The Tang Dynasty started from saving Empress Changsun

Chapter 202 The Kind Grandson Empress

The next step is to make a variety of ceramic and metal molds from the sand, so that the glass can be blown quickly.

At the beginning, Chen Jingke was needed to provide ideas, but soon these craftsmen surpassed him in shaping techniques and tricks, and sometimes he had to be shocked by the creativity of these people.

However, his work is not over, but he is preparing to make a super difficult glass product.

One seems to be very simple, and it was very common in previous lives, but it is actually very difficult. It can be called a product of the flower of the glass industry.

plate glass.

Yes, that is flat glass.

Humans have mastered the art of glassmaking, generally speaking, for thousands of years.During this period, the East and the West explored and studied together, and produced various glass products.

Some glass products are very complex and exquisite in shape, which is not inferior to modern times.

However, the ancients who could make complex glassware could not make the simplest flat glass, let alone large pieces of flat glass.

It was not until the 50s that the technical difficulties were overcome and the float glass-making technology was invented, realizing the industrialized manufacture of flat glass.

That is, since then, large pieces of floor-to-ceiling glass have become common architectural decorations.

So how did humans make flat glass before then?

There are two processes, one is the method of producing small pieces of flat glass, and the other is the method of producing large pieces of glass.

The production technology of small pieces of flat glass is relatively simple. First, the glass is blown into a gall shape, and the two ends are cut off, and then cut and spread from the middle.

After tempering and trimming, it becomes a relatively rough flat glass.

If you need a more delicate and transparent flat glass, you need to spend time polishing it.

The most difficult thing is to make large pieces of flat glass. It was not until the eve of the industrial revolution that the French invented the die-casting process to produce flat glass.

It is to put the glass liquid on a flat metal plate and roll it back and forth with a rolling shaft to get a piece of flat glass.

But as the glass solidifies, ripples form on the surface, making it blurrier than a mosaiced action movie.

If you want smooth and transparent glass, you need to spend time polishing it.

This process requires the cooperation of two workers and takes a very long time.Even the most skilled workers need a hundred working hours to polish the desired effect.

If there is an accident in the middle and the glass shatters, sorry, start over.

Therefore, large pieces of flat glass were very expensive, so expensive that when Guangxu wanted to install a piece of glass for his own door, Cixi personally issued an order to reprimand the officials of the household department for not stopping it.

Even Empress Dowager Cixi thought it was expensive, and one can imagine how high the price was at that time.

Therefore, it is not an exaggeration to say that flat glass is the flower of the glass industry.

What Chen Jingke has to do now is to take down this flower.

Of course it's not float glass. Don't even think about it without a certain industrial foundation. What he wants to do is die-cast glass.

In fact, if there is no special requirement, the corrugated glass produced by die-casting can be used as architectural decoration without polishing at all.

This kind of glass with its own mosaic can also protect people's privacy to a certain extent.

He told the craftsmen of his idea, and they worked together to research and soon came up with a set of similar die-casting equipment.

After continuous improvement and correction, the corrugated glass that barely meets the requirements was finally produced.

The craftsmen were calm about the machine and the rough glass, not knowing what it meant.

Some people even think that it is too wasteful to spend time and effort making a machine for such a piece of glass.

With that time, it is better to study several unique glass shapes.

Chen Jingke did not have the same knowledge as them, nor did he explain too much. It is difficult for people who have not experienced it to understand the meaning.

As long as these craftsmen work honestly according to his orders.

Flat glass needs to be cut. As we all know, the best tool for cutting glass is diamond, which is also called diamond.

Diamond is not unique to modern times. The ancients discovered it long ago. The name diamond is what the ancients in our country called it.

"Nanzhou Foreign Objects" written by Wan Zhen in the Eastern Jin Dynasty contains: Diamond, a stone, is shaped like a bead, and it is as sharp as a horse.

"Tang Liudian" also has records about diamonds, where it is called diamonds.

It's just that the ancient Chinese didn't play with diamonds, and even there are not many people in the world who play with diamonds. Everyone is not very rare about this kind of thing.

It wasn't until a certain business group in modern times linked it with marriage and love, and hyped it for hundreds of years, successfully hyping it into a sky-high price.

In fact, the reserves of diamonds are very rich. On average, each person can get a basket of diamonds and be rich, and they can also be manufactured artificially.

The point is that man-made diamonds are exactly the same as natural diamonds, and no equipment today can tell the difference between the two.

If you want to know which is man-made and which is natural, it all depends on the certificate, which is what people write on it.

That's why some people say that the most successful business hype in the world is selling diamonds.

The ancients did not play with diamonds, and the place of production is not in China, so this thing is really a scarce thing.

But the most indispensable thing in the palace is rare things. Chen Jingke proposed to use diamonds to cut glass, and Changsun Wugou immediately sent several pieces, and they were not small.

The largest piece weighs about one or two pounds, which translates to more than 100 carats, and the smallest piece weighs [-] to [-] carats.

The status of these things in the palace treasury is not much different from that of stones, and no one cares about them at all.

Break the smallest piece of diamond and use the small pieces to make a glass knife. Then it's time to test your skills and patience.

Find two handy craftsmen to polish, first practice with a small piece of glass, and then polish with a large piece of glass after mastering the skills.

When the craftsmen were polishing the glass, Chen Jingke was not idle, and started another invention.

In other words, he made plate glass not for the simple purpose of making windows, but for a more important purpose.

Plane mirror.

This is the magic tool for cutting leeks.

I won't go into details about the silver mirror reaction here. With the current conditions, he can't get harmless materials like glucose, so he can only choose to use poisonous mercury.

In order to prevent the mercury from hurting people, he thought of a way.

Make a copper case to wrap the mirror tightly, and stuff some sulfur powder into the case-the sulfur can absorb the volatilized mercury gas.

With so many protections, the harm of the mercury mirror is almost negligible.

When the first mirror was made, the craftsmen finally showed shocked expressions.Then they thought they understood Chen Jingke's purpose of making die-casting machines, and admired him very much.

Next, Chen Jingke used his power for personal gain and made dozens of mirrors the size of A4 paper, which he took away when he was about to leave the palace.

He didn't directly send these small mirrors to his eldest grandson Wugou, it wasn't shocking enough, so if he wanted to come, he would come with a floor-to-ceiling mirror.

After another ten days of waiting, two pieces of flat glass with a height of 1.5 meters and a width of [-] centimeters were polished and turned into two floor-to-ceiling mirrors after another operation.

The exquisite shell was cast in copper, and if he was not afraid of being called dirt, he would have wanted to inlay it with gold and silver embellished with precious stones.

Even so, these two floor-to-ceiling mirrors are extremely exquisite.

When they appeared in front of the eldest grandson Wugou, the queen couldn't maintain her image anymore, she rushed over and hugged them without letting go.

Looking at herself in the mirror, she couldn't believe it, and asked, "Is this also made of glass?"

Chen Jingke was full of a sense of accomplishment in his heart, and said: "Yes, this is also made of glass, and the process is very complicated. It takes about ten days for two craftsmen to make two mirrors like this."

The corner of Changsun Wugou's mouth floated into a smile and said: "Is that so, then we have to sell it at a higher price, what do you think of a hundred strings?"

Chen Jingke thought for a while and said, "It's too low. I think it's cheaper to double it."

Changsun Wugou said without hesitation: "Then double the price, three hundred per side."

Chen Jingke is no nonsense. A plate glass of this size in the 89s and 7.32th century sold for one hundred pounds in the UK.At that time, each pound contained about 732 grams of pure gold, and one hundred pounds was [-] grams of gold.

Of course, the prices of two different countries in different periods cannot be completely equal, but this can at least be used as a reference.

Converted from ancient to modern units, one tael in Datang is equivalent to 31 grams today, and 730 two grams is equivalent to 23 taels in Tang Dynasty.

In the Tang Dynasty, one tael of gold was approximately equivalent to ten coins, and 730 two grams of gold was approximately equal to 320 six coins.

And this is only the price of flat glass, and the price of making it into a flat mirror is even higher.

In addition, there were competitors in the UK back then, and France and other countries were also selling glass, and the competition lowered the price.

At this time, Datang is the only one in the world, and three hundred coins is definitely very kind.

However, considering the sales volume, Chen Jingke thought about it and suggested: "It is true that you can sell more money, but it will also reduce sales. It is better to spend two hundred yuan a side."

"In this way, more people will consider buying, and small profits but quick turnover can make more money."

"And when the price is low, those merchants will be willing to sell mirrors abroad. When foreign sales are opened, that is the real source of money."

The eldest grandson Wugou had a different opinion, and said, "No, if mirrors can be mass-produced, your idea is correct, but the manufacturing process is complicated and time-consuming."

"Two skilled craftsmen can make two sides in ten days, and only 3000 sides a year. Even if we employ a hundred craftsmen, we can only make more than [-] sides a year."

"The world is so big, how can a mere [-] mirrors fill it up, I think [-] wires are too cheap."

Chen Jingke thought about it for a while, and it really made sense, and said: "What my aunt said is that I was wrong, so let's go for three hundred coins."

These two mirrors were kept by the eldest grandson Wugou, although Chen Jingke argued hard, one side was for the little son, a mother can't grab things from her daughter.

The eldest grandson Wugou said directly: I will keep it for her first, and give it to her when she grows up.

Well, Chen Jingke was suddenly speechless.

However, considering that the mirror contained mercury, it would be dangerous if it was broken, so there was no further dispute.

The mirror is his last product. After the successful production, he can't play any new tricks, and the rest can only be explored by the craftsmen themselves.

So he bid farewell to his eldest grandson Wugou, and after getting permission, he returned to Zixiao Temple with those dozens of small mirrors.

(End of this chapter)