Chi Hao, the envoy of the escort, sat down and bowed to Du Zhongxiao, saying, "I'm late to come, so don't blame me for the luck."

Du Zhongxiao said: "It's good to arrive. Alas, Iron Supervisor has made all the things and used money everywhere. You haven't been delayed. These days, we are so worried. It's really not easy to get here from Raozhou for thousands of miles. You can rest for a few days."

Chi Hao said: "When I came, I was graceful for the time being, so I was not in a hurry to go on the road. According to the instructions of the supervisor, when the subordinates go back, they must transport 10,000 stags of iron of copper coins. Please prepare the order and take it away at that time."

Du Zhongxiao said: "What a coincidence, the furnace has just been built in the past two days, and we are preparing to start the furnace to smelify iron. However, what does the iron you want to bring back look like? Is it cast iron or cooked iron? Is it an iron ingot or iron sheet? How big is each piece?"

Chi Hao hesitated for a moment and said, "The copper supervisor has tried two ways to use iron to smelite copper. One is to crush pig iron into powder, and water the gallbladder water. After the color changes, release water to collect copper. Another is to use a cooked iron hammer to make iron sheets, soak it in the gallbladder water, and scrape it in sequence. The second method is to use a less labor-intensive method and benefit a lot, but the iron sheet is difficult to make. Knowing the meaning of the supervisor, it is best to collect cooked iron sheets."

Du Zhongxiao said: "This is not difficult, so I'll give you a piece of iron. However, the price of iron and pig iron is not the same. It takes labor to hammer it into pieces, and the price is even higher. Although we are all working for the court, it's really difficult for us to make the accounts clear."

When Chi Hao heard this, he couldn't help but smile: "It's okay, the official in charge of the supervisor told him that the copper supervisor would buy it at the market price."

The copper smelting place is both a place for smelting copper and a place for minting coins. What they lack the least is cash. When they buy iron sheets from here, they can make more copper, and with more copper, they can make more money. In this era, the court did not control the amount of minting coins, and the more minting the better. The Raozhou Copper smelting was not afraid of Du Zhongxiao asking for a high price, but was afraid that he would not be able to supply so many iron sheets.

After handing over the official business, Chi Hao bowed: "When I came, I brought some local products such as lotus seeds and dried bamboo shoots. There were two baskets outside to give them to the judges. They were all local flavors, so don't dislike them."

Du Zhongxiao smiled: "Thank you. There are many chestnut and red dates in the nearby mountainous areas. You can buy some and transport them back."

Of course, such long-distance transportation cannot be wasted. It is a routine operation to sell local products. Otherwise, how much does it cost to travel thousands of miles with Chi Hao and his team for dozens of people? Not to mention that there are local officials taking the opportunity to transport goods and make some money, so of course the people below will not go there.

When Chi Hao left, Du Zhongxiao asked Liu Wei to divide the local products he sent into several parts and give them to several officials in the Iron Supervision Bureau. Including the Ye County Magistrate Li Bing, there is also one part. It is not easy to be an official for thousands of miles. Although things are not worth much, they always have a heart.

Five hundred thousand jin of coins is not a small amount, weighing two or three million jin, and it is like a small hill. In order to put this money, the Iron Supervisor officially established a military fund warehouse at this time, and Liu Wei was temporarily in charge of the key. The military fund warehouse did not store military supplies, but stored important materials such as local money and silk. The Song Dynasty was because the army established a country and collected taxes, money and grain, and everything was to support the army. Therefore, the most important local database was named in the name of military funds, which meant to invest in the army.

After everything was handled properly, Du Zhongxiao couldn't help but think about Curry's money. It would be a pity to keep such a large amount of money in Curry. The money could not be moved. Isn't it like land, houses, and it would lose the meaning of spreading the world? It would be fine if I had to spend a few years there. If I borrow money from the industry and collect interest, it would be the way for the Iron Supervision to make money.

It is not surprising that Du Zhongxiao thought this way. In fact, many officials think so. The various local financial treasuries, military funds, theoretically belong to the Three Divisions, and officials dare not move around. Others, such as the ministerial treasury, Changping, etc., all officials lend. Some even don’t feel satisfied with the lending. They are used to do business. In addition to increasing the money in the warehouse, some people also make a part of the profits themselves. Later, when Wang Anshi reformed, all the official treasuries lend and collect interest, and they are assessed layer by layer. Too much is as bad as too much, which harms the people.

This is the disadvantage of not having banks. Currency often stagnates among the people and cannot move, and funds become assets. The court almost used all copper courses to mint money, but the world still lacks money. The more business develops, the more money it lacks, and it becomes a stubborn disease.

Of course, Du Zhongxiao is not just about collecting some interest, how much is it? Moreover, in order to collect more interest and reduce risks, the official lending habitually will not be short of funds and don’t want to lend money to you. If you really lack money, you will not be able to lend. The purpose of lending is to make the dead money in Curry flow and turn it into capital, thereby promoting the development of the industry.

The iron supervision here produces so much iron every year and consumes so many people, which will inevitably drive many industries. Only by using this money as capital, it will be released to the public and as capital, so as to make the local economy prosper, can it be truly valuable. However, what to do is require detailed planning.

Chi Hao lives in an inn on the other side of the Li River, sent his subordinates out, went to nearby prefectures and counties to buy local products, and brought them with him when he was about to go back. He had a very high profit and was well done, so he could make a fortune in this errand.

On that day, Chi Hao bought some meat and drinks in his room. An official arrived and asked him to go to the Iron Supervisory immediately. Today is the day to officially start the furnace and smelting iron. The first thing he delivered was the iron sheets he needed, and he had to set the specifications himself.

The palace servant was a small military officer with no ranks and ranks, with a humble status. Chi Hao and others nominally belonged to the Sansi and transported goods all year round, but in fact they were under the jurisdiction of the local government. Du Zhongxiao was the transshipment judge. Although he was from Jingxi Road and could not take care of them in Jiangnan Road, he was facing Sansi. How dare Chi Hao be negligent? After getting the news, he hurriedly wore the public uniform and took a boat from the ferry to the iron supervisor. He led his own official to the newly built iron smelting place.

A very large shed is built here, with a huge stove inside, which is more than two meters high, thin at the top and thick at the bottom, and a diameter of more than one meter wide. This furnace is too big, like a mountain, and people look extremely small.

Du Zhongxiao and Su Song and others stood under the furnace, watching the craftsman loading the materials from the furnace mouth. Of course, this blast furnace has been tried. Three furnaces have been smelted in total these days, and after many modifications, it has been officially produced from today. By this time, the blast furnace has been smelting iron for more than a thousand years, and various technologies have matured. This furnace was built according to the blast furnace in Xiangzhou and is more conservative. Du Zhongxiao did not make any modifications. In fact, because of the use of coke and the hardness increases, the furnace can be built larger. However, this is the first one, and everything is mainly safe.

When they came forward to see each other, Chi Hao stood beside Du Zhongxiao and others, watching the people around him busy. Everything here was too spectacular, shocking physically and mentally, and no one spoke.

The fire was already lit last night, and the furnace had already been heated and was loading coke. The loading port was too high and it was too difficult to use manpower to carry it. A conveyor belt was built from the pile of materials. Five strong men next to them rode on a wooden horse, pedaling hard, and turning the conveyor belt together. These people were not good at studying a few days ago, so they could only do the work of strength. The two liners replaced each other, changing every other hour.

The conveyor belt is divided into squares one by one, and walks past the loader, and fills them with large iron shovels. The squares are used to calculate the weight of the material, which is simple and easy to use, and saves the trouble of classification and weighing. Once the iron smelting furnace is turned on, it will not stop day and night until the furnace life is exhausted, and the furnace lining will be replaced after the furnace is shut down and cooled down. According to the experience in Xiangzhou, this furnace should be able to be used for about one year. Du Zhongxiao's plan is to produce ten months a year, shut down the furnace for maintenance, and replace the furnace lining and other damaged places.

The furnace material reaches the top of the furnace and enters a large funnel. The funnel is hung on a shaft, and the furnace material falls into it and hits the iron wall, causing the hopper to rotate slowly and sprinkle the furnace material into the furnace evenly.

At this time, the coke had been loaded, and the loader rested, and the people on the other side began to load ore. After the ore was mined, it was roasted, broken and screened, which was the work done by the nearby contractor and the villagers. Du Zhongxiao vaguely remembered that this step should have ore dressing and sintering, but the appropriate method had not been tested yet, so he could only follow the existing technology.

After loading ore, limestone started to be loaded. The amount used was much less than coke and ore, and it was filled from time to time.

After all the materials were filled, everyone took a break for a while and looked up at the top of the stove.

There were two people above looking at the furnace and reporting the situation in the furnace from time to time. The temperature was high and the smoke came out of the furnace, and the conditions were extremely harsh. However, not everyone could do this kind of work. It requires experience and technology, which is better than the loading and raising conveyor belts below.

On the other side of the stove, there are five big men on one left and one right, each of whom is riding a Trojan horse, driving two huge bellows to blow wind into the stove. The common bellows at this time are pushed and pulled by people, and the wind power is insufficient. How can a person's arm strength compare to the leg strength? Du Zhongxiao made this Trojan horse and replaced the push and pull. In fact, it is a simple crank slider mechanism that turns the rotational movement into reciprocating movement.

I don’t know how strong the fire in the furnace was. Chi Hao was a few feet away and still felt hot. Have he ever seen such a scene? He couldn’t help but forget the time. I don’t know how long it took, but I heard the person above who was watching the furnace mouth shouting, and the people below began to make slag.

The hot slag was taken out of the furnace and placed aside. When it was a little cooler, the slag transporter would be pushed away with a cart.

After a while, he finally smashed the iron outlet and the red iron flowed out.

When everyone saw the iron flowing into the bucket, they let out a sigh of relief. Although they had tried it a few times and the furnace was officially turned on today, everyone was still worried. The furnace was too big, and once there was a problem, it would take countless more effort.
Chapter completed!