Some wild flowers have begun to bloom sporadically on the river beach.

In the hillside fields, various trees began to sprout buds and flower buds.

After two spring rains, the weather has become warm and cold, and it is sometimes high and sometimes low. It is still necessary to wear fur to keep it cold when it is cold in the morning and evening, but you can start wearing lavender sandals at noon.

In just a few days, a layer of light green tender grass began to emerge on the river beach, and wild fruit trees planted on the hillsides and inside and outside the courtyard also began to bloom in large quantities.

The seeds of large farmland sown on both sides of the river have begun to sprout, and from a distance there is a tender green and fresh color.

Mother Ba and Ah Mother patrolled and checked the farmland all day long, and were so happy that they couldn't stop.

This large area of ​​farmland carries the hope of this tribe's harvest for a year.

For generations, since they have become sensible, there has never been a year like this spring, which makes them feel unparalleled leisure and full of hope.

Women no longer need to collect wild vegetables every day when they go out early and come back late.

Men no longer have to busy fishing and hunting every day.

Women have a lot of time to spin and weave and take care of the family, and men can also focus on more construction projects.

The construction of the embankment planned in front of the courtyard is constantly increasing and widening, and people come and go and carry stones and carry soil on their backs.

Some strong men cut down large oak trees on nearby mountains and transported them to kiln factories to pile them up.

Although I don’t know what Xu Chen wants to cut down so many big trees to burn charcoal, Mo Ba and others know that Xu Chen will not be aimless. Seeing that he is busy in the kiln factory all day long, he must be holding up a big move, as if the newly refined things are different.

Feng took a group of hunters to prepare for the third trip to the Mongolian tribe and Gonghuo tribe.

This time, more goods were prepared. They used more than ten horses to carry baskets back and forth to the river beach pier outside the valley every day, and there were also a lot of linen.

With the arrival of spring and summer, the demand for tribes such as snails in Gonghuo will definitely increase a lot this year. It is not important to exchange for anything. What is important is that this kind of business activity will greatly promote the connection and economic development of various tribes.

Even if the Ba tribe has sufficient animal skins, for the development of each tribe, valuable things can be exchanged for the sake of the development of the animals. The animal skins can be made of armor, harnesses, leather goods, pockets, books and other items, and the demand in the future is still very large.

The exploration and opening up of the two waterways of Wulong River and Jicang River has greatly strengthened the connection between several large tribes, and the speed of economic exchanges and information exchanges has become faster and smoother.

In the past, we might only take advantage of the tribal conference to communicate briefly every six months, but now we have exchanges almost every month.

And the node of communication is the Gonghuo Clan.

As such tribal exchanges accelerate and cargo circulation, the Gunhuo Basin will continue to become prosperous and lively.

After a few days of busy preparation, more than ten wide bamboo rafts on the river bay were all tied up.

As we became more and more familiar with the waterway, Feng and a group of hunters became more and more courageous. In the past, six or seven people could control a raft, but now two or three people could control it very skillfully.

The most important thing is that after spring, the southeast wind blows. When you come back from the downstream, you no longer need to paddle too many people. You just need to control the sails and go upstream quickly and steadily.

Therefore, spring is the best season for traveling south and north, and it is limited to between January and February. When the rainy season comes in March, the waterway will basically be interrupted, and then it will be completely cut off throughout the summer. The deep and dense land routes will also be cut off. Wild beasts such as tigers, leopards, wolfs and bears, and ubiquitous poisonous insects and snakes will greatly limit the scope of activities of each tribe, and they will all be limited to activities near their habitats.

This time, Feng went to the Gonghuo Clan and sent back twenty Gonghuo Clan and the Cha clan prisoners.

There are twenty left, and Xu Chen doesn't plan to return them. In fact, these people don't want to go back at all. When they heard that when they were going back, they were as uncomfortable as their parents and wives. Some people even cried and hugged Xu Chen's thighs and howled, saying that they were a Ba tribe and a Ba tribe ghost. They would never go anywhere in their life, and would rather be in the Ba tribe's labor camp until they died.

Faced with this situation, Xu Chen could only reluctantly agree to help them redeem themselves.

Therefore, Feng had another very important task this time, which was to ask the Gonghuo Clan to redeem these prisoners. For this reason, he asked Feng to prepare a lot of pottery and linen alone to express his sincerity in exchange.

In order to make the witches of the Gonghuo Clan less resistant, Xu Chen also wrote a letter with animal skins, saying that these prisoners were volunteered to stay in the Ba tribe, not forcibly left behind. In order to compensate for the losses of the Gonghuo Clan, the Ba tribe will send several magical gifts from the Gonghuo Clan to express their gratitude in the future.

This animal skin letter was also stamped with the Great Witch King Seal and the Great Witch Seal, indicating that this transaction was recognized by the gods and was absolutely fair and just.

In mid-January, Feng led a huge team to officially start and left the Ba tribe for the Yu Gong tribe and the Gonghuo tribe.

The construction of Xu Chen's smelting workshop was officially completed, and the smelting of the first bronze alloy in human history began.

In the kiln factory, the smelting workshop covers about half acre, but in fact it is only a relatively large pergola.

One of the smelting furnaces is only half a person tall.

After several days of fumigation and simple renovation, the smelting furnace has met Xu Chen's requirements.

Among the five small stone houses next to it, there are many smelted copper ingots. Most of these coppers were smelted by the Wu tribe, and some were smelted by the kiln workers from the kiln factory smelted the copper ore sent by the Wu tribe before. In the other few vine baskets, some lead and tin were placed.

Several smelters took out three metals: copper, lead and tin.

Xu Chen asked someone to use his own gold scale to weigh fifty kilograms, eight kilograms and two kilograms respectively, put them into a crucible, then put them in a heating furnace, ignite the fire and start smelting.

Xu Chen didn't know how many of the three metals used in ancient bronze, but overall, the amount of copper is the largest.

As the main alloy material, tin not only reduces the melting point of copper, but also increases the hardness of alloy. Too little is not enough to effectively reduce the melting point of copper. Smelting is more difficult. Too much will inevitably affect the properties of the alloy, and may become very brittle and hard, greatly reducing the toughness of copper.

As for lead, the amount should be the least, mainly to increase the fluidity of the metal melt when casting large objects with complex shapes and patterns. If the additional cooling is added, the properties are fragile and will reduce the quality.

Xu Chen had tested the properties of copper-lead alloy last time. Although the proportion is a mess, it is obviously not suitable for use as a knife. Not only is it toxic, it is easy to break.

Therefore, although Xu Chen did not know the appropriate ratio of these three metals in bronze, he still knew about a little bit of fur at least from the influence of the accumulation of bronze civilization of his ancestors for thousands of years.

That is, copper is definitely the main one, tin is the second one, and lead is the auxiliary one, and the copper-tin ratio remains within the ranges of seven to three, eight to two and nine to one. Even if it is not accurate, the smelted alloy will definitely not be too bad.

At present, Xu Chen does not need sharp swords at the weapon level to pretend to fight, but also requires knives, axes, chisels and saws for logging.

As long as the bronze sword and axe is not as sharp as the stone sword and stone axe, it will be more durable than the stone sword and stone axe.

Although tin was added to reduce the melting point, Xu Chen also knew that the lowest melting point of bronze was at least about 800 degrees. Without the two high combustion materials, charcoal and coal, it was very slow to use this small wood stove to raise it to this temperature, which was definitely not something that could be done in one or two days. Therefore, after the smelting began, he was not in a hurry. He just told two kiln workers and several smelters to take care of the fire carefully and keep the furnace in the most violent combustion state.

The two kiln workers are experienced and will ensure that there will be no problems when patting their chests. They will definitely burn all the metals.

After all, they have been smelting copper ore and have also refined copper-lead alloys. The years of firing kilns have allowed them to master enough smelting experience.

Several newly joined smelters are responsible for helping transport wood and fan, and learn how to take care of the fire and observe the furnace temperature, etc.

Xu Chen was free and started making molds for casting using clay.

The mold is actually a more refined technical job than smelting. Xu Chen has done several simple sword, axe, hammer mud molds before, and has also poured some samples, but those are all playful. The cast copper ware is actually erroneous and exaggerated, and the shape of the utensil is also very small. Among them, the largest copper hammer does not need any shape, like a hammer, as long as it can be used.

However, this time things need to be stricter, and you must know how to look decent.

Because bronze alloys are not as forged repeatedly like steel, they can be cooled after pouring and forming, and their properties are fixed. At most, they can be gently beaten and trimmed in a small range after heating, but they must not be folded and forged, otherwise they will be completely ruined.

Therefore, in the manufacturing of molds, we need to be as good as possible and there should not be too many deviations.

Because I was not in a hurry and had the experience of making clay molds in the first two times, Xu Chen decided to do a fine job slowly. Sitting next to the stove, he started to tint clay on the ceramic board slowly with clay.

First use ceramic tiles to form a square mold according to the utensils to be cast, fill them with clay, slap them tightly and smoothly, and then use the thin threads to cut the clay to cut it into upper and lower half.

Next, a scraper made of wood and bamboo slices began to hollow out the inside and took out a hollow appearance of a tool axe.

The tool is easier to deal with because it is the shape of a long strip, the handle and the body are connected together, and it is enough to simply dig out the shape. It only needs to ensure that the upper and lower pieces do not leak after the mold is closed.

But the axe is more troublesome. Not only is it complicated in shape, but it also requires holes to install the axe handle. This requires that the holes are in the center after closing the mold and there should not be too much deviation. Otherwise, after the axe handle is installed, it will be a crooked handle, which will look awkward and awkward.

Fortunately, I had cast copper hammer heads before, and I still had some experiences. Therefore, Xu Chen took three days to slowly prepare more than a dozen models.

After these models are made, they are placed under the pergola and dry in the shade.

According to Xu Chen's plan, a machete should use about two kilograms of material, and axe should use five kilograms.

This weight is definitely a heavy tool for later generations who cannot stand shoulders and cannot resist hands. If the arm is sore and weak after a few strokes of the wheels.

But for these savages with thick hands and feet covered in fur, they are probably light and can make a fancy look with one hand.

These savages weighing seven or eight kilograms can be thrown out nearly a hundred meters away. They usually lose stones when hunting or playing games, and more than ten kilograms of stones can be easily thrown out twenty or thirty meters away. It is as easy as eating and drinking water.
Chapter completed!