During the period, there may be a small amount of ordnance produced. Quality issues."

As soon as Luo Zhixue heard that there would be quality problems, he immediately said, "Will it affect normal use? If the gun will explode, it won't work."

Yuan Gaofeng said: "This is not true. No matter how serious I am, I will not send guns that will explode to the front line. The main reason is that the life of the barrel and the barrel will be lower than the standard. The Xiangyang Arsenal is expected to produce The lifespan of the first batch of artillery made in China is only about 250 rounds, which is not as good as the 350 rounds of the Liqingdian arsenal."

Luo Zhixue frowned slightly when he heard this: "250 rounds, a little less, if we really fight, a few large-scale battles will be scrapped!"

Artillery also has a service life. When firing shells, the barrel needs to bear the high temperature, high pressure and corrosion caused by the burning of gunpowder. These will make the barrel more and more fragile. After firing more than a certain number of shells, the barrel will continue If it continues to be used, there will be a great risk of bombing.

For safety reasons, scrapping is required.

If you are really reluctant to scrap it, you must also reduce the charge to reduce the risk of bombing by reducing the power.

The cast iron cannons in the Rural Protectorate had a mediocre lifespan!
There is no way, the smelting technology is not good enough, and the materials are so watery...

The long-tube iron cast artillery produced can still be used, which is already the result of higher precision processing by the rural protection army using large hydraulic equipment.

It would be even more uncomfortable if the life span of the body, which was already very ordinary, was cut off.

Hearing Luo Zhixue say that the life span of the barrel was a little short, Ding Gangyi, the supervisor of the Liqingdian Armory Factory, said: "The barrel life of the iron cannon is still too bad, and it is too difficult to improve. Our factory organized manpower to cast a A bronze cannon."

"Although the cost of the bronze cannon is higher, the performance is superior, especially the life of the barrel will be longer, at least it can reach more than [-] rounds."

"And the processing of bronze cannons is also simpler. We can use the existing large-scale hydraulic equipment for rapid processing to increase production!"

Luo Zhixue naturally knew that the bronze cannon was better.

Especially in the current situation where the technical level is limited, the advantages of bronze artillery compared with cast iron artillery are not so great.

But the bronze cannons are all good, but there is one bad thing: expensive!
The price of copper and the price of iron are not on the same level!

Casting a [-]-jin bronze cannon costs at least several hundred taels of silver
But the current 200-jin iron cannon costs only [-] taels for a whole cannon.

This is several times the cost.

Luo Zhixue had hoped for a breakthrough in the iron cannon technology before, but now, Luo Zhixue knew not to count on it in a short time, and use the bronze cannon.

Immediately said: "Since the bronze cannon has been trial-manufactured, there is no need to hesitate. Change to cast bronze cannons as soon as possible, and cancel the plan to cast iron [-]-jin long cannons after a smooth transition!"

"You can't let the artillery unit have to replace the artillery after fighting a few battles on the front line."

Hearing what Luo Zhixue said, Ding Gangyi, the supervisor of the Liqingdian Arsenal, was also relieved. He presided over the research and development and casting of the [-]-jin bronze long-barreled artillery. This was the first major event he did after he took office as the supervisor of the factory.

Now that the bronze cannon has been recognized by Luo Zhixue, there is hope for him to be promoted in the future!
Luo Zhixue was pondering in his mind: it is not the purchase cost that limits the number of artillery equipment of the Rural Protection Army, but the limited production capacity of the arsenal.

Cannons cost 100 taels or 1000 taels. In fact, the Township Protection Army can afford it now. Anyway, the biggest expense to maintain artillery units is not the purchase cost of the artillery itself, but the maintenance costs of the artillery and the mules and horses that pull the cannons, as well as the expenses during combat. Ammunition costs.

When the artillery production capacity of the arsenal is limited, Luo Zhixue naturally hopes to obtain better artillery within the limited production capacity.

The barrel life of this bronze cannon is more than two or three times that of the iron cannon, and if it is changed to a cast bronze cannon, it can further increase production capacity because it is easier to process.

The addition of the two is equivalent to increasing the artillery production capacity by at least three or four times.

Of course, there was another important reason why Luo Zhixue decisively decided to switch to the bronze long cannon: the rural protection army is not short of money!
Rich and self-willed!
(End of this chapter)