After giving Liu Yidao the blueprint of the anti-counterfeit seal and the pattern of Tang Yuan's motherboard, Li Zexuan went to find Uncle Fu and assigned him another task.
"Young Master, is there really such a magical paper in this world?"
Faubert was surprised when he heard Li Zexuan's intention.
Li Zexuan smiled and said, "Of course there is. It's just that the production method is more troublesome. When it's done, Faubert, you'll understand that what I said today is true!"
That's right. He wanted the workshop to produce a batch of special paper for the production of banknotes!
After all, if he wanted to prevent the banknotes from being copied in the future, just relying on the anti-counterfeit seal was not enough. With another anti-counterfeit method, it would be an extra layer of insurance in the future!
"Good! Since Young Master is so confident, I'll give it a try! "
Faubert nodded and took a pen and paper from the side. He sighed and said, "Hehe! Young Master, please don't blame me! I'm old, and my memory is not as good as before! Young Master, please tell me in detail how to make this water pattern paper. I'll write it down and try it out in two days! "
Li Zexuan looked at Faubert's wrinkled but kind face. He smiled gently and said, "What's there to be surprised about? After all, a good memory is not as good as a bad pen! Faubert, you can leave the workshop's affairs to your subordinates. Don't tire yourself out! "
Faubert smiled and said, "Hehe! Thank you for your concern, Young Master. I understand! Now in the workshop, I'm just talking. It's not tiring at all. Doctor Sun even praised me for my strong body before the New Year! "
"That's good!"
Li Zexuan gave a heartfelt smile of relief and then got down to business. "Uncle Fu, this kind of paper is actually not that complicated to make. First, let the steel factory forge a batch of water pattern rollers with protruding patterns. Then, install the water pattern rollers on the rollers of our paper machine and use them to imprint the paper.
During the papermaking process, the water pattern roller would come into contact with the front of the paper, and the front of the paper would be imprinted with water patterns! The vertical and horizontal water patterns on the wet paper could be seen under the light. They were evenly and neatly arranged patterns with different transparency!
Oh, that's right, the material for the production of water pattern paper must be the bark of the Chu tree. Other materials cannot be used. Faubert, you can arrange for people to buy a batch of Chu tree bark for the workshop. First, buy it near Chang 'an. Later, go to Sichuan to buy it, because there should be a lot of Chu tree in Sichuan. "
Watermarked paper was the kind of paper that would show bright lines or patterns other than the curtains when it was exposed to light. It was the same principle as how modern RMB could show the portrait of a great person when it was exposed to light. This kind of watermarked paper could increase the potential beauty of the paper, and could also be used to prevent counterfeiting!
In fact, water-patterned paper had existed since ancient times. It was not a patent of modern people. According to the original history, in the middle of the Tang Dynasty, the people of Chengdu invented "water-patterned paper". It had two types of printing, clear and dark. Other regions could not produce it at all, so it was called "Sichuan paper".
Thanks to this, the earliest paper currency in China's history, Jiaozi, first appeared in the Sichuan region. It was only later that it slowly spread out!
In the beginning, people did not care about paper money at all. They only used it as stubs and felt that it was very easy to carry around. Later, they found that it was very useful and began to use it for transactions. Jiaozi was gradually popularized just like that.
When it came to the Southern Song Dynasty, because there was no supply of Sichuan's water-patterned paper, they switched to printing paper from the Jianghuai region. However, Jiangnan paper did not have the special anti-counterfeiting ability of Sichuan paper, so there was a large amount of fake money in the market. At that time, there were more fake Jiaozi, Guaozi, and Jiaozi than real money. Strict laws could not stop the counterfeiting of paper money. This directly caused the Southern Song Dynasty's economy to sink into a quagmire!
Therefore, the water-patterned paper used to produce banknotes was a very important anti-counterfeiting method!
"Chu tree bark? Young Master, why must we use Chu tree bark to make paper? "
Faubert listened and nodded his head. In the end, he could not help but ask.
Li Zexuan replied, "Faubert, paper made from Chu tree bark not only has better toughness than normal paper, but it also has better texture!"
Faubert nodded his head skeptically. Then, he felt that it was a little strange. "Young Master, why did you go through so much trouble to make water-patterned paper?"
It was all his fault for only caring about the technical aspects and ignoring Li Zexuan's purpose.
Li Zexuan smiled mysteriously and said, "Faubert, you will understand later. Other than the water-patterned paper, there is one more thing that I need to trouble Faubert to arrange for people to do as soon as possible! "
"Young Master, please speak!"
Faubert had long been immune to Li Zexuan's creative ability, so he did not make a fuss about it at the moment.
Li Zexuan paused and said, "Faubert, recently you have been thinking of ways to control the carbon content in the steel to refine a slightly softer steel. I plan to use this steel to make an engraving board, an intaglio engraving board! After this steel is refined, let Master Liu draw the engraving pattern I gave him on the steel plate, and I will engrave it myself later! "
Intaglio printing, or Intaglio printing, was the traditional method of modern banknotes production. In the twenty-first century, all the countries in the world were still using intaglio printing to produce banknotes. The inked part of the printing plate was concave. During printing, the printing plate was directly in contact with the paper. Under the strong pressure, the ink in the concave pattern was directly transferred to the paper. The ink on the paper was three-dimensional, and if you touched it carefully with your hand, you would feel that it was uneven.
On modern banknotes, it was easy to find two characteristics of intaglio printing. One was that the ink layer was thick, and the second was that it had a strong three-dimensional effect.
Intaglio printing was the ultimate anti-counterfeiting method that Li Zexuan had designed for Tang Yuan. He did not believe that there would be a place in the world with such advanced printing technology as Qi Qu Ge's workshop!
More importantly, the master plate used for intaglio printing was hand-engraved. Hand-engraving had a unique anti-counterfeiting property, because every engraver's work had its own personal style and characteristics, and also had a certain degree of chance. This was something that could not be imitated by others, including the engraver himself, who could not carve an identical engraving plate!
Although there were many advanced copying techniques and counterfeiting methods in the twenty-first century, it was impossible to copy a banknote that was exactly the same as a hand-engraved banknote.
With this three-pronged approach, Li Zexuan could be said to have blocked all avenues for those who wanted to copy banknotes!
Although Faubert had never seen intaglio engraving and intaglio printing, he could roughly guess what Li Zexuan wanted to do from the words. After thinking for a while, he nodded and said,
"Good! Currently, the workshop can already produce steel. The soft steel that Young Master mentioned should also be no problem! "
Li Zexuan replied with a "Mm", then got up and left.
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