Chapter 299 The Dawn of the Engine

Fengtian's original name was Shengjing, and he buried the emperors of the Taizong of the Qing Dynasty. Soon after Manchu entered the customs, he changed his name to Fengtian, which was taken from the meaning of Fengtian Chengyun. Of course, he also had another name in Li Mo's heart, Shenyang.

But on the issue of whether to change the name, Li Mo has always had his own ideas. Every city name and road name has its historical background. Personally, he doesn't like the scene of the whole country's liberation road and Nanjing Road like later generations.

No matter what the Qing Dynasty is, it is an indelible history on the land of China. As for whether to change the name, he handed over the power to the State Council for his own consideration. He didn't want to ask too much about such things.

The land of dragons in the Qing Dynasty and the northeast heavy industrial base of later generations are changing little by little in the hands of Master Li at this moment. It extends outward from the railway station. There are all kinds of newly built facilities everywhere. A row of wooden telephone poles have been emitted out radially. In addition to the telephone line, it is also connected to the most important facilities outside the city. One of them is the power plant.

Whether it is telephone, telegram or electricity, it is Master Li's favorite. At the beginning of its establishment, the newly established Northeast Telephone and Telegraph Company issued a bold word to set up a telephone line in every village. That kind of heroic words did not attract Li Enfu's praise, but was kicked in the mud.

It's not that Li Enfu doesn't support it, but that it's impossible for the State Council to invest so much money on the phone at this moment. You know, in order to connect Taiwan, Luzon, Ryukyu and even Lushun before the construction of its own cable factory, the State Council has purchased a large number of submarine cables from the United States for two years. It took a lot of effort and a lot of money. It was not until recently that the final laying of the submarine cable from Taiwan to Luzon was completed, connecting the north-south telephone line.

And in the case that the military and the VIP axe department use readable radios, such a large-scale telephone telegraph is also suspected of waste. If it hadn't been for the fact that there were no wires and had not been declassified, Li Mo insisted that it was not allowed to be put into civilian use for the time being. He would even be unwilling to set up a telephone line. Finally, considering that the finance was not rich, Li Enfu only approved the pulling of telephone and telegraph lines to the most important cities and factories, and rejected the idea of moving into every farm.

This matter later spread to Li Mo's ears, and he couldn't laugh or cry. Unexpectedly, the young people of the telephone and telegraph company had such a far-reaching idea beyond the times, so they also took the initiative to write a letter to the telegraph bureau to comfort the disappointed young people.

However, before Li Enfu's headache on the telephone and telegram was over, he was almost stunned by Master Li's huge power development plan. According to Master Li's plan, the major cities and roads in Northeast will be energized, and electricity will be popularized to every town and village in Northeast China in ten years.

In the case that Honolulu and Ryukyu are both bright, the three northeastern provinces also need to build five large thermal power plants and ten hydropower plants. Such a huge plan and capital only made him angry that he came to Li Mo to argue with him overnight.

In fact, Li Mo also made a mistake. His plan is completely based on the power demand construction of future generations, but at this moment, Northeast Power has just started, and it is impossible to lay it to every household, so he finally agreed to slow down, but we must ensure the construction of three large power plants, because he knows better than anyone else, no With electricity, there are no high-precision machine tools and no promotion methods to improve production efficiency.

However, considering the financial pressure, Li Mo said that he would subsidize the patent fees collected by his global power service company to the State Council for the next ten years, and Li Enfu left with a smile.

Ten years of patent fee!

Master Li is also painful to think about it. European countries led by the United States are desperately developing electricity. It is not enough to order alternators in Honolulu. They also bought patents to imitate themselves. The germination of electrification has initially appeared in various countries, and the annual patent fee is exploding, not to mention Tesla, an electrical appliance. How can Master Li lag behind in the initial stage, a super awesome man in the era of transformation?

Meat pain must also be done!

In this mentality, coupled with Tesla muttering behind him that he did not support his cause, Master Li gritted his teeth and went to the power plant, and stamped his feet to drive Tesla back to the laboratory, letting him continue to study what he urgently needed, and even threw the electric-driven high-precision machine tool project to him, saving that guy. You have nothing to do to annoy yourself.

Free hard labor and skilled technicians have promoted the rapid construction of power plants, and consumption promotes innovation. Li Mo is still very clear about this famous saying. Only when everyone begins to accept electricity and electricity consumption begins to explode, will all kinds of electrical appliances emerge one after another, not to let Master Li in the second half. He hid in the laboratory all his life and kept inventing small household appliances.

Outside the window of the car, the two Daqing ticket numbers and the Northeast Bank belonging to the State Council played against each other across the road. When Li Mo hooked the corners of his mouth, he had to accept the test of bumpy pain.

The cavalry battalion and the guard battalion temporarily transferred to protect around formed two solid lines of defense. Even in order to ensure that the last thing would not happen again, Chen Ping specially transferred a night cat, but at this time, the machine gun and important parts on it were covered with canvas, which was hard to see.

After half an hour of driving, three huge power plant chimneys appeared in front of him, and rows of neat factory sheds also entered the field of view. Seeing these, Master Li's bumpy sufferings just now disappeared in an eye, and he even temporarily forgot how to deal with Mr. Sun.

These days, industrial areas are different from those of later generations. Most of them are spacious semi-open factory sheds, bricks, mud and tiles, and loess as walls. They only want to block the wind and rain, and the materials are much simpler. It is far from what many people think, they are wrapped in cement and steel, so they can be built so fast.

Li Mo is not looking at the power plant today. Although a steam turbine generator in Fengtian Power Plant has been put into operation, his goal is a factory that is not particularly eye-catching in the distance.

The factory consists of three large greenhouses of more than 200 meters and several small houses. The outside is surrounded by earthen walls. There is a plaque hanging at the gate. Several security guards under the plaque are guarding the gate. When they see the convoy coming, they immediately stand up the railing excitedly.

When passing through the factory door, Liang Qichao also looked at the plaque on purpose. The third smelter in Northeast China? What is this for? Is it steelmaking? But it doesn't look like Hanyang Factory?!"

While Liang Qichao was in doubt, the convoy had already driven into the factory, and several young technicians and factory leaders who were waiting were red with excitement.

When Li Mo got out of the car, the protective guards had already dispersed. In addition to several technicians and factory leaders who came to greet him, the factory shed was even more crowded with people. After several months of training, although the workers who had just entered the factory did not know who came, so many cars appeared in front of them and knew that they must be coming. A big man.

After taking over the helmet and mask handed over by Du Dazhuang, Li Mo quickly put on Yan Fu, who was dressed in the same way, Mr. Sun and Liang Qichao walked to the first factory shed under the protection of several guards.

Seeing Li Mo coming this way, the workers in the large factory shed hurriedly returned to their posts and stood quietly in their seats, like soldiers waiting for inspection. With Li Mo nodded, a loud shout spread throughout the factory.

"Open the oven!"

With this loud sound, the burner began to add coal to the preheated furnace. A cart of ores that Liang Qichao and Mr. Sun didn't know well were poured into the smelting furnace. At the same time, all kinds of large and small bags were poured into the furnace. The last few workers controlled a steam-driven stirring stick and kept stirring. Melting furnace.

Both of them are a little puzzled, but Li Mo is very clear that the Bayer method used by the workers is a special method of refining alumina. By adding crystal seeds and constantly stirring, the alumina in the solution can be slowly precipitated as aluminum hydroxide, until the molar ratio of sodium oxide and alumina is increased to six. After most of the aluminum hydroxide solution is precipitated, the alumina water and matter in bauxite can be dissolved when heated. This is the process of dissolving bauxite with a kind of mother liquor. By using these two processes alternately, bauxite can be treated in batches, from which pure aluminum hydroxide products can be obtained, forming a Bayer cycle.

Yan Fu next to

nodded while looking. It was not the first time he had seen such a scene. After the construction of the Ryukyu Island Power Plant, there was also a such refinery, but the output there was very small, and the annual output was only a few tons, as long as it was used to train workers and provide aluminum to the laboratory.

Aluminum!

Looking at the red solution, Master Li's heart was surging.

Aluminum is the second most abundant metal in the world. There are abundant bauxite resources all over the world, including Northeast China, Luzon, Australia and the United States. Even Guinea Island opposite Micronesia also has abundant bauxite resources.

And the reason why he cared about aluminum and took the aluminum factory as the first stop of his three-provincial tour and the first start of construction was entirely because of the engine problems that have been bothering him more and more recently.

Golden finger can be brought, but the industrial foundation and technical ability are here. Even if it is assumed that Master Li can get out the tube against the sky, there is nothing he can do in the face of complex integrated circuits.

In fact, the engine field is the same. Although the engine technology of the previous republic was not advanced, bringing it back to this era is against the sky. Starting from the sky, will it be more against the sky in the future?

Really?

At least the steps on the internal combustion engine are difficult, which makes Master Li more or less suspicious. The car engine is still trapped at 25 horsepower, and the diesel engine is almost the same. As for the engine needed by the plane?

Well, Master Li really can't imagine what kind of scene it would be to install an engine made of hundreds of kilograms of all-nickel steel with only a poor power of dozens of horsepower on that small wooden shelf!

Weight and technology have become the biggest problems for the engine.

The process can be slowly reformed. As long as the workers are more skilled, as long as there are more and more senior technical workers, sooner or later, we can break through this barrier, from double cylinders to four cylinders, from double strokes to four strokes, and even more sophisticated and complex.

And the weight worries Master Li to death. Take the car in his current seat as an example, it uses a two-cylinder two-stroke gasoline engine, which is much more advanced than the single-cylinder car sold abroad, but the problem is that the all-nickel steel engine weighs more than 200 kilograms, and the whole is an iron mass!

How to lose weight became a pimple in Master Li's heart. It was not until Chang Linlai told him that the physical material laboratory led by the Curie couple completed the experiment he explained to enhance the hardness and strength of aluminum. After adding iron, manganese, nickel and other elements, he finally made an aluminum-based alloy, he suddenly thought of future generations. The aluminum engine!

Originally, Master Li asked the laboratory to concentrate on aluminum to prepare for the future aircraft, but he didn't expect that there was hope for engine weight reduction. The same aluminum alloy material is half lighter than the same volume of nickel steel. If the engine loses more than 100 kilograms at once, it means that it can carry more fuel, run more roads, or carry more goods.

When the technology is mature, the horsepower is a little stronger, and even after breaking through the V-shaped technology, Master Li will be able to officially get rid of the nightmare heart problem, and this also involves one of the most critical army equipment.

Tank!

The famous T34 is an aluminum engine!

In fact, aluminum is nothing new these days. The mining of bauxite began in France in 1873, and the production of alumina from bauxite began in 1894. It also uses the Bayer method, but so far the production scale is only more than 1,000 tons per year.

In addition to the engine troubles, the reason why it has to consume energy to go to the aluminum industry is also forced out by the rapidly soaring demand for steel. In fact, there is no shortage of good iron ore in Li Mo's hands, one in Canada, two in Australia, two in Luzon, which have been proven and positioned, and even sent engineers to Canada with explosives. With the rapid mining of Maoshan super-large iron ore, coupled with the two iron ores in Hainan that have just arrived, and the purchase of steel directly from the United States one after another, he does not lack mineral resources. If the total amount of resources is calculated, it even exceeds the sum of Carnegie and Morgan!

But the problem is that this is not the 21st century. Without dozens and hundreds of tons of advanced mining equipment, it completely needs to rely on explosives, iron picks, and people carry it on their backs. The total amount of resources cannot be quickly transformed into existing materials.

Before, the land was small. Master Li only built a few small steel mills one after another. After capturing the northeast, Huludao and Anshan are also building two large steel mills. It can be said that they are ready for production capacity, but it is an indisputable fact that the ore transportation is slow.

The best 10,000-ton ocean-going transport ship this year is only about ten knots at the fastest speed. It takes a month to come one way from Australia, and it takes more than ten days for Canada. Therefore, unless several iron ores in Maoshan and Northeast China are immediately put into production, I'm afraid it will not be able to alleviate the sharp increase in steel consumption. .

So Li Mo put his mind on aluminum. Aluminum is much softer than steel. It can shape its name, but it also means that it can't replace the steel that countries love the most. Therefore, it has not yet entered the eyes of decision makers. If aluminum alloy had not been developed in advance, it is estimated that Master Li would not have paid too much attention, but it was used to replace cans. First-class iron products are more than enough. The reason why aluminum became the main material after World War I was that after World War I consumed too many steel resources, everyone finally had to focus on aluminum.

Of course, in addition to the fact that aluminum alloys that are harder and have better heat-resistant have not been developed, there is a more difficult problem that countries do not pay attention to aluminum, that is, electricity!

Electricity is needed to refine aluminum!

Although electrolytic aluminum technology is nothing new and appeared in 1894, this method cannot be promoted on a large scale, because electricity is still a luxury at present.

Even now, countries have begun to build power plants, but after being skinned by Master Li, they are reluctant to build expensive power plants for electrolytic aluminum consumption. You know, even in the era of developed electricity in later generations, the aluminum industry is a high energy consumption and a restricted industry.

Only the combination of Master Li, who is interested in power investment, and the power maniac Tesla, will not hesitate to use electricity for industrial consumption. Especially Master Li, whose obsession with electrification has almost made the State Council hate it. According to his order, the machine driven by a steam engine belt The bed should be changed to electric, and the machine tool driven by the internal combustion engine should also be changed to electric. Electric tools such as chainsaws and electric hammers have also been thrown into the mechanical laboratory.

No one knows why Master Li is so obsessed with electricity. Only he knows that the second industrial revolution represented by electrification has sprouted, losing the opportunity of the first industrial revolution and making the country a slave to opium, so we must seize the second one anyway, or even You have to take the lead!

In the wild thinking of Master Li, a handful of white alumina powder was extracted, loaded into the car and pushed to the second shed in the distance. Li Mo and everyone quickly followed.

After entering the factory shed, Mr. Sun and Liang Qichao were even more surprised. They saw that there was no refinery in the factory shed at all, only a few strange huge grooves. Yan Fu immediately introduced them to them.

In the explanation, after the workers poured a truck of alumina, also known as bauxite, into the electrolytic tank, and then added a certain proportion of cryolite powder, the technician immediately called everyone to leave and checked around again.

As a technician pulled down the switch, powerful direct current suddenly poured into the electrolytic cell, using high-quality anthracite as the carbon body as the anode, and aluminum liquid as the cathode. After entering the powerful direct current, the chemical reaction began in the electrolytic cell at high temperature. The anode products are mainly carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide gas, among which It contains a certain amount of harmful gases and solid dust such as hydrogen fluoride, and the product of the cathode is aluminum liquid.

After the aluminum liquid was extracted, it was purified and clarified in the insulation furnace, and finally cast into large silver aluminum blanks. After watching all the processes, Sun Liang couldn't help but take a deep breath. It was the first time that they saw this complete industrial process, from ore to decomposition, and then into pieces through electrolysis. The aluminum ingots only dalled them, and kept asking the technicians who led them to visit.

According to the introduction of the factory director and technicians, the current first step of alumina refining is mainly used to train workers when it is produced. In the future, this step will be taken directly to various bauxite mines by the learned workers, and even Australia and Guinea will be established, which will become a complete electrolytic aluminum factory. .

According to the original plan, as long as the raw materials can keep up, the smelter can extract 500,000 tons of finished aluminum billet every year, and this is the first phase, followed by the second phase and the third phase. In the future, a super-large smelter with an annual output of more than two million tons will be built here.

Squat down, touch these slightly hot aluminum blanks, look at the complex process in the eyes of those people behind him, and the silver is like a pile of silver-like aluminum blanks. Everyone blushed with excitement, but only Li Mo knows that these are only semi-finished products, and some other metal materials need to be added to change. Their texture has become an industrial material that can really be used.

Soon, these aluminum ingots will become engines. At that time, the Cossack cavalry?

Hmm, the young master cut you to death! ......

(to be continued)