The huge iron smelting furnace was storing with thick smoke, and the temperature was very high, and the furnace body was emitting hot air. Even if it was far away, Shao Wangyu and Wen Yi could feel the heat waves coming towards him. He looked at the giant creature with some concern, worried that if the workers were not operating properly, the iron smelting furnace would explode.

However, it is too embarrassing to shrink so timidly and dare not approach.

Yuwen Yin suppressed his uneasiness and slowly approached the iron smelting furnace with the company of officials, but stopped on a high platform.

Yuwen Il would not be afraid of death, and the accompanying officials did not dare to joke about this person's safety. Although the iron smelting furnace was safe, everything was afraid of everything. Therefore, everyone protected the vassal king who was inspecting the scene and stayed on the edge of the safe area to watch the iron smelting process.

This is a new iron smelting furnace built using the latest smelting technology of the Daye Ironmaking Institute. When the raw materials are sufficient, the daily output of an iron smelting furnace (dried iron) is about 4,000 kilograms. After the baking, the cooked iron is made into rails or nails in the railway workshop and is used to build the Qinlan Railway.

Yuwen Il has seen the technical information of this kind of iron smelting furnace, but he can't quite understand it. Now he is observing it on site, so he asked the technicians without shame, taking the iron smelting process diagram and asking the technicians for advice.

The technicians dared not laugh at the vassal king for not knowing anything. Considering that the other party was probably just asking casually, they tried to introduce this new iron smelting furnace to the other party in simple and clear words.

The principle of iron smelting is very simple. Put the iron ore into the furnace and heat it, melt it, separate the molten iron and impurities and leave the furnace, and after cooling, it becomes iron.

Iron is divided into pig iron, and the pig iron is relatively brittle. The melted pig iron is like water and can be cast into various models, which is for casting;

Fried iron is tougher, and the melted fried iron is very viscous, not like water, more like paste, so it cannot be cast, and can only be forged.

One of the key points of iron smelting is to ensure that the furnace temperature in the iron smelting furnace is as high as possible. For this reason, the fuel burned must be "strong" and the air must be constantly blown to make the furnace burn more vigorously.

Fuel, blower, and new iron smelting furnaces are just about these two points.

First of all, fuel. After nearly thirty years of development, the fuel of iron smelting has evolved from charcoal to coke, and now it has become "gas". Therefore, this new iron smelting blast furnace does not burn solid fuel, but gas fuel.

The combustion temperature of gas is very high, higher than that of charcoal and coke, so the furnace temperature can be further increased.

Therefore, the new iron smelting furnace must be equipped with a gas generator to use coal as raw material to generate gas.

The second is blowing. If the air blowing into the furnace is cold, the cold air will lower the furnace temperature. Therefore, the air blowing into the furnace needs to be preheated, that is, the hot air must be blown into the furnace.

The new iron smelting furnace uses a new blower driven by a steam engine. Not only does the air volume be high, but the air and gas are mixed, and after preheating, they enter the heat storage chamber.

The so-called heat storage chamber can be regarded as a high-temperature oven that vents at both ends (alternately switches air ducts). The high-temperature exhaust gas emitted by the iron smelting furnace itself can further heat the air and gas mixture passing through the furnace body to hundreds of degrees.

Such a scorching mixed gas enters the iron smelting furnace to burn, which can effectively ensure high temperature in the furnace.

How much high temperature is there? Stay firmly above 1,500 degrees.

Iron ore melts quickly in this kind of iron smelting furnace, and after various decomposition removal processes, it turns into molten iron and flows out of the furnace mouth.

When Yuwen Yin heard this, he asked: "Above 1,500 degrees...How do you know how much temperature is in the furnace? Ordinary thermometers can't stand such high temperatures at all."

A technician replied: "Best you, the new iron smelting furnace uses a thermoelectric thermometer, which can withstand high temperatures."

"I know that the temperature measurement principle of this hot thermometer is a bit complicated..."

"Big King, the principle of a thermoelectric thermometer is roughly as follows: If a rod-shaped circuit composed of two conductors has a temperature difference at both ends, an electric current will be generated in the circuit..."

"The larger the temperature difference between the two ends of the circuit, the stronger the current, so you can judge the temperature at the heated end based on the strength of the current."

"So, a thermoelectric thermometer made of heat-resistant alloy enters the furnace through the furnace wall. Workers can see the ammeter outside and the temperature corresponding to the scale pointed by the pointer to know how much the furnace temperature is in the furnace."

"Of course, the principle is very simple, but it is not simple to implement..."

The word "Wen" is the name of the emperor. In theory, it should be avoided and replaced by other characters, but this word is indeed difficult to replace. Therefore, the court did not restrict the use of "Wen" in industry, science and technology, so Yuwen and technicians could carelessly say "temperature" and "furnace temperature".

Such an explanation is simple and easy to understand. Yuwen I nodded and asked again: "The furnace temperature reaches more than 1,500 degrees. Isn't this possible to make steel?"

The technician replied: "What the king said is that this kind of iron smelting furnace is actually a steel smelting furnace. Because the furnace temperature is high enough, as long as the carbon content of the iron is controlled, steel can be refined."

"According to the current research results, the difference between pig iron and wax iron is the "carbon content": iron with a carbon content greater than two percent is pig iron, and iron with a carbon content less than two thousandth is wax iron."

"And iron with a carbon content of between two thousandths and two percent is steel."

"So, when smelting iron, control the carbon content and remove other impurities as much as possible to get the desired pig iron, cooked iron and steel."

"The smelting of pig iron and ripe iron is relatively easy. As for steelmaking, it is quite difficult. If you talk about it in detail, you can't finish it in a few days."

According to the technician's introduction, the new iron-making (steel) furnace must be "optimized" for the iron ore used, because iron ore is divided into "acidic" and "alkaline", so the refractory bricks on the inner wall of the iron-making (steel) furnace must be made of different materials to "either attributes are incompatible".

At the same time, the corresponding "flux" and "slag-making agent" must be mixed to separate the impurities in the furnace from the iron.

If the "attributes" of the furnace lining and the agent are incorrect, even if steel is refined, this steel will become brittle.

For example, the iron ore produced in Daye Iron Ore needs to be smelted with an alkaline furnace. Only in this way can the steel refined be good steel. The same iron-making furnace used in Liguo Ironmaking Institute and Wuyang Ironmaking Institute must be "optimized" for the local iron ore "attributes".

Now, the iron smelting furnace in front of us has not yet been "optimized" the local iron ore produced, so we can only refine pig iron and cook iron at present.

Hearing this, Yuwen Il looked at the iron smelting furnace again.

There are three new iron smelting furnaces in this iron smelting site (each furnace produces about 4,000 kilograms per day and night, and take turns to provide iron materials for the railway track factory.

The railway tracks produced by the factory supply railway construction projects in the area.

Generally speaking, a railway that is a one-mile long consumes 60,000 kilograms of iron. The railway track factory here is desperately providing "nutrition" to promote the "slow growth" of segmented railways.

From Jincheng, Lanzhou to Shangfeng, Qinzhou, there are several similar iron smelting furnaces that use new iron smelting furnaces to smelte, plus the supporting railway track factory, which swallows a large amount of iron ore and coal every day, and provides railway tracks and nails for railway construction sites day and night.

In addition to various steam machinery and the demand for coal by construction site trains has greatly stimulated the coal mining and transportation industries in the areas along the route, and has also made the freight fleet (horse-carriages) busy.

Laying rails requires sleepers, gravel as a roadbed, and a large amount of stone is required when building railway bridges. Therefore, the business of logging yards and quarries is becoming more and more prosperous, and timber merchants are becoming active.

People from all over the railway sold grain, livestock, and vegetables to the construction team, or were hired to work at the construction site. The simplest way to smash stones (smash large stones into small stones), even women and children could do it.

Many young and strong men took advantage of the slack farm to work in the railway smelting and railway track factory work, and a large number of small vendors started small business at construction sites.

It can be said that the construction of railways has driven the development of all industries along the route, and many people have gained benefits from it.
Chapter completed!