The wind blows from the South Sea

Chapter 90 Launching the second set of iron-making blast furnaces

"The commander-in-chief has a lot of experience in getting money. Every time he gives some advice, he is enlightening and enlightening, which is very beneficial to us! God teaches people the talents of saints and saints, so we can only make ourselves rich. Lin has learned from it."

"Brother Zong, the Lin family has been deeply involved in the Qianzhuang. Now we should combine it with Western business philosophy and use it for our own purposes. This is the right way."

"The commander-in-chief gave me the advice, how dare Lin not follow it?"

"This is very good. Both the daily necessities company and the bank are the purse strings of my Nanyang Army. The Nanyang Bank is left to be managed by Brother Zongyi. He should work together with the scholar to promote the issuance of new money and focus on expanding the savings and credit business. This The priority is now.”

"Lin saves the money and will fully cooperate with Xiucai Gong in promoting the issuance of new money."

"Um……"

Feng Guohui responded. With his hard and soft tactics, he finally tied the branch of the Lin family in Surabaya City to his chariot. He was very happy in his heart.

With this handle, Batavia's Kapitan Lin Zongguang was forced to lower his arrogant head and frequently secretly showed his favor to Nanyang Company.

The important thing is

The Lin family has been running bank business all year round and has spread its bank business throughout Java Island and even Sumatra. They are the only big Chinese businessmen who can do this.

To put it bluntly, they are cannon fodder.

Talked for a while

Zheng Xiucai mentioned that the steel plant is under intensive preparation. The current relevant blast furnace equipment has basically been installed and debugged, and the final ignition trial production is being prepared.

This is because considering that the new batch of more than 3,000 recruits have not been in the army for a long time, they need a period of precipitation and experience to establish a sense of belonging and honor for the Nanyang Army.

Therefore, further military expansion is only on paper, and there is no strong demand for implementation.

Feng Guohui appropriately mentioned some business concepts for the future market, such as deposit-taking and lending, general deposits and withdrawals, and other convenient businesses such as draft withdrawals from other places, which can promote the smooth development of Nanyang Bank.

You have to eat in one bite and don't take too big a step.

The Nanyang Army does not just fight and kill, but is also good at recruiting and using manpower and forces, including Chinese and indigenous people, so that more people at the bottom can see hope.

It is expected that trial production lasting 7 to 3 weeks will begin at the end of July.

Temporary recruitment for the war was completely timely.

Several people were drinking tea in the flower hall while talking about the current affairs. The atmosphere seemed very harmonious.

Feng Guohui also planned to appropriately recruit some indigenous soldiers, mainly indigenous residents in some towns, to be used as auxiliary forces of the Nanyang Army.

The steel plant has always been the focus of Feng Guohui's attention. The investment in related supporting factory and mining equipment has so far exceeded one million silver coins, including the upstream mineral processing plant, coal kilns, steel plant buildings and supporting facilities. It is Nanyang Company's largest project in Tianjin.

This helped to draw the lower-class indigenous residents of the city into the camp of the Nanyang Army. Once their hands were stained with the blood of the white colonial army, they would become friendly forces in the same trenches.

The Hu and Lin families are now tied to the Nanyang Company's chariot, which has achieved Feng Guohui's purpose of recruiting one faction to attack the other, which is more conducive to quickly restoring the situation in Surabaya City and stabilizing public confidence.

What's more, as cannon fodder troops, indigenous soldiers do not need to undergo complete military training, nor do they need sophisticated firearms and equipment. Basically, some cold weapons such as broadswords and spears are enough.

Next Step

The effect of subduing the Lin family is not limited to this. Among the four major families in Surabaya City, the Qiao and Huang families were uprooted and completely liquidated. Their former power is now gone.

Having a stable rear area is extremely important to the rapidly expanding Nanyang Army, and it serves as a clear example.

Now for my own use, I can apply my valuable business philosophy and experience to Nanyang Bank.

Since its establishment, it has stood at a very high level.

Of course, this plan has not been implemented yet.

In terms of the level of huge profits, the steel mills are far behind the spice trade. This is a situation determined by the prominent contradiction between supply and demand in the spice trade itself.

This is not the case with steel. The United Kingdom is a major steel producer in the world today and has the ability to export large quantities of steel products. France and the United States are rising stars with great potential in this heavy industry field.

This has kept the price of steel products at a stable level around the world.

In the current Nanyang market, the price of high-quality steel per ton is about 42 to 46 silver coins, and the range of fluctuation is not large.

Based on Nanyang Iron and Steel Works' output of 8 tons per month, the output value is about silver coins, which is less than one million silver coins a year.

Excluding costs, the profit is about 60% to 70%.

The reason why profits can reach such a high level is mainly due to the fact that the iron mines enslave thousands of nearly free convict labor. In addition, our own mines do not pay any taxes, so how can we not make money?

It only takes a year and a half to make back all the investment costs.

"The production preparations of the steel plant cannot be relaxed. After it is officially put into operation, I will consider using the casting production capacity of the steel plant to build a set of blast furnace ironmaking equipment." Feng Guohui said this, put down the tea cup in his hand, and looked at the tea cup in front of him. After a few people, he continued;

“Judging from the current mine production progress, there is a large margin for mining and iron ore powder production, which can fully support the production of the second set of iron-making blast furnaces.

Over the past few months, a lot of raw materials have been stored.

The scope of the factory area we regulate for steel plants is very large. Let alone adding one set of blast furnace ironmaking equipment, just adding 5 or 6 sets is enough.

If it can reach an annual output of 5 tons of steel, then our Nanyang Army can be ranked first in large-scale steel production capacity in the entire Nanyang region or East Asia.

This laid a solid foundation for the future development of the steel shipbuilding industry.

The so-called people rely on the mountains to eat the mountains, and rely on the sea to eat the sea.

Now that Britain's 3.2-ton steel giant "Great Eastern" has entered the sea, our goal does not need to be so high, as long as we can build an offshore cargo ship of two to three thousand tons.

I believe that this will be a new beginning for the industrial development of the Surabaya region and further promote regional prosperity. "

Feng Guohui's words gave everyone present full confidence. News in the Surabaya area was not blocked. The news that the British-made 3.2-ton giant ship "Great Eastern" was launched in February 1858 had been publicized through newspapers and magazines.

The steam engine passenger ships "Great Western" and "Great Britain" with a displacement of several thousand tons were launched in 1837 and 1843 respectively, and achieved great commercial success on the North American route.

This gave British engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel the idea to build a 10,000-ton ship.

He believes that large ships can reduce operating costs and carry the same number of passengers or goods. Large ships are more economical and more market competitive than small ships.

On March 1852, 3, Brunel drew a sketch of this 25-ton ship. This ship was seven times the largest ship in the world at that time.

Feng Guohui is not so ambitious. The next step he envisions is to develop a shipyard, focusing on freight iron ships of two to three thousand tons, which are mainly used in shipping trade connecting important ports in Southeast Asia.

Larger ships place high demands on port terminal facilities, which most ports cannot meet.

Taking a 3000-ton ship as an example, the draft is generally between 5 and 5 meters. Nowadays, ports in various regions of Southeast Asia can basically cope with it.

The draft of a 10-ton ship is often more than 16 meters, and the draft of the "Great Eastern" reaches meters. Even Batavia, Luzon, Singapore, and Guangzhou cannot meet such extremely high requirements.

Hu Huadong was particularly excited. He had driven a sailing cargo ship to the port of Chennai in India, where he had seen British steam iron ships and carefully observed them.

It's just that the steam-iron ship weighed more than 1400 tons, but it was also an eye-opener for him.

He never thought that the commander-in-chief was also interested in developing the shipbuilding industry in the Surabaya area. This made him very excited and said sincerely, "The Western ships have always had strong and powerful guns, far surpassing ours. If one day, Surabaya can also build such a magical ship." Iron steamship. Even if I can just take a look at it, I will wait until death to rest in peace."

"Hahahaha... Dear brother from East China, you don't have to be like this. It's just a few iron ships, what are they worth?" Feng Guohui burst out laughing after hearing this.

He waved his hand with a heroic expression, and his attitude alone was admirable.

Plans can't keep up with changes.

With the rapid rise of Nanyang Company, Feng Guohui also gave up his original plan to purchase a sail cargo ship.

Instead, they are preparing to start anew and build a modern shipyard mainly with shipbuilding technicians and engineers hired from the UK, supplemented by young and knowledgeable overseas Chinese.

From now on, Nanyang Company's transportation fleet will all consist of steam iron ships. The cargo ships produced in the early stage of the shipyard will mainly undertake orders from its own transportation company.

After it develops to a certain level, it will then undertake shipbuilding orders from outside.

As a result, it is very necessary for steel plants to develop a second set of iron-making blast furnaces, because the shipbuilding industry uses a considerable amount of steel.

In the construction of the Great Eastern giant ship in the UK alone, more than 17 tons of various steel materials were used, which is almost the output of today's steel plants at full capacity for nine months.

Therefore, the shipbuilding industry is truly a major consumer of steel.

The significance of developing heavy industry is not only this. Nowadays, in the trial production of steel plants, 9-pound, 12-pound, and even 16-pound artillery can be cast.

The next step is to equip the 7-pound shore gun with the 32-star fortress, which will also be cast and produced by the steel plant. This is the power of heavy industry.

Owning a steel factory means you have a steady stream of artillery and other heavy weapons manufacturing capabilities. You can have as many as you want, and your war potential is unlimited.

This is a heavy industrial production capacity that no amount of spices can bring. It is of great significance to separatist forces like the Nanyang Army and cannot be measured by money.

As long as a 32-pound long-tube shore gun can be produced, it can completely block the Surabaya Strait with artillery fire, making it difficult for the Dutch naval fleet to take a step forward. This is an absolute deterrent.

(End of this chapter)