Roland stood in the backyard of the firing room, waiting for the first batch of cement to come out.
This brick house was specially designed for cement production, it was about 15 meters long and 4 meters wide. There was a door at the front and back, the difference was that the front door was as wide as possible for people to move materials. The back door was only wide enough for one person, which allowed Anna to sneak into the firing room.
For this reason, he also built a wall halfway around the house, surrounding the back half of the firing room, and arranged for the Knight to guard the entrance and exit – they were all Carter's subordinates, their loyalty was unquestionable.
The production process of cement was very simple. After crushing the limestone into powder, it was mixed with clay and iron powder, then using the dry or wet calcination method to produce clinker, and then grinding it together with gypsum could be used. The raw materials were very common, and iron powder was difficult to produce in large quantities, so it could be left alone, the key was the temperature of the clinker.
Roland did not remember the specific temperature needed to burn the cement, even if he remembered, he had no way to measure and control the temperature – whether it was an infrared thermometer or a thermocouple thermometer, they were countless times more complicated than cement. He only knew that the temperature was almost close to the melting point of iron, and the calcination process was also a difficulty in producing cement.
In the era of undeveloped smelting technology, maintaining the temperature of the blast furnace had always been a problem that troubled everyone. Ordinary open blast furnaces lost a lot of heat, and it was difficult to maintain the furnace temperature above 1200 degrees. And the reverberatory furnace also needed a high-temperature resistant liner, so he couldn't think of how to make refractory bricks. The traditional blast furnace was even worse, the temperature could reach the standard, but relying on the long and narrow furnace cavity to calcine the cement, he was afraid that after the Months of the Demons, it would not be able to produce enough cement.
Therefore, the firing room designed by Roland did not have any heating measures, he relied on Anna.
The artificially crushed small particles of limestone and clay were mixed with water to form a slurry, which was evenly spread in the firing room. Then the Knight locked the door, and sent away the handymen. Anna entered from the back door, and let the flame roast the slurry on the ground until the iron rods were melted.
Roland was a little restless, this was his first step in guarding Border Town. If he could not produce cement, the plan to build a wall in three months would just be empty talk. Without the protection of the city walls, no one would be willing to stay in this ghastly place. Whether it was real history or fictional literature, a stable base was essential if one wanted to farm well.
"Your Highness, can this thing you're talking about really stick the stones together?" Carter Lannis, who was guarding Prince Roland, asked. Although the prince told him that this was the latest research result of the Graycastle Alchemy Workshop, he was still skeptical. After all, those people had never produced any truly reliable alchemy products.
"Who knows? That's what they say, "Roland said as he spread his hands.
In this world, Alchemy and Astrology were known as the Sage Arts, and they were very popular in many countries on the continent. The royal family would usually train their own alchemists and astrologers for the purpose of refining secret medicines and predicting fate. For ordinary people, these studies were too advanced, so they would blindly believe them. With this in mind, Roland naturally blamed the source of the cement formula on the alchemy workshop. As for whether the Chief Knight believed it or not, it didn't matter.
The flames coming out of the window gradually extinguished, it seemed that the firing was finished.
Roland stood up and drove Carter out of the courtyard, waiting alone in front of the brick house's back door.
The iron door creaked open, and Anna came out naked. Roland immediately covered her body with a robe and gave her a glass of water, "How is it?"
The witch's face was covered with dust. Although the dust from the wet cement was low, when it was calcined, the hot air would still bring up dust. For her, who couldn't wear a mask, staying inside for dozens of minutes was obviously not too comfortable. She coughed twice and nodded, "The mud has turned into ashes."
Roland couldn't wait for the temperature to drop low enough, he wrapped a wet towel around his head, grabbed a shovel and went through the back door.
The hot air instantly surrounded him, making it difficult to breathe, and the skin on his hands was burning. Fortunately, it didn't take too much time to shovel the ashes, otherwise staying in this environment for a few minutes would cause high temperature shock.
"Is this what you want?" After Anna put on the witch suit, she stretched out her head and asked.
"It looks like it," Roland spread out the powder and felt its residual temperature with his fingers, "I'll have to try it to know."
"What's its use?"
"Building houses, building bridges, repairing roads, there are too many places that can be used. If it succeeds, people's homes will not be afraid of the cold, nor will heavy rain and snow be able to destroy them. "He patted the little girl's head with his other hand," It's all thanks to you. "
Anna lowered her head. He didn't know if it was an illusion, but he felt that the girl's breathing became faster.
In theory, the fired clinker should be ground with gypsum to adjust its hardening time. But at this time there was no need to think so much, after a short rest, Roland shoveled out two more shovels, then called Carter who was standing outside the courtyard, and asked him to prepare the cement mortar according to the ratio of three parts of ash powder and one part of river sand.
The Chief Knight didn't mind doing some rough work, for him, doing this kind of work was much better than fighting for His Highness in Graycastle or hooking up with noble ladies.
Because the raw materials didn't add iron powder, the resulting cement mortar was pale in color, showing a grayish white. Roland poured it on one of the stone bricks, and then buckled the other one on top. The cement solidification time was about four hours, considering the instability of the trial product, he intended to simply wait until tomorrow to see the results.
Early the next morning, Roland hurriedly took Carter and Anna to the backyard of the firing room. Opening the door, he noticed that the surface of the cement was in a solidified state, and the two stone bricks were tightly joined together. The solidified surface looked bumpy, and part of it was covered with hoarfrost.
Roland squatted down, scraped off the hoarfrost produced by the alkalization reaction, and pressed the hardened cement with his fingers. The feeling made him happy – the surface of the cement was hard and hard, completely different from the feeling of the compacted soil, even if he used his nails to dig hard, he couldn't leave a trace on it.
After Carter got the signal from Prince Roland, he first tried to lift the stone bricks, but failed. He kicked them from the side several times, until the joint between the cement and the ground broke, the two stone bricks were still firmly stuck together. Finally, he swung the hilt of his sword and hit them hard, but he could only knock off a small piece of the corner.
"Is this the effect of 'cement'?" Carter immediately realized its effect, "It's incredible. Yesterday it could flow like a melted candle, but after only one night it became as hard as a rock. With this thing, we can build a wall as fast as we want. As long as we have enough stones, we can even build a wall around the border within five years! "
"What's the use of that?" Roland said disapprovingly, "No matter how tall the wall is, it can't stop the enemy from inside. I'd rather turn the shabby wooden houses in Border Town into solid cement houses, so that my people no longer have to worry about falling into a situation of homelessness after a natural disaster. "
"…" The Chief Knight was stunned, he really didn't expect that Prince Roland, who had all kinds of bad habits of the aristocracy, would say such a thing.
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