Su Chengyu opened the letterbox and took out the secret message, only to see Zhu Yujian replying to his request a few days ago:

1. Reform the military system, abolish the military membership of the soldiers of the Longwei New Army, and increase the pension for casualties.

That's right.

Second, the Longwei camp increased the guidance and gave ranks.

That's right.

3. Establish a mission office, temporarily increase the number of nine grades, and confer missionary officers.

That's right.

Fourth, Lin Mi took over the affairs of the Ganzhou Ordnance Bureau.

I will send an order to the Ganzhou Ordnance Bureau to fully cooperate with you, but if you take over completely, I am worried that it will affect your training in Longnan.

5. Cancel the status of craftsmen and craftsmen, and change it to the matter of craftsman rating.

For the time being, the craftsman status will not be cancelled, and the craftsman grade assessment will be promoted first.

It should be said that Longwu is still very cooperative, such as the increase in the preparation of nine products, he almost forced the cabinet to pass. Su Chengyu said in his heart: "This emperor is really blameless in other aspects except for having no soldiers and no money. ”

With Longwu's approval, many things can be started.

The first of these was the establishment of a mission office.

At this time, the Ming Dynasty was in trouble with internal and external troubles. The soldiers did not look like soldiers, the sense of honor was gone, there were few victories in battles, the officers bullied the soldiers, the soldiers robbed the people, and the Ming army could be said to be no less harmful to the people than the Qing army.

In particular, the hundreds of thousands of troops in the four towns of Jiangbei in the former Hongguang Dynasty were all cleared, and the image of the Ming army was sent to the eighteenth layer of hell.

Corruption and corruption among civil officials have become commonplace, and they have turned down to the clear. Under the combined persecution of corruption and erroneous taxation, a large number of yeoman farmers went bankrupt and excessive taxes were rampant. Coupled with the repeated ravages of Li Zicheng and other rogue bandits and the Ming army that suppressed bandits, the land of China was already a mess.

The people were so disappointed in the imperial court, no one believed that the Ming Dynasty would get better, and some people even hoped that the Manchurians would come to "save" themselves.

It's not terrible to lose a battle. With the background of the Ming Dynasty, it is not a problem to organize hundreds of battles, but if the people lose confidence in the imperial court, they will really have no power to return to heaven. So the top priority is to save the confidence of society!

As a descendant, Su Chengyu knows the importance of propaganda best, and only by leading propaganda can he influence the trend of public opinion, re-boost people's confidence, and prevent the failure from spreading out of control.

This mission was his long-brewing propaganda offensive, and all matters had been planned long before he arrived in Longnan.

Now with Longwu's approval, he drove to find Wang Keqian, the county magistrate, early the next morning. Although he could not be shown the secret decree of Longwu, he could dictate the establishment of the mission office.

Wang Zhixian had just received a letter from his officials in the morning, asking him to cooperate with the establishment of a mission in Longnan. As soon as he heard Su Chengyu say this, he immediately said: "If there is something that needs to be done, please ask Your Highness to give orders." ”。

"There are two things that Lord Wang can help with." Su Chengyu said, "First, the mission office must have a place to act as an official business. Second, I need you to help me make the selection of officials for the mission office public. ”

Wang Keqian immediately nodded and agreed, and immediately called the relevant personnel to start handling it.

Su Chengyu explained the matter of the mission house, and immediately rushed to the porcelain kiln where the crucible was fired.

This time I was lucky, the crucible was fired perfectly, smooth and clean, and I couldn't find the slightest crack. He hurriedly asked the craftsman to write down the details of the firing time, temperature, and cooling method on paper and handed it to him, which were all precious technical information, and it was estimated that if he took the crucible recipe to England, it would sell for at least 10,000 pounds or 20,000 pounds! A pound sterling in this era was worth about two taels of silver.

By the time the crucible had been carefully transported to the iron yard, the hearth had been dried, and the blower was pushing in circles by the donkeys.

Su Chengyu immediately ordered the pilot fire.

The craftsmen first spread the burning charcoal fire on the bottom of the hearth, and then began to arrange the coke neatly on it, and when one layer of coke was ignited, the next layer was laid.

When the coke was spread to a set height, the crucible was set up on the base of the crucible by two craftsmen with large shoulders and round waists using special "large tongs".

Just the preheating of the crucible made Su Chengyu mad - there was no thermometer! It can only be estimated. He sighed lightly in his heart, ancient industry really relied on empiricism.

When Su Chengyu felt that the temperature was about the same, he instructed the craftsman to carefully put the iron prepared in advance into the crucible, and then add lime, iron slag and other slag agents.

All that's left is to cover the pot, increase the volume of air, and wait for the result.

About an hour later, through the observation hole in the lid of the crucible, it could be seen that the iron paste in the pot was gradually turning white, and Su Chengyu knew that it was very close to the iron melting.

The craftsmen looked at this strange pot with curiosity, and although the proprietor said that it was making steel, none of them believed that such a pot with a smoulder, and a lot of strange things such as lime and slag were added to it—they used to only add a little lime when smelting iron—could really make steel.

Of course, Su Chengyu couldn't explain to them what reactions such as FeS + CaO = CaS + FeO or 2P + 5 (FeO) + 3 (CaO) = 3 CaO.P2O5 + 5Fe were going on.

In fact, a large part of the reason why iron is not as good as the mechanical properties of steel is caused by the impurities of S sulfur and P phosphorus, which are mixed in iron. China's iron ore, in particular, is particularly high in sulphur. Sulfur and phosphorus can cause iron to crack and brittle, reducing the impact resistance and toughness of iron. The same piece of iron will become tough and durable immediately after dephosphorization and desulfurization.

The traditional steelmaking method is that because the molten iron cannot be melted, the sulfur and phosphorus contained in the iron cannot be contacted by the outside world, so it is difficult to remove it by chemical reaction.

At present, Su Chengyu can burn the iron to a liquid state, so that these impurities have a full chance to come into contact with lime and other slag agents. One of the main functions of the slag forming agent is to react with impurities, so that sulfur and phosphorus adhere to the slag forming agent and precipitate.

Of course, because the pot used in crucible steelmaking is made of graphite, a large amount of carbon will compete with the slag agent to react, resulting in a decrease in the dephosphorization and desulfurization effect, but compared with the traditional means of repeatedly forging oxidized surface phosphorus and sulfur, the effect is much better. There are also some large particles of impurities, such as ore slag, which will automatically float on the molten iron after the iron is melted, and the removal effect is excellent, which is also absolutely impossible to do by traditional forging methods.

In addition, the method of forging steel will cause problems such as subtle defects in the forging direction and uneven carburizing of steel products, which do not exist here in the crucible steelmaking method.

Historically, the advent of crucible steelmaking in the eighteenth century led to a leap in the quality of steel in Europe, and even England planned to legislate a ban on the export of crucible steel.

After about three hours, the first pot of iron turned completely into a red-hot liquid, churning slightly in the crucible.

The craftsmen had already been assigned tasks by Su Chengyu, and at this time, as soon as he gave the order, a large group of people immediately surrounded them. The process of opening the lid, pouring the slag, casting, and cleaning is carried out in an orderly manner, and it is not like the first operation.

In fact, these people have never seen crucible steelmaking, but in addition to molten steel, there are many similarities between other steps and traditional steelmaking.

No sooner had the ingots been poured into the mould than the craftsmen had begun to fuel the hearth, and the crucible had been placed on the hearth before it had cooled down, and new pieces of iron were thrown into the pot.

This time, Su Chengyu adjusted the amount of slag making agent, and added alkali, alum and a small amount of sand. He only remembered that these things helped to dephosphorize and desulfurize, but he was not impressed by the specific addition ratio. The optimal slagging agent ratio can only be determined by subsequent attempts.

On the other side, the steel ingots poured for the first time were still red, so the craftsmen in charge of forging sandwiched them on the forging table and began to make all kinds of steel products.