Chongzhen's domineering

Chapter 234 The Rebel Jurchens Are Completely Lost (Part 2)

In July, the capital city was sweltering with heat.

However, things are different now. With ice to cool people down, the people of the capital no longer feel that hot.

Even more so, because the shops along the street have ice and hand-cranked fans, you can feel the cool breeze wherever you walk down the street, which is very refreshing.

Zhu Jue was particularly pleased at this moment, because both the rebels and the Jurchens had been rendered helpless by Pan Yunteng and Sun Chuanting, and all he received were good news.

Furthermore, the Spanish envoy will be coming to negotiate in July. As long as he can reach an agreement with them on the "cooperative development" matter, the Ming Dynasty will no longer lack the raw materials needed for development.

At that time, the Ming Dynasty will surely develop rapidly, and it will be possible to suppress the Little Ice Age disaster, deal with rebels and Jurchens, and even dominate the seas.

He was eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Spanish envoy when, unexpectedly, more good news kept coming from the capital.

The first piece of good news is that the inner court shoe factory has officially started production.

The so-called inner court shoe factory was actually the large royal garden south of the Wanshou Palace.

Originally, he only ordered people to slightly modify the factory buildings that had already been built inside, in order to fool the Spanish envoys and make them think that they bought rubber to make shoes.

But things are different now; he really wants to develop the shoe-making business and make a lot of money.

After the first batch of rubber arrived this year, he ordered Yuan You to recruit a group of experienced craftsmen who specialized in repairing and maintaining the imperial palace. They built a batch of new factory buildings there, including boiler rooms, warehouses, kitchens, and other supporting facilities.

At this moment, the royal garden looks like a garden factory, with countless factory buildings and countless young and beautiful palace maids busy among the red flowers and green trees.

Nowadays, this place not only has shoe manufacturing factories, but also factories for drawing and embroidery.

The skilled painters from those craft households were all gathered in a workshop to depict various patterns, flowers, birds, insects, fish, auspicious beasts, and so on.

All the palace maids who were skilled in embroidery were gathered in a workshop, and their task was to select various patterns to embroider onto shoe uppers.

They would make various styles of shoes out of the embroidered shoe uppers to see the effect. If they looked exceptionally good, they would prepare for mass production; if not, they would continue to test the production.

To put it bluntly, they are developing new shoes.

These high-end shoes can't be made up of just a few styles. If they want to monopolize this high-end industry, they not only need a variety of styles, but they also need to constantly develop new styles.

However, they are still short of rubber at the moment, so large-scale production has not yet begun here.

The palace maids were mostly busy designing new shoes, and they didn't have to make many pairs a day, so they were quite leisurely.

Zhu Juena was leisurely strolling around the factory buildings.

This place is truly wonderful, with lush greenery, birdsong, fragrant flowers, and countless beautiful women. The flowers are beautiful, but the people are even more so; it's a feast for the eyes.

Just as he was pondering whether to go and check out the new shoes, Fang Zhenghua suddenly strode over, cupped his hands, and bowed, saying, "Your Majesty, Minister Yuan has sent word that the cement plant has also started production."

The cement plant has also started production?
This is truly a double celebration!

Upon hearing this, Zhu Jue immediately waved his hand and said, "Cheng'en, gather everyone to board the ship. Zhilong, let's go take a look."

It couldn't be more convenient for him to leave the palace now. As long as he gets on a boat, he can reach any outer city of the capital within half an hour.

The cement plant was located in the south of the southwest outer city, near the moat. It was just a short walk from there by boat.

At this moment, the huge cement plant was already bustling with activity, the machines roaring.

Yuan You, Lu Xiangsheng, Song Yingxing, Song Yingsheng, and others, all wearing masks, stood in front of a row of machines, watching with great interest.

Upon seeing Zhu Jue arrive, they immediately stepped forward, bowed, and then ordered someone to fetch a mask.

Zhu Jue didn't say anything. He quickly put on his mask and stood with the others to watch.

Cement production is actually quite simple. It involves drying the raw materials, grinding them into powder, mixing them evenly, then calcining them at high temperatures to produce clinker, and finally grinding the clinker into powder.

As for the raw materials for making cement, they are mainly limestone and clay, and the auxiliary materials are gypsum, iron ore, etc., which the Ming Dynasty had no shortage of.

The reason why cement hasn't appeared yet is partly due to outdated ideas, but more importantly, it's due to the grinding process.

It is very easy to grind crops such as wheat, rice, and soybeans into flour.

Therefore, foods such as flour, rice noodles, and tofu existed long ago.

Grinding stones into powder is no easy task, and it's almost impossible to do it by hand, which is why cement has been slow to appear.

The late appearance of cement can also be attributed to probability. If stones are easy to grind into powder, then some bored people would have mixed various powders together to try or just play around with them. And while playing around, cement probably came out.

The key issue is that it's very difficult to grind stone into powder, which is why no one has been able to develop cement.

Grinding this stone into powder is really not easy. In later generations, several kinds of equipment would be needed. Now, they used every tool and equipment they could think of.

For example, smashing it with a sledgehammer.

The sledgehammers weren't used manually; instead, a steam engine rotated a hinge to move the hundreds-of-pounds-weight sledgehammer. Below the sledgehammer was a massive cast-steel platform with baffles on either side. A long ramp was built at the rear for the soldiers to push the stones onto the platform. A screen was installed on the small dump truck at the front to collect any stones that weren't broken to a certain degree and continue pounding.

After the stones are crushed into pieces roughly the thickness of a finger, they are poured into the middle of a steel roller with downward corrugations to be ground into rice-grain-sized pieces. Then they are put into a special grinding mill to be ground into powder. After being stirred evenly, they are calcined into blocks, then crushed, ground, and ground again.

This process seems simple, but apart from the smashing step which can be done manually, the other steps must be done by machine.

Of course, the equipment used to make cement in later generations was not so crude.

Zhu Jue reiterated his previous statement: "First, you need to have it, and then you can improve it."

He looked closely for a while and saw that the first batch of cement had already started to be produced.

As soon as the discharge port was opened, a small cart was quickly filled, followed by another small cart, and then another small cart, until more than twenty carts were filled.

This amount seems like a lot, but it's actually only about 10,000 jin (5,000 kg). This is because each small cart can only hold about 500 jin (250 catties), otherwise, one person wouldn't be able to push it.

He stepped forward, picked up a small piece of the finished product, rubbed it, and nodded slightly.

Fortunately, the processing level of the Ming Dynasty was already high enough that the cement they produced was just like flour, pure powder without any fine particles.

As for the quality, there's really no need to test it. He still remembers the proportions of the raw materials, and it's fine to make it with ordinary cement.

He thought for a moment, then pointed to the pile of river sand in the corner and said, "Father-in-law, have someone stir it up and start laying the ground."

The factory floor was just leveled soil, not paved with stone slabs, because that's how it could be built quickly.

If the ground needs to be paved with stone slabs, it will take a few more days.

He had already said that the factory floor could simply be paved with cement.

Therefore, river sand, shovels, guards, and the like were prepared well in advance.

Yuan You waved his hand, and the craftsmen immediately pushed the cement over and got to work.

Mixing cement mortar is actually similar to mixing glutinous rice and lime mortar, and the soldiers are quite efficient at it.

Soon, a truckload of cement was mixed into cement mortar.

Zhu Jue pointed directly to the partition set up in another corner and said, "Shovel it over, flatten it, and scrape it a little."

This is actually quite simple. Lime mortar craftsmen have done it before, but they used to smear it on walls, which is much more difficult. Smearing it on the ground is not difficult at all.

Soon, the partition was filled with cement mortar. The craftsmen scraped it slightly with a steel plate brush, and the cement mortar became as smooth as a mirror.

The next step is to wait.

Zhu Jue waited for a full half hour before walking over, squatting down, and gently pressing his finger on the cement ground.

Then he nodded slightly and said, "Yes, there are no problems. We can start mass production now. You can't step on it for a day, and you can't put heavy objects on it for five days. After five days, it will be similar to a stone slab floor."

Uh, that's it?

Upon hearing this, Yuan You, Song Yingxing, and Song Yingsheng all showed expressions of disbelief.

They thought this thing would be very difficult to develop.

After all, they built a whole bunch of grinding equipment.

Who would have thought it would be so easy?

Seeing this, Zhu Jue simply asked, "Yuan Jiu, how much cement can this cement plant produce in a day?"

Song Yingsheng pondered, "If all ten factories are put into operation, this cement plant can produce one million catties of cement per day."

The idea of ​​using kilograms to calculate this sounds terrifying, but in reality, one million kilograms is only five hundred tons.

In later generations, cement plants were built to produce thousands of tons of cement per day. A single production line could produce a thousand tons of cement a day, and several production lines could produce several thousand tons.

None of the cement plants he visited had fewer than five production lines, some even had more than ten. And that was only because they didn't build production lines like crazy, considering sales volume. If they could sell as much as they produced, there would probably be super cement plants with dozens or even hundreds of production lines.

At this point, producing one million catties a day would barely be enough for Liaodong.

Upon hearing this, Zhu Jue nodded slightly and then decisively said, "Zhilong, arrange for several batches of medium-sized Zhiyuan merchant ships to transport cement, five ships per batch, continuously transporting it to Liaodong. You can unload the cement at Liaohai City Wharf. As for river transshipment, let Boya and the others arrange for smaller Zhiyuan merchant ships to transport it themselves."

When Sun Chuanting received the cement, he was overjoyed. The walls of the three cities were rising at a visible speed. Judging from the progress, they could probably be built to a height of ten feet in less than ten days.

When Huang Taiji received the news, he couldn't help but panic.

The Ming army's fortified cities were also the nemesis of their cavalry.

The speed at which they are building cities is terrifying. What will he do if the area south of the Prince River becomes densely populated with cities and fortresses?
He was completely at a loss.

(End of this chapter)