The Maojin knife from the late Jin Dynasty

Chapter 176 Arrangement for Ge Hong
Liu Tai understands the importance of brand very well, especially for wealthy families. Are they eating right?They only eat expensive ones!

Well, the reality is that with the Wuhu chaos in China, aristocratic families fled south, and the aristocratic families in the north were even more suppressed. The more they were suppressed by power, the more they would find ways to make up for themselves in other aspects of life.

If you say that the fine sea salt you make yourself is more delicious than coarse salt or land salt, then that's not necessarily true. It's just that this product is branded from the beginning, which is a luxury.

As for the suppression of land salt, it is the combination of sea salt and tidal energy that has reduced the cost of salt collection to an astonishing level.

Even the sun salt method, land salt and sea salt can be used, but land salt requires manpower to transport the brine, but sea salt can directly rely on tidal energy to replace a large number of manpower resources, so the production cost is much lower.

For Liu Tai, what really constrains him from selling Haiyan on a large scale is the transportation conditions.

For example, if the area controlled by Shile could be directly accessed by ships through the Yellow River, it would be easy for Liu Tai to build a salt hall there and then dump it there.

Even if Shi Le had a salt well, Liu Tai's sea salt was cheaper, so he could only accept Liu Tai's sea salt.

Because Shi Le was not familiar with business, he ignored Liu Tai's desire to work with the salt industry to implicitly suppress Lu Salt, and at the same time control a large part of Shi Le's economic system.

However, Liu Tai knew that this kind of thing could only be suppressed slightly at best, but could not be completely suppressed.

One of the most important points is the transportation costs mentioned. Shile's poor land transportation capabilities became the basis for protecting his salt industry from being completely defeated by himself. After all, there are places where only the local land salt industry can transport it. .

This feeling is like what a certain big shot said, because human beings' own talent shortcomings limit the infinite development of artificial intelligence, thus setting up the last firewall for the final game between humans and artificial intelligence.

After Liu Tai and Gou Xi discussed the relevant matters, they handed over the prisoners to Chu Hui and asked Chu Hui to deal with them one by one. Then he sent people to notify Jie Fei, Meng Dong and others, asking them to come and find them in the morning and afternoon respectively. Negotiate among yourself.

On the next day, Jie Fei came early to wait at the door of Liu Tai's mansion. After he was introduced into the living room, he saw Ge Hong who looked elegant, handsome and elegant.

Liu Tai came to see the two of them after finishing his morning exercise and washing up, and said:

"Did you come so early? You haven't had breakfast yet. Let's eat breakfast together and have a full meal before we talk!"

Hearing Liu Tai's words, Jie Fei nodded repeatedly. Ge Hong was puzzled, but seeing Jie Fei agreeing, he naturally did not dare to refuse.

Today's breakfast is millet porridge, meat buns, pickles, pot stickers, tofu puffs and the like.

Liu Tai was not polite. He ate five meat buns, seven pot stickers, a small plate of pickles, a bowl of salted tofu with sauce, and a bowl of millet porridge. Finally, he was seventy percent full.

After all, if you want to live a long life, you should not eat too full every time you eat, Liu Tai still knows.

In contrast to Liu Tai's calmness, although Jie Fei ate a bit cautiously, his hand movements did not slow down.

What he prefers to eat is noodle soup, especially when soaked in oily residue and pickles, which makes him feel comfortable after he is sweating profusely.

Compared with the way Liu Tai and Jie Fei eat, Ge Hong is much more reserved in eating. In other words, he didn't eat a normal breakfast at all, but ate some seasonal fruits, which was more like a meal for the two of them.

After finishing breakfast, Liu Tai handed a piece of dental floss to Jie Fei and Ge Hong, and then picked up his teeth first.

The floss handle is an F-shaped metal vessel infiltrated with silver, and a golden floss made of silk is tied to the opening on the floss. The floss will be replaced after each use.

Compared with toothpicks, Liu Tai prefers to use this tool to clean his gums. After picking his teeth, a maid will bring ginseng soup to rinse his mouth. Liu Tai also enjoys the treatment of a feudal bureaucrat as a landlord.

There are no professional dentists in this day and age. If you do get a dental disease, it may not lead to death but the pain will be unbearable.

In ancient times, it was more important to maintain teeth than to treat them.

Returning to the main hall, Liu Tai said to Jie Fei, "I want you to come over to Alai today. I want to introduce Ge Hong and Ge Zhichuan to you.

From today on, we will open the position of Danding Division, specializing in the basic analysis of material changes in the world and the world's energy.

The first thing is to prove that the Zhouyi is correct. Since the Zhouyi has 64 hexagrams, then there must be basic substances representing these 64 hexagrams in the world. This is what the Danding Division needs to do - find all 64 basic substances.

Secondly, find the principle of energy operation.

Not to mention, why has the sun never been extinguished after burning for so long since ancient times? If we find the reason and can use it, we will no longer need coal to burn steel in the future, but directly use the sun to calcine steel! "

Jie Fei couldn't help but be stunned when he heard Liu Tai's words. He didn't expect that Liu Tai actually wanted to use the sun to make iron. How dare he!

Liu Tai said to Ge Hong, "In the process of your research, whatever manpower, resources and space you need, ask Jie Fei to help, he can provide them.

For the sake of your research, you can even overdraw one-tenth of the pig iron production in the second year! "

"So many?!" Jie Fei was a little surprised when he heard Liu Tai's words and lost his voice.

"Because if anyone in this world can solve the problem of quickly removing impurities from pig iron and forging it into steel, the only person I can think of is Ge Hong and Ge Zhichuan!" Liu Tai pointed and said seriously. .

When Jie Fei heard this, he formally looked at Ge Hong for the first time, but he was a little unbelievable.

Thanks to Jie Fei's efforts, various blast furnace ironmaking technologies have been constantly innovated, the coal industry has flourished, and various new technologies have been tried. Even now, Qingzhou's pig iron production has exceeded [-] tons a year.

But Liu Tai's problem now is that it is not difficult to make them into pig iron through blast furnace steelmaking technology. As long as they are willing to invest, even modern people can build an ironmaking furnace and then create pig iron.

The real difficulty now is how to quickly forge pig iron into steel. The steelmaking technology of the Han Dynasty does not mean that it is impossible, but it will consume a lot of human resources.

For example, the annual output of pig iron produced by Liu Tai is more than [-] tons. At this time, the pig iron is successfully converted into usable steel, but not even one-fiftieth of it is produced.

This determines that Liu Tai's weapon production is greatly restricted. It's not that he doesn't want to use these irons as weapons, but that using these pig irons as military weapons is making fun of the lives of the soldiers.

Maybe they received some impact, and the armors worn by the soldiers cracked directly. This is the end of using pig iron as weapons.

This kind of pig iron weapon is not even as good as the bronze sword craftsmanship of the Qin Dynasty.

Therefore, these pig irons can only be thrown into the private sector to make farm tools, because small private workshops can digest the pig iron bit by bit through their own steel-making technology.

But for Liu Tai, the efficiency of steelmaking technology is too slow. His blast furnace ironmaking technology needs a technology that can convert pig iron into steel more quickly. In Liu Tai's judgment, it should be the steel filling method.

But Liu Tai didn't know how to use the steel filling method.The only thing Liu Tai knew clearly was that in this era, other than the original inventor of the steel filling method, who else could invent the steel filling method, and the only one Liu Tai thought was the great chemist Ge Hong.

"I'm afraid Hong is unworthy of the general's praise of someone like this!" Ge Hong saluted quickly when he heard Liu Tai's words to Jie Fei.

Liu Tai said to Ge Hong, "I think the development of business always requires three pivots, that is, raw materials, production technology, and the required energy.

It's like I've been asking Jie Fei to find a way to use coal to replace firewood so that it can be calcined to a higher temperature. This will make it easier to burn higher temperatures to dissolve iron ore.

This is an important reason why our pig iron production is more than that of other places. "

"It's all the Duke's guidance and expectations. Fei is just a craftsman!" Jie Fei said quickly.

Liu Tai smiled and said, "In addition to energy utilization, he also needs to improve the production technology in the production process.

For example, how to make coal burn at a higher temperature, how to forge steel on a large scale, and how to reduce manpower as much as possible and increase the use of mechanical force in the production process, etc. These all need to be solved by Xie Fei one by one! "

When Ge Hong heard this, he looked at the craftsman in front of him in surprise. Because he had also made elixirs, Ge Hong understood that if Jie Fei could really solve these things as Liu Tai said, he would not be called a great craftsman, but a divine craftsman. .

Liu Tai continued, "As for the raw materials, I leave it to you Ge Hong. Only by understanding the properties of all the basic substances in the world can we find the principles for improving steel production. If we work according to the principles, we can get twice the result with half the effort."

Otherwise, if you keep trying the same materials, Jie Fei has been trying for more than a year and has yet to get any results! "

When Ge Hong heard this, he couldn't help but look at Jie Fei, who only showed a calm and polite smile.

As for the bitterness under the smile, only those who have been experimenting but not getting results know it.

Liu Tai told Ge Hong, “It is not easy to find 64 basic elements.

Then we will start with the most common elements around us. For example, whether iron is a single basic element or a composite element composed of basic elements, you should start with iron.

Understand all the properties of iron and create a standard for other basic elements in the future.

Since iron is being smelted, let's also find out whether the substance charcoal is a basic element.

In this way, he can help Jie Fei solve the iron-making problem while completing the purpose of finding 64 basic elements! ! "

"Yes!" When Ge Hong heard Liu Tai's words, he couldn't help but respond with some anxiety in his heart.

Liu Tai turned his gaze to Jie Fei and continued, "You go down first, and if you encounter difficulties or need my help, let me know.

In my opinion, you and the entire steel and coal industry behind you are the foundation of our Qingzhou.

Even if something happens, tell me and I will definitely solve it! "

"Thank you, Duke, for paying attention!" When Jie Fei heard this, he immediately began to express his gratitude to Liu Tai.

Ge Hong looked at Jie Fei next to him and saluted Liu Tai in the same way.

The two left Liu Tai's mansion. Jie Fei looked at Ge Hong and said, "Don't take Mr. Ge's unreasonable demands to the Duke too seriously. As long as you keep working hard in this direction, even if there is not much progress, the Duke I won’t blame you!”

"Oh? Has the county prince assigned you a similar task to Mr. Jie?" Ge Hong couldn't help but asked curiously.

"When the Laiyang Steel Field was established in Laiyang County, I was asked to develop a hollow but tightly fitted steel pipe that can be mass-produced!" Jie Fei shrugged, "The general just told us so much, in order to create such a steel pipe. Here comes the steel pipe!”

"What is the use of this kind of steel pipe?" Hearing Jie Fei's words, Ge Hong couldn't help but said with a bit of confusion: "Even if it is used as a weapon, wouldn't it be a solid weapon that would be easier to fight?!"

“I don’t know, but if the Duke asks us to do something, it must be for the Duke’s purpose.

Now that we have such a goal, every time our Laiyang Steel Plant uses new technologies to calcine steel, we try to see if we can make such steel pipes.

Although we are still far away from such steel pipes, at least we feel that our skills are constantly improving! "

Jie Fei said this, and then said to Ge Hong, "So, the Duke has set some seemingly impossible tasks for you, but as long as we work towards the goal specified by the Duke step by step, we will eventually make progress!"

"I understand the truth! But how should I rub the sun with my hands?!" Ge Hong couldn't help but be confused after hearing Jie Fei's words.

"According to what the Duke said, let's start with the two basic materials of iron and charcoal.

As for rubbing the sun with our hands...this is not something we humans can do! "Jie Fei couldn't help but smile bitterly.

Compared with the fact that he only needs to mass-produce seamless steel pipes, what Ge Hong needs is to rub the sun with his hands. Is the gap between people really that big?

In fact, Jie Fei had a little misunderstanding here, because Liu Tai wanted his Donglai Steel Pipe Factory to be able to make hand-rubbed steel pipes.

It's just that a series of power technologies have not been developed yet.

When the steam engine could be applied to some large objects, it was almost time for Liu Tai to make this feeble request.

Today's steam engines convert water vapor into mechanical energy that can work. It is not difficult for skilled craftsmen such as Jie Fei to turn it into reality.

The real difficulty is that the mechanical energy it brings is quite unstable, and the steam power it brings is even smaller when used.

Nowadays, steam engines cannot even pump water in mining areas. Their only function is to hammer pieces of coal into pieces driven by mechanical arms.

After all, hammering coal into powder during normal work is not an easy task, and it is even a form of punishment.

But with the advent of the steam engine, it can still do this simple mechanical work.

For miners, when they have free time, they can shovel a pile of cinders into the fire and burn it to their heart's content. This can support the movement of the robotic arm for about 5 minutes and then use it as waste.

It's just that when to add water and when to add coal, one person needs to watch over it to prevent the thing from stalling.

(End of this chapter)