"It's your water cup, what's wrong?" Fang Er asked matter-of-factly.
"Ah? Oh! It's nothing." Xiao Qing didn't know what else to say.
After helping Xiao Qing into the house and changing her dressing, Fang Er went to the workshop construction site.
The iron ingots and tools had all been delivered.
Two hundred *shi* of iron ingots, not a lot, not a little. One *shi* was 120 jin, which was 24,000 jin, or about 12 tons.
Placed together, it really wasn't much. The density of iron is 7.8 grams per cubic centimeter, about eight times that of water, so 12 tons of iron was only about 1.5 cubic meters.
Each ingot was about 20 jin. Fang Er set up the furnace and melted down all the ingots one by one, forging and removing impurities. The men from the manor became excellent laborers, ostensibly for "training their bodies." Zhao Hu and the others, seeing that they could help, happily wielded hammers.
It took a full two days to forge all the pig iron ingots. The result was a significant reduction in the amount of iron. One had to admit, the quality of the products from these small workshops was truly garbage.
Out of the entire 200 *shi* of iron, after forging and impurity removal, only a little over 100 *shi* remained.
Fang Er used half of it to make the forging bed. This didn't require much skill, just two large iron ingots, one above the other. The bottom one was fixed, and the top one was connected to the powered waterwheel.
As the waterwheel turned, the upper ingot, weighing over a thousand jin, was driven up and down in a reciprocating motion.
Fang Er dared not delay, as the hardwood bearings might not last more than a few days.
The iron that had only been forged once was barely enough for the forging bed. Fang Er continued to forge the remaining iron, this time directly using the waterwheel.
A whole ingot of iron weighing over a hundred jin was heated red-hot and placed on the forging bed.
As the heavy forging hammer fell, with a loud thud, the red-hot ingot was struck, and a layer of black impurities was expelled. With each strike of the hammer, the impurities were rapidly pushed out.
Finally, as the ingot cooled and the forging bed was separated from the waterwheel, the ingot was removed, having shrunk considerably again.
It took a full day for all the ingots to go through this process, leaving only about 4,000 jin.
One had to admit, there was truth to the saying that many hands make light work.
Apart from when Fang Er personally handled the forging bed, he only directed the entire iron purification process and did not involve himself further. Zhao Hu and the others completed these tasks very well.
While they were busy, Fang Er was not idle either.
He had people find clay to make molds.
By the time all the iron had been processed, a large number of molds were laid out by Fang Er.
The processed iron was melted again. During the melting process, Fang Er experimented by adding carbon powder to the molten iron.
After several trials, he finally managed to produce steel. The molten steel was then directly poured into the dried clay molds.
Once the steel inside had cooled, Fang Er broke the clay molds, and a round steel column appeared before everyone.
Looking at this behemoth, Fang Er's grin widened.
Hiahiahiahia!
Damn the Zheng family! Damn the Cui family! Just you wait! My killing weapon is about to be finished!
This!
Was a cannon barrel!
Because there was no time to build a blast furnace, the amount of molten steel was limited each time, so the cannon barrel was only a little over a meter long, and the muzzle was only ten centimeters in diameter. Fearing the material wouldn't be strong enough, Fang Er made the cannon barrel a crazy ten centimeters thick! The entire barrel weighed a thousand jin!
Since Fang Er only intended to use it temporarily, the bore was not polished excessively, only slightly refined.
By the Longshou Canal, the finished cannon was mounted on a steel frame, looking formidable.
"Young Master Fang, this thing used so much iron, what is it for?"
Zhao Hu looked at the iron lump before him, expressing his doubts.
A group of thirty to forty people had spent four or five days creating such a thing, and besides Fang Er, no one knew what it was for.
"Want to know? Don't be scared later."
Fang Er smiled slightly, as if he could already see the doom of the Cui and Zheng families.
He had someone fetch gunpowder and cautiously poured about a jin into the barrel, tamping it down with a wooden stick, then inserted an iron ball from the muzzle.
In the direction the muzzle was pointed, he had them place many wooden stakes, one every five or six meters, to test the cannon's power.
A fuse hole was reserved at the rear of the cannon. A long fuse was inserted, and Fang Er told everyone to stay away, then handed a burning taper to Zhao Hu: "Go, light it, and then run back as fast as you can."
"Uh! Young Master, will it be dangerous?" Zhao Hu asked nervously, seeing Fang Er's serious expression.
"Don't worry, not much gunpowder is loaded, it'll be fine, don't worry." Fang Er said with a guilty conscience.
Zhao Hu asked no more questions. He took the taper and walked to the cannon. After carefully lighting the fuse, he casually threw the taper aside and, as Fang Er had instructed, sprinted back.
The fuse was long, a full meter or two. By the time Zhao Hu reached Fang Er and the others, he had just turned to look when he heard a booming sound. Then, a column of flame erupted from the muzzle, and a dark iron ball flew out of the barrel.
Fang Er watched the trajectory of the iron ball with anticipation.
"Alright, miscalculated."
The iron ball landed less than fifty meters away, bounced a few times on the ground, and then stopped moving.
The wooden stakes hit by the iron ball only had shallow pits.
"Young Master, this thing doesn't look very powerful."
Sun Zhou said with disappointment.
"After being so secretive for so many days, this is it?"
"Why the rush? It's just a test, again."
Fang Er stepped forward, grabbed a wet towel, wrapped it around an iron rod, inserted it into the cannon bore, and scrubbed back and forth to clear the gunpowder residue.
After finishing, he directly added double the amount, two jin of gunpowder, and tamped down the gunpowder.
The iron ball was loaded.
"Sun Zhou, it's your turn to light it this time. Remember, run after you light it!"
Fang Er instructed.
"Don't worry, Young Master, watch me."
Sun Zhou swaggered forward, lit the fuse, and then leisurely walked back.
He hadn't reached halfway when a loud "dong!" louder than the previous one sounded. Sun Zhou, facing away from the cannon, was startled.
Fang Er didn't pay attention to him, his eyes fixed on the cannon barrel.
This time, the iron ball flew nearly a hundred meters!
After landing, it bounced quickly, and the wooden stakes it hit shattered, sending wood chips flying.
"Hiss~~~~!"
Everyone gasped!
"Holy crap! This is amazing!"
"Yeah, I can't believe this is something we made in the past few days!"
The strong men discussed in disbelief.