Even though it was a machine from China, high-quality thread didn’t come out right away.
At first, it produced something that barely qualified as thread, but people quickly understood the principles of the machine.
After a few more adjustments, decent thread began to emerge.
Seon-hui asked while looking at the thread.
Since Seon-hui and Jeong-sun were from Joseon like me, it was comfortable for them to work as a Supervisor in a place where only women worked.
“If we weave cloth with this, will it become Calico?”
“Calico needs finer strands, so this won’t work. At this level, we can only produce Kwangmok.”
“Even so, this is better than Joseon-made cotton, right?”
“It’s better than that. It’s machine-spun thread, so the thickness is consistent. Surely you’ve used a spinning wheel before, haven’t you?”
“I have, but I’m just worried about whether this will actually make money.”
“To be honest, this won’t bring in much money.”
“Then why did you bother buying it and building a factory?”
“I’m going to build a factory in Wonsan with these, so this is preparation.”
“In Wonsan?”
“Yes. Unlike Shijimi, Wonsan will have plenty of women even if the wages are low, so we can make a large profit. I’m training the women here in Sidimi now so they can teach the women in Wonsan later. The women here can pass their skills on to the people in Wonsan.”
“Can we even go back into Joseon? I feel like the officials would catch us and throw us in jail for running away from Joseon land.”
“Don’t worry about that; I’ll take care of it. Surely I wouldn’t just hand the people here over to a Joseon Official.”
My credit among the people of Sidimi is quite high.
They know that I’ve yielded many profits to them, so they mostly believe my words.
Seon-hui knew this as well, so she didn’t speak further on that point and asked instead.
“When do you think it will be possible to build a factory in Joseon?”
“If things go well, it might be possible starting next year. If it’s late, we’ll have to wait until the day Joseon undergoes the Opening of Ports to Russia, so it might take two or three years.”
In the original history, I knew the Opening of Ports to Russia happened in 1884, but it seems it might happen a bit earlier due to my intervention.
Because I’ve been scattering gold all over the place, people who see it seem to think that Joseon has many gold mines.
Perhaps because of that, I have a strong feeling that the United Kingdom, France, the United States, and Russia are already moving to establish diplomatic relations with Joseon.
How do I know?
I’m already receiving requests from the United Kingdom and Russia asking if I can act as an intermediary interpreter.
Some in the United Kingdom even asked if I could put pressure on Joseon.
Look here, if I go to Joseon, I might die as a border-crosser. What kind of pressure could I possibly provide?
Anyway, looking at these movements, I think the treaties between Joseon and the Western powers might happen a little sooner.
Seon-hui asked.
“By the way, have the people you sent to Vladivostok to learn skills returned?”
“Yes, they just arrived. They’ve been learning techniques for over a year, and now that they’ve bought casting equipment, we should be able to make something here.”
The people Seon-hui mentioned were those I had specifically selected and sent to Vladivostok to learn casting techniques.
In this era, technological development hasn’t reached the high level of the 20th century yet, so with casting technology alone, there are quite a few machines that can be made even at the level of a local blacksmith shop.
I was a history buff and an avid reader of alternative history novels before I dropped into this era.
When you combine being a history buff with being an alternative history fan, you end up knowing how to make one or two types of engines.
There is one engine I can theoretically build.
The thing I’m trying to make is a Hot Bulb Engine.
In English, it’s called a Hot Bulb Engine, and in Japan, it’s the thing they call a Yakidama Engine.
Unlike the Steam Engine, which is an external combustion engine, this is an internal combustion engine.
Despite being an internal combustion engine, it’s easier to build than a Steam Engine.
For a Steam Engine, the difficulty of building the boiler is higher than the difficulty of building the engine itself.
In contrast, this Hot Bulb Engine can truly be built in a local blacksmith shop if you have casting technology.
Of course, a Joseon blacksmith shop wouldn’t work because they lack casting skills.
The Hot Bulb Engine was an engine widely used in Korea during the early to mid-20th century.
It was commonly used in the engines of boats often called ‘putt-putt boats,’ or as the engine for mills and rice polishing plants.
If you remember the ‘tung-tung’ engine sound of a putt-putt boat or the peculiar ‘tung-tung’ sound of a single-cylinder engine from a mill, you have heard the sound produced by a Hot Bulb Engine, commonly known as a Yakidama Engine.
While a gasoline engine, a representative internal combustion engine, ignites compressed fuel inside a cylinder with an electric plug, and a diesel engine ignites fuel with the heat of compression when compressed at high pressure, a Hot Bulb Engine works differently.
A small bulb-shaped device called a Hot Bulb, or ‘sogu’ in Korean, located on top of the engine cylinder, is heated by an external heat source.
The fuel compressed into this bulb is then ignited by the stored heat.
Once combustion begins, the temperature inside the cylinder becomes high enough that there’s no need to continue heating the bulb.
That’s why the Hot Bulb Engine is sometimes considered a type of diesel engine.
The Hot Bulb Engine has several advantages over the Steam Engine.
First, its thermal efficiency is higher than that of a Steam Engine.
While the thermal efficiency of a Steam Engine is roughly 6%, a Hot Bulb Engine usually has a thermal efficiency of about 12%.
Second, it has high stability.
A Steam Engine requires a boiler, which always carries the risk of explosion.
Thus, while an engine engineer doesn’t have to watch the engine at all times, the boiler man must constantly observe the boiler to check if the pressure becomes too high and risks an explosion.
In comparison, a Hot Bulb Engine has no such concerns.
If a problem occurs, the engine simply turns off; it doesn’t explode.
Third, it is easy to maintain.
Although there are slight differences depending on the type, a Steam Engine absolutely requires an engineer, a boiler man, and a stoker.
A Hot Bulb Engine is so easy to manage that a single engineer can do everything, and they don’t even need to watch it constantly.
You can just turn the engine on and go about your business.
In the past, the captain of a putt-putt boat often doubled as the engineer.
However, some Hot Bulb Engines hastily manufactured in Japan during the Pacific War were made without various automatic equipment, requiring an engineer to be attached at all times.
Fourth, fuel is easy to obtain.
This isn’t strictly an advantage over a Steam Engine since a Steam Engine can burn anything that can be burned in a boiler, but it is certainly an advantage compared to other internal combustion engines because anything that burns can be used as fuel.
Gasoline, Kerosene, diesel, and heavy oil can all be used, and even crude oil or vegetable oils like soybean oil can be used freely.
Besides that, they have a long lifespan and rarely break down.
Even an engine that hasn’t been used for decades can be made to run again after dusting it off and doing some minor maintenance.
They have the advantage of being able to be used for over a hundred years without issue.
However, there are disadvantages. Although the thermal efficiency is higher than a Steam Engine, it is lower than other internal combustion engines.
Because it takes a long time to start up, it cannot be frequently turned on and off.
While it is good for ships, tractors, threshing, or sawmills with long operating times, it is difficult to use for automobiles.
Also, its large size and heavy weight are significant disadvantages compared to other internal combustion engines.
However, these are only disadvantages compared to modern internal combustion engines, not compared to the Steam Engine.
Because of the advantages of being easy to make and easy to manage, they were widely manufactured and used in countries where precision technology was not yet developed.
I had prepared the blueprints and even models for casting for this Hot Bulb Engine.
However, nothing comes out perfectly from the start in any endeavor.
The items cast at the newly built ironworks did not fit together properly.
To overcome this, I had sent people to Vladivostok for a year to learn casting technology.
If we couldn’t overcome this one thing, wouldn’t the time spent learning those skills be a waste?
After several revisions, the cast engine parts that didn’t fit well at first finally aligned.
Almost all parts of a Hot Bulb Engine can be made through casting, and the very few parts that aren’t cast can be made in a local blacksmith shop.
This is a level that could even be made in a Joseon blacksmith shop.
Other than that, carburetors, bolts and nuts, and fuel pipes made of brass were simply purchased from abroad.
When the Hot Bulb Engine was first operated, not only the Joseon people but also Fridolf Gek, Mikhail Yankovsky, and Yuli Briner came out to watch.
Fridolf Gek, in particular, watched with great interest because I told him we could make powerboats with this engine.
I personally operated the first Hot Bulb Engine for the first time.
I started heating the Hot Bulb at the very top of the engine with a torch.
Since this heating is essential, most Hot Bulb Engines came with a torch or burner attached from the start, or at the very least, there was always space to place one.
I had attached a torch when I made this one.
After about ten minutes, when I thought the Hot Bulb was sufficiently heated, I opened the fuel valve and turned the heavy flywheel, which weighed over a hundred kilograms, by hand.
One of the disadvantages of the Hot Bulb Engine is this heavy flywheel, which is one of the reasons the engine is so heavy.
Tung! Tung! Tung! Tung!!
The peculiar tung-tung noise of a single-cylinder engine began to sound, and the engine, which had seemed doubtful it would run properly, began to rotate while making the tung-tung-tung-tung sound.
Upon the successful operation of the engine, I and everyone else began to shout ‘Ura’ in Russian.
Perhaps because they’ve lived in Russia for a long time, or perhaps because there aren’t many slogans to shout in Joseon at times like this, these people shout ‘Ura’ instead of ‘Manse’ whenever something good happens.
While the people were cheering and shouting ‘Ura,’ Fridolf Gek asked.
“Can this really be put on a ship?”
“Of course. In fact, I made this one specifically to put on a ship right away.”
“How much power does it have?”
“It should output roughly 60 horsepower.”
“So you’re saying this thing doesn’t need a stoker or a boiler man?”
“Since it uses oil instead of coal, you just need to pour oil into this fuel tank. Why would we need a stoker? Besides, as you can see, there’s no boiler, so we don’t need a boiler man either.”
“Can we use Kerosene for fuel?”
“Yes. That’s why I ordered cheap heavy oil from Standard Oil.”
The oil we use is mainly imported through Standard Oil’s branch in Japan.
Ever since I started investing in Standard Oil through J. S. Morgan, I’ve continued to invest, and now I am the second-largest shareholder, owning over 10% of Standard Oil’s shares.
Of course, the largest shareholder is Rockefeller.
I continued to invest in Rockefeller while maintaining a correspondence of opinions.
This time, I requested that he send not just Kerosene, but also the heavy oil and gasoline left over after making Kerosene.
Gasoline was the main culprit that occasionally caused Kerosene to explode, so Rockefeller put the most effort into removing this gasoline during the process of commercializing Kerosene.
The gasoline extracted this way was put into drums and mostly handed over to dry cleaning companies or simply thrown away.
I requested that he send that separately, along with the heavy oil remaining after the Kerosene was removed.
Later on, gasoline and heavy oil would both become money-makers, but from the current perspective of Standard Oil, they were nothing more or less than troublesome byproducts that were difficult to dispose of, so I could buy them at a price close to free.
These items are being transported separately to Sidimi along with the Kerosene sent to the Japan and Shanghai branches of Standard Oil.
I am bearing the shipping costs, but those shipping costs are essentially the price.
“Skipper, I’m going to build fishing boats equipped with these in the future. It should be perfectly possible at your shipyard, right?”
“In the course of building ships, we install things much heavier than this. This much is easily possible.”
“Then let’s make a few more and test them out immediately. The sea is overflowing with herring, but it breaks my heart to see those Japanese guys taking them all. Until now, we couldn’t catch them properly because we didn’t have powerboats, but now that we have power, anything is possible, right?”
“A 60-horsepower powerboat is no match for existing fishing vessels. I’ll build the ships, so you just keep making the engines.”
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