Apart from those extremely rare natural treasures and exotic golds and irons, most high-quality weapons are made of steel. In the Yanhan Dynasty, the time required to refine high-quality steel was often calculated in years. Therefore, a good weapon would inevitably be time-consuming and labor-intensive, and the cost would be extremely shocking. Even a famous master might have to spend all his fortune to afford it.

But after Li Feng improved the steelmaking technology, the so-called hundred-refined steel can now be directly produced in batches, which means that Wang Jing’s soldiers and main forces will be able to be equipped with a large number of sophisticated weapons and equipment in the future.

By then, everyone will have a tempered steel knife in their hands. Who can resist this?

Just thinking about it makes me feel terrible.

The increase in steel production has an immediate effect on strengthening military strength, which shows how important the strategic value of Li Feng's research is.

His presence is probably no less effective than that of first-rate generals and strategists.

Although Lao Li did not have such vision and knowledge, he was still greatly shocked by the emergence of this steelmaking technology and believed that the world was about to change.

"Hey, Lao Li, what are you thinking about?"

Seeing that Old Li stood there for a long time without any response, Li Feng stepped forward and patted him on the shoulder, admonishing him, "Continue to improve the technology. Minister Jia said that the ironworks will have a lot of orders in the future, and we have to find a way to further increase the output of steel."

"Ah, do you want to continue improving it?"

Old Li couldn't believe his ears, and his expression was quite surprised: "Team Leader, this technology is actually very powerful. There is no blacksmith in the world who is better than us. Why do we need to improve it? Could it be that Minister Jia doesn't want to give other blacksmiths in the world a chance to survive?"

"You are such a loose-lipped fellow! You even dare to make up stories about Minister Jia? I don't think you know how powerful he is!"

Li Feng cursed with a smile.

Old Li had just come to Luoyang from Yanzhou to work hard, and had only been in Qiqiao Pavilion for a short time, so he didn't quite know how terrifying Jia Xu was.

But Li Feng knew that the reputation of being a poisonous scholar that had been circulating among people made people fear Jia Xu a little bit, and they would not look down on him just because he was easy to talk to.

Realizing that he had said something wrong, Lao Li slapped himself a few times.

Li Fengcai said, "Big people must have their own considerations. We who work below should just do our duty and not think about those trivial things. Otherwise, if you offend the nobles by saying something wrong, I can't protect you, understand?"

Old Li knew that words can cause trouble, so he looked around and saw that no one else was around. He then approached Li Feng and asked quietly, "Team leader, I heard that you were selected for the next batch of engineers at the Imperial Academy of Engineering?"

"What are you asking for?"

"Hey, look at what you said. Didn't Marquis Qi say that a soldier who doesn't want to be a general is not a good soldier? Although I, Old Li, am old, I also have dreams, okay?"

Li Feng laughed when he heard this: "With a body that can barely even kill a pig, you still want to be a general?"

"Team leader, what you said is not true. I don't know how to lead troops in battle. I just want to ask, is there any hope for me, Old Li, to enter the Imperial Academy of Engineering in this lifetime?"

The title of engineer is not simple. Not only does it have good benefits, but it also allows one to meet officials without bowing, and has the right to participate in politics. How prestigious would it be to tell others about it?
Old Li thought happily that if he could really be selected, he would be able to have a separate page in the family tree when he returned home in the future. This would be a great event that would bring honor to the family.

In the past, being a craftsman was a menial job. Even if one wanted to stand out, there was no such opportunity. So one could just muddle through day by day, just hoping to have enough food and clothing.

But who in life would like to be inferior to others forever and live like a puddle of mud?
Ever since Chen Sheng and Wu Gao shouted "Are kings, princes, generals, and ministers born of different species?", even beggars in China have been holding their breath and wanting to become emperor.

And more than a thousand years later, there really was a beggar who rose from obscurity and aspired for the supreme throne.

Lao Li has never thought about becoming an emperor, but now he really wants to be an engineer.

Li Feng did not discourage Lao Li. Instead, he patted him on the shoulder, smiled and encouraged him, saying, "If you want to be elected as a skilled worker, you should stop boasting and do more practical work. But to tell you the truth, the selection of skilled workers will be held once a year in the future. Everyone has a chance, as long as you can achieve outstanding results."

Hearing this, Lao Li was immediately excited, his face flushed with excitement: "Team leader, just wait and see, I, Lao Li, will definitely become a foreman within three years!"

Old Li’s ancestors were also wealthy. I heard that one of his ancestors served as a county governor during the Qin Dynasty.

However, hundreds of years have passed, and the Li family has now fallen into decline. Over the past few hundred years, the family has only produced some blacksmiths of some fame, but no official. There has not even been a chance to be selected as a filial and honest official, and their life is miserable.

Therefore, Lao Li thought that he had no hope of becoming an official through formal channels, but if he became an engineer, he would have the right to participate in politics and make decisions, which was also considered an official status, so Lao Li was very concerned about it.

The existence of Lao Li is just a microcosm of the countless craftsmen in the Three Kingdoms era.

Since Confucianism became the only official ideology, the heritage left by various schools of thought have been exploited so severely that they have no chance to rise again.

Therefore, Wang Jing opened a little loophole to allow craftsmen to have the opportunity to be promoted. Immediately, everyone worked hard and competed to be the first, fearing that they would miss this God-given opportunity and regret it for the rest of their lives.

In the ironworks, Li Feng, who received the scientific research task, led Lao Li and other veteran blacksmiths to start technical research.

This research and development model was first created by Wang Jing after he founded the Mohist Academy. He found that the modern scientific research system also had a very obvious improvement effect when used in the ancient environment.

After all, no matter how talented a person is, there is always a limit to his intelligence and talent, and geniuses are not easy to find. Therefore, if we really want to promote technological development, the best way is to pool resources, divide the work and cooperate, gather the wisdom and strength of countless people, learn from each other's strengths and overcome each other's weaknesses, and achieve extraordinary achievements.

While other princes were still busy fighting for territory and exploiting the people, Wang Jing had already been integrating his craftsmen and teaching them how to work as a team and advance and retreat together.

In contrast, craftsmen in other places are still working alone, with masters teaching apprentices and accumulating forging techniques from father to son and grandson to grandson. The difference is not even a little bit.

As time goes by, the gap between the two sides will only get bigger and bigger, and in the end even the competitors will not be able to catch up.

You know, in Luoyang under the rule of Wang Jing, craftsmen like Li Feng had already begun to establish a team model, leading a dozen or twenty blacksmiths with rich forging experience to begin observing and analyzing, and researching better smelting techniques.

The gap between the two sides is not only reflected in technological achievements, but also in ideological cognition and scientific research models.

Li Feng is very talented. Through his many years of forging experience in the Li family, he discovered the secret of fuel.

He discovered that when using coal or coke, a large amount of gas would be produced in the iron-smelting furnace.

There was no corresponding treatment method in the past, so this kind of gas could basically only be discharged from the top of the stove. The blazing flames when the gas was burning were very spectacular at night, and the flames rising into the sky were really beautiful to look at.

But this is a serious waste of resources and also pollutes the environment.

So after Wang Jing's reminder, Li Feng also conducted many experiments with Lao Li in private, and finally came up with a solution, which is to transport the gas to the heat storage furnace through a pipeline for heating. Various methods will eventually raise the hot air to a temperature above that required to melt steel.

This is Li Feng’s technological innovation, and in terms of importance, it is even more important than Lu Fang’s improved silk weaving machine.

After all, the improvement of the silk loom was only a technological improvement in light industry, which only improved the economic benefits.

The innovation of smelting technology enhances a country's comprehensive national strength!

Standing in front of the regenerative furnace, Lao Li sighed: "Although we can smelt iron or steel without a regenerative furnace, the production efficiency is totally incomparable."

Li Feng also looked excited: "Have you calculated how much the output has increased?"

Old Li quickly found several Mohist disciples who were proficient in arithmetic, and the leader was Yang Xiu, a mathematical genius, who used a newly invented thermometer to measure, and finally calculated a relatively complete result. Yang Xiu took the report and looked at Li Feng and Old Li: "Congratulations, after calculation, the regenerative furnace developed by your metallurgical group can increase the air supply temperature to more than 300 degrees. The same amount of fuel iron has increased the output by more than three times compared to cold blast. It is truly the best in the world. Even if Ou Yezi were alive again, I'm afraid he would have to call you teachers."

Li Feng and Lao Li were very excited when they heard the result.

Just by improving the heat storage furnace, Lao Li is qualified to participate in the third batch of engineer selection, and there is a high probability that he will be selected. This invention is enough to change his destiny!
Yang Xiu smiled and encouraged, "Keep working hard. As long as you maintain this momentum, everyone in the Metallurgical Group will have a bright future."

"Haha, I'll take your word for it!"

Old Li's face flushed red, and it was obvious that he benefited greatly from Yang Xiu's words. After Yang Xiu left, he continued to study in depth with Li Feng with great energy.

Now he has tasted the sweetness of life. As long as he does research well, what does it matter if he is just a craftsman?
I, Old Li, still have the opportunity to achieve success and bring honor to the Li family!

The entire ironworks had also heard the news. Some old blacksmiths had originally thought themselves to be smart and were guarding their little assets tightly, cherishing them and refusing to share them. They only wanted to learn some skills for free and then return home to keep them as heirlooms.

It was Old Li who had a slightly longer-term vision. He took the initiative to help Li Feng and shared all the smelting and forging experience accumulated by their Li family over the years. This led to the invention of the heat storage furnace together.

In fact, some of the ancestors of the Li family had noticed the waste gas discharged from the furnace during iron smelting, and had thought about how to use it. However, they had no relevant knowledge accumulation, so their repeated attempts all ended in failure, and even people died because of this, so they had to give up in the end.

But even though we gave up, many of the attempts and ideas we had at the time were recorded and passed down from generation to generation. These accumulations have now become wealth.

On the road of scientific research, even failure itself is an important asset because it can reduce the cost of trial and error.

It was with the help of Lao Li that Li Feng was able to develop the technology of the heat storage furnace so quickly. Therefore, giving Lao Li a recommendation spot in the third batch of engineer selection list can be regarded as returning the favor.

Now the other old blacksmiths couldn't sit still anymore.

If craftsmen can also have dreams, who would be willing to just be a salted fish waiting to die?
Seeing that Old Li was about to become successful, they no longer thought about "never telling anyone" and now they wanted to pour out all their secrets to let Li Feng see that they could talk and still be patriotic.

When Wang Jing heard the good news from the Metallurgical Group, he immediately dropped what he was doing and came to inspect in person.

In the iron yard, Li Feng and Lao Li stood beside Wang Jing excitedly and answered some of his questions: "Hello, Lord Qi!"

"Excuse me, how is the situation?"

Wang Jing attached great importance to the development of metallurgical technology. After all, the output and quality of steel were directly related to the strength of military strength.

Li Feng was very excited and immediately reported the good news to Wang Jing: "Reporting to Lord Qi, the high temperature hot air generated during smelting will cause damage to the air outlet of the iron smelting furnace, so this place must be protected."

"I see."

Although he couldn't quite understand what he saw or heard, Wang Jing still had a smile on his face.

With his help, Qiqiao Pavilion's current technological level is enough to overcome this problem that gave ancient blacksmiths a lot of headaches.

Li Feng specially designed a special air vent, which has a wrought iron coil embedded in a cast iron conical tube, with both ends extending out of the bottom of the conical sleeve, one on each side.

Once it starts working, water flows in from one end of the extended pipe and flows all the way to the narrow end of the vent.

Although Wang Jing couldn't see, he had very good ears and could hear the water flowing around the coil and finally flowing out through the pipe extending from the opposite side.

With this smelting furnace, the metallurgical group was finally able to produce steel in large batches. Its technical strength and process level surpassed all civilizations on the entire earth by thousands of years.

After this, the next step is to start coking.

Li Feng seemed to be worried that Wang Jing didn't understand, so he explained to him with great interest: "Qi Hou, please see, in the early days we used charcoal, which resulted in uneven quality of steel smelted and difficult to control. Now we have changed to coke, and the effect is immediate. It seems that coke is the most ideal fuel."

Compared with Li Feng, Wang Jing understands the strategic significance of coking technology better.

Coal coking not only provides high-quality fuel for the steel industry, but the various by-products obtained in the coking process are also important raw materials in the chemical industry and are one of the prerequisites for promoting the establishment of the chemical industry.

Speaking of the chemical engineering system, it has now been initially successfully established thanks to the efforts of Taoist Shi Zimiao. It is also with the help of Taoist alchemists that the metallurgical team has been able to achieve results so quickly.

The steel industry is actually a production system that spans multiple disciplines. Whether it is physics or chemistry, relevant knowledge reserves are essential.

Therefore, Li Feng often exchanged their respective knowledge reserves with the Taoist and Mohist schools. The resulting linkage effect was very significant, and the efficiency of scientific research was greatly improved.

In order to improve the efficiency of coking, Li Feng also specially asked Shi Zimiao to develop a complete set of coal coking equipment.

In Wang Jing's eyes, this equipment must be very backward in terms of technology, and it cannot be compared with the coking equipment of the industrial age. But in this era, it is definitely high-tech, and can even be called black technology.

Not only can it be used for coking, but its by-products can also be used to manufacture a variety of important chemical products.

Including gasoline, diesel, asphalt, phenol, toluene, crude benzene, sulfuric acid, various solvent oils, lubricating oils and paraffin. It can be said that once it is put into production, the chemical industry level of Wang Jing's territory will definitely have a qualitative leap.

However, such a set of equipment has a high technological content and is naturally difficult to install, requiring a large number of skilled technical workers.

This was despite special training being conducted in advance, as well as the preparation of a large number of drawings, installation manuals and special equipment.

However, the people in charge of the installation were all a group of half-way installers, most of whom were landless refugees recruited by Qiqiao Pavilion.

Even after a period of literacy education, their knowledge level is still quite limited. Not to mention the high school level, even the level of a third grader is difficult to reach. Their comprehension ability is probably similar to that of a first or second grader. Naturally, this work efficiency gives Wang Jing a headache.

Therefore, the progress of equipment installation was quite slow, and the production equipment that Shi Zimiao had developed was of the continuous operation type and could not be started and stopped. Hundreds of tons of coal had to be fed in at a time.

The total coal reserves in Luoyang at present are only 80 tons. These coals were ordered by Wang Jing from Bingzhou and transported by Zhang Liao. They are mainly used for heating for residents.

This amount is not enough for one-time charging, so even though new technology has been developed, the metallurgical group can only adopt the simpler traditional coking method first.

Speaking of which, it was Wang Jing who told Li Feng about this traditional method of coking, because Wang Jing happened to have come into contact with this industry before he traveled through time.

There are many traditional methods of coking. The simplest is the open-air method. The coal is piled into a semicircular pile on the ground, covered with straw to start the fire, and it will become coke after a certain number of days.

However, the coking rate is relatively low. This method was once used by the country during the Great Leap Forward in Steel Production, but it caused extremely serious waste of resources and environmental pollution.

However, this is the Three Kingdoms era, and Wang Jing can ignore environmental issues. After all, development is the top priority, and environmental governance can be dealt with later.

However, coal tar is an important raw material for the chemical industry and cannot be wasted so casually.

Therefore, Wang Jing found Yang Xiu and asked him to use his overly clever mind to help design a mathematical model.

Yang Xiu gladly accepted the challenge, and then worked with Li Feng and Lao Li to design an improvement plan. After spending some time, they finally developed the Kailuan round furnace and used this new method for coking production.

There are three different specifications of Kailuan furnaces, and the amount of material to be added each time is uncertain. It was Yang Xiu who, after calculation, found the best cost-effective material ratio for the furnace. (End of this chapter)