Daming Crazy Emperor

Chapter 303 What is Industry
The invention and wide application of the steam engine is the symbol of the first industrial revolution.

It is precisely because Britain took the lead in completing the first industrial revolution that it became the world hegemony.

Taichang knows all this.

The question is, what exactly is industry?
This seems to be a common sense question, but it is not easy to sum it up in one sentence.

Taichang also suddenly realized that he was promoting the first industrial revolution in Daming!

However, he didn't know how to describe industry to his ministers.

It seems that mining, smelting, manufacturing steam engines, manufacturing various machine tools, and even weaving, shipbuilding, producing porcelain, manufacturing various daily necessities, etc., all belong to the industrial category.

Question, some of these things already existed, such as mining, smelting, weaving, shipbuilding, porcelain production, and various daily necessities, etc. Didn’t the Ming Dynasty always have these businesses?
Perhaps, replacing labor with steam engines is the industrial revolution.

Because it can significantly improve production efficiency.

In short, the key to the industrial revolution is not to be obsessed with what is called industry, but to promote the application of steam engines in various fields and improve production efficiency as soon as possible, so that the manufacturing industry of Ming Dynasty far exceeds that of other countries in the world.

The batch manufacturing of steam engines or the research and development of various machine tools is the key to improving production efficiency, so Taichang has devoted its main energy to the steam engine factory.

Several important officials from the Ministry of Industry even took their disciples to live in the newly built steam engine factory, where they frantically developed various machine tools all day long.

The invention of screws or batch manufacturing quickly solved the problem of fastening parts, and the development of drilling machines also quickly broke through the bottleneck.

Of course, it is not right to fix the parts on a bracket attached to the ground, or in other words, this approach is not conducive to improving production efficiency.

Taichang gave a reminder, and Bi Maokang, Wang Zheng and others quickly made a table similar to a punching machine.

In this way, the person who operates the lathe can be the same as the person who operates the punching machine, just stand or sit there and process.

Don't underestimate this little improvement, many times a small detail can significantly improve production efficiency.

The key to this detail lies in the convenience of operation, the operation is convenient, and the efficiency will naturally increase.

This time Taichang did not limit himself to mentioning points, he even called together several important officials from the Ministry of Industry and explained in detail why he did this and why he had to pay attention to details.

This also made the machine tools developed by Daming far surpass all countries in the world in terms of operability.

The drill press was developed, and the lathe was next.

The lathe also has a special name, that is, the industrial machine tool.

Or, to put it another way, the machine tool is the mother of industry, and the lathe is the most important machine tool.

If you want to develop a lathe from scratch, the difficulty is not ordinary.

Fortunately, Daming already has the foundation, because the grinding machine has already been made, and the grinding machine is the simplest lathe with a little improvement.

How simple is this simplest lathe?

When Taichang saw the first lathe developed by Bi Maokang, Wang Zheng and others, he couldn't help crying and laughing.

This is actually a grinding machine, but a few screws have been added to the place where the original parts were fixed, and the grinding stone originally fixed on the machine table has become a sharp chisel.

Well, this thing looks like it might actually work.

In any case, as long as this thing can realize the function of a lathe, as for the improvement, it can be done slowly.

Taichang controlled his facial expressions, and directly signaled Bi Maokang, Wang Zheng and others to start their performance.

This simplest machine tool cannot be driven by one person.

The steam switch must be controlled by one person.

The front and rear positions of the chisel must be individually adjusted.

It also takes a person to move the chisel back and forth.

What they fix the chisel is a copper slider, a smooth copper rod is pierced on each side of the slider, and two ropes are tied to each end of the slider, and the other end of the rope is tied to the two sides. on a large wheel-like disc.

In this way, as long as someone stood opposite and turned the two large discs, the copper block holding the chisel could slide back and forth.

It can be said that this lathe is not the same thing as the lathes of later generations.

However, since Bi Maokang, Wang Zheng and others have invited him as the emperor, they should have basically realized the function of this lathe.

Taichang nodded, and Wang Zheng immediately fixed a forged connecting rod on the large turntable at one end of the machine tool with screws.

And Bi Maokang instructed Song Yingxing to slowly pull the chisel fixed on the copper slider at the other end, and leaned on the copper rod to make gestures for a while.

They seem to have tried it more than once, so the position of the chisel basically needs no adjustment.

Bi Maokang took a closer look, then waved to Song Yingxing to move the chisel back a little, then waved decisively: "Turn on the steam engine."

Upon hearing this, Sun Yuanhua opened the steam valve without hesitation.

"Puff puff puff", there was a puff sound, and the big turntable holding the copper rod started to rotate immediately, and the speed of rotation was getting faster and faster.

Bi Maokang waited for a while until the rotation speed of the copper rod stabilized, and then waved his hand to signal Song Yingxing opposite to turn the big disc, and slowly brought the chisel closer to the copper rod.

There was a sound of "sizzling" friction, and tiny broken copper wires immediately splashed out from the rapidly rotating copper rod, and where the chisel passed, the copper rod also became shiny.

This lathe is really usable, and the speed is not slow.

In less than a cup of tea, Song Yingxing slid the chisel close to the square on the top of the copper rod. This copper rod is considered a car!
Seeing this, Bi Maokang immediately raised his hand to ask Sun Yuanhua to turn off the steam, then scooped a ladle of water from the nearby wooden bucket and poured it on the copper rod to cool it down, then carefully took the copper rod down and ran to Taichang, Excitedly said: "Your Majesty, look, the connecting rod car of this steam engine is ready."

Taichang took a look at the connecting rod, and there were obvious threads on it!
He was quite curious: "Is this all right?"

Bi Maokang nodded repeatedly and said, "Okay, just grind on the grinder for about half an hour."

Hearing this, Taichang couldn't help but said dumbly: "Have you got to grind for half an hour?"

But Bi Maokang said with satisfaction: "It's already very good. If you don't drive, it will take at least an hour."

Uh, this efficiency has only doubled?

The parts from the lathe should only need to be ground a little bit!
Obviously, this lathe still needs a lot of improvement.

Taichang thought about it carefully, then walked to the lathe and pointed to the chisel and said, "This lathe cannot use a chisel, it needs a special turning tool, which is roughly a square stick, and one corner can be sharpened."

Immediately afterwards, he pointed to the big turntable that clamps the parts and said: "Also here, you can't just clamp one end of the parts, and the other end should be a sharp cone that can slide back and forth to push the other side of the parts." hold so the part is fully seated."

Immediately afterwards, he pointed to the two large discs that pulled the slider and said, "And here, you'd better replace it with a rack and a gear."

When he said the first two sentences, everyone was still nodding their heads, but at this point, Wang Zheng couldn't help asking: "Your Majesty, what is a rack?"

How to explain this?
Taichang thought for a while, then asked, "Where are the gears?"

It's on this lathe.

Wang Zheng walked aside without hesitation, pointed to the position where the steam engine was connected to the big turntable, and said, "Your Majesty, look, there are gears here."

Taichang walked over to have a look, then pointed to a gear and explained: "Look, this gear is round, and the other gear is also round. When it turns, it can bring the other gear to turn. If you put the other Make a long bar with teeth, and then add a handle to this gear, then, when you turn this gear, can the gear move back and forth with the slider?"

It turns out that the rack is what it means.

Wang Zheng just thought about it for a while, then nodded again and again: "I understand."

Relying on the images of later generations in Taichang's mind, the speed of improvement of the lathe was still very fast. In less than a month, Bi Maokang, Wang Zheng and others made a real lathe.

Although the lathes made at this time are far inferior to those of later generations, there is still no problem in lightly processing copper parts.

The successful development of the lathe can be said to be a sign of entering the stage of industrialization, because it is easy to develop other machine tools with this mother bed, and with more and more types of machine tools, the production efficiency will definitely be higher and higher.

The Ming Dynasty has already sounded the horn of industrialization, and the industrial era belonging to the Ming Dynasty is coming!

(End of this chapter)