"What is this?" Nightingale looked at the shiny black stone on the table and asked.
"Obsidian." Roland didn't even raise his head, concentrating on drawing the blueprint in his hand.
"Black … what stone?"
"No, I'm talking nonsense." He sighed, just looking at the shape and color, who knows what kind of stone this is. He didn't study geological exploration, he may not be able to distinguish pure metal in front of him, let alone ores. The little knowledge he had in his head told him that ores were mostly complex compounds with different impurities and different colors. Take iron ores for example. Hematite, pyrite, and siderite, in terms of appearance, could be said to be thousands of miles apart. Pyrite, in particular, would sometimes show a light yellow metallic luster. It was often mistaken for gold, which was why it had the nickname of fool's gold.
As for heat resistance … compounds have no fixed melting point, it is also related to impurities and composition, so it can't be distinguished by temperature alone. Moreover, metal elements exist in the ionic state, without knowing the method of purification, it is useless to burn it.
"You also don't know something?" Nightingale was surprised.
"There is a lot," Roland put down the quill and made himself a cup of black tea, "Do you want to drink?"
"No," she waved her hand, "By the way, beef jerky is not as delicious as grilled fish, in the future you should put fish in your drawer."
"…" Roland was silent for a moment, he decided to pretend he didn't hear this sentence. He also planned to give this stone to the chief alchemist Kyle Sichi to deal with, minerals more or less have a certain degree of radioactivity, it is not a good choice to put it in the office as a decoration.
Recently, after the evolution of Soroya's ability, he found that he can suddenly make a lot more things.
First is the tap water system, which can greatly improve the happiness of the residents. Think about it, after a busy day returning home sweaty, want to wash your sticky body, only to find that the water tank is empty, and you have to go to the nearby well to fetch water, this feeling must be terrible. Moreover, Roland was also very tired of the process of scooping water from the water tank to wash his face and hands. He always felt that if the water was left in the tank for a few days, parasites would grow. Not to mention that the water tank was rarely cleaned once a month. If he looked carefully, he could even see the accumulated scales at the bottom of the tank floating like caterpillars.
If they used a water tower to supply water, there would not be any technical difficulties. They would use a steam engine to pump the water from the Redwater River into the water tower, and then rely on the siphon principle to flow through the pipes to every household, thus forming an automatic water supply system. The reason why Roland had never put it into practice was because of … the materials.
Water supply pipes were either made of iron or copper. If the iron pipes were not treated with anti-rust treatment, they would be scrapped after a few years. Copper pipes were the perfect water supply pipes. They were resistant to corrosion, did not form scales on the inner walls, were non-toxic, and even had the effect of sterilizing copper ions. But to use the metal used to make money as a water supply? The output of the North Slope Mine was far from this level of luxury. Even in the future, copper pipes were only considered for high-end residences.
At present, Border Town was not only unable to export minerals, but also had to import metal ingots. Therefore, whether it was iron pipes or copper pipes, Roland was reluctant to use them to create a water supply system that could not be used for profit.
But now it was different. With Soroya's coating, it meant that he could use his magic to produce water pipes. For example, he could take an iron pipe as a mold, wrap it with paper, and then let Soroya cover it with the coating. After pulling out the mold, it would become a pipe. Even if such a pipe could not withstand pressure, as long as it was placed in a covered pipe ditch, it would be fine.
Next was the power supply system … I'm afraid that in a short period of time there would be no way to popularize the whole town, but making the castle full of light was something that Roland had always wanted to achieve. Reading with a weak candle was too painful, and it also caused great damage to the eyes. Plus, summer was coming. What kind of feeling would it be to light torches and candles on a hot and muggy night?
Now that there were generators and wires, it would not be so far before the castle entered the electrical age. As for the filament of the light bulb … He vaguely remembered that before the use of tungsten filament, people generally used carbonized bamboo filament to make incandescent lamps. Bamboo was not a rare thing, it could be found in the woodlands south of the Redwater River.
However, what Border Town currently needed the most was an iron smelting facility. The output of iron was directly related to the scale of mechanical production and weapon manufacturing, and it was also the foundation of the town's survival.
"What you drew is … a tower?" Nightingale sat at the table and asked curiously.
"Almost," Roland nodded. "But it is empty inside, it is used to fill fuel and ore. Its function is the same as a shaft furnace, it can smelt iron ore into pig iron."
This was an upgraded version of the ancient shaft furnace.
He had been to the construction site of the shaft furnace designed and manufactured by Losiya. To tell the truth, apart from its small capacity and low temperature, the structure of the furnace was very close to that of a blast furnace. If it were not for Soroya's evolution, which gave the town the ability to produce refractory bricks, he would have built ten more such shaft furnaces.
But with refractory bricks, he naturally had to consider a furnace with a higher furnace temperature and a higher output.
The height of the newly designed furnace was nearly eight meters, four times that of a shaft furnace. The furnace body was tower-shaped, with a maximum internal diameter of three meters. In order to prevent collapse, there was a support frame at the bottom. The furnace wall was thin at the top and thick at the bottom. The belly was half a meter thick, and the innermost layer was made of Soroya's brand coated fireproof bricks. At the same time, it was equipped with a circle of air supply vents for the steam engine to pump air into the belly of the furnace.
In order to make full use of the power of the steam engine, Roland also designed a set of automatic feeding equipment for the blast furnace, including a climbing rail and a special feeding cart with a movable door at the bottom. After the cart climbed to the top of the furnace under the traction of the steam engine, the buckle at the bottom of the cart would be hooked, so that the fuel or ore would be poured into the furnace. For this era, this system could be regarded as the top technology.
Unlike the shaft furnace with a large opening and low heat, once the blast furnace was put into production, it would not stop for a long time. It needed a continuous supply of fuel and ore, and its output was much higher than that of a shaft furnace. As long as five or six such blast furnaces were built, the town's pig iron output would double.
…
After drawing all the blueprints, Roland rubbed his numb wrists, took out a box from under the table, and pushed it in front of her.
Nightingale was startled, "This is …?"
"Well … I originally planned to give it to you earlier, but it took some time to carve the pattern. After all, I'm not very familiar with the machines in the factory," Roland smiled, "Open it and take a look."
She reached out to open the box, and couldn't help but let out a gasp of surprise.
Inside, she saw two revolvers placed on both sides of the box. Different from the prototype used by Carter on the day of the competition, these two revolvers were shining with a silver light, and their surfaces were so shiny that it could reflect a person's shadow. The handles and the body of the guns were engraved with exquisite patterns, and the barrel was also printed with Nightingale's name: To Veronica.
This plan had been brewing in Roland's mind for a long time. Compared to the inconvenient and troublesome front-loading flintlock, the newly developed revolvers were already quite perfect. Whether it was safety or firing rate, they were all maintained at a relatively high level. For a witch with such high mobility like Nightingale, what kind of power could the guns display in her hands, he was looking forward to it.
"Thank you," she smiled, picked up the two revolvers, jumped off the table, and made a shooting posture, "Will you teach me how to use them?"
You've already exceeded your reading limit for today. If you want to read more, please log in.
Login
Select text and click 'Report' to let us know about any bad translation.
