Things here in Xishan are slowly getting on track, and Liu Jin is a lot more relaxed. He has free time to work on some black technology, and recently Liu Jin has been busy firing glass.
Glass is not uncommon in later generations. It is very common. From household window glass, car glass, to special bulletproof glass, tempered glass, etc., there are countless various glass products with different functions.
In this era, glass was a rarity in the Ming Dynasty. Only a handful of merchants from the Western Regions brought a small amount of glass products from Europe, such as some glass wine bottles, glass products and the like, and the prices were extremely high.
The key is that they are still very rare.
Only when European colonists opened up routes to the East, continuously transported Western things to the East, and then transported Eastern silk and porcelain back to Europe, did the number of glass products slowly increase, but it was still not ordinary people.
Something affordable.
The reason why Liu Jin wanted to make glass was partly for money. Xishan Coal Mining was a big business and the daily expenses were very huge. It was obvious that the product of briquettes alone would not be able to sustain long-term development, and another one would have to be opened.
financial resources.
Another aspect is also because my student Lin Shuhong is going to the Golden Continent with the fleet, and I also want to get him a telescope. Navigation without a telescope is not enough.
With glass, you can make glass bottles and the like, and you can also make some vitamin cans yourself, and let the fleet take them with you to prevent septicemia.
In this era of immature navigation technology, if you want to cross the Pacific and reach the Golden Continent, in addition to the geographical knowledge you teach, other things are also indispensable.
As long as Liu Jin can think of it, Liu Jin will prepare it as much as possible for his students and fully equip the fleet.
He also told himself about the matter of Huangjin Continent. Whether the fleet can successfully reach Huangjinzhou and return safely is related to his future destiny. No one is more concerned about it than Liu Jin.
In the workshop for making honeycomb briquette stoves in Xishan, Liu Jin had a small stove built for himself to study glass firing.
Liu Jin carefully inspected the raw materials that had been collected. The raw materials for glass were very simple and very common. They were everywhere, so it was not difficult to collect them.
Firing glass is also very simple. The temperature it requires is not high. A temperature of more than 600 degrees can almost melt most of the raw materials.
Generally speaking, if the temperature reaches 1500 degrees, all the raw materials can be perfectly blended together, and the bubbles in the glass can be completely eliminated.
It is not difficult to achieve a temperature of more than 1,500 degrees. It is completely achievable in this era. You must know that the temperature of a general charcoal fire can reach more than 700 degrees on the earth, and the temperature of a blacksmith's relatively closed bellows furnace can reach 1,000 degrees.
Liu Jin slightly changed the structure of the kiln, and added a blowing device to the kiln to increase the supply of oxygen. Liu Jin estimated that the temperature reached 1500 degrees, perfectly integrating all the materials, and integrating the glass into the kiln.
Once the air bubbles are removed, there should be no problem at all.
"It's almost no problem~"
"Erhu is at work~"
Liu Jin carefully checked all the raw materials and recorded each raw material in detail, so that an experimental record could be formed. The next time he operates, he can modify it based on the last operation and summarize.
.
"Okay~"
After hearing Liu Jin's instructions, Zhao Erhu started to get busy.
Bag after bag of glass raw materials began to be poured into the furnace, and then he blew the bellows like a tireless cow.
Since Zhao Erhu followed Liu Jin, he had no worries about food and clothing. Not to mention eating plenty of meat and fish every day, at least he had enough to eat three meals a day.
Compared to his previous home, not to mention three meals a day, he could only eat half full for two meals a day. As for eating meat, he could only taste it in his dreams.
Following Liu Jin, he became stronger. He was originally as tall as a bear, but now he is simply a humanoid tank.
The bellows whirred as Zhao Erhu pulled it. The stove used charcoal, the best horse-mouthed firewood. With the entry of a large amount of oxygen, the charcoal inside also began to burn blazingly.
The original red color slowly turned to white, and the temperature became higher and higher.
As the temperature continues to rise and continue to heat up, the various glass materials inside begin to melt continuously, slowly fuse together, and begin to form something in a red fluid state, which is glass.
Liu Jin was not in a hurry to get out the burned glass. After all, he was also a person who had traveled through time in later generations. He had learned some chemistry knowledge, and he had read a lot of historical novels. Among them, burning glass was a must-have for the time-traveling party.
skills.
I have read a lot of historical novels and I have read about fired glass countless times. Many of them mentioned that the glass in fired glass needs to be stirred, so that it can be better integrated and the glass can be mixed.
The impurities inside are removed more cleanly.
You can also reduce and eliminate the bubbles in the glass as much as possible. These bubbles are actually carbon dioxide, which are impurities produced by chemical reactions after the various raw materials inside are fired at high temperatures.
If these impurities and bubbles are not removed, the fired glass will be colored, and the presence of bubbles will seriously affect the quality of the glass. If you want to make a telescope, you definitely need glass with relatively high purity.
In addition, if he wants to make money from this glass, Liu Jin is also planning to make some glass crafts and the like. There are too many impurities and bubbles, but they will seriously affect the value of the crafts, and they will not be able to sell them at a good price.
Liu Jin held a long iron rod in his hand. He inserted the iron rod into the stove and began to stir. While stirring, he observed that more raw materials were melting inside and the heat wave escaping became more intense.
Liu Jin also directly used an iron rod to get some glass out, ready to see the effect.
When the glass is just out of the oven, it is bright red and has very good ductility. Generally, the processing of glass products is carried out at this time. It can be shaped into whatever shape is needed. If it is to be made into a bottle or the like, then
If you need to blow glass, use the hollow stick in the middle to connect it and keep blowing air into it.
