industrial overlord

37 Blackmail
The next day, Zhu Tiejun and his party left the petrochemical machine and returned to Hanhua Machinery Factory in a Jiefang truck.Under the leadership of Wei Dongqi, Lin Zhenhua came to the precision machining workshop and began to work as a translator for foreign expert Ford.

Ford is the after-sales service manager of Spicher in Asia. Although he is only 25 or [-] years old, he is already a senior engineer in the company.In the early years, he has been responsible for the installation, commissioning and technical training of the company's products in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and other places. This is his first time to work in mainland China.

Ford crossed the border from Hong Kong and entered Bao'an, Guangdong, and was invited to board a bus. After a few hours of bumpy rides, he arrived in Guangzhou, then took a train to Jiangnan Province, and then changed cars to Petrochemical Machine.Along the way, the curtains of the vehicles he was riding in were all closed, and the Chinese accompanying him very tactfully advised him not to open the curtains to watch the scenery outside.Out of awe of the mysterious China, he accepted the suggestion and came to the petrochemical machine in a daze.

After entering the petrochemical machine, he gained the freedom to move around the factory area, but he was still discouraged from leaving the factory area.He knew that the owner here did not want him to see the poor side of society. Some American journalists who had been to China had disclosed this point.In fact, there are many rumors about Red China in the United States. For example, some people believe that there are many intelligence personnel in China, who will monitor foreigners on any occasion and listen to their phone calls.Concerned about such matters, Ford made a conscious effort not to discuss anything classified on the phone.

Ford has no complaints about the restrictions he has been subjected to. He thinks the Chinese people's way of saving face is understandable.He is a very straightforward American. In his eyes, China is a very humane land. When he walked around the family area of ​​the petrochemical machine, he selectively ignored the rough life of the workers, but he was very concerned about the people. He appreciates the harmonious interpersonal relationship between people. He feels that this kind of harmony between people is lacking in developed industrial countries.He even felt a little puzzled, why doesn't this country retain the idyllic life of working at sunrise and resting at sunset, instead of modernizing it?
The Department of Light and Chemical Industry of Jiangnan Province attached great importance to him as a foreign guest, and the petrochemical machine also arranged the best accommodation conditions and the best meals for him.Among them, the accommodation item did not satisfy Ford. At the very least, he hoped that his room should be equipped with a toilet and shower, but the best guest room of the petrochemical machine could not meet this requirement.In terms of food, Ford was full of praise. Chinese food is inherently more exquisite than Western food, and the meat and vegetables used do not contain any hormones and chemical fertilizers, which greatly enjoyed Ford's taste buds.Sometimes, Ford thinks that China is the real developed country, while the United States is more like a developing country, because the Chinese can eat this kind of green and pollution-free vegetables every day, but the Americans have to endure the tasteless life brought by high technology .

In these days of petrochemical machines, the only thing that Ford can't bear is the poor English of the translators sent by the Chinese.The female teacher arranged earlier had no problem handling some daily conversations, but when she spoke English, it always had a taste of Nandu dialect.In order to translate mechanical English, the Chinese are said to have invited an expert surnamed He from a neighboring province.This expert He only learned English when he was in college more than ten years ago. When interpreting for Ford, Expert He often stopped and nervously flipped through a dictionary in his hand, while Ford had to stop and wait. , the feeling is like listening to a disc of music that keeps getting stuck, which is painful.

Suddenly, a young man surnamed Lin appeared. He spoke fluent American English and was familiar with obscure vocabulary of mechanical majors.With his help, Ford's work efficiency has been greatly improved, and the training effect has been significantly improved.Not to mention, Ford found that Mr. Lin seemed to have been in contact with the MK800 model for a long time, and his demonstration on the machine tool was sometimes even more proficient than Ford himself.

"Lin, thank you very much for your work. With your help, I feel that the work has become a very pleasant thing." After the one-day training, Ford expressed his gratitude to Lin Zhenhua in an American way.Chinese people generally talk more reservedly, while Americans are very straightforward, even exaggerated.For example, he obviously just wanted to say that Lin Zhenhua's translation was good, but when the words came out of his mouth, it made people feel that Lin Zhenhua was simply great to the extreme.

They were walking on the boulevard of the petrochemical machine at this time, and the workers coming and going on both sides did not dare to approach them, but just looked at them from a distance and talked in low voices.This happens every time Ford appears, but in the past everyone was talking about Ford, but now the focus of discussion is increasingly focused on Lin Zhenhua.Many people in petrochemical machinery know that there is a very good young man in Hanhua Factory, who can act as an interpreter for American experts, and his level is higher than that of a director invited from the Light Industry Department of Xiangping Province.

Lin Zhenhua ignored the gazes around him, and was not overwhelmed by Ford's exaggerated words. He smiled and replied, "Mr. Ford, this is what I should do."

"Mr. Lin, our training these days is very efficient. I think, in three more days, my work can be completed, and then I can return to Hong Kong." Ford said.

Lin Zhenhua pretended to be surprised, and said, "Really? What a pity, Mr. Ford, I've been busy doing translation work for you these days, and I haven't had time to ask you some questions that I originally wanted to ask you."

"Oh? What's the problem?"

"Of course there are some problems about the operation of MK800."

"Isn't the question about the operation method already mentioned during the training? You are the translator, so is there anything you don't understand?" Ford asked curiously.

Lin Zhenhua had a harmless smile on his face. He took out a piece of paper, handed it to Ford, and said, "That's right. Actually, my problem is very small. I'm using MK800 and processed according to this set of parameters. When using a 27-tooth gear, I found that the distribution of each tooth is not uniform, can you tell me where is my operation wrong?"

Ford was still smiling at first, but when he heard Lin Zhenhua talk about 27 teeth, his smile froze.He took a look at the parameters handed over by Lin Zhenhua, and couldn't help asking in a trembling voice: "Mr. Lin, how did you know that MK800 has this defect?"

Lin Zhenhua secretly laughed in his heart. As early as he heard that the CNC machine tool he bought was MK800, he knew that his chance had come. The control chip of MK800 is the famous Z80. This chip can be regarded as a milestone in industrial control chips. Many CNC machine tools use this chip.However, when Spicher launched the MK800, there were several serious bugs in the control program written by the programmers. When the parameters were set to certain special values, there would be errors in the program, resulting in the processed Part dimensions deviate.The machining of a 27-tooth gear under certain parameters is one such situation where things can go wrong.

Due to the special combination of this group of parameters, many companies may not necessarily encounter such a situation, so this hidden BUG of MK800 has not been paid attention to for a long time. Even if some companies make mistakes, it is often attributed to the operation Human error, seldom thought of as a defect in the machine itself.After a lapse of several years, someone finally discovered this problem and reported it to the Acta Mechanica Sinica, which caused an uproar for a while.Spischer had to spend huge sums of money to recall a large number of MK800, but also suffered a huge loss in reputation.

As an in-house engineer at Spischer, Ford himself knew that the machine was flawed because the error had already occurred during an accidental internal test.Spischer Company regards this matter as a core secret, and prohibits insiders from leaking it to the outside world. At the same time, it secretly organizes people to study the cause of the error, trying to solve the problem internally before it is exposed, and then in the name of system upgrades, sell it The program chip on the outgoing MK800 machine was replaced, thus avoiding a scandal.

Ford never imagined that the young man who usually laughed and laughed with him would have such secret information and presented it to him in such a way.Of course, he would not believe that Lin Zhenhua just discovered this secret by accident. The parameter settings on that piece of paper were exactly the same as those set by Spischer during internal testing. How could there be such a coincidence in the world?What's more, from Lin Zhenhua's face, he couldn't see any intention of asking for advice, but more of a gloating expression.

"Mr. Lin, have you disclosed this to anyone?" Ford asked nervously.

"Mr. Ford, we are friends, how could I tell others about such a thing first?" Lin Zhenhua acted quite righteously.

Ford breathed a sigh of relief: "Oh, that's great, I don't want more people to know about this."

"However..." Lin Zhenhua continued: "I heard that the International Machine Tool Society has a publication called "CNC Machine Tool". If I write a paper to discuss the design defects of MK800 and provide detailed data, what do you think? Would they be interested?"

"No! You can't do this!" Ford blurted out, causing several passing workers to stare sideways, not knowing what had happened between the foreigner and the young man from another factory.After Ford finished shouting, he realized that he was too reckless, and quickly lowered his voice and said, "Mr. Lin, you should know what kind of losses our company will suffer if such an article is published in a magazine."

"I don't think the loss is too big, right?" Lin Zhenhua pretended to be stupid, "I remember you said that the MK800 has sold less than a thousand units so far, which is about 1300 million U.S. dollars, and your company has recalled all of them. , should be able to bear it."

"1300 million is not a big deal?" Ford said with a bitter face. "What's more, this is not just a matter of recalling the MK800. All of our company's products will be questioned, and the company's brand loss will far exceed 1300 million."

"Then what do you think we should do?" Lin Zhenhua had an innocent expression on his face.

Ford said: "Mr. Lin, can you sell me the paper you want to write? Then pretend that you don't know that this happened. In terms of price, you can open it as you like."

Lin Zhenhua asked: "Why, you mean that your company Spischer plans to pay me to keep my mouth shut?"

"This...of course not what it means." Ford said, "However, we just hope that you can give us some time. We are now organizing personnel to correct this problem. I believe that during this period, this problem will not be given to your country. What loss did the industry bring. Of course, we feel very sorry for keeping you silent, so I can ask the company to give you a very generous compensation fee, for example, two thousand dollars."

Two thousand U.S. dollars was a huge sum of money back then, and the U.S. dollar on the black market has been sold at a price of 1:10. If Lin Zhenhua got the two thousand U.S. dollars, he could exchange them for 2 U.S. dollars on the black market. Become a double million household.Ford has some understanding of the income level of Chinese workers, and he believes that such a huge sum of money will definitely move Lin Zhenhua's heart.

It's a pity that what Ford met was a time-traveling person. By 2011, two thousand dollars was no longer a temptation for a Chinese white-collar worker. What's more, Lin Zhenhua knew that the secret he had mastered was worth far Wouldn't it be a fool if you sold it for more than two thousand dollars?
"Mr. Ford, I'm a principled person. I would never do such a thing as paying money to keep my mouth shut." Lin Zhenhua said awe-inspiringly.

"I know...but..." Ford was at a loss for words. Apart from spending money, he couldn't think of any other way to silence Lin Zhenhua.Ford had never done such a thing as murder and silence, and he did not dare to think in this direction.In his impression, all Chinese people have practiced kung fu, and killed people in China to silence... their brains are rusted?

Lin Zhenhua waved his hand: "For the sake of the friendship between the Chinese and American people, and out of respect for your company, I have decided not to accept any money and not to publish my paper for the time being."

"That's great!" Ford wanted to hug Lin Zhenhua and kiss him, "Mr. Lin, we won't use money to insult your personality, but for the sake of our friendship, I can ask the company to treat you and your Family members provide some living support.”

"I haven't finished." Lin Zhenhua interrupted Ford, and continued: "In fact, I not only discovered that there are defects in your company's products, but also conducted in-depth research on the causes of the defects, and concluded that Some results. I re-wrote a program for your control system, which perfectly solves the problems found so far. I would like to know if your company is interested in purchasing this program I wrote?"

"You mean, you found the BUG in the program and provided a patch to correct it?" Ford asked in surprise, and he shook his head immediately: "This is impossible, our program source code has never been released. , you have no way of knowing what kind of problem exists in the code."

Lin Zhenhua took out another piece of paper, handed it to Ford and said, "Mr. Ford, don't be too subjective. This is a bug I found and a patch I designed. You can send it to your software programmers. They think my point of view is correct, and the patch I designed works, so how about we discuss the transaction issue?"

Ford took the paper and asked hesitantly, "Mr. Lin, are you just trusting me with your results? Are you not afraid that I will break my promise?"

Lin Zhenhua said: "I know that Americans are the most trustworthy. Do I have any worries when doing business with Americans?"

Ford smiled gratifiedly: "Yes, yes, of course we are trustworthy."

Lin Zhenhua changed the subject: "Of course, it is imperative to be cautious. I will not let myself take risks. In fact, I found four bugs in the control program of the MK800 produced by your company, involving four kinds of bugs. Different parameter settings. What I submit to you now is only one of them. I will submit the other three to you after we sign a contract. Of course, you can also refuse to cooperate with me. I I think the editors of the International Journal of CNC Machine Tools are still interested in cooperating with me."

"No, no, Mr. Lin, this kind of situation will not happen." Although it was January weather, Ford felt drenched in sweat. The young man in front of him was really terrifying. This was simply blatant blackmail.In any case, my sore feet were pinched by others, and I could blackmail them as much as I wanted, but I had no choice but to admit it.

"I will give your company three days. I think it shouldn't take so much time to test a program patch?" Lin Zhenhua said.

"Thank you, Mr. Lin, I will send these contents back to the company right away! Before that..."

"Don't worry, Mr. Ford, we are friends, and I won't make things difficult for my friends." Lin Zhenhua said kindly.

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The third update is over, 12000 words, please give me some encouragement?

(End of this chapter)