Lin Gao Qiming

Chapter 191 Glass

"This is a bit like an earthen building." Wu De commented.

"Yes, it is indeed influenced by the earth building. If such a building is successfully tested in Baitu, all our settlements will adopt this structure in the future." Wen Desi is extremely fascinated by his design.

"Mr. Wen, this design is not bad." Mei Wan's face clearly showed "otherwise", "But there is still a difference between a tulou and a house like ours. It’s very strong, and its quality can be called concrete. It’s a brick-and-wood structure—it’s designed like this, if it’s just good for security control, it’s very difficult to defend against enemy attacks…”

"Materials can be improved in the future. Now let's see how the overall living effect is." Wen Desi has a soft spot for his own design. "The brick and wood structure is only for a while, and it will definitely become reinforced concrete in the future."

"Well, but there is a problem with the design here: if a biogas digester is installed in each unit, the resident population of each unit is only 150 to 200 people. If only these people do not have large livestock, the biogas output rate will be very low."

"It doesn't matter, even if it's used to light street lamps." Wen Desi knew very well that a biogas digester of this size has limited effects, but the biogas digester here is mainly used to ferment manure so that it can be safely used in farmland , to reduce the spread of parasites and infectious diseases.

"Let's try to build two or three unit buildings." Mei Wan gave in.

"You build it first. As for arranging the occupancy, I have other ideas." Wen Desi said to Wu De, "Let's go down and talk."

Wen Desi and Wu De were talking about the issue of future employee grades. The reason why he thought of this issue was by accident when he designed the residence B in Baitu Village.

Since the residents of Baitu Village are mainly skilled workers of various kinds, their treatment should be better than that of ordinary workers who simply provide manual labor, otherwise it will not be conducive to increasing the income level and promoting the enthusiasm of workers.It is obviously unreasonable and inappropriate for a shipbuilder to be paid the same wages as a strong soil picker.

"There is also food. The current rationing standards for certain types of work in the future are too low." Wen Desi pointed out that heavy industry is about to start, and some heavy and toxic types of work may not be able to ensure the health of workers without strengthening nutrition.

To increase the rationing level, it is necessary to establish the types of work, technical standards and grades of workers, otherwise there will be no problem of scale.

"It's hard for me to say this question. I have never worked in an industrial enterprise and have no experience. Anyway, I have no objection here." Wu De expressed his attitude.

Wen Desi stared at him for a few seconds, then nodded: "The main thing is to ask for opinions from the labor department—"

"I'm simply managing labor." Wu De said, "The executive committee is now going to set a grade and remuneration system for employees, and I agree with both hands. I have some ideas about remuneration."

As he spoke, he talked about some of his views on the current issue of employee remuneration, mainly because the treatment of dependents of employees is too low.Children may be undernourished.

"Cheng Dong proposed at the meeting of the executive committee that the currency system will be implemented in the next year. I want to take this opportunity to implement a monetized wage system. Simple exchange vouchers such as work point vouchers are becoming less and less suitable for current needs. .”

"Well, what you said is reasonable." Wen Desi said as he walked, "Which currency system do you agree with us?"

"Do you mean paper money or metal money, silver standard, gold standard or something?"

"Correct."

"I don't understand this." Wu De knew that Chairman Wen must have his own research on the currency system. He didn't know much about it, so it's better to say less. Committee arrangements."

After Wen Desi and Wu De broke up, they decided to go to a glass factory to see the current situation of glass trial production.The glass factory completed its infrastructure work years ago.Guo Yi has sent several telegrams from Guangzhou, urging Crossing Industry to supply goods as soon as possible—it is not an option to always sell the inventory on the Fengcheng ship, and the bargaining chip they offered to Zhu Cailao and Liu Xiang was also glass.It's not only a joke that it can't be made after a long time, but it also affects the reputation.In addition to trade, the chemical sector will also have a great demand for glass in the future-after all, this is the only material they can manufacture with confidence that can withstand the corrosion of most chemicals.The chemical sector is also counting on glass for reactors, vessels and piping of all kinds.Beginning on December 23, professionals were drawn from the professional groups of chemical industry, machinery and metallurgy, and the glass research team with Ji Si retired as the team leader began trial production.

The first requirement for making glass is a crucible that can withstand high temperatures.The crucible used by the research team was brought from the 21st century—although Ji Situi knew that magnesium chloride in bittern could be used to make a high-temperature-resistant crucible, and ancient Chinese smelters could also make it. There is an ancient castle, Dimibao, built in the late Ming Dynasty. Its walls are made of discarded crucibles from Runcheng Town, a nearby iron smelting town.However, making crucibles is a specialized technology after all, and if the technology is not well mastered, it is easy to explode during use.Back then, Wu Yunduo encountered the problem of repeated explosions of self-made crucibles.It is not considered a pass until the technology learned by a dedicated craftsman is finally found.It is obviously impossible for someone to make a crucible in the crossing, and Lingao is not an important smelting town, so the possibility of finding local craftsmen is very slim.So I deliberately brought a batch of crucibles of different sizes for emergency use.

The crucible for making glass is closed. The reason why it is closed is to prevent the molten glass from being polluted by soot during the smelting process.The raw materials are quartz sand, quicklime and soda ash.

Quartz sand is a relatively rich mineral in Lingao, and it is easy to obtain a large amount of high-quality raw materials, which can be used for spare after simple selection and washing.

As for soda ash, the traversers don't yet have the ability to make soda ash, but they have two emergency methods.One is to use plant ash instead.This is quite an old craft and European countries have been using this raw material for a long time.Seaweed ash is the best plant ash for glass refining.Obviously, the most indispensable thing in Lingao is seafood.

The second method is to use the native method of Marublane soda production. They have Glauber’s salt bought from Guangzhou. After heating and dehydrating, they mix limestone and charcoal in proportion and put them in a crucible for firing at high temperature. Grind the product with a millstone, stir and dissolve it in water, filter out the alkali brine, and evaporate it to get soda ash.

Considering that the second method is too troublesome, Ji Situi decided to use the first method of seaweed ash.This method has been used in Europe for hundreds of years, and there will be no major problems for them to use it.

So Li Di, a chemical and mechanical enthusiast of the navy, took people to the beach to catch a large amount of seaweed, dried it and burned it to plant ash on the spot, and then transported it back in wooden barrels.

When Li Di was collecting plant ash, Mei Wan sent all his best masons.Their task is to build a group of glass furnaces. This method is very old and has been put into use in the 16th to 17th centuries. The advantage is that it is simple and easy to do, and the smelting does not require high temperatures.

The first furnace is the material sintering furnace, which is a furnace with a vault, which is divided into a combustion chamber and a sintering chamber. The raw materials of glass are sintered into glass frit in this furnace.

The second furnace is circular and consists of three chambers.The lower chamber is used for adding fire and burning, and there are 6 arched openings on the outer wall of the middle chamber, which are used to put in the glass crucible. After the crucible is put in, these openings are blocked with soil, leaving only a small opening. .There is a small square opening in the center of the top of the middle chamber, through which heat can flow into the highest chamber. There is an opening behind the highest chamber, and behind it is a pottery annealing tunnel, where glass products are gradually cooled and annealed after they are completed.

Of course, in this group of people from all walks of life, there will be countless suggestions for improvement of any design.In terms of the structure of this glass furnace, a layer of diatomite insulation bricks is added between the inner brick and the outer brick, which greatly increases the thickness of the furnace wall, but the insulation effect can save a lot of fuel.

Considering that the temperature for making glass is at least 1200°C, although they know from the technical literature that this type of glass furnace does not need a preheating chamber or the like, Ji Situi and others have never guaranteed that it will be usable. From the point of view, a ceramic pipe is added to the highest outdoor in the center of the top of the circular furnace to guide the discharged hot air into the preheating chamber to supply the blower for hot blasting.

After completing this improved version of the glass furnace, the chemical engineering group and the mechanical group jointly started the firing glass test.The first firing process took up to 10 hours, and finally the solid raw material in the crucible finally became a sticky glass paste.Everyone immediately began to try blowing, and the blown things turned out to be in strange shapes and shapes.

"How can this thing be sold?" Xiao Bailang sighed when he saw the glassware with different shapes, many bubbles and green color in front of him.

"The air bubbles can be solved by stirring. As for the color, as long as manganese dioxide can be added, it will become transparent." Li Di is confident, "But everyone's blowing skills are really bad. You need to practice more."

"Manganese dioxide, did you create one?" Xiao Bailang said dissatisfied.

"I knew there was such a thing." Li Di really didn't know where they could find this manganese dioxide.

"Well, manganese dioxide is actually not needed," Ji Situi said, "it acts as an oxidizing agent, manganese dioxide is not necessarily required, potassium nitrate is also an oxidizing agent, and this is added to proceed."

The so-called potassium nitrate is saltpeter, and they still have a lot of it.After several more attempts, the glass experiment group finally made colorless glass the day before New Year's Eve.This achievement made many people in the industrial sector cheer: the artifact of time travel——glass, was born!

(End of this chapter)