The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 635 Fireships and Self-Propelled Land Vessels
The territory to the north of the Ming Dynasty was indeed vast.

The Nurgan Commandery covers an area of ​​tens of thousands of miles.

If we were to completely wipe out the Oirat tribe and take over their territory extending north to the Khanate of Siberia, that would cover an area of ​​twenty to thirty thousand li.

With such a vast territory, it's impossible to rely solely on naval ships circling the coastline for defense; fortified towns must also be built in the middle for protection.

They can't just ignore the resources in the middle of the 20,000 to 30,000 miles; they'll definitely send people to mine for minerals and timber.

The problem is, these distances are often tens of thousands of miles, so how do we transport people, horses, and supplies?

At this time, most of the land transport was done by horse-drawn carriages. A horse-drawn carriage could only travel a little over a hundred miles a day at most. It would take more than a hundred days to travel more than ten thousand miles, and more than two hundred days to travel more than twenty thousand miles. A round trip would take more than a year. This method of transport was obviously not feasible.

It's fair to say that transporting goods by horse-drawn carriage over distances exceeding ten thousand miles is impractical.

So, what to do?

Xiao Zhu Changxun's question suddenly reminded Wanli of something: trains and railways.

If we could develop a train and then use railways to traverse the vast northern territory, it would be much easier to transport people, horses, and supplies.

The vast territory to the north of the Ming Dynasty is rich in mineral and forestry resources. If a railway could be built, it would be convenient to transport minerals and even timber.

Trains and railways were of paramount importance, almost as important as steamships to the Ming Dynasty, whose land territory was expanding rapidly.

This is such an important thing, we need to develop it as soon as possible.

Song Yingxing happened to have some free time, so it shouldn't be a problem to hand it over to this little guy for research and development.

Wanli thought about it carefully, and then solemnly said, "Chang Geng, do you fully understand the principle of steamships?"

That's actually very simple, not even as complicated as a loom.

This is tantamount to a test, so he doesn't need to be modest.

Song Yingxing nodded readily and said, "Your Majesty, I understand everything."

Emperor Wanli nodded slightly, then offered a suggestion: "Think about it, if a fire ship can move on its own in the water, can a boat travel on land?"

Boating on land?

Upon hearing this, Song Yingxing's eyes lit up.

What would happen if we brought the flying shuttle onto land?

He hadn't really considered this question, because according to his usual way of thinking, boats were meant to travel on water, and who would think of bringing a boat onto land?

He thought about it carefully, then sighed helplessly, "Your Majesty, it seems that traveling by boat on land is not feasible."

Because the boiler and steam engine weigh at least a thousand kilograms, and with water added to the boiler, it weighs several thousand kilograms. If you also consider the weight of the coal and the ship itself, it weighs tens of thousands of kilograms. If you also bring the crew, horses, and supplies, it weighs at least tens of thousands of kilograms.

It's so heavy, the wheels would definitely have to be made of high-strength steel to support it. The problem is, even if the wheels can support such a heavy load, the ground can't.

A horse-drawn carriage carrying several thousand kilograms of weight would have its wheels stuck in the ground and unable to move, let alone a flying shuttle, which itself carries a steam engine and boiler weighing several thousand kilograms.

Wheels made of tempered steel will sink into the ground as soon as they hit the road, unless we build an iron plate road, that is, we pave the road with thick iron plates.

Your Majesty, if it needs to bear a weight of tens of thousands of kilograms, then the iron plate must be at least two inches thick. That piece, about ten feet in diameter, would probably weigh several thousand to tens of thousands of kilograms.

One li is 150 zhang. If we want to build this kind of iron plate road, it must be at least 10 zhang wide. So, one li would require tens of millions of jin of iron.

Your Majesty, we can't possibly use so much iron to build roads, can we?
Moreover, our current output of wrought iron is only enough to repair a few miles a day.

You are a genius.

You can even imagine a road made of iron plates!

Wanli shook his head slightly, then continued to advise, "Chang Geng, we don't need to cover the ground with two-inch iron plates."

All we need to do is lay iron tracks under the iron wheels. You know what iron tracks are, right?

Do you remember the workshop at the Summer Palace that forged 500-jin and 1000-jin cannon barrels? Those steel beams were like railway tracks, except the carts on them were pulled by manpower.

Oh, I see!

Upon hearing this, Song Yingxing couldn't help but let his eyes light up and said, "Your Majesty is wise. A steel beam that is ten feet long would only weigh about a thousand catties, and a beam that is one mile long would only weigh 150,000 catties. Two beams would only weigh 300,000 catties."

If we were to cast those rails using wrought iron from a single furnace, the wrought iron we produce in a day could pave at least a hundred miles of railway. This method is indeed feasible.

Actually, the rails weren't that thick.

Wanli shook his head slightly, then explained in detail: "The steel beams you see are suspended in the air, with nothing underneath them, so they have to be cast so thick, otherwise they would be bent under the weight."

"We lay railway tracks on the ground, with something underneath, so there's no need to cast them that thick, not even half the thickness."

That makes sense!

Upon hearing this, Song Yingxing exclaimed excitedly, "Your Majesty, do you mean that we only need to lay 100,000-jin (50,000 kg) of rails for each mile?"

"I haven't weighed it myself." Wanli nodded slowly and said, "That should be about enough."

Then this railway can definitely be built.

Upon hearing this, Song Yingxing excitedly rubbed his hands together and said, "In this way, the molten iron we produce in a day can build hundreds of miles of railway, which is over 100,000 miles a year!"

Once this railway is built, traveling by land by boat will cover at least a thousand li a day, and even twenty or thirty thousand li will only take twenty or thirty days. It's incredibly convenient.

of course.

Wanli nodded slightly, then took out paper and pen, and explained in detail as he drew: "We can't lay these rails directly on the ground. In order to fix them, we have to lay the rails on wooden beams."

The timber doesn't need to be buried in the ground; it can just be buried in the middle of the gravel. This makes it easier to replace the timber.

Also, we need to make these wheels protrude on one side, and the protruding sides of both wheels should face inwards, so that the inner side is wedged between the two rails, and the train above will not run out of the rail range.

The train here isn't like the flying shuttle or the Weiyuan warship, which are made as a single unit. We can make it into individual carriages. The front carriage has a steam engine and boiler, and the back has about ten more carriages, which can carry both people and goods.

He drew it based on his impression of railways and trains. Although the drawing wasn't very good, the meaning was clearly expressed.

Looking at the sketch, Song Yingxing's eyes lit up, and he nodded repeatedly, saying, "Your Majesty is wise, I understand."

I'm glad you understand.

Emperor Wanli put down his pen and solemnly said, "I entrust the research and development of these railway tracks and trains to you. We will go to the Summer Palace tomorrow to begin the research and development of the railway tracks and trains."

Great, that's wonderful!

Song Yingxing was so excited that he almost danced with joy.

Xiao Zhu Changxun was a little confused; he didn't quite understand.

Emperor Wanli, seeing this, offered no explanation.

Even if you explain it to someone who doesn't understand, they still won't understand. But once they see the real thing, they'll understand.

He always acted on his words, and the next morning around 7 a.m., he indeed brought Song Yingxing and a group of concubines, princes and princesses to the summer palace.

That afternoon, around 1 p.m., he invited Yongnian Bo Wang Wei to come to the largest foundry in the Summer Palace.

Song Yingxing is very enthusiastic about studying things, and he has already finished drawing the railway track blueprints.

Emperor Wanli handed the blueprints directly to Earl of Yongnian, Wang Wei, and then asked, "Father-in-law, how long do you think this size of rail can be cast?"

Yongnian Earl Wang Wei took the blueprints and examined them carefully. He then estimated that "rails of this thickness would weigh about 300 jin per zhang (approximately 1.3 meters)."

Casting objects this heavy in Sha Tin is already the limit. If you want to cast something even longer, you'll have to make a clay mold.

Your Majesty, do you need a lot of this? If not, then make a few clay molds, and cast them to be two or even three zhang long, no problem.

"If we need too many, that won't work; making clay molds for such long objects takes quite a bit of time."

We also have to consider whether people can lift it. These days, laying railway tracks in the wild still requires people to carry them. A 1300-pound track is just right for four strong men to carry from the front and back. Any longer or heavier and it will be difficult to lift.

Upon hearing this, Emperor Wanli thought about it carefully and then nodded slightly, saying, "Then let's cast one piece each ten feet long, with holes at both ends of each piece so that they can be connected with thick iron sheets."

"Father-in-law, you'll need to build a larger foundry specifically for casting iron rails. We need a huge quantity—at least tens of thousands a day."

what?
Do you know how much it costs to heat tens of thousands of pieces of wrought iron?

Upon hearing this, Earl Wang Wei of Yongnian cautiously said, "Your Majesty, ten thousand pieces are equivalent to about three million catties of wrought iron. Just the centipede boats alone would require sixty boats to haul them over."

Moreover, casting requires time to cool down. If you say you can cast more than 10,000 pieces a day, then our sandy fields would have to be able to bury that many at the same time.

If you add the furnace and the channel for pouring molten iron, this workshop would probably have to be built to a size of several hundred feet.

"Your Majesty, there isn't such a large open space in the Summer Palace."

That's not all; the workshops that made the locomotives and carriages took up even more space.

After thinking for a moment, Wanli decisively said, "Then let's enclose another piece of land, about ten li in circumference, south of the Summer Palace."

This workshop for casting railway tracks is only part of the project; we need to build something much bigger. As for how big that workshop should be, you can discuss it with Chang Geng.

what?
We need to build something even bigger!

When Yongnian Earl Wang Wei heard this, he was stunned.

This railway track consumes three million catties of iron every day. How much iron would it take for something even bigger?

If we add in the labor costs, how much more money would that cost?

Fortunately, the Ming Dynasty is not short of iron or money.

(End of this chapter)