Rebirth of Zhu Di's son

Chapter 371 The advent of new steam trains
On the first day of November in the third year of the Qianxi reign of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Gaoxu, the Emperor of the Qianxi Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, issued an edict, ordering Admiral Hu Hu, the director of the Patent Office of the Ministry of Industry, to supervise Mo Qiaosi of Shuntian Prefecture to take charge of the reduction and improvement of steam engines.

One and a half months later, Hu Hui led the Mo Qiaosi steam group craftsmen to successfully create a powerful small steam engine according to the steam engine improvement drawings designed by Zhu Zhantang, the beauty king of the Ming Dynasty.

Immediately afterwards, the first steam locomotive with a load of more than [-] kilograms that used the power of steam to run on the rails was successfully launched.

Because this steam locomotive uses coal or wood as fuel and breathes flames, people call it a "train."

It can tow five carriages, carry 70 kilograms of goods, and can carry [-] people at the same time. It can cover a distance of [-] miles in half an hour.

Emperor Qianxi Zhu Gaoxu was overjoyed. The Patent Office of the Ministry of Industry was upgraded to the Patent Office, and a minister was appointed to take charge of the affairs of the Patent Office. He was placed under the Minister of Industry and was at the same level as the left and right ministers, and was held by Hu Hui.

However, the rails at this time were not strong enough to support the weight of the trains, so they often broke and caused trains to derail.

Moreover, single-cylinder locomotives are prone to flameout, and once they stall, they have to work hard to push the locomotive.

In view of this, Zhu Gaoxu issued two imperial edicts.

The first imperial edict ordered the Ministry of Industry to build a steam train improvement research and development factory in the suburbs of Beijing. It was named "Shuntianfu Train Improvement Research and Development Factory" and Hu Hui served as the factory director.

The second imperial edict was to hold a steam train operation competition at the Shuntianfu Train Improvement and Research and Development Factory three years later. In addition to being rewarded with 10 taels of silver yuan, the winner would also be awarded a hereditary title, with the highest being a rural marquis and the lowest being a pavilion uncle.

Under this stimulation, within just two years, various new steam locomotives were invented and manufactured by craftsmen from major mining factories in the Ming Dynasty and private craftsmen of wealthy merchants.

In April of the sixth year of Emperor Qianxi's reign, in order to invent and manufacture a steam locomotive with a greater load capacity, Hu Hui discussed with craftsmen and began to build a steam boiler with strong pressure. However, the boiler unexpectedly exploded, killing dozens of people and injuring hundreds.

Hu Hui was impeached by the censor and demoted to the people by Zhu Gaoxu.

Zhu Gaoxu promoted Yu Qian, who was responsible for the construction of the cable telegraph from Ningxia and Liaoyang to the capital, as the Minister of the Patent Office and the director of the Shuntianfu Train Improvement R&D Factory.

At this time, Zhu Zhantang, the beauty king who was about to leave Huawozhou in the east of the feudal dynasty, found the despondent Hu Hui incognito and took out a design drawing of a horizontal boiler steam locomotive.

Hu Hui is proficient in steam engine manufacturing, and the ingenuity and brilliance of this design can be seen at a glance.

Horizontal boilers have large water capacity, high thermal efficiency, fast steam production, sufficient steam, and long service life. The most important thing is that the load capacity of trains using this kind of steam locomotive will become larger and the speed will be faster.

After Zhu Zhantang went to sea by boat, Hu Hui and his eldest son Hu Changning used the money funded by Zhu Zhantang and spent more than a year and repeated experiments to finally build a small and powerful horizontal boiler steam locomotive.

In May of the seventh year of Qianxi's reign, the imperial court held a steam train competition as scheduled outside the Shuntianfu Train Improvement Research and Development Factory.

The new steam train "Hope" jointly manufactured by Hu Hu and his eldest son Hu Changning successfully defeated the "Jinling" manufactured by Yingtianfu Moqiaosi and the "Beiping" manufactured by Shuntianfu Moqiaosi.

The "Jinling" and "Beiping" broke down during the race although their speed was not slow due to their weak structure and excessive coal consumption.

The "Hope" was far ahead with a speed of [-] miles in half an hour, and won the final victory!

After the game, Hu Hui and his son were summoned by Zhu Gaoxu.After some questions and answers, Zhu Gaoxu learned that in addition to the horizontal boiler, there was another important reason why the "Hope" was able to achieve final victory.

Hu Hui added rims to the edges of the train wheels to prevent the train from derailing, and also installed a toothed track between the two load-bearing rails.

He considered that steam locomotives running on tracks would cause wheel slippage, so he installed a ratchet on the locomotive so that it could roll on the toothed third rail to drive the locomotive forward.

The advent of this new type of steam train marked the gradual demise of the era of horse-drawn freight, and rail trains began to dominate the freight world!
In June of the seventh year of Qianxi, Zhu Gaoxu issued an order to the Ministry of Industry to build three railway lines in five years.

The first one is called the Beijing-Nanjing Railway, which connects Daxing County, Shuntian Prefecture, through Tongzhou, Shunyi, Huairou, Miyun, Gubeikou, Yuyang and other places to Daning in western Liaoning, with a total length of about 750 miles.

The second one is called Jingtong Railway, which connects Wanping County, Shuntian Prefecture, and ends at Datong, Shanxi Province via Changping, Yanqing, Baoan, Xuanfu and other places, with a total length of about 630 miles.

The third one is called Yutong Railway, which connects Shuofang Yulongwei (Erenhot), passes through Yulongyouwei (Sunit), Xinghe (Jining) to Datong, Shanxi, with a total length of about [-] miles.

The Ministry of Industry dispatched more than 70 officials, recruited more than 300 surveyors, divided into three teams, and spent ten months producing three detailed planning documents.

After Zhu Gaoxu read the planning document, he found that in order to build three railways on schedule within five years, the total amount of silver dollars required to purchase construction materials exceeded 2000 million, and the total number of workers required exceeded 16.

However, excluding internal funds, the Ming Dynasty's annual fiscal revenue from the 20th year of Yongle to the seventh year of Qianxi was about 2000 million silver dollars, of which tariffs accounted for about one-sixth, and special revenue from porcelain tea, salt, and sugar was about [-] million silver dollars. Accounting for one-sixth, iron and silver mining and other specialized income accounted for about one-third, commercial taxes, land taxes, military settlements and other income accounted for about one-third.

Although 2000 million silver dollars only accounts for one-sixth of the annual fiscal revenue, the average annual expenditure of the imperial court in the past seven years is as high as 3000 million silver dollars!

That's right!

Just can’t make ends meet!

Of this 3000 million taels, 4000 million taels are included in the royal salary, official salaries and various subsidies. The court's loans of various money and grain to overseas vassals are 2000 million taels, and the military expenditures for garrisons in various places are also 2000 million taels. More than 3000 million yuan was invested in building roads and canals in the northeast, northwest, southwest and other places, as well as Changke Academy and Mo Qiaosi. In addition to the expenses for natural disaster relief such as floods and droughts, sometimes the national treasury was not enough, and Zhu Gaoxu even needed to come from within. Pay money or take a loan from Daming Royal Bank.

Moreover, the Ministry of Revenue, the Ministry of Personnel, the Ministry of Punishment, the Ministry of Rites, the Ministry of War, the Metropolitan Procuratorate, and the Dali Temple all opposed the construction of three railway lines at the same time.

Their objections were very consistent, that is, starting construction at the same time would put too much pressure on the court. They could build one line every year, and they could also accumulate experience in railway construction.

However, this goes against Zhu Gaoxu's plan.

According to Zhu Gaoxu's plan, three railways will be built within five years, and ten railways will be built simultaneously in the next five years.

The reason why he is so anxious is because time waits for no one!

Seven years after Qianxi's death, Zhu Gaoxu is already 51 years old!

(End of this chapter)