The wind blows from the South Sea

Chapter 68 Wear small shoes

When the heavily armed cavalry appeared hundreds of yards in front of the infantry array, the officers of the 2nd Battalion at the forefront loudly issued the "prepare to fight" order, and the commands came one after another.

The soldiers acted in accordance with the command, "put down the gun" in unison, took out a customized small package of gunpowder, poured the black powder from the muzzle of the gun, and then made a virtual action of biting open the paper package to load the warhead.

Nowadays, soldiers use fixed-load ammunition. Each bullet and black powder are in a small paper package, separated by sutures in the middle, and are uniformly produced and distributed by Nanyang Company.

Under normal circumstances

The soldier carries 15 small paper bags with him, all in a palm-sized rectangular wallet, which is 15 rounds of ammunition.

After firing 3 to 5 rounds of volleys normally, you need to mount a spear and charge, transforming into a spearman.

The bayonet equipped with the French Republic Nine-Year-Old Rifle is a long and narrow saber with a scabbard, about one foot long.

It is usually hung on the belt on the left side of the soldier's waist. It is made of fine steel and can cut meat and trees. It is very sharp.

Because it is a drill, real warheads are not loaded, but the action of loading bullets must be done properly.

Then the soldiers pulled out the long ramrod, stretched it from the muzzle of the gun, and tamped the loaded black powder. Then withdraw the ramrod and insert it into the buckle of the flintlock rifle.

After completing the entire reloading action, the soldiers of the second battalion held their guns in their hands, feeling confident.

At this time, the cavalry in front had already started and gradually accelerated. They charged forward in a fan shape. The sabers waved in the hands of the cavalry were gleaming with cold light, and they charged forward in an unstoppable manner.

The sound of galloping horse hooves was like muffled thunder passing through the valley, hitting the hearts of the soldiers all the time.

Feng Guohui stood on a high ground on one side and watched the soldiers' performance attentively. He saw that the cavalry were getting closer and closer, and there were some slight commotions in the originally neat queue.

The soldiers faced the impact of the cavalry. Although they knew it was a drill, fear arose in their hearts.

When the cavalry charged within 100 yards, the ferocious faces waving swords were clearly visible, and they rushed towards them with shouts and screams...

As a result, a few soldiers in the 1st platoon were so frightened that they dropped their guns and ran away. As a result, part of the 3rd company of the nd battalion collapsed, and more than soldiers followed them and turned around and fled.

Although the officers shouted harshly, they still did not stop these deserters.

Fortunately, the remaining soldiers of the 3rd Company overcame their fear and blind obedience and persevered tenaciously.

When the cavalry approached to a distance of 80 yards, the officers gave orders: "Hold the gun straight, prepare, fire..."

Burst after burst of intensive gunshots sounded, accompanied by thick clouds of gunpowder smoke curling up, the officers ordered to reload bullets immediately.

Under the tremendous pressure of the approaching cavalry, many soldiers could not restrain their hands from shaking. Some of them took the powdered gunpowder to the muzzle of their guns and shook their hands, causing the black powder to scatter.

Some even stuffed paper bags into the muzzles of their guns in a hurry, and many had deformed movements. However, there were also many soldiers who had solid training in basic skills and completed a series of loading actions such as gunpowder loading and tamping.

Sure enough, under the pressure of actual combat, it can be seen that the training level of each company is uneven.

The big mules equipped by the cavalry company are not very fast, and their ears are covered to prevent the sound of gunshots from startling the animals and causing unnecessary trampling casualties.

When they were forty or fifty yards away, the cavalry had already divided into several cavalry squads, whizzing past each company at a distance of more than twenty meters.

At this point, a round of actual combat training has been completed.

This result directly made the second battalion commander Hu Laohu face dark. There were no deserters in the third battalion in the back row, which made him even more embarrassed.

He led several officers to capture the twenty-odd deserters and beat them severely with whips until they rolled on the ground and begged for mercy.

Feng Guohui also darkened his face and ordered an inspection of the soldiers who were reloading gunpowder in the second battalion. All the soldiers who had not completed the loading action were picked out. The number was as high as 137.

With the addition of more than two dozen deserters, the number was close to half of the 2nd Battalion.

Immediately the order for punishment was issued;

More than twenty deserters went to receive 20 whips each and were starved for nine meals in three days.

The third company commander and all officers in the company each received 30 lashes, were demoted one level, and were allowed to perform meritorious service even if guilty.

Soldiers who have not completed the reloading action will each receive five whips and will have no food today.

Soldiers who passed the test were given meat to eat at night, and white-flour steamed buns were enough.

With the lessons learned from the 2nd Battalion, the commander of the 3rd Battalion, Mai Laowen, and all his officers went into battle, threatening and encouraging the soldiers, and almost used all their means.

Fortunately, the soldiers of the third battalion experienced a cavalry charge in the back row. After the second battalion withdrew, the performance of the third battalion in the face of the cavalry charge was much better.

At least there were no deserters, but there were still nearly a hundred people who had not completed the reloading action.

Feng Guohui was very dissatisfied with the result and became furious on the spot. He took the unqualified soldiers forward and whipped them until they cried for their fathers and mothers.

He then ordered that in the next week, multiple rounds of actual combat training between cavalry and infantry would be conducted every day, and psychological stress training items would be added.

The so-called "psychological stress resistance training" means that the soldiers stand in a marching column of four people, and the cavalry attack them from the left and right sides waving their sabers.

Let the infantrymen complete virtual reloading training under tremendous pressure amidst the sound of cavalry's hooves at close range. If it doesn't work once, do it 10 times. If it doesn't work 10 times, do it 100 times.

After Feng Guohui left angrily, officers such as Hu Laohu and Mai Laowen were all as if they had been given blood. They stared at the soldiers with eyes that made people feel chills in their backs.

Everyone knows that the superiors are getting impatient and are going to have a really hard time now.

After Feng Guohui finished his explanation, he ignored the military training here. Instead, he took people to inspect the valley and personally planned the future construction land.

The Landoshan Mine is a valley with a small mouth and a big belly, a bit like a three-section gourd. It is about 5.82 kilometers long and has a total area of ​​about 13.7 square kilometers. It is mainly composed of gentle hilly areas.

Although it is not very wide, it is enough.

There is a rapid river thirty to forty meters wide winding through the middle of the valley. The water is clear and sweet.

Feng Guohui named it "Calabash River" because it passes through a gourd-shaped valley.

Based on the principle of proximity

Feng Guohui and his men spent four days determining the locations of the iron ore quarries, mineral processing plants, coking coal kilns, brick kilns, and steel plants one by one. They were basically lined up along the Hulu River.

In the plan, the iron ore quarry and the mineral processing plant will be connected by rails, and rail cars will be used to transport large amounts of ore to the mineral processing plant.

Rail cars in mines today are generally pushed by humans or pulled by animals, and there is no other good method.

After the iron ore enters the concentrator and is crushed into powder, it enters a conveyor belt driven by a steam engine, and magnets are used to separate the iron ore powder from useless soil.

The soil was discarded nearby. Feng Guohui drew a line for the discarded soil. In the future, the soil will be stacked along this line and plans to build a soil gravity dam.

Of course, this was many years later.

The focus was on the location of the steel plant. Feng Guohui finally located the steel plant on the lower reaches of the Hulu River, close to where the village and training ground are today.

This is because the steel plant is seriously polluted. When the steelmaking blast furnace burns, black smoke billows, blocking the sky and the sun. The fly ash after combustion will inevitably pollute nearby rivers and land. In the future, villages and towns can only be set up in the upper reaches of rivers, and the situation will be slightly better.

After the main workshop, auxiliary workshop, casting workshop, rolling workshop and office buildings of the steel plant were established one by one with lime lines.

Feng Guohui then led the crowd back and immediately went to see the results of local steelmaking.

Now more than two dozen indigenous steel-making furnaces have been erected. Each one is a clay furnace more than two meters high, with a discharge port set up at the bottom. The discharge port is about 80 centimeters high from the ground.

When Feng Guohui arrived here, more than twenty steel-making furnaces were burning with flames, and villagers were working hard to pull and blow the bellows next to each steel-making furnace.

Wang Dachui and several blacksmiths were shirtless and very busy.

They were stirring the orange-red molten iron with long iron rods, and from time to time they would have people add lime powder or charcoal powder. Their bronzed bodies were full of strength, and large drops of sweat were all over their bodies.

Such a labor scene made Feng Guohui unable to help but stop and take a look.

a moment later

Wang Dachui raised his hand excitedly and shouted: "I think the heat is almost done. No need to add more charcoal. The furnace can be started later."

After the explanation, he took the water ladle handed to him by the person next to him and drank the cold water in big gulps.

After being reminded by others, Wang Dachui saw Feng Guohui and others standing aside. He quickly jumped down the steps from the furnace mouth, walked over with a happy face and handed over his hand to report; "Reply to Mr. Feng, we are here The furnace will most likely be able to make steel, and if it does, it can be used to cast large-sized flanges for ball mills in the future."

"Oh, how confident are you?" Feng Guohui immediately became energetic.

Wang Dachui replied confidently;

“Reply to the master;

We brothers are relatively new to this method of frying steel. We didn’t have many opportunities to get started in the past. We only watched old iron-smelting masters do it.

This time, all the iron slag waste that went into the furnace was removed by hand. Most of it was shaped iron, but it just needed to be refined again.

After spending so much effort, we simply tried to make a furnace of molten steel to see if the quality would be 60-70% certain.

Even if it doesn't work, you can always make good steel by practicing a few more furnaces. "

"Okay, okay, okay... If you practice good steel, I will give you a big reward, sir." Feng Guohui said three good words in a row, and a heartfelt smile appeared on his face.

If you can practice good steel yourself, you will greatly save the cost of purchasing steel, which is not a small amount.

In particular, ball mills and pulverizers are extremely heavy and consume large amounts of steel.

Generally speaking

These mining machines are large in size and extremely heavy. Large objects such as the base can be cast with pig iron, but some moving parts, including large-size flanges, steel shafts, rollers, rolls, large gear plates and other parts, need to be Cast with more wear-resistant steel.

If you can produce it yourself, you will save a lot of money.

This method of stir-frying steel had already appeared during the Song Dynasty and was widely used in steelmaking in small workshops. It is still the main method of steelmaking today.

However, the steel-frying method is very labor-intensive and requires a lot of experience from the steel-making master.

Even the best steel-making master would not dare to pat his chest and say that he can make high-quality steel in every furnace. It is normal for several furnaces to break.

Feng Guohui was in a good mood, so he and Wang Dachui stood by the workshop and chatted freely, expressing satisfaction with the progress of the ironmaking workshop.

In just a few days

The iron-making workshop has poured more than 140 iron balls and more than 20 thick I-beams, each of which is 6 meters long.

Not long after these I-shaped iron beams were poured, they were dragged out in their entirety just as they were taking shape. Several master blacksmiths rushed forward and started repairing with sledgehammers and small hammers.

Therefore, the upward surface is treated to be quite smooth and flat, so that it can be used for traveling on a truss frame or for transporting ore trucks in the future. It can reduce a lot of resistance and save energy greatly.

As for the downward side, there is no need to deal with it. It is built on the roadbed anyway. Whether the surface is rough or not does not affect its use, as long as it is strong.

Such an iron I-beam is six meters long and weighs about 360 pounds. Normally, it requires four local iron-making furnaces to discharge materials together before it can be poured.

According to the production capacity of the small iron-making workshop, each iron-making furnace can produce two furnaces of high-temperature molten iron a day and can produce more than 10 I-beams.

The remaining molten iron will be used to pour the iron balls.

The surface of these iron balls is pitted and has obvious joints and scars, making them look very rough in workmanship.

But this does not affect the use. The ball mill will be filled with a large number of ore fragments and hundreds of iron balls at once, and the ore will be ground into powder while rolling.

Iron ore is mostly fragments the size of fingernails, which are called "melon seeds" in the jargon. They are quickly ground into stone powder under the impact of a 30-pound iron ball.

Over time, the iron balls will become smooth and shiny.

"Master, now the furnace can basically make two furnaces of molten iron a day, which can cast an I-beam of about sixty or seventy meters long.

The problem now is that the raw materials are not in supply, and it is too slow to hit with a hammer.

When everyone started the furnace, whenever they had free time, they all helped to break stones, but it was not enough.

That's why we came up with the idea of ​​iron ore slag. After all, it has been refined once, and the impurities in the soil are much less, so the effect of re-refining is better.

There is also charcoal and coal that cannot keep up with the use. The mule-horse cart that went to buy coal today did not come back until the afternoon and almost stopped the furnace. "

"Oh...there's still this matter?" After hearing this, Feng Guohui's expression turned ugly.

He immediately summoned Dan Zheng to find out the whole story. Dan Zheng was a son of a merchant in Yanwang City, and he was different from Mr. Lu Zhenchao who stayed in Tianjia Town.

Danzheng is younger and more knowledgeable. What's even more rare is that he comes from a Peranakan family. He has studied in Malacca for several years and is proficient in the local indigenous languages, Chinese and English, and is fluent in Dutch.

He is a rare and comprehensive talent, and he is responsible for outsourcing coal.

Danzheng's answer quickly made Feng Guohui's face turn from cloudy to gloomy. The coal piles in Qiaojia Coal Mine were piled up into mountains, at least thousands of tons in volume.

When Danzheng went to discuss it a few days ago, the coal mine manager was very nice and said he could have as much coal as he wanted and that he could get a good discount on the price.

The wind direction had changed sharply in the past two days. When the mules, horses and carts that were hauling coal arrived at Qiao's mine, either the person in charge was not there, there was no manpower to load the carts, or problems of one kind or another were being ignored.

Danzheng knew that someone had caught him, and he was afraid of being blamed for his incompetence, so he was thinking of giving some benefits to the mine manager.

"Pujie, this is obviously for Nanyang Company..." Feng Guohui understood after hearing this and couldn't help but curse.

How dare a small mine manager dare to wear small shoes for Nanyang Company?

If the tiger doesn't show off its power, do you really think I'm a sick cat?

(End of this chapter)