A Man of Science and Engineering in Troubled Times Wandering in the Late Qing Dynasty

Chapter 60 Greenwich
But when he got in the car, Li Yu obviously realized that something was wrong. He overestimated himself too much!

The simplest point: how does this car start? Hey! ?
Lord Kelvin sat next to him, commanding Jorsen: "Hurry up, shake the car!"

"Shake it?" Li Yu was taken aback.

I saw Jorsen ran to the front of the car, grabbed a handle in front of the car, and turned it around a few times like a hand-cranked tractor before the car's engine started to run.

Li Yu finally understood why Chairman Huggins wanted to have a driver. This action was indeed too laborious and ungentlemanly for him!

It's not right for you to ask a guy in a suit and tie to crank a tractor!
What's more, cars at this time are very easy to break down, and you often need to lie under the car to repair it, which is even more ungentlemanly.

At that time, carriage drivers often laughed at cars, the most important thing was that it was easy to lie down.

As for driving it, it's not that difficult. This car is equipped with the earliest two-speed manual transmission developed by Peugeot, yes, only two speeds.So it's easy!Speaking of driving, anyone who is nearly [-] years old like President Huggins can drive it.Because no matter how proficient you are, the frustration of shifting gears is also great.

Cars really became difficult to drive, and it started when Ford developed an automatic transmission a few years later. Although it was also a two-speed, the operation logic was suddenly much more complicated.Even if it is a modern old driver, it is estimated that it will take several days of practice.

After a few laps in the yard, Li Yu will be able to control Li Yu initially. Lord Kelvin grabbed his hat tightly and said, "Let's go!"

This Daimler car was an open-top car, and almost all cars are also open-top cars now. The four of them drove towards the Greenwich Observatory in the southeast in the wind of London with light smog and soot.

"How?" said President Huggins. "Suffocating speed!"

Huang Kaijia was really excited. If it wasn't for the presence of two academic veterans, he would have sang loudly.

However, Li Yu still had a calm expression on his face: suffocating?It's really suffocating! The speed of 18 km/h is really not as good as electric cars in the 21st century!
But this is indeed his first time driving a Mercedes-Benz. He has lived for more than 20 years, and has taken hundreds of millions of planes and subways, and hundreds of thousands of buses, but this is the first time he is in a Mercedes-Benz.

Although it is accurate to say that this car cannot be called a Mercedes-Benz, it is almost the same!

Seeing that Li Yu was silent, Chairman Huggins thought he was concentrating on driving, so he asked again.Li Yu came back to his senses, pretended to be excited and said: "It's really fast, lightning and thunder!"

Then he turned his face and continued to drive the car calmly and unhurriedly.

There were also steam buses in the UK at the beginning, but they were big and clumsy, slow to start and slow to brake, and often couldn't even stop when going downhill.The most important thing is that due to the high furnace pressure, explosions often occur. Tens of thousands of explosions occurred during the 20 years of use, so they were quickly abandoned.

Nowadays, many roads in Britain are made of granite and are uneven, and the suspension of cars is far from as strong as in later generations, so it is still quite bumpy, but it is better than horse-drawn carriages.

Driving on the streets of London at the beginning of the twentieth century is definitely a super cool thing. There used to be a notorious "Red Flag Act" in the UK, that is, a person in front of the car needs to hold a red flag to open the way. It was really cool at that time, but It was too much, so the act was repealed in 1896.

But even if there were no red flags waving, many people still stopped to watch them, and even some ladies in the carriage waved to them.

Huang Kaijia touched this and that, wishing he could open it too.

It didn't take long for the four of them to arrive at the Royal Greenwich Garden, where the Observatory is located.

The terrain here is relatively high, and Li Yu saw at a glance the pier to the north where they first arrived in London——Canary Wharf.It can also be regarded as the busiest terminal in the world now, but it has become the CBD of London in later generations, with skyscrapers and skyscrapers. The three tallest buildings in London are built here, including Citibank and HSBC Center.

Chairman Huggins led several people into the observatory, and Li Yu saw the prime meridian not far ahead, which is the famous 0° meridian.When many people go to London to play, they will run to the prime meridian, and then step on one side, as if stepping on the east and west hemispheres.

Several people entered the door and directly found Christie, then Director of the Royal Observatory.

Christie was quite surprised when she learned of the intentions of several people: "Sir, the president wants to re-measure the redshift of α Canis Major?"

President Huggins nodded: "That's right."

"But, you have already obtained the result, why do you want to test again?" Christie asked puzzled.

President Huggins said: "Because I have been strongly challenged, and also, I have been strongly tempted by three boxes of fine Cuban cigars."

Lord Kelvin smiled and said, "You may not win."

Director Christie asked again: "Who will question you?"

"It's him." Huggins pointed to Li Yu behind him.

"He is?" Director Christie asked back, looking suspiciously at the yellow-skinned and black-haired Li Yu in front of him, "Japanese?"

Li Yu was wearing a Liuhe hat at this time, and the braids could not be seen from the front.

"No," President Huggins said, "he is from the Qing Dynasty, and he is Chinese."

"Chinese?" Christie was even more puzzled, "How come!"

President Huggins said: "Remember the previous paper on X-rays and the laws of thermodynamics, the author is him."

"You, you are Yu Li?!" Christie also repeated Li Yu's name backwards.

Li Yu leaned forward and bowed slightly: "It is indeed my servant."

Christie said in surprise: "My God! You have come to England! I have read your paper, it is wonderful! Why, don't you know astronomy?"

"It's just a little knowledge." Li Yu said modestly.

Lord Kelvin said: "Don't listen to the Chinese, they say one or two, I think it is at least twelve!"

Christie immediately became interested, "It's rare for someone to question Chairman Huggins, so I really need to test it carefully. The station just updated its equipment a while ago, and it happens to be studying binary star systems, focusing on the observation of Canis Major Alpha star."

At that time, the astronomical community knew that Sirius was a binary star system. In addition to the extremely bright Sirius, there was also a white dwarf with a large mass but a small volume that did not emit light.

After Christie became director, he paid special attention to the binary star system, but at that time there was no theory to explain why a celestial body with a volume only the size of the earth had a mass as large as the sun.

He brought a few people to the telescope, which was an unusually huge telescope with a diameter of 28 inches. With the addition of a half-prism beamsplitter, this thing looked like a monster in a science fiction film.Ordinary people stand in front of it like a little baby.

Observation, spectroscopy, spectral analysis, and calculation, with the joint efforts of several people, finally got the result at night: it is indeed a blue shift!
(End of this chapter)