Guide to Traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty.

Chapter 1190 Epilogue : I'll support you
(Thanks to the engineering book friend for reminding me. Please forgive Lao Wang, a liberal arts student. Today, I carefully studied the converter and rotary kiln and found that my understanding of the converter was completely wrong.)
(I spent the whole afternoon looking up information and downloading books on metallurgy and cement preparation. So, there is only one update today.)
Early morning, Ministry of Works.

"Morning, Master."

"It's polite."

Xie Yan nodded and greeted everyone along the way, and walked quickly up to the third floor.

He had become familiar with some of the officials in the Ministry of Works, but people still often cast inquiring glances at him.

There's no way, he's too famous in the Ministry of Industry.

Partly because of academics, partly because of the princess.

The person in charge of the Ministry of Works who was in charge of contacting him was Fan Ying, a fifth-rank official who was usually responsible for handling official documents and occasionally managing some small and medium-sized projects.

Xie Yan came to look up information, so there was no need for him to watch him in person. He just wanted to take the opportunity to build a good relationship with Xie Yan.

After all, Xie Yan lived in Minister Chen's house for a while!
"Mr. Xie, have you finished reading yesterday's information? I found some new ones." Fan Ying's attitude was extremely enthusiastic.

Xie Yan nodded and smiled: "Thank you, Mr. Fan, for helping me find it."

These days, Xie Yan was in the information room of the Ministry of Industry, mainly reading information about various furnaces and kilns, including blast furnaces, converters, lime kilns, ceramic kilns, glass kilns, and so on.

Fortunately, he knew nothing about metallurgy, otherwise the related technological developments in the Ming Dynasty would have given him a magical sense of time and space confusion.

Take the blast furnace and converter for smelting steel as an example.

If the technological level of various supporting technologies is converted into another era, it can be extended from the middle of Qianlong period to the Second Opium War. Some technologies are still in Qianlong period, while some technologies have reached Xianfeng period.

The hot air stove has been developed, but it uses external heating rather than a heat storage hot air stove.

The converter has been developed for seven years, but it uses the bottom-blowing air method. The steel produced is too hard and brittle, and its toughness, durability and fatigue life are poor.

To put it bluntly, the steel contains too high levels of nitrogen, phosphorus and sulfur.

Currently, the Xuzhou Iron and Steel Plant produces 4500 tons of iron, 200 tons of wrought iron, and 1000 tons of crude steel annually.

Do not replace the original converter with the later converter. Taking the United States in 1892 as an example, the total annual output of 110 converters was only 470 million tons of steel, and the average annual output of each converter was only 4.27 tons.

The converter technology of the Ming Dynasty at that time was far inferior to that of the United States in 1892. Even the ratio of iron, carbon and other elements was not fully understood, and the ingredients were still in the stage of relying on experience. The furnace was often shut down for maintenance due to malfunctions. The denitrification, dephosphorization and desulfurization processes were even more unknown.

The annual output of Xuzhou Iron and Steel Plant is unique in the country. Because the iron ore here is of the highest quality, the imperial court gave priority to the development of Xuzhou.

Let’s talk about various types of kilns.

The temperature of the town kiln is the highest, and air gaps are set between the inner and outer walls of the kiln to form an insulation layer to reduce heat loss.

Xie Yan planned to learn from the heating and insulation methods of various furnaces to build a vertical cement kiln.

Cement rotary kiln is so advanced that he has no idea what it is!
Fan Ying sat at the other table, pretending to read some information, and from time to time he glanced at what Xie Yan was drawing.

It seems like he is drawing a blueprint.

As I was drawing, I felt like something was not right, so I changed the paper and started over.

Xie Yan muttered:

"The Li family used ordinary coal, which is difficult to burn completely, so they had to switch to anthracite or coking coal. The traditional method of raising the kiln temperature has reached its limit, so other means must be used."

"The input materials can be divided into layers. The top layer is the preheating layer, the middle layer is the sintering layer, and the bottom layer is the cooling layer. Air should be blown in from near the cooling layer to accelerate the cooling of the clinker while increasing the temperature of the combustion air."

"Such calcination and blasting, coupled with the change in the volume of the heated balls, are likely to cause excess side winds and weaken the ventilation in the middle, resulting in uneven heating of the kiln materials and prolonged cooling time of the clinker. How the hell is this solved? Damn it, I need to build a kiln and do experiments, I can't come up with it out of thin air."

"There is also the height-to-diameter ratio of the entire vertical kiln, the volume ratio of each material layer, and how to achieve the best effect. This can only be determined through experiments."

Xie Yan drew a rough blueprint, handed it to Fan Ying and said, "This is a cement kiln. It has nothing to do with iron and steel smelting."

Fan Ying smiled and said, "Since it has been reported, given your status as a Furong scholar, it is fine even if it is related to steel smelting."

"Thank you for your care these days. I have something urgent to attend to, so I'll take my leave now." Xie Yan said with a bow.

Fan Ying immediately stood up to see him off.

Xie Yan took a carriage and hurried to the princess's house.

The doorman warmly invited him in: "Your Highness has ordered that if Scholar Xie comes, there is no need to inform him again, and he can go directly to the inner courtyard."

Xie Yan was a little embarrassed: "Before entering the inner courtyard, can you arrange for someone to lead the way? There are too many corridors here and I'm afraid I'll get lost. I forgot to remember the way the last two times I came here."

The doorman made arrangements immediately.

After finally entering the inner courtyard, Xie Yan stopped again. He still needed to be notified of the inner courtyard, otherwise he would not know where to find the princess, and the princess also needed time to dress up.

Soon, Qingluan came running over happily: "My dear, please come in quickly."

Xie Yan took out a pair of earrings and said, "I forgot to bring a gift last time. It's not a rare thing. I bought it for a few coins. I'll give it to Youniang to show my appreciation."

Qingluan smiled even more happily, and quickly put it away when no one was around: "The princess is about to eat, has Liu Lang had lunch yet?"

"It's a good opportunity to have a free meal." Xie Yan said. The two of them came to the dining room, and Zhu Tangxi sat at the table waiting.

Most of the tableware has been changed to porcelain, but the gold cups and ivory chopsticks have been retained, both of which Xie Yan once joked that he liked.

After they greeted each other, Zhu Tangxi asked Xie Yan to sit down and asked a maid to serve more food.

Xie Yan was really hungry. He had been using his brain the whole morning, so he wolfed down the food as soon as he picked up the bowl.

Zhu Tangxi himself didn't eat much either. He just watched Xie Yan eat and chatted for a while before saying, "A decree will be issued soon. You can do business, but I still can't."

"Is there such a thing?" Xie Yan asked in surprise.

Zhu Tangxi elaborated: "After the new decree was issued, royal relatives with titles, royal clans with titles, and officials at all levels are still not allowed to engage in business. However, restrictions have been lifted for their close relatives."

Xie Yan commented: "It's just a change of soup but the medicine remains the same."

Zhu Tangxi smiled.

The reformists in power today will certainly take the opportunity to get involved in industry and commerce under the pretext of reforming industrial and commercial taxes. If the law remains unchanged, they will let distant relatives or slaves act as white gloves, and if the law is changed, they will directly let close relatives go.

In fact, they are all the same, the essence has not changed.

Read the error-free version at 69shuba! 6=9+shu_ba is the first to publish this novel.

Deng Gongwu agreed because the essence of the matter had not changed, and it would not be stopped whether the ban was changed or not. After it was put on the table, it would at least be easier to investigate in the future - if someone dared to investigate.

What about increasing industrial and commercial taxes to enrich the central and local finances, and then using this to make local governments abolish excessive taxes and levies? This method is only useful in prefectures and counties with developed industry and commerce, and is pure nonsense for the vast backward areas.

The regional development of the Ming Dynasty was extremely unbalanced, and the burden on farmers in backward areas would become heavier and heavier. The only solution was to check the land area and reform the taxation. Whether it was the land tax or the single whip system, they were essentially the same thing.

But no one dared to touch agriculture.

Although Deng Gongwu had a tough attitude, he was actually guilty and had no confidence in agricultural reform.

Wang Anshi and Zhang Juzheng dared to take action because they had to make changes to the financial difficulties. The tight national finances gave rise to a group of reformist officials who gritted their teeth and carried out reforms to strengthen the country.

At this time, the Ming Dynasty's finances had become abundant as there had not been a major war for many years, and could even be said to be in surplus.

Since they were not pushed to that point, naturally there were few officials who supported agricultural reform. Deng Gongwu could not find enough like-minded people, so his enthusiasm would be in vain.

After chatting about the reform for a while, Zhu Tangxi asked, "Liu Lang, have you made any progress in improving cement?"

Xie Yan put down his chopsticks and said, "I came here for this very reason. I need to build a cement kiln for experiments, and I need to build more than one or two. It's very expensive, but I don't have enough money."

"How much do you need?" Zhu Tangxi asked.

Xie Yan said: "It's not clear yet, but one thousand guan is definitely more than enough. I'll borrow the land for the kiln from the Li family. They also have the materials for the cement experiment. I'll also ask the Li family to help buy other raw materials. After the deal is done, I'll let them use the patent for ten years for free."

Zhu Tangxi asked: "How long will the experiment take?"

Xie Yan shook his head: "It's hard to say. It may take a month, half a year, or even a year. I only have a general idea now. The more specific details will all need to be adjusted through experiments."

"Then you won't go to Imperial College to study?" Zhu Tangxi asked again.

Xie Yan said: "Just ask for leave. If the time is too long, just apply for leave of absence."

Zhu Tangxi didn't say anything else, just ate and chatted with Xie Yan.

After lunch, Zhu Tangxi took Xie Yan to a room, took out the banknotes he had prepared long ago and said, "Here are 1,500 coins. Come back for more when you have used them up."

"We don't need so much. One thousand strings of cash is more than enough. We can keep the rest of the money to start a factory together." Xie Yan really didn't consider himself an outsider. He counted out one thousand strings of cash and accepted it directly.

Zhu Tangxi took back the extra notes with a smile, without writing any IOU or anything.

Firstly, talking about money would hurt feelings, and secondly, I’m not afraid that Xie Yan would default on his debt.

The consequences of defaulting on debts are serious!

Xie Yan said: "When our cement factory business is prosperous, I will support my sister and we won't need to spend the money of the royal family and the court."

"Who wants you to raise it?" Zhu Tangxi spat, but she was quite looking forward to it in her heart.

After getting drunk that day, we behaved in an overly intimate manner. In this day and age, we would have had to get married.

The relationship between the two has basically been confirmed.

Xie Yan no longer wanted to have three wives and four concubines. He had a princess as a base, and a beautiful maid named Qingluan. This kind of life could only be dreamed of before, but now it could become a reality. Maybe the princess would even tacitly allow him to have two more maids.

Hehe, Xie Yan had already been secretly happy, he didn't have any big pursuits.

Zhu Tangxi suddenly asked, "Liu Lang, have you read this issue of the Ming Daily?"

"I didn't have time. What's wrong?" Xie Yan asked.

Zhu Tangxi turned around to lock the box, taking the opportunity to hide the smile on his face: "The cultural and educational section of the Ming Xunbao published an academic conference a few days ago."

The article "Qingsi Chenghao" was also published, and Xie Yan's parents who were far away in Huangzhou Prefecture could also see it.

(End of this chapter)