Su Chengyu thought about it for a while, since he decided to make steel by himself, there was no need to spend too much on steel knives.

So he announced that the quality of the saber required that it should be made of steel, and asked the two to re-bid.

The housekeeper of the Zhen family smiled, looking confident. Regardless of the scale or cost of Longnan's ironware manufacturing industry, his Zhen family is firmly in the top spot. Even in the entire Ganzhou, the Zhen family's ironware workshop is one of the best.

Sure enough, as a result of the bid opening again, Longnan He Ji quoted 440 taels, while the Zhen family gave a price of only 410 taels.

After all the bidding projects are over, the merchants are busy going back to stock up. Bidding this novel way of trading makes them very appreciative, the transaction speed is fast, free from cumbersome human feelings, although the price is slightly lower, but usually talk about the time of a transaction, in exchange for bidding can get more than ten cases.

In fact, Su Chengyu had no choice but to bid for munitions alone this time, of course he knew that small-scale purchases would lead to higher prices.

But his military uniforms, military boots and the like have a special appearance, and they can't be purchased with ordinary military supplies of the Ming Dynasty. Secondly, the Ming Military Department and the Ministry of Industry have a reputation for corruption far and wide, and he is really not worried about the quality if he goes through the official procurement channels.

Su Cheng has his own plans, and when the team expands in the future and he has enough influence, the bidding cost will be further reduced. He even planned to extend the bidding mechanism to the government in the future, estimating that the cost of the war in the Ming Dynasty could be reduced by three or four percent, and the quality of military supplies could be more guaranteed.

After a routine round of the barracks, he put aside the side business and began to devote himself to his steelmaking business. In fact, in terms of the construction of the barracks, as Chen Xiongfei and others gradually became familiar with his planning, they were basically able to take over the construction command work.

Su Chengyu first made a preliminary plan for the construction of a steelmaking plant. The planned scale is controlled at about two tons per furnace, and a larger scale will be built after the process is mature.

As for the specific steelmaking technology used, his first favorite was open-hearth steelmaking. The crucible steelmaking output is too low, and it is not easy to make low-carbon steel. The converter has too high requirements for the processing capacity of the equipment, in addition, it is difficult to meet the requirements for the blast, and the converter has strict requirements for iron.

Taken together, the open-hearth method is more suitable in all respects. Although the construction of heat storage and heat conduction systems is somewhat troublesome, they can be solved by investing manpower. In addition, open-hearth stoves are not picky eaters, and pig iron and scrap steel can be used as raw materials.

So Su Chengyu began to list the main components of open-hearth steelmaking on paper: warehouse, blast furnace, smelting room, molten pool, furnace, blast system, sediment room, regenerator, etc., and even in order to ensure the supply of gas as fuel, he also planned to build a separate gas generator.

He picked up the list of facilities he had just written, and immediately frowned—even if it didn't count the labor costs, it would have cost a lot of money just to get the equipment done.

He hurriedly calculated the funds in hand, and brought a total of 7,000 taels of silver to Longnan, and some of it was lost in the chaos of Qingliu County, plus the cost of building a military camp in recent days, and now there are less than 6,000 taels left.

The 8,000 taels of "labor money" in Ganzhou have already set off and should arrive in Longnan in the near future. In other words, he now has fourteen thousand taels at his disposal.

However, after deducting the first payment of nearly 3,000 taels for the purchase of military uniforms and leather boots, as well as the expenses for food and military salaries reserved for the troops, the silver that could be used to build the steelworks was only 8,000 taels at most.

This amount of money is definitely not enough to build an open-hearth steelmaking plant, and Su Chengyu has to invest 40,000 or 50,000 taels in rough calculations. He subconsciously wanted to take out a loan......

"Banks are really a good thing, but unfortunately they don't." He sighed, he could only face the reality again, if he wanted low input and quick output, there was only one choice - crucible steelmaking.

He took a piece of paper again, and listed the equipment for making steel from the crucible: the storeroom, the crucible, the hearth, the blower, and it was done. The total expenditure is about three or four thousand taels.

Changed to crucible steelmaking, Su Chengyu also had to reduce the target output to less than 1,000 catties per furnace.

After the plan is decided, specific problems will follow, the size of the crucible and hearth, the air volume of the blast equipment, how many people are needed for the furnace, how many people are needed for the casting and forging process, and even what products to produce must be planned in advance.

He only felt that his head was big for a while, and looking at the problems in his hands, it seemed that the matter of finding a craftsman could be solved by others.

So he called Qiao Qian and Hong Si and asked them to lead people to look for ironworks and iron-making workshops all over Longnan. Don't talk about digging people, just take down the whole shop, and if there is a larger scale, come back and inform Su Chengyu, and he will come forward to talk in person.

After the two left, Su Chengyu remembered some other necessities - refractory materials. He had to send people to purchase refractory bricks, kaolin, graphite and other materials, and specially instructed that if Longnan could not buy it, he would go to Ganzhou, in short, he must buy it as soon as possible.

After instructing these matters, Su Chengyu was finally able to calm down and calculate the parameters of the pot and stove.

According to the amount of tapping in each furnace close to 1,000 catties, the size of the crucible is set to be nearly 40 centimeters in diameter, 50 centimeters high, columnar, the bottom is hemispherical, and there is also a lid with observation holes. The hearth is paved with refractory bricks, and the size only needs to be a few tens of centimeters larger than the crucible, plus the air vent and chimney.

Easier said than done, by the next morning, he had finally finished drawing all the design drawings for all the parts. It's just that whether it's suitable or not will have to wait for the actual production to know.

But even if the design is not so perfect this time, it doesn't matter, it should be regarded as accumulating experience in the future, after all, it is just a small stove of one ton.

As for the charge ratio, blowing volume, etc., he doesn't even know how to start the calculation at the moment, so he can only test it slowly in the specific production process.

Industrial production in ancient times was a process of accumulating experience through repeated attempts and finally achieving the goal. Su Chengyu laughed at himself in his heart, not long after he came to the Ming Dynasty, he had to start learning the production mode of the ancients.

He put down the pen and was about to sleep for a while, when he heard the guard report that Qiao Qian was back.

After Qiao Qian marched into the tent and saluted, he said excitedly: "Master, I really sleepy and come to the pillow, someone in Dongli Renbao wants to sell an iron yard." ”

Su Chengyu immediately fell asleep and ordered the horse to rush to Dongliren.

This is a small iron yard in this era, covering an area of more than ten acres, built on the edge of a wide river.

A water drain was also built along the river, which used the force of the water to drive the stone mill to crush the ore.

Su Chengyu saw the iron-making blast furnace more than two zhang high in the iron yard from a distance. Although it is an earthen blast furnace, its structure is still relatively reasonable, and black smoke is floating from the tall stove roof.

Hearing that a military master was coming, the owner hurriedly came over and paid homage when he was far away.

Su Chengyu was immediately happy when he saw someone coming, isn't this the shopkeeper He who came to bid yesterday?