The rise of the prince

Chapter 337 The Enlightenment of the Rainstorm

On the fifth day, the continuous rain caused the water level of the river to rise, destroying the five waterwheels on the bank of the palace. Gao left the water wheel and was stopped by Li Xingzhou, because it was too desperate, and there was no way to save him if he accidentally fell into the water.

That night, three more waterwheels were washed away. When the heavy rain stopped in early July, twelve waterwheels in the palace were washed away, and the wreckage went to nowhere. Some of the remaining waterwheels also had problems. There are only 25 in normal operation.

The 42 seats were suddenly reduced to 25. The huge factory in the Wangfu suddenly stopped a quarter of its functions.

Li Xingzhou was also frightened and woke up suddenly from the ecstasy in the rain, which was also a great loss to the palace.The palace mobilized all craftsmen for emergency repairs.
On the other hand, there are people in the west of the city who are suffering from the same disease. Now after the rain, the west of the city has completely become a watery country, the sewers are blocked, and the streets are full of foul-smelling underground sewage, which greatly affects production and life.

Only then did Li Xingzhou realize the importance of relocating the residence again.

He had thought before that Prince Xiao's Mansion was not the most suitable industrial area, because the surrounding population was relatively large, and the river water was not controllable.

The ideal hydraulic system is preferably an artificial river dam, so that the size of the water flow and the water level will become controllable, as long as the gates are used to control it.This is also the method used by the rising industrial countries in later generations.

The advantage of natural water sources is that they are abundant and convenient, but the disadvantages are also reflected in this heavy rain, which is uncontrollable and unpredictable. If it rains for another four or five days, it is estimated that all the water tankers in the palace will not be spared.

Li Xingzhou has been optimistic about the place for a long time. It is in the northeast part of the mountain behind the Wangfu. It is close to the north gate and away from densely populated areas. It can dig waterways to divert water from the river. After the north gate is the shipyard of the Wangfu. The work sheds are connected together, which is very convenient.

Digging waterways can use gunpowder to open mountains and break rocks. It's not difficult. The problem is that he doesn't have cement
Without cement, it would take at least ten years to build such a huge building complex.

This is not a joke. In the ancient times when there was no cement, the most advanced adhesive in construction was glutinous rice water, and its bonding ability was limited, so the building strength could only be enhanced by grinding stones.

Grinding materials and grinding stones into square shapes is the most time-consuming and labor-intensive part.

It will take more than ten years to build a new palace and a new industrial zone in this way.

Li Xingzhou tried to calcine cement by himself. Before that, he asked Shiyu to buy limestone for this purpose, but he was busy with Zhu Rong and Tieniu for several days, and the gray powder that was burned was not cement at all, and the adhesiveness and cement were not good. Fabi, in all likelihood, the temperature is not up to standard.

Now, we can only ask someone to repair the water wheel honestly, so that the operation of the palace can be restored quickly.

After the heavy rain, Li Xingzhou was free for the past few days and visited many people, such as Degong, He Zhao, Mao Luan, etc., because Degong told him that these people had spoken for him in the court.

The Suifa guns and artillery of the palace are constantly preparing the new army. So far, there are already 3000 firearms teams, plus [-] wheeled artillery. Yan Yan lives with Di Zhi in the camp outside the city and trains the new army every day.

Battle reports of northern Liao people going south come every few days.

The latest one was before the rain. Due to the heavy rain in the north, the Liao army camped near Nanjing and could not move forward. However, it is estimated that they will continue to go south after the rain and the weather will clear. Wei Chaoren predicts that the troops will come to the city in mid-July.

Although there was, it began to rain in the south, the roads were interrupted, and there were no more reports from the north.

So the court became tense again, and the emperor frequently called all the ministers to discuss matters, because he didn't know what was going on in the north.

Li Xingzhou was thinking about the future of the palace in the palace.
In the early morning of the eighth day of July, the emperor's uncle Li Yu received hairy crabs sent by thousands of miles, and they were still alive and kicking, so he sent some to his home. Li Xingzhou liked these things, and around the Mid-Autumn Festival, it was a good day to eat crabs.

When the sun was rising, before Li Xingzhou had time to handle his precious crab, Zhu Rong rushed in excitedly, shouting, "My lord, come and see a certain new furnace!"

Li Xingzhou was taken aback, and he didn't have time to take care of his precious crab, so he followed Zhu Rong to the back of the palace to see what new furnace he was talking about.

When he was away, Zhu Rong was constantly researching the ratio of graphite to clay, and added a small amount of plaster of paris to find out a graphite crucible with higher temperature resistance, and increased the volume of the graphite crucible again to improve the efficiency of steelmaking.

For this reason, Li Xingzhou was overjoyed at the time, and he also specially presented a handwritten certificate, rewarding Zhu Rong with 1000 taels of silver, which made everyone in the palace envious.

I don't know what Zhu Rong has come up with this time. He seems to have well-developed limbs, a simple mind, and five big and three rough, but the wisdom of the working people is condensed in the simple production and labor. from.

"What are you looking at this time?" Li Xingzhou asked as he hurriedly followed him to the back mountain. It had only rained heavily for the past few days, and the road was slippery and muddy. The sun is unbearably hot.

Zhu Rong walked and said, "You'll know when you get to the prince!"

After arriving at the kiln group in the back mountain, Li Xingzhou finally understood what Zhu Rong was talking about, and stared blankly.

A new type of large kiln, the whole body is black, similar to a calcination room, with a large internal space, the difference is that it is made of bricks made of graphite refractory materials!

Li Xingzhou got into the furnace and took a closer look, and couldn't help but pat him on the shoulder: "You are a fucking genius!"

"Hey hey hey" Zhu Rong scratched his head embarrassedly and laughed: "I didn't think too much about it, I just wanted to make the crucible bigger, but the builder found that the clay could no longer support it, so I thought it couldn't be integrated anyway, so I just made the crucible bigger. If the material is made into bricks and then put together, wouldn’t it be done.”

After hearing this, Li Xingzhou felt that tm made sense. What a simple but useful idea.

"How much heat can this thing withstand?"

"I don't know, it's okay to burn it all afternoon yesterday, Xiaogang should be able to melt water."

Li Xingzhou was very excited. This might be what he wanted. These days, he had been thinking about how to build a high-temperature-resistant calcination furnace. He hadn't come up with an idea yet, but Zhu Rong gave him a special surprise first.

"Go ask someone to bring over the pile of limestone powder in the inner courtyard of the palace." Li Xingzhou waved his hand and said excitedly.

After a while, several large sacks of limestone powder were brought over. Li Xingzhou took off his coat and went into battle shirtless. He personally mixed the limestone and clay together, and then asked someone to add water to make a thin slurry.

Then find a wooden barrel for clay, lift the mud into the kiln, and spread it on the bottom.

"My lord, what are you going to do?" Zhu Rong asked puzzledly while helping to transport the mud.

Li Xingzhou wiped the sweat from his forehead: "What to do. Burn it, add fire to me, success or failure depends on one action, don't save me coke, the hotter the fire, the better!"

Seeing this, Zhu Rong nodded and smiled honestly: "Okay, my lord ordered it to be burned, so I will burn it!"

Immediately, he rolled up his sleeves and ordered Zhu's family to increase the fire vigorously. Suddenly, the water vapor evaporated, and the surrounding area suddenly rose several degrees in the scorching summer. It was really not a place for people to stay.

Li Xingzhou was sweating profusely from the heat, but still refused to walk away, staring intently at the calcining kiln built with graphite refractory bricks.

(End of this chapter)