As winter goes and spring comes, the recovery of the canal not only makes the pier in Zhangjiawan lively again, but also makes the commercial port of Lugou. Several small piers along the river are full of ships. Various commodities such as cotton cloth and wells from Lugou will be transported from here along the canal to various places along the canal.

But in just a few months, the once desolate Lugou River seemed to have become a very lively river. The merchant ships traveling back and forth between here have brought new vitality to the river.

The vitality of the river is because factories of all sizes on the river bank, the raw materials and products needed by factories all require ship transportation. Of course, the prosperity of the factory has also led to rapid development around the factory. Now this commercial port has even become the largest "city" with a hundred miles of Beijing. Commercial ports with nearly 60,000 people but not based on the city are extremely rare in Daming. After all, in the past, most commercial ports like this were built on cities, and in contrast, this was entirely because of several factories. With the development of factories, they have become more and more prosperous, which has completely deviated from the traditional urban development model that has been traditional for thousands of years.

The dock, factories, commercial ports, these things complement each other and make the prosperity here.

Compared to the lively bustling on the wharf, the more lively are several construction sites in the industrial and commercial port area. New yarn mills, weaving factories, dyeing factories and other factories are being built. Of course, when they are busy, the Lugou iron factory in the distance is busier than usual. After all, the equipment required by the new factories is manufactured from here.

The increase in new factories has also stimulated the development of iron factories. The current iron factories have even become a composite factory with thousands of workers, thousands of various equipment, and various metal processing and manufacturing capabilities such as machine processing, forging and casting. To a certain extent, this is the "incubator" of the Ming industry today. Of course, no one has realized its role yet!

When the workshop was busy, at the edge of an iron-melting furnace, more than a dozen workers were busy there. A large cast sand box was placed in the casting pit by a driving crane. Then, with the shouts of the workers, the furnace mouth of the iron-melting furnace opened, and the red iron water flowed into the sand box along the groove, and a faint white smoke was discharged from the exhaust hole of the sand mold.

"It should be almost the same!"

Looking at the discharge of the white water vapor, Shi Yiwen thought silently, his eyes were still staring at the sand box.

Although the Lugou Iron Factory has cast hundreds of thousands of castings of different sizes, ranging from parts of thunder guns to wheels of carriages, it can be said that the casting process has long been familiar with the road, but Shi Yiwen's expression still seems a little anxious about the current casting products.

After all, what is about to be cast now is a weapon to change the course of war - artillery!

Although artillery such as the tiger squat cannon and the Dafro machine had been available in the Ming Dynasty, the long-barrel cannon has not been introduced to the Ming Dynasty from Europe. After all, even similar artillery in Europe was just invented.

In fact, at the beginning, Shi Yiwen did not expect to cast artillery, and even "invented" the flintlock rifle, it was just a matter of fate to drive the ducks on the shelves. Even now, the reason for casting artillery is just because of actual needs.

"Is this maritime merchant really inseparable from artillery?"

As the young master of Duke Cheng’s Mansion, Zhu Dingchen looked at the sand boxes with some confusion, his face full of questions.

"It must be inseparable,"

Shi Yiwen, who was originally bent down to check the pine cannon mold, gave an example when he stood up.

"Just like from Zhangjiawan to the capital, but for a few dozen miles of open space, there are fields on both sides of the official road, so every time the green gauze tent is in full swing, there are often gangsters who take the opportunity to rob the property of single-handed merchants. I don't know how many unjust souls die on that official road every year."

What is a peaceful and prosperous era? There are still bandits in the peaceful and prosperous era. Shi Yiwen is naturally deeply touched by this. He almost lost his life in Mentougou. However, at least on the road from Zhangjiawan to Beijing, this kind of murder and robbery has become a thing of the past. After all, the road was so fast that it was rushing to work in the early spring. Those single-travel merchants and scholars could buy tickets and get on the bus and take passenger buses to Beijing, which not only could they avoid the pain of wind and rain, but also save their lives.

"This is the place where the best is in broad daylight, let alone the sea that is endless and without any kingly laws?"

After asking back, Shi Yiwen pointed to the cannon mold carefully made with woodworking machine tools on the ground and said.

"Where is on the sea, the king's law is just a few cannons and a few shells. If there are no shells and cannons, the merchant ships leaving the sea will be just fat in the eyes of others."

Why did the Ming Dynasty's merchant fleet once traveled to Southeast Asia but disappeared from history in the end? To put it bluntly, it was because it was not armed. Of course, there were various reasons such as history. However, without armedness, it was impossible to survive in this world of "the prey on the weak". Shi Yiwen then explained specifically.

"Just like those Western merchants, it is true that they are merchants when they come to us, but on the way they also play the role of pirates. When they encounter targets that can be robbed, they will definitely kill them. If there are no cannons on our ship and go out of the sea, it is like a sheep entering the tiger's mouth."

Zhu Dingchen heard Shi Yiwen's explanation very seriously. Although he didn't understand this very well, he just nodded and said in the end.

"Well, my father told me that all these things are based on you. Since you think they are useful, then install them. However, this cannon is not heavy. A ship needs to be equipped with 12 cannons. Will there be more? If there are too many cannons, there will be fewer goods."

Although he didn't know how to sail, Zhu Dingchen also knew that the load capacity of the ship was limited, so he was naturally worried that these cannons would be too heavy and would be less loaded at that time. Compared with artillery, he was more concerned about how much money he could earn from going to sea. After all, according to his father's statement, Western companies will be the foundation of Chengguo Duke's Mansion in the future.

Therefore, while he was almost "obeying orders" on Shi Yiwen, he also had some of his own ideas.

Shi Yiwen just explained with a smile when he asked Zhu Dingchen's questions.

"Our guns are different from ordinary guns. They have a short tube, a large diameter, and are very light in weight. Each door weighs only 500 kilograms, which can't occupy much place..."

When casting artillery, Shi Yiwen specially chose another world's "Caron Cannon". The caron cannon is a very unique type of artillery at the end of the 18th century. Its diameter is close to howitzers and mortars, but the method of use is to shoot flat like cannons. It only has a single gun ear, a ring on the gun button, and the muzzle part does not expand outward, but instead shrinks inward. Its caliber is huge, and it can even reach 64 pounds, but its weight is much lighter than cannons of the same caliber.

Although the caron gun is short and has few charges, it is followed by a short range and poor accuracy, but this defect at sea is not obvious. Since in the naval battle in the sailing era, a very close distance of 200 yards was a normal range, the accuracy and range of the caron gun can fully meet the combat needs of this distance, and the large-caliber shells it fired are full of destructive power. Therefore, the guiding ideology of naval combat is that the Royal Navy, which is close-range combat, began to equip the caron guns in large quantities and use them instead of small-caliber long cannons. This move greatly improved the firepower of British warships at close range.

These advantages are the reasons why Shi Yiwen chose them. Of course, this is also related to the technological progress of the iron factory, especially the putting of a number of new machine tools. It is precisely because of the putting of those machine tools that he does not need to cast a hollow gun body like the Europeans, but first cast a cylindrical solid gun body, and then drill out the barrel with a boring machine. The application of horizontal boring machines, sand mold casting guns to create gray cast iron and other technologies in iron factories has improved the production efficiency of the factory. The application of these new technologies has also laid the foundation for the emergence of the factory casting carabin.

Of course, its technological advancement also makes it difficult for outsiders to imitate it. After all, in the era of casting artillery, although casting artillery was complex, the threshold was not high. However, if the artillery was so sophisticated, the threshold would be greatly improved. Just like now, without the equipment of the factory, outsiders could not create artillery of the same performance. This also means that in another world, the artillery that the Ming Dynasty had finally cultivated was directly given to him by the Qing Dynasty because of the behavior of several traitors. The Qing Dynasty not only obtained the cannons, but also the craftsmen who cast artillery. This was a disaster for the Ming Dynasty and this nation. But now it is impossible. Even if the artillery betrayed, they still could not cast the same artillery, because these artillery were industrial products of the industrial era.

Advanced enough technology is the best choice to eliminate imitation!

"A 500 kilograms per door, twelve kilograms are... 6,000 kilograms. If you add shells and gunpowder, you must have more than 10,000 kilograms! But I have seen it in Tianjin, your boat is not small."

Nodded slightly, Zhu Dingchen looked at Shi Yiwen and comforted him with kind words.

"Zhiyuan, to be honest, thank you for your hard work these days. You have worked a lot from building ships to casting cannons."

Faced with Zhu Dingchen's kind words of comfort, Shi Yiwen just smiled.

"This is nothing. Now I'll be busy with my work first. When the captain arrives, he will be able to go out to sea!"

Compared to artillery and even ships, what is really needed is the captain! The captain is the most important thing on the sea. Everything without the captain is empty talk! Without the captain, everything is just a mirror and a fool.

"captain?"

Zhu Dingchen asked in a daze.
Chapter completed!