The reason why Old Man Niu welcomes Xu Wei is that Xu Wei's casual suggestions can improve the quality of iron-making. Before joining Xu Wei, he was just an ordinary blacksmith, but under Xu Wei's suggestions he has learned how to make Bailian.
With a sword, just a stacking technique and a blower technique instantly made Mr. Niu a famous sword forger.
But what Xu Wei is now teaching Old Man Niu is the blast furnace ironmaking technology.
In this era, charcoal was generally used for iron-making, so that a high-quality sword could be made. Although there was a lot of coal in Bingzhou, people in this era also thought of using coal to make iron. However, China's coal mines and iron ores were rich in sulfur, and if iron was added
Without the sulfur element, it will be very brittle, so what is refined is basically scrap iron, so people prefer to use expensive charcoal to make iron instead of coal.
People in this era obviously did not know the steps of desulfurization. Of course, there may be a few famous swordsmen who knew it, but they regarded this method as a family heirloom and guarded it tightly. It was not popularized and was eventually lost in the war.
But desulfurization is no secret at all to Xu Wei.
Although he was a scumbag when he first took the chemistry class, he had read thousands of novels and learned a lot of useless knowledge, including the fact that adding a little limestone to iron making can improve the quality of the steel.
Don’t ask me about chemical principles!
Don’t ask me about the reaction equation!
My chemistry teacher died early!
Well, the chemistry teacher is not dead. The real reason is that Xu Wei, a scumbag, has basically forgotten his high school chemistry knowledge, but he knows that as long as it is a farming novel, the one who writes about ironmaking must have added limestone.
So he asked Old Man Niu to give it a try, and he actually produced 100 kilograms of molten iron from coal. The quality was pretty good. The shocked Old Man Niu wanted to become Xu Wei's disciple.
In this era, Xu Wei did not have access to the Internet, so he became interested in this phenomenon. After thinking about it for a few days with his poor chemical knowledge, he felt that it might be the neutralization of acids and bases that actually increased the quality of iron.
The iron-making technology during the Eastern Han Dynasty was not very good, otherwise Xu Wei would not have taught a sword-making master by slightly improving the blower.
Although Xu Wei had never practiced iron smelting, after watching Old Man Niu and the others working for a long time and unable to produce molten iron, he knew that the temperature of the charcoal was not high enough to produce molten iron.
In order to increase the temperature of iron-making, Xu Wei knew that it would be better to use coke to make iron. We would build a kiln, put the coal in and ignite it, let the coal burn to normal and then close the cave, and what would be left behind would be coke.
Old Man Niu used the coke he got from Xu Wei to make iron. He felt the temperature and said excitedly: "This temperature is much higher than that of charcoal. It should be possible to refine high-quality steel!"
The molten iron was quickly refined and poured into the mold. After cooling, several plowshares appeared.
The old man Niu looked at the plowshare and said excitedly: "The quality of this iron is very high. It can be used after a little polishing!"
With Xu Wei's several pointers, Old Man Niu has already regarded Xu Wei as the God of Ironmaking, and he obeys his words.
And Xu Wei also thought that he had read all the knowledge about ironmaking from Taneda-ryu novels, such as the master Niu Laohan. What blast furnaces, how to use hot air to increase the speed of ironmaking, what hydraulic hammers, etc. Xu Wei couldn't see.
The amount of iron tapping is one hundred and dozens of kilograms each time.
The excited old man Niu found his son and asked him to write down what Xu Wei said in a notebook. These are secrets that are not passed down. Old man Niu has decided that this secret book can only be read by his son, and no one else can read it.
Keep it as a family heirloom.
Xu Wei continued calmly: "We want to build a new blast furnace. In the future, we will have to tap 10,000 kilograms of iron at a time to be enough for us!"
When Old Man Niu heard this figure, he was so surprised that he couldn't open his mouth from ear to ear, but thinking of Xu Wei's magical methods, he still followed Xu Wei's instructions to build the blast furnace.
But soon Old Man Niu found Xu Weida again and said: "Captain, the temperature of the coke is too high, the furnace can't hold it, and it's all burned."
Xu Wei was surprised and said: "No one was injured, right?"
Old Man Niu said: "No, after the old man discovered this situation, he asked people to leave the stove."
Xu Weidao said: "This is because bricks are not good. We need to use refractory bricks. Go to Mr. Wang and tell him to try adding some graphite to the bricks used to build blast furnaces in the future."
Xu Wei remembered that there were refractory bricks with aluminum added, and there was also some kind of graphite crucible. Xu Wei couldn't get aluminum, but graphite was very common. Adding some of it should be able to make refractory bricks.
At the same time, he also said to Old Man Niu: "Old man, you can also try adding other minerals. Maybe you can make a more powerful refractory brick. This iron-making requires high temperature. If the bricks are not good and cannot withstand the heat, they cannot be smelted."
Good iron!"
Old Man Niu nodded with deep approval!
At the same time, he said to Old Man Niu: "We are not afraid of problems. If problems arise, we will improve them."
But refractory bricks are not omnipotent, they just melt slower, so Old Man Niu found Xu Wei again.
"I have to think about and solve the problem by myself. All the iron-making knowledge I know has been handed over to you." Xu Wei couldn't laugh or cry, and that was all he had to do.
But Old Man Niu said as he should: "Captain, you are a master of iron-making. There is no one in the world who knows better than you in iron-making. Instead of us thinking about it for a long time, dragging down the progress of iron-making cannot be solved. How can we solve the problem?"
Why don't I come here for help? The captain needs to know that everyone is clearing wasteland with wooden plows in the suburbs of Mayi. How can you bear to watch everyone use wooden plows to clear wasteland?"
While iron was being smelted, land reclamation outside Mayi also began. Xu Wei knew the shortcomings of big pot rice, so he directly divided the million acres of wasteland into 14 pieces. Each community with 10,000 people had a piece of wasteland, and each piece had another
Divide it into 10 small pieces, and each ten small pieces are further divided into ten pieces of less than 100 acres of wasteland, which are reclaimed by a group of 10 people. This way, the amount of land reclamation is fixed, and the group of ten people are all acquaintances, and the gangsters are embarrassed to look at other people.
People work hard.
At the same time, Xu Wei divided the plowing cattle and horses into groups. However, the gap in farm tools was too large, so everyone had to use simple farm tools such as wooden plows, hoes, and shovels to clear the land. The efficiency can be imagined.
Xu Wei said helplessly: "Okay, let me help you think about it!"
Xu Wei stayed at the steel plant for a few more days. The only way he could think of was to make hollow refractory bricks, which would have better heat insulation. Xu Wei even suggested: "If that doesn't work, you can lay ceramic pipes between the refractory bricks."
Use water to cool down!”
This was already a trick that Xu Wei could think of, but of course he didn't know if it would work.
The new refractory bricks can finally withstand the problem of coke overheating. The blast furnace Xu Wei wanted was finally built by Mr. Niu. Although it is only 2 people tall, Xu Wei is completely an earthen blast furnace, which is probably only the level of the Republic of China.
But in Niu Laohan's view, this was a major historical process. Niu Laohan specially invited Xu Wei and other high-level officials to come to the steel plant.
When the molten iron flowed towards the grinding tool, Old Man Niu said proudly: "This blast furnace makes more than 10,000 kilograms of iron every day, and can produce thousands of plowshares a day. As long as you give the old man a month, Mayi's wooden farm tools will be
It won’t happen again.”
And Old Man Wang and the others looked at the blast furnace as if they were looking at an alien spaceship. It was simply Zentraedi technology.
Even Xu Wei didn't know that under his transformation, iron-making technology had leapt forward by a thousand years, and that this small blast furnace had reached the technological level of the 19th century.