In the past week, the border town has been relatively calm.

According to Iron Axe and Brian, the strength and number of Hive Beasts will increase as the Hive Moon continues. Taking advantage of the current lack of defensive pressure, Roland once again sent a sloop full of ore to Willow Leaf Town.

With the commissioning of the first steam machine, the number of workers at the North Slope mine has halved, while production has steadily increased and is now back to pre-collapse levels. With the machine doing the work, manpower has been greatly saved.

At the same time, Roland carried out a preliminary reform of the mining production system, from the original fixed salary to a floating salary. He asked Barov to calculate the average daily production of previous years, set it as a standard, and get an extra reward for each increase in production, with an extra reward for discovering gem veins. This measure effectively promoted the production enthusiasm of the workers, and the whole mining area was in full swing.

With the surplus ore in hand, Roland naturally wanted to do something.

In addition to including Steam II in the production plan, he also intends to build a batch of manual machines.

The machine tool has a long history, and in layman's terms, it is essentially a tool table for processing tools. Therefore, the anvil can be regarded as the most primitive machine tool - fixed by hand and built by hand.

It's easy to say that it is made by hand, but it is too inconvenient to fix it by hand, so people add clips or grooves to the table to fix the parts to be machined. For example, the barrels of early arquebuses and flintlock pistols were hammered out by hand on grooved anvils.

Later, the human tapping planing and milling alone can no longer meet the needs of processing, the machine tool is differentiated, according to different uses, using different fixing methods and processing tools, manual and mechanical linkage, effectively improving the shortcomings of the pure manual output each time the strength is different.

Roland was thinking about hand milling machines.

Despite the versatility of the milling machine, its main purpose is to produce involute gears, so its structure can be simplified accordingly, requiring only a pair of grooves to hold the chainring and a steel grinding disc that can be rotated. Anna's help can easily create a specially shaped grinding disc for cutting gears – the top of the tool is ground into a trapezoidal shape, heated to a reddish state, an iron bar is drawn on it, and then immersed in water for quenching, resulting in a custom-made grinding disc with high stiffness.

Once the key problem was solved, Roland immediately recruited Carter and asked him to hire two carpenters to build the base of the milling machine for himself, while Anna continued to make other metal parts in the castle's backyard.

It has to be said that with Anna, metalworking has become as easy as pinching mud, especially after she has mastered the retraction of flames. Now for the initial processing of small pieces, she uses her hands to pinch out the approximate shape. Seeing the other party melting the iron ingot into viscous molten iron and then kneading it around, Roland sighed.

If it weren't for the witch, he would have had to delay the realization of these plans for more than a decade.

Two days later, the first simple milling machine appeared in the backyard.

Roland was not idle during this time, drawing gears can be regarded as his old profession, he designed a set of gear sets to regulate the speed and stabilize the output of the steam engine. The corresponding toothed disc has been molded, and the milling process can be carried out only after the milling machine is assembled.

Cogs are nothing new, most of the world's mines are drained by livestock pulling wooden gears and winch mechanisms, and this time the chief knight was finally satisfied—he had traveled so many times for His Royal Highness that he could understand what the other man was going to do.

Roland also had him bring three blacksmiths and their respective apprentices to learn how to use the milling machine in the courtyard. It was impossible for him to operate the machines himself on a daily basis, so he had to train a group of professional workers.

After everyone had bowed respectfully, Roland began to demonstrate how to use a milling machine to machine gears.

He didn't mind being a senior fitter in front of everyone. In fact, there are all types of princes in this era, and there are many hobbies, plus I have a bad reputation before, so there is no pressure to operate the machine tool.

The chief knight was on the sidelines to pour him warm lard - in the days when there was no oil to lubricate, it was a bit of a waste to replace lard, but it was better than nothing. These lards are poured over the grinding disc and then fall into the porcelain basin below, where they can be used over and over again.

Roland first carved the tooth splitting marks on the chainring at the designed angle, and then erected the chainring and fixed it on the table. Then pull the grinding disc above the chainring, align it with the engraving line, and press the pedal. The pedal drives the wooden wheel, which transmits the power to the grinding disc shaft via the belt.

He then stabilized the handle of the grinding disc with his hand and pulled it down slightly, and the rotating grinding disc slowly cut into the toothring at a 90-degree angle.

Since the material of the chainring is pig iron, and the grinding disc is quenched steel, it is not very laborious to cut out the tooth marks. The smell of lard filled the scene, and the blacksmiths and apprentices, who had not tasted meat for a long time, swallowed their saliva in unison.

After the presentation, it's time to sign the contract. Commerce in the frontier towns is still in its infancy, and industry is out of the question, whether it is a steam engine or a machine tool, there will not be a phenomenon of being rushed to buy by shops as soon as it is manufactured. In this day and age, most people don't realize the immense significance that these things represent, as well as the potential business value. Therefore, Roland can only take the initiative to promote the use of machinery.

He stipulated in the contract that the blacksmith's shop using the milling machine was required to produce at least one set of gears per week, and the materials required were to be provided by the castle for a fee of 10 silver dragons. At the same time, you must pay a fee for the use of 2 silver dragons per week. Because this set of machines is not given to the blacksmith shop for free, but more like a loan.

After entering the Demon Moon, the business of the blacksmith shop has also dropped a lot, and at this time, there is an opportunity to make money, or the order personally given by His Royal Highness the Prince, and everyone naturally has no objections. At the same time, Roland told them that this is only the first milling machine, and several more will be produced in the future, and those who are interested can apply to the city hall.

"Your Highness, why don't you just write on the contract that the processing fee is 8 silver dragons?" asked Carter puzzled after the blacksmiths left.

"The numbers are the same, but they don't mean the same," Roland explains, "and this is probably the first commercial lease contract in a border town, and I need to set an industry code." ”

The chief knight wiped his forehead, and His Royal Highness the Fourth Prince seemed to be talking nonsense again, but he already had experience in this, as long as he pretended to listen carefully, His Highness would continue to explain.

"With a good start, a virtuous circle can be formed. At the moment I am the only one who needs to buy gears, so I provide the machines, and they pay for the manpower, and they get paid for the employment. In the future, when other people have this kind of demand, they will realize that they will earn much more than the remuneration for buying a machine tool and producing it themselves," Roland paused, "so that when faced with new things, they can first avoid risks by replacing production, and I can also get returns through rental, and the subsequent development of new things is determined by market demand." It's a virtuous circle. ”