I want to be emperor

Chapter 1005 Industrial Gas Machine
In the 46th year of Chengshun, in Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company, the somewhat dilapidated factory area was cleaned and given a new look. The exterior walls of several office buildings and laboratory buildings were specially painted to make them look like new.

The signboard at the gate has also been redesigned with a new "Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company". These large golden characters shine brightly in the sun.

Many workers in the factory are also wearing decent work clothes, especially a group of middle and senior managers of the company, and contract employees are all wearing neatly ironed black professional clothes without a trace of wrinkles, and the few headed by The real core senior executives, namely the company's general manager's office, financial affairs office, and executive co-organizer, are all wearing cyan robes made of fine silk fabrics.

This kind of blue robe is not an ordinary Hanfu, but the standard official attire of the Chu Empire!
Although contemporary Chu officials often wear professional attire in daily life, in some formal occasions, especially ceremonial occasions, traditional official uniforms are standard.

The official uniforms of the empire are similar to the official uniforms of the pre-Ming Dynasty. They are all in the traditional official style. In terms of color, red robes are for the fourth rank and above, green robes are for the seventh to fifth ranks, and green robes are for the eighth and ninth ranks.

However, there is no complement, but instead animal crests are used to indicate the official's rank.

Today, the Governor's Office of Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company is wearing a blue official uniform and a fifth-grade badge.

Although Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company was quite brilliant in the early years and once became the largest agricultural machinery company in the empire, the agricultural machinery and equipment industry was originally a niche industry among many industries in the empire...the market size was actually very limited.

After all, in the era of steam engines, agricultural machinery and equipment still had great limitations. They were professional equipment with high procurement costs and high usage costs. Only some large farms would purchase specialized agricultural equipment for agricultural production.

But zooming into the entire empire, in fact, contemporary agricultural production is still based on animal power. Taking the local area as an example, horse farming is generally used in the north, while oxen is used in the south. For overseas territories under direct jurisdiction, it depends on the situation. For example, horses are also commonly used in the Americas, while oxen are commonly used in Southeast Asia.

Of course, even if animal power is used, various mechanical equipment are also widely used, such as the animal-powered rocker harvester commonly used in horse farming areas... This thing is more suitable for large family farms in some areas and some small companies. farm.

There are also various human threshing machines, plows, etc.

These simple animal or human agricultural equipment have been widely used in the entire agricultural production, and the empire's animal husbandry is very developed.

Take the southern region as an example. Cows are no longer a rare strategic commodity. Most rural families will raise one or more cows. After all, raising cows does not cost any extra money. Just let half-year-old children or the elderly drive the cows to graze. When farming is busy, the cattle are given some feed to eat better.

Oxen are quite efficient at plowing fields.

The rice that is widely grown in the south is harvested manually using toothed sickles available on the market. After harvesting, a human pedal thresher is used to remove the rice, and finally it is dried.

Farmyard manure is also widely used in this process, and natural chemical fertilizers are also used in some areas where conditions permit... Most of them are guano dug up from the Pacific Islands or South America as raw materials, which are processed and used as fertilizers.

The seeds are no longer the old seeds with extremely low yields, but specially cultivated grains produced by official agricultural grain seed institutions. Although the yield of this cultivated grain cannot be compared with the original The various high-yielding hybrid rice varieties in time and space are comparable, but they are still much better than the original grain varieties.

Such a complete set of agricultural production processes, except for the poor quality of grain varieties and the lack of large-scale application of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, is actually not much different from the family agricultural production in a certain area in the 90s.

Of course, due to the application of grain seeds, chemical fertilizers, and pesticides, the level of yield per mu was far lower than that of later generations... But even so, the agricultural production level of the Chu Empire was not comparable to that of the traditional feudal dynasties.

However, even so, the agricultural mechanized production supported by the empire for a long time is still in a relatively backward state, and its application scope is relatively limited.

The main reason is that the limitations of steam engine agricultural equipment are too great, and other agricultural production activities cannot be used except for large farms.

This also made the steam engine agricultural machinery and equipment industry in the Da Chu Empire a relatively small-scale industry for a long time, with limited annual output value.

As a niche industry, and its overall scale is not large, Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company had only a thousand employees even at its busiest time.

And now, there are only more than 500 people left... The main business is no longer even the production of steam agricultural equipment, but the production of various steam engine tractor chassis, and then sold to various other messy machinery and equipment manufacturers.

For example, some steam engine-powered excavators and bulldozers used on many large construction sites... The steam engine wheeled or crawler chassis of these equipment are basically provided by the three major agricultural machinery companies. Among them, Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company has transformed into a more... Thorough, so the number of semi-finished chassis provided is even larger.

Although the original core business, namely agricultural machinery and equipment, is still continuing, its revenue share has dropped to less than [-]%!
In recent years, many people in the industry no longer even regard Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company as an agricultural machinery and equipment company, but as a supplier of steam engine power chassis solutions.

Such Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company, from the beginning of its construction, although it is an enterprise affiliated to the Ministry of Industry, it was not directly invested by the Ministry of Industry at the beginning. Instead, it was invested and constructed by the Liaodong Provincial Department of Industry and the Hekou Industrial Office. The supervision level was only from Only the sixth grade.

Later, Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company developed and expanded, with the number of employees exceeding [-] and becoming a leading company in the agricultural machinery industry. The company's specifications were upgraded to the sixth grade.

After the 30s, the company was assigned to the management of the newly established Northeast Machinery Corporation, and its grade was upgraded to the fifth grade, turning it into a pure enterprise affiliated to the Ministry of Industry.

This kind of example is not a special example, but a general example.

At present, the government-run enterprises in the Dachu Empire have undergone many rounds of integration after years of continuous reform, and some specialized large-scale head offices have been established. At the same time, in the 30s, the authority of state governments to establish and manage government-run enterprises was revoked.

Even the Industrial Departments of various state governments were abolished in the 30s. The original industrial management functions were merged with the Industrial and Commercial Departments, and the government asset management functions were merged with the Finance Departments.

Currently, the only institutions that can establish government-run enterprises are the provincial industry departments and the Ministry of Industry!

Of course, the local state finance department can still invest and hold shares in the name of investment, but this kind of shareholding only enjoys the right to dividends and not management rights.

All government-run enterprises in the Dachu Empire, regardless of whether the shareholder is the Ministry of Industry or the Provincial Department of Industry, or the financial department of a state government, or the investment of various ministries in the Gyeonggi Province, the management rights of these assets are under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Industry and the provincial Department of Industry.

At the same time, the provincial industrial departments have dual jurisdiction over the business of the provincial governor's office and the higher-level Ministry of Industry. However, only the Ministry of Industry has the authority to appoint key government-run enterprise officials.

For provincial enterprises, although the ownership of this enterprise belongs to your province, the senior managers of provincial enterprises are directly appointed by the Ministry of Industry, and the local governor has no right to interfere.

In order to manage the huge official enterprises, the empire has been continuously exploring and improving itself over the past 40 years. The current management plan is also a compromise made by all parties over the years, but it is not the final plan, because the top management of the empire has been All are changing the management model of government-run enterprises... Mainly because government-run enterprises have many problems from time to time, leading to problems such as poor management of a very large government-run enterprise, high-level corruption, short-sightedness, only short-term performance, neglect of long-term development, etc. question.

Whenever a problem occurs, the empire's top officials will make adjustments to these government-run enterprises!
The industrial departments of local and state governments were completely abolished that year because of the revelations that local and state government-run enterprises were experiencing large-scale losses, corruption, and large-scale illegal losses of official assets.

At the beginning, the high-ranking officials of the empire also thought of many ways to govern by restricting power and combating corruption and malfeasance. Later, they could no longer control the development... Many people secretly snickered, thinking that the high-ranking officials of the empire were nothing more than this. When local gangsters and the like were fighting, the empire's top officials made a sweeping move and completely abolished the industrial offices of local state capitals!

Since there are a huge number of local government-run enterprises with stubborn diseases that cannot be cured, then they should simply not be cured and just put them all into incinerators and burn them up!
If I can't cure you, I can't kill you?
Then, local and state government-run enterprises were completely shut down... Of course, this does not mean that local government-run enterprises were banned and closed down, but that jurisdiction was transferred to the provincial industry departments or directly under the Ministry of Industry, avoiding the need to come from local states. Direct interference from the government yamen.

Then there was a large-scale purge... countless heads fell to the ground.

Beginning in the 30s, the empire continued to reform government-run enterprises, mainly through various mergers and the establishment of various large-scale head offices. Northeast Machinery Corporation was established under this background. As a very large enterprise directly under the Ministry of Industry, it has more than 20 first-level subsidiaries and its total assets have reached 3000 million yuan.

Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company is just an ordinary subsidiary of their company.

But no matter what, Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company is a government-owned enterprise under the Ministry of Industry, and its three absolute top managers are all industrial officials.

It’s normal to wear official uniforms on formal occasions!
Today, the senior managers of Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company are on alert, naturally because something big has happened.

Half a month ago, they had received orders from the head office. Mr. Shen, the right minister of the Ministry of Industry, would come to the Northeast to inspect various government-run enterprises, and Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company was among the inspection scope.

The right minister of the Ministry of Industry came to inspect... This was an unprecedented first time for Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company. Even when they were at their peak, they had never received such a high-level official to inspect.

Not to mention the minister, even senior officials at the level of director of the Ministry of Industry have never been here. The most recent inspection by a senior official was the deputy director of the Innovation Department of the Ministry of Industry two months ago.

And why did the Minister come to inspect?
Outsiders may not know this, but people from Hekou Machinery Company know very well that the purpose of the inspection is to see their gas machines.

Last year, His Majesty said that we should pay attention to the research and development and application of internal combustion engines, and the empire quickly issued many policies to support the research and application of internal combustion engines.

It didn't take long for the Ministry of Industry to come down to investigate, and then selected Hekou Machinery Company, Tangshan Machinery Company, and Liaodong Machinery Company as key support companies for internal combustion engines... Well, these three companies were also among the few that had invested heavily in research and development in the field of internal combustion engines. , and achieved certain success.

For example, the four-stroke structure of Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company.

Liaodong Machinery Company’s nozzle oil and air supply structure.

Tangshan Machinery Company’s electronic ignition structure.

Due to patent issues, these three companies were forced to license each other's patents... In the end, these three companies all had basic internal combustion engine manufacturing capabilities, at least not restricted by patents.

Except for these three companies, it is almost impossible for other companies to obtain patents related to internal combustion engines from these three companies, which also means that they cannot enter the field of internal combustion engines before bypassing many patents for internal combustion engines.

Therefore, the industrial sector has no choice but to choose these three companies as key support companies for internal combustion engines... because apart from these three companies, they have no other targets to support.

Patent restrictions are a flaw.

This has also allowed the half-dead Liaodong Hekou Machinery Company to receive a large amount of policy and financial support. Among them, just an industrial gas machine research and development project that was declared received R&D funding support of 20 yuan, and it also received financial bank support. A large low-interest loan.

However, the above-mentioned support must be seen to show results.

Hekou Machinery Company did not dare to neglect and quickly reorganized the internal combustion engine project team. After technical demonstration and market research, they gave up their early plan to apply gas engines to mobile equipment, that is, tractors, and instead went for industrial power. way.

Although contemporary industrial power includes various steam engines, electric motors also appeared after the emergence of the electrical age.

However, there is still a huge market demand for gas machines in the industry, especially in some coal-producing areas and areas with large gas plants nearby. The supply of gas is convenient and cheap, which will result in the use cost of gas machines being relatively low... at least Much cheaper than electric motors.

Electrical equipment these days is extremely expensive... High value-added industries with deep pockets cannot afford electric motors.

However, steam engines also have many shortcomings and cannot be suitable for all industries.

Therefore, some industries have a hard demand for industrial gas machines.

There was a market demand for this, and Hekou Machinery Company's gas machine technology reserves were still very deep. Therefore, after changing its research and development approach, it actually developed an industrial gas machine.

After hearing that Hekou Machinery Company had produced an industrial gas machine, the Ministry of Industry responded quickly and soon sent a deputy director down to inspect and confirm that the results were true.

This time when a big boss from the Ministry of Industry came to the Northeast region to inspect the development of government-run enterprises, Hekou Machinery Company's industrial gas generator project was naturally included in the scope of the inspection.

A group of managers from Hekou Machinery Company waited for a long time, and finally arrived in the afternoon with Mr. Shen, the right minister of the Ministry of Industry, and his party.

The right minister of the Ministry of Industry went on an inspection trip, and the standards were naturally very high. There were more than 20 horse-drawn carriages accompanying him. There were also patrols to clear the way. The governor's office of Liaodong Province was also personally accompanied by the chief envoy. In addition, the third-grade general manager of the Northeast Machinery Corporation The supervisor also accompanied him personally.

After Shen Xufei, the right minister of the Ministry of Industry, got off the carriage, he greeted the people from Hekou Machinery Company with a kind smile. After a few words, he went to visit the experimental building of Hekou Machinery Company accompanied by everyone... And according to the itinerary, we only looked at the industrial gas generator project in this test building.

As for the others, I won't check... After all, I am a second-grade officer, and time is very precious. How can I have extra time to look at workshops and office buildings, and make messy reports?

Today alone, Shen Xufei will inspect six government-owned enterprises in Hekou, and then hold a meeting there. He will leave for Shenyang tomorrow to continue his inspection.

With limited time, Shen Xufei's inspection trip was relatively hasty. He skipped many inspection projects prepared by Hekou Machinery Company and went directly to the gas generator project team.

Here, he finally saw the first practical industrial gas machine in the Dachu Empire!
The chief engineer of Hekou Machinery Company introduced this gas engine. It adopts a single-cylinder four-stroke design. The maximum speed can reach 260 revolutions per minute. The single-machine horsepower can reach [-] horsepower. The most important thing is that the thermal efficiency value is very high and can be achieved.

It is also worth noting that this gas machine does not use the electronic ignition mode that they worked so hard on before.

Because the electrification technology of the contemporary Dachu Empire was not yet at home, and electronic ignition was too difficult, they resorted to other ignition modes. At first, they used open flame ignition, but found that this thing was not very good, so they tried it again. Heat pipe ignition.

The principle of ignition of this heat pipe is actually very simple. It is to add an iron pipe with one end sealed and protruding into the cylinder, and then use a flame to heat the external sealed iron pipe; at the same time, when the gas and air mixture is injected into the cylinder, Part of the mixed gas contacts the iron pipe that is sealed at one end and heated. Due to the high temperature of the iron pipe, it deflagrates, and finally pushes the piston to reciprocate.

This kind of ignition structure is naturally not as good as electronic ignition, but it is also much better than open ignition. However, it also has some problems of its own, such as high processing technology requirements and average ignition reliability.

But this is already the best way Hekou Machinery Company found when electronic ignition cannot be applied in practice and can only stay in the laboratory state.

If they don't use this ignition method, then they can only use the old open ignition mode, and that thing is even worse!
(End of this chapter)