Courtyard Houses: The Great Masters of a Nation Hidden Within

When I arrived at 10 a.m. the next day, Gao Jianguo was already sitting in Lao Chen's office.

Old Chen was holding a document in his hand, examining it closely.

He came today for two things.

The first thing was to get Lao Chen to approve the electrode repeatability test plan that Liang Jianguo had revised according to his wishes.

The second thing is even more crucial. He had never touched the prototype of the GH2747 high-temperature alloy before, so he had to ask Lao Chen to take a look. If there were no problems, then it would go through the three-level review process.

Old Chen reviewed the first proposal very quickly, signed it as soon as he put pen to paper, and Gao Jianguo could start working on it immediately once he got it to the lab.

When it was the second serving, Old Chen glanced at it and exclaimed "Oh!" He then moved closer to the window, where the light was bright. He looked at it while muttering to himself.

"This performance boost is really good!"

"Yes, the processing channels are working smoothly."

"Wow, so only these few elements? They're all inexpensive, cheap."

"..."

After a long pause, Old Chen finally put the gh2747 proposal back on the table, tapped his finger twice on the cover, and asked Gao Jianguo, "Are you confident? How sure are you?"

Gao Jianguo raised his right hand and gestured: "This number."

Old Chen didn't know where Gao Jianguo's confidence came from, and could only guess that it was the unreasonable self-confidence of a genius. However, Old Chen had no doubt about what Gao Jianguo said.

After listening to him, Old Chen tapped his finger lightly on the cover of the proposal, pondered for a moment, and then said, "This is such a waste of resources; this needs to be a separate project."

Gao Jianguo didn't quite grasp it: "Wasted?"

Old Chen nodded, never holding back when teaching his apprentice: "Hmm, this thing is within our factory's main business scope, with such a high level of innovation, such strong overall performance indicators, and such a wide range of applications. It's clearly award-winning material. It's a waste to treat it as a side benefit under thermocouples."

Taking a sip of tea, Old Chen added, "If we really succeed in making it happen, things will be difficult with the publicity department. Thermocouples can win awards, but their own level of sophistication is nowhere near that of this thing."

Gao Jianguo finally understood. Old Chen was worried that this thing was being controlled by thermocouples, making it difficult to apply for awards and projects in the future, and that it would be suppressed by the thermocouple ceiling. He had to admit that the old master was indeed the old master, and he had thought of all the intricacies of the situation much more thoroughly than Gao Jianguo had: "Then you set the rules, and I'll be in charge of implementation."

Old Chen pondered for a moment: "Here's what we'll do. You'll still proceed with the original plan to trial-produce this alloy, but you'll need to draft a separate plan and submit it as a separate research project. Trial production and plan drafting should go hand in hand; neither should wait for the other. As for personnel, don't have too many; just a lean and efficient team is fine."

Gao Jianguo nodded: "Okay, are Fang Xiufang and Liu Weiguo free? Their workstations are right in front of and behind mine."

He specifically pointed out that the two men were sitting in front of and behind him, not to emphasize how close they were, but because he had figured out a bit of what Old Chen was thinking.

Old Chen was clearly pleased with his arrangement: "Hmm, it seems you've figured it out. Well, remember this: during the trial production, you can let them handle all the other tasks, but you have to do the ingredient preparation, mixing, and feeding yourself. Do it all by yourself, and don't let anyone else touch it."

Old Chen pronounced the words "personally" and "alone" very clearly.

Gao Jianguo immediately assured him: "I understand the rules, and I will ensure their proper safekeeping and execution!"

Old Chen patted him on the shoulder: "Alright! Go ahead and get busy. Remember, from this moment on, this plan is not to be handled by anyone else. You sign the verification section yourself in the three-level review process, I'll sign the review section, and you don't need to worry about the final approval; I'll handle that. I must say, this three-level review system you came up with is quite interesting; whether it's good or bad, you can easily distribute or discard it as you please."

Old Chen was clearly in a great mood at the moment, and even made a joke at the end.

Gao Jianguo had just turned to leave when Old Chen called him back: "Wait, you call this alloy 'high-temperature alloy'? You don't even have a proper name?"

Gao Jianguo admitted, "Yes, as you know, I'm not good at naming things, and it's inconvenient to directly incorporate my family background into the name, so I'll just make do with this for now."

He said that, but what he really thought was, "I knew that empty name was reserved for you."

Old Chen's enthusiasm suddenly surged: "Let me think about it. The Third Rolling Mill, in 1959, was the first company to develop this thing independently... Let's call it '3z-591 High Temperature Alloy.' It has all the necessary components embedded in it. Use that name for your new report."

The flattery was completely ineffective, but Old Chen was overjoyed. When Gao Jianguo came out of his office, the old comrade actually started humming the Peking Opera piece "Dingjun Mountain".

After leaving Lao Chen's place, Gao Jianguo went straight into the laboratory without stopping.

He first handed the signed electrode repeatability test plan to Liang Jianguo, telling him that once the steps reached this point, they could proceed according to the plan.

Next, Gao Jianguo found Sister Fang and Liu Qiang and asked them to come to him once the electrode trial production was completely completed. Both of them remembered this.

However, it will take some time to complete all the positive and negative electrodes of that batch of formulas, so the two of them won't be able to come in the next few days. Gao Jianguo will take advantage of this time to select the parts of the plan that are completely unrelated to them, and the rest will be used as the trial batching material for 3z-591 high-temperature alloy, which will be distributed later.

After explaining everything, Gao Jianguo asked Liang Jianguo how the experiment was going. Although it wasn't fully completed yet, according to his plan, the correct answer for type K should have finished the verification experiment.

Before Liang Jianguo could even open his mouth, Liu Qiang couldn't hold back any longer, excitedly saying, "It's almost done, Team Leader Gao! Everything's going smoothly. In one of the K-type groups, the nickel-chromium ratio on the positive electrode is 90:10, and the nickel-silicon ratio on the negative electrode is 97:3. The thermoelectric potential output has jumped to around 40 millivolts, and the other performance metrics are also quite impressive."

Liang Jianguo glanced at Liu Qiang and continued, "Yes, Team Leader Gao, this group, under ambient temperature of 25 degrees Celsius, when the measured temperature was raised to 1000 degrees Celsius, achieved a thermoelectric potential output of about 40 millivolts after cold junction compensation."

Liang Jianguo's words were far superior to Liu Qiang's, and he clearly explained the key test conditions.

In places where rigor is required, carelessly omitting prerequisites like Liu Qiang does will lead to serious problems.

Liu Qiang probably realized what was going on, scratched the back of his head, and smiled sheepishly.

Gao Jianguo checked the machining progress of Yi Zhonghai, Jia Dongxu, and Li Guoqiang again, and there were no major problems. The research project was progressing normally, and everyone was full of energy.