This young master can only be speechless. It seems that Li Yuan is like a girl in her first love, falling in love with the flower-picking thief who took her virginity away. He snuggled up at the window every day, waiting for the dark and obscene figure of Li Mi, the flower-picking thief, to appear.

Of course, such descriptions cannot be told to Li Shimin, so that this kid will not fight me hard. However, Li Yuan's performance at this moment is like a bad guy who is about to be drowned, and Li Mi stretched out a rope as thin as wool. However, Li Yuan could only reach out to grab it, hoping to survive.

My uncle finally left Jiaozhi, and Qiu He, the former prefect of Jiaozhi, has now become the governor of Jiaonan Province. I have issued an order to merge the original Jiaozhi, Jiuzhen, Rinan counties and surrounding areas into a province, and have given a large number of preferential policies to vigorously develop Jiaozhi.

There is coal and iron here. Nowadays, nearly one-third of the steel in Guanzhong is input from here. The steel material is quite good and the quality is stable, which is much more than the iron found in Guanzhong that often affects the quality of the steel due to the different impurities contained in it.

Even now, the Artillery and Gunpowder Research Institute has set up two groups to specialize in the smelting of Jiaozhi Steel. After all, the content and impurities of iron ore in different places are different, and the required heat and how to remove impurities are also different.

At present, Jiaozhi has developed into three shipyards, 35 large and medium-sized docks, with a total number of workers reaching more than 17,000, and the number of people in related industries exceeds 70,000. The birth of Mianhua and the improvement of weaving machinery have greatly improved the quality of sails.

Now, the No. 12 dock of the largest Jiaozhi No. 1 shipyard has begun to build keels for a giant ship of 653 tons. This is the largest ocean-going giant ship in the world today, and it is an excellent ship designed after the improvement of the respective advantages of the Fu Ship, Galen Ship and Clippers.

It is named the Chinese ship. The ship only needs at least fifty people to operate, and when fully loaded, it can reach a number of thousands. Generally speaking, it can carry more than 300 tons of cargo and 250 people to sail on the sea for three months.

Such load capacity and ocean-going performance are definitely second to none. Moreover, the speed is not slow. Well, of course, it is at least half slower than a real fly-slipper, but compared to ordinary ships in this era, it is already extremely fast. What is important is that this kind of ship has extremely strong wind resistance, so it is very suitable for ocean-going navigation.

Previously, this kind of 100-ton and 200-ton ship had already started sailing on the sea. After their verification and retrieval of the vacancy, it was finally decided to build this 653-ton giant ship.

Of course, this is far from the limit of ocean sailing ships. I remember that in later generations, the most powerful wooden battleship of the English Navy even reached 2,000 tons, so we are still early. In the future, I believe that in less than ten years, we will have the ability and strength to build these warships.

But whether to build it or not is another matter. After all, such a warship is indeed a sea fortress, but it needs a rival to appear in order to exert its huge power.

In this era, the largest ships were probably from the Chinese Empire, and other people, such as Dashi and Persian warships, were said to be the largest ones of about 100 tons. Taking 2,000 tons of giant ships to deal with them is really a sense of incongruity of killing chickens with a large guillotine.

Now, the ships produced by the shipyard in Jiaozhi are gradually replacing the merchant ships in the hands of the maritime merchants of the Chinese Empire. However, it is no problem to buy our merchant ships, but these ships have clear numbers and will make it clear to these merchants that these ships must not be sold to anyone outside the Chinese Empire.

Although other countries cannot be completely prohibited from learning technology, the later the better. In addition, the only ones sold as merchant ships are currently only Fu Ship, Sand-Pan and Galen Ship, while the fly-scissors and Chinese Ship are not allowed to be sold to anyone.

Their production is also limited to the First Shipyard, which is a standard military shipyard. Anyone who dares to get close to it, then go to the prison honestly for a few years before talking about it.

The total population of Jiaozhi is also expanding rapidly. From less than 180,000 in the past, it has now exceeded 350,000. The population from Tiannan to Jiaozhi is only 100,000.

Although gunpowder weapons have begun to be used in large quantities, the gunpowder weapons manufacturer is still in a confidential state and has been arranged by me at the foot of the mountain north of the Qinling Mountains. At present, the most produced things are grenades or mines.

The grenade only needs to be wrapped with a layer of iron sheet with appropriately quenched and beautiful patterns on the outside, and it is naturally filled with granular gunpowder. In addition, its fire equipment is the simplest, a flint ignition device.

There is no need for high-tech and sophisticated things, or even very exquisite parts, or even outsourcing iron sheets are just iron sheets. Therefore, grenades such as low-quality and low-priced things have become something that the generals strive for.

At present, it mainly supplies troops such as Yan'an County, Xihai County, Heyuan County, or the south of Bashu. Well, the best weapons to shock foreign enemies. On the contrary, civil wars are used less.

As for artillery, preparations are still being made. In a word, how can the cannon be built if there is insufficient copper?

The flintlock musket has now been equipped with an imperial guard battalion, and it is expected that by the end of this year, a division will be equipped. By then, in history, the world's first gunpowder weapon unit will show its true appearance in front of the world.

In addition, the research and smelting of cast iron are currently progressing rapidly. Today, the Chinese Empire lacks copper, but there is no shortage of steel. What's more, the excellent steel transported by Duojiaozhi is very popular among craftsmen.

When copper was short of before, the smelting and improvement of cast iron had already been added to the agenda, but the progress was very slow.

The most important thing is that the performance of cast iron cannons is indeed inferior to that of cannons cast in bronze and brass. The advantage of cast iron is that it is cheaper, not that its performance is better than other metals.

Whether brass or bronze, although it is expensive, it has a tough texture and is not easy to explode. After a long period of time, the bronze cannon will deform and disturb the shells through the barrel. Therefore, the best artillery cannon fire is still brass.

However, cast iron can be improved. The earliest cast iron cannons would explode after firing five consecutive rounds of shells, while later cast iron cannons could have been able to fire twenty-five to thirty shells without blowing up the chamber.

Nowadays, the quality of the cast iron produced is quite good, but there are still some problems that need to be solved, such as the strength is still slightly insufficient, and continuous firing will still cause a blow-off phenomenon. In addition, the cast shell of the cast gun still needs to be improved, and the quality of the cast iron still has the possibility of improving it. That is, try to reduce the impurities and carbon content in the cast iron iron.

If it is really possible to reduce the impurities and carbon content to a large extent, maybe high-quality things like cast steel will appear nearly a thousand years ahead of schedule. Think about it during the First World War, the cast steel cannons of the German Krkrupp Company could be said to be the top artillery of that era.

Now we have coke, and the impurities in the iron and water that I proposed to them that blow in hot air and accelerate the oxidation of iron and water is also mixed with lime, icystone, iron alum to filter some unhelpful phosphorus and other impurities to form waste residue. This makes it possible to refine better steel now. Unfortunately, with my lack of chemical knowledge, I only know that electrolysis can obtain oxygen, and I really don’t know how to work to extract oxygen.

Even these smelting methods are some basic common sense I asked about after seeing them in the small steel mills in the town.

Nowadays, the questions that the old craftsmen communicated were completely distorted, and at most they would occasionally squeak to express their support and encouragement for them.

Fortunately, these people have learned to use their pens and record the process of each research, so that the newcomers who join in can understand the principles and methods of steel smelting in the shortest time.

Even the many textbooks of the college’s engineering school today are the old craftsmen who have never known literacy for most of their lives. They first learn to read, and after writing, they write down their own experiences, or they specially hired people to record their ideas and ideas, and finally got them.

As long as this problem can be solved, I believe that in the near future, the army of the Chinese Empire will be able to use cast steel cannons. At that time, copper only needs to be used to cast shell shells, which can save a lot of copper to do other things.

In the north, Eastern Turks, and Jie Li Khan once again sent envoys, strongly demanding that we increase the exchange rate of spirits and horses, strongly demanding that we open the export of iron tools, and even demanding that we can trade weapons with us, willing to trade horses, cattle and sheep, and other materials they own for weapons and armor produced by the Chinese Empire.

Nowadays, Bailian weapons have begun to equip troops on a large scale. Although the lethality of Bailian Steel Knife cannot cut off the enemy's weapons with just one knife, it can easily break the opponent's armor. Especially leather armor, in front of Bailian Steel Knife, leather armor is not much different from paper.

Even those with strong armor like Li Yuanfang can easily cut the iron armor with a powerful steel knife. Now, we have sold out the inventory in the Chang'an arsenal of the former Sui Dynasty. Well, we either use it as a favor or sell it to those powerful people in need, especially those in the Central Plains.
Chapter completed!