Canteen System Assistance Notes

The workers' dormitories are built on a small piece of elevated ground. Surrounding them are shops and clinics run by the consumer cooperative, along with a small square. All of this was built by the workers' self-government in their spare time, working alongside the construction troops. Through here, you can reach the various factories throughout the Huinong Industrial Zone. The coal-fired power plant and waste heat power plant have recently come online, bringing electricity to the area. Long, white streetlights have also been installed along the roadside, making nighttime walking a breeze.

Du Youlin sighed. The nights of May and June were still a little chilly, but his heart was warm. Unconsciously, this desolate land by the Yellow River had become increasingly bustling. If this continued, it would one day be even more lively than Jinyang City.

"Dad! What is that?"

The boy was quite excited. The factory was holding a celebration party, and family members were allowed to go. However, his wife was still in confinement after childbirth and couldn't go, so Du Youlin had to take his son, Du Shengxi, along. As expected, the little boy, who could eat well, was a curious Xiong Huier, who wanted to play with and explore everything he saw.

"What is this? Didn't you learn about it in class?" Du Youlin glanced at the man who was hawking cotton candy in the prime spot under the streetlight. "This is cotton candy, brought here by a traveling vendor!" He thought, "When this kid gets promoted and lives in the school, he won't have time to make such a fuss."

"Dad! I want one!"

"Eat, eat, eat, that's all you do! Walk carefully and look ahead!"

Du Youlin slapped his child's head, forcing him to turn towards him. "The banquet will start soon. You're full now, so you won't be able to eat all the delicious food later." He thought for a moment, "What's so delicious about this? It's just a spoonful of sugar. Eating that much sugar will give you worms in your teeth!"

"oh....…"

Du Shengxi turned around dejectedly, regretfully bidding farewell to the lovely cotton candy and the stomping cotton candy vendor. Within two minutes, his attention was piqued again. "Wow! How can a spoonful of sugar puff up into such a large ball of cotton candy? Can steamed buns and noodles be like this?"

"That.…..…"

Du Youlin's brain didn't react at once. To be honest, Du Youlin had only attended elementary school and half of junior high school. The skills of a furnace worker in a steel plant were all learned and accumulated bit by bit on the job. Although he was a skilled worker who could handle a large shift, he could not be considered an intellectual.

Du Youlin thought about it. This thing was made in an iron basin, inside a rotating iron head. The peddler remembered adding a spoonful of sugar to the iron head and stirring it with a stick to form a ball. "Isn't it similar to making a sugar figurine?... No, it seems different..."

Because he hadn't studied this thoroughly, Du Youlin couldn't answer his son's question. However, he couldn't admit he didn't know and compromise his fatherly authority. He decisively exercised his fatherly authority and employed his classic tactics for dealing with a curious child:

"What are you daydreaming about? Just focus on your journey. You'll understand this when you grow up!"

As the sky gradually darkened and the streetlights gradually came on, the two, one adult and one child, finally reached the factory. They made their way around a few corners until they reached the factory cafeteria. Over the past six months, the Huinong Ironworks, while still undergoing construction and production, still resembled a large construction site, but the scaffolding had gradually expanded to the surrounding area.

In addition to the Huinong Steel Plant, which has a power plant, coking coal plant, hot air plant and steel and iron making plants, the air separation plant, ammonia synthesis plant and slag cement plant upstream and downstream of the steel plant have also started operation. There are also brick factories, waste heat bathhouses and transport marshalling yards under construction.

There were already many people here. Du Youlin greeted the workers around him who had brought their families with them. At the factory gate, a banner reading "Warmly celebrating the first steelmaking of the new open-hearth furnace" was hung high, with some firecracker debris scattered around. This was the theme of the celebration party. The newly built "twin-bed open-hearth furnace" had produced steel for the first time, turning the molten iron that Du Youlin had personally delivered into even tougher steel.

He could see many familiar and unfamiliar faces gathered around this newly built factory area on the bank of the Yellow River - or rather, around the city. There were so many workers here, plus the surrounding troops responsible for security, that even this celebration banquet could not be held all at once and had to be spread over several days.

All this made Du Youlin feel that this factory was not a dead object made of steel and machinery, but a noisy and annoying thing just like his own children.

Even things that grow.

"Comrades!"

As the factory bell rang, everyone fell silent. The guild chairman stepped forward, holding up a large enamel teacup. "This victory isn't the end of all our work, but the beginning of a new journey!" Without further ado, I'll just give you a few words of advice.

"Today, don't overeat or get drunk."

"Today, everyone must eat well! Now, come, let me toast to everyone!"

"oh! ! ! ! "

The sumptuous food and clinking glasses at this moment are the honor they deserve.

Chapter 94: Ironworks Banquet

A twin-hearth open-hearth furnace splits the hearth of a conventional open-hearth furnace into two, equipped with oxygen lances, and uses top-blown oxygen to smelt steel. While one hearth is operating, the heat from the other hearth can be used to preheat the charge. This reduces construction costs, improves smelting efficiency, and lowers fuel consumption. The only trade-off is a reduction in the number of steel taps per batch. Overall, daily steel production actually increases.

This is one of the main reasons why Balu built an air separation plant. With this set of technology that no one else has used, Huinong Iron Works uses completely ready-made shelf products.

Combined to form a world-leading steel industry - although this production

The scale is really too small - but in the country at that time, it seems that it has the ability to take the lead.

After the first steel was produced from the twin-hearth furnace, the ironworks Party Committee used the first batch of molten steel to cast a huge sickle, attached it to a steel ingot, and sent it to Fushe. It is said that it caused a sensation on the day it arrived; and another steel ingot was made into a hammer, engraved with the date, and placed at the entrance of the factory as a souvenir.

No wonder the steel workers at Huinong Iron Works are so happy.

Because so many people were attending the celebration banquet, even though it was held over several days, there were still a lot of people. Du Youlin and his son found a seat, grabbed their bowls and chopsticks, and went to the food pick-up area. This celebration banquet was clearly inspired by the Red Army's practices during the later stages of the Long March: the central dining tables were joined together to form a long table, upon which a variety of large hot pots of food were laid out. Everyone scooped whatever they wanted into their bowls, as many as they wanted, a buffet-style affair.

Listen carefully, no wasting food here! Du Youlin grabbed his son's arm tightly, restraining Xiong Huizi from flying out. "Don't embarrass your father! When the time comes, tell me what you want to eat, and I'll pick it up for you." Then, as if thinking of something, he added, "There's so much food right now, so eat a little less of each, try a few more and see how it tastes."

-------one

Because it's located in Ning Province, and adjacent to the lush, grassy Hetao region, mutton is quite cheap here. The ironworks previously produced many iron tools and brought in a lot of sheep. Tonight's banquet is a rather grand local feast. Several sheep kept in the kitchen will be slaughtered and skinned, and the meat, fat, blood, and offal will be prepared into a variety of dishes with diverse flavors. There's a sizzling roasted lamb leg, a milky white mutton soup, and even hand-pulled lamb, which is simply delicious and fragrant.

Little Du Shengxi looked at the table overflowing with dishes, his eyes sparkling. He wished he could break free from his father's grasp, rush forward, and devour all the greasy, flavorful delicacies in a "Baimaotian"-style spree. However, the workers present were well-disciplined, and the good food usually kept them queuing politely. Furthermore, with his father Du Youlin's iron grip, he had no choice but to obey.

"Chives, pickled leeks. You are a child. If you eat too much meat, you should eat some vegetables too."

"What's this stuffing? Oh, mutton and carrot dumplings. Don't eat too much at once, or you won't be able to eat anything else." "Oh...oh, these are kidney dumplings. Children can't eat them."

Du Youlin protected his son, sometimes forbidding him to eat this, sometimes asking him to eat more of that. After a few rounds, his son's temper was almost worn out, and the table with the whole lamb dish also came to the end. "Dad, what is that? Can I drink it?"

He looked in the direction his son's hand was pointing. At the end of the table, there were a number of large barrels with "Beer" signs on them. "Oh, that's beer. It's bitter and astringent, not very tasty." "But then I see so many uncles drinking it. If it doesn't taste good, why do they all drink it?"

"That's..." Du Youlin didn't expect his son to be able to choke him back. He glared at him and said, "You little bastard, you dare to talk back to me?" "Alas! It's a happy day, Old Du, don't be mean to the child."

Across the table, a burly, bearded chef spoke. He bared his white teeth at little Du Shengxi and smiled, sharpening a large knife and a sharp blade. "Little kid, you're still young, you can't drink." With a thud, he slammed the large knife down on the wooden chopping board. Using a small sharp knife, he picked out a piece of chopped meat, chopped it into fine pieces, and handed it over. "Here, eat more of this! Eating meat will help you grow taller and stronger. If you want to drink anything, go get some soda over there. Leave the wine to your dad."

For some reason, Lao Du felt that his child suddenly became obedient.

-——―――――—

Things went smoothly afterwards. Xiong Weizi, who had been acting well, stopped making noise and followed his father obediently.

Then I took some vegetables and fruits, and finally set an example for myself and

The son ordered an orange-flavored soda from a glass bottle and sat down to eat it at a banquet table.

Honestly, besides the delicious mutton, Du Youlin was also very pleased with the variety of fruits and vegetables provided in the cafeteria. Besides the usual apples and dates, there were also pineapples and bananas, which he had never tasted before. These were things that the masters of Jinyang City probably didn't have much of, but now, the Huinong Ironworks was casually distributing them to the workers as a side dish.

After all, in the Northwest, strictly speaking, eating meat is much easier than enjoying fresh vegetables, especially rare fresh fruit, at this time of year. In May, before, the only things you'd have to eat were dates and nearly rotten apples, or those incredibly expensive canned fruits. In Jinyang, bringing a basket of four canned fruits to a visitor during New Year's greetings was considered a very nice gesture.

If Mr. Lu knew that our current performance is so good, he would definitely be very happy.

Hmm? Where's Lao Lu?

Du Youlin thought of the steel expert who had set such a high aspiration and even changed his name. It was he who had persuaded him to come here, indirectly changing his fate. Why wasn't he here for such a celebration? "Oh! You mean Lu Gangtie, Chief Engineer Lu? He's worried about the furnaces, so he's on the night shift." An enthusiastic worker pointed to the distant, illuminated No. 1 blast furnace. "He's content with just the blast furnace and the open-hearth furnace. Ha, you're really worried about him, Boss Du. Why don't you go check him out? He'll be so happy."

"Oh, okay, thank you!"

While nodding to his coworkers, Du Youlin had another thought.

Chapter 95: The Emperor of the Open Furnace

There is still some distance from the canteen to the steel plant's smelting workshop.

After asking his fellow workers in the dormitory to take his well-fed child back home, Du Youlin said hello to the chef, took a lunch box of meat and vegetables, grabbed two steamed buns, thought for a while, stuffed two bananas into his coat pocket, and strolled towards the smelting workshop.

"I'm going to check on the furnace! There are new guys working in the furnace crew today, and I'm worried about them." He showed his work ID to the factory workers' self-defense team and displayed his lunch box. "I'm also going to check on Engineer Lu Gao. He must be hanging around the factory again. I didn't hear he went to the celebration party. Look! I brought him some food."

"Oh! The cafeteria has delivered food to the stove crew this evening. It's lamb chops with rice! If you send it there at this time, I'm afraid it will only be a midnight snack!" The Self-Defense Force worker pressed his work ID card against a black object and nodded. "Let's go! Engineer Du, remember to come out early! If you're any later, the street lights will be turned off, and it's hard to walk on the road at night!"

"Why!"

The No. 1 open-hearth furnace is on the other side of the No. 1 blast furnace. They are all in a long shed, connected in the middle by a small railway track in the factory area. A small steam camel car pulls the torpedo can back and forth, loading the molten iron from the blast furnace into the spindle-like carriage and pulling it to the open-hearth furnace at the other end; then on the other end of the railway track, there is a similar steam camel train running, which is used to pull away the slag and dump it where it should go.

Du Youlin walked slowly along the railroad tracks, a sidewalk supported by iron scaffolding. A pile of pipes twisted and turned above and below him, disappearing into a tank, a room, or some massive piece of equipment. Suddenly, he realized his awkward situation—where could Senior Engineer Lu Gangtie be now?

He'd come to look for his friend on a whim, without having contacted them beforehand. The factory was so vast, looking for him outright would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. He was simply bored, and even if he found him, the mutton in his lunchbox would be cold. "Forget it, let's go to the open-hearth stove first." He stuffed the steamed bun into the sleeve of his cotton coat and started walking.

Du Youlin knows about ironmaking, but he has only a basic understanding of steelmaking and knows almost nothing about the advanced "twin-hearth furnace"; Lu Gangtie, on the other hand, is an expert who has worked in a German steel plant and studied related majors. He is an expert in the No. 1 blast furnace.

After the work went smoothly, he immersed himself in the work of the No. 1 open-hearth furnace and rarely even went home.

The probability of finding him at the flat furnace now is definitely higher.

—―――――——

"Lu Gangtie? Ha! Boss Lu! Boss Lu is busy right now, please wait for him!"

A worker standing nearby pointed ahead. A steelworker, wearing a silver heat-insulating suit, an iron helmet, and blackened glasses, was thrusting a long pole into the observation port of the open-hearth furnace. Sparks flew everywhere as he moved. Behind him, a familiar figure and another worker were prodding the ground with a newly-extracted pole, then squatting to examine the extracted steel sample.

That's Lu Gangtie over there. Compared to the blast furnace workers who call him Senior Engineer Lu or Engineer Lu, most of the workers on the open-hearth furnace side call him "Boss Lu." This somewhat joking name is probably because Old Lu was too picky during the entire open-hearth furnace construction phase, and the workers around him suffered as well.

Although he was addressed differently, everyone respected him. "Alright, alright! Take five steel samples! Be frugal with the sampling needles!"

Lu Gangtie's voice was remarkably faint in the clamor of the factory. After the last steel sample was removed, Old Lu picked up a pair of tongs and poured a bottle of water onto the sample. A sizzle! A mist suddenly rose. The sample had quickly cooled and could be handled.

Next, Lao Lu placed the steel sample on the grinding machine. As the sample touched the rapidly spinning grinding wheel, a string of sparks flew out. Against the black background, the sparks' paths and shapes were strikingly clear: bright yellow and dense, they shot down with the wheel's rotation, splitting into numerous pollen-like bright spots. However, the scattered sparks were small, scattered only a short distance, and quickly dissipated into the air.

Lu Gangtie said nothing, taking the other steel samples from the inspector and repeating the process. Sparks flew from the grinding wheel and the background board, then faded away again and again. The inspectors, on the other hand, stood by nervously, their hands held high, as if awaiting the emperor's decree or the boss's ruling.

“It’s okay this time.”

After a long time, Lu Gangtie finally spoke, and the quality inspectors finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Next time, pay attention to the carbon ratio... The lab analysis takes at least a day, which is definitely too late. Here, it's up to you to check... As for the spark shape, we can refer to standard samples, but we need to rely on experience to judge..." Lu Gangtie stroked his chin, his expression devoid of joy. Instead, he gave serious instructions to the quality inspector beside him. The latter could only pecking at rice like a chicken, then lowering his head to write something on the sketchpad.

"Quality control is our life. We cannot give unqualified steel to soldiers to make bayonets!

"But this furnace is okay, let's go ahead!"

----―-

The workers clapped their hands happily as the overhead crane, hoisting the steel, was starting up, lifting the oversized spiral steel coil to the taphole of the open-hearth furnace, where it awaited its arrival. It appeared that there were no major issues with the current heat of steel. In the sand molds to the side, workers were already checking the progress of the billet casting. Soon, the molten steel would be channeled into the spiral steel coil and then hoisted here to be cast into steel bars or bars. These billets or bars would then be sent to the next processing area, where they would be pressed into plates by a press or forged into billets by a forging machine.

Because the twin-hearth furnace taps steel at a rate over four times faster than a standard open-hearth furnace, even though the number of taps per turn is reduced by half, the overall workload actually increases. In the final moments before tapping, everyone takes advantage of the opportunity to eat and drink to replenish their energy. If they haven't finished the fried rice yet, the custom at the open-hearth furnace is to warm it by placing it on the poured but still-warm steel ingots until the next free moment.

"Old Lu! Boss Lu! Your old friend is looking for you!"

Someone shouted, and Lu Gangtie, who was drinking salty soda, turned around and saw Du Youlin standing on the other side.

Unexpectedly, without the expected greetings or greetings, Lu Gangtie threw down the soda bottle and rushed over with astonishing agility. He climbed over the guardrail and ran in front of Du Youlin: "Old Du!

"Is there something wrong with the blast furnace?"

The casual quality inspector immediately followed up: "Engineer Lu Gao! You need to go and rest! You've already worked two shifts!"

But it seemed the comrades responsible for the enforced rest weren't very enthusiastic. Lu Gangtie opened his eyes wide and glared back. He didn't care about anything else and pressed Du Youlin's shoulder. "Is there a material overhang? Is the flue gas overpressure? Or is the molten iron quality substandard? Oh, there's no alarm, so it shouldn't be a serious matter..."

"What?"

Du Youlin stamped his feet, took out the steamed bun and the lunch box full of mutton from his arms, and then showed the banana in his pocket to his left and right.

"I'm here to bring you a midnight snack, Engineer Lu! Why do you keep talking about steel?"

Chapter 96: The Boss of the Blast Furnace

Because the vertical bending continuous casting machine had not yet been invented, there was no off-the-shelf product in the world that could achieve continuous casting and rolling. Even the Eighth Route Army, with its "strange data" and advanced assembly technology, could not directly create an integrated steel production line. Therefore, even the Huinong Iron Works was forced to stick to this step-by-step steelmaking process.

"You came over so suddenly that I thought something had happened to the stove!"

Lao Du put the banana in his pocket on the table and watched Lu Gangtie pick up the mutton in the lunch box with chopsticks and eat it with steamed buns. The lunch box placed next to the iron mouth of the blast furnace was heated by heat radiation and was still warm. The temperature here was high enough, and the white steam that came out when he breathed had disappeared.

"I'm not on duty tonight, and I wouldn't be the one to come to you if something happens, Senior Engineer Lu." Du Youlin shook his head. The two of them had just trotted back from the open-hearth furnace to the duty room under the blast furnace. After checking everything, the intellectual Lu Gangtie finally gave up. "What if? So we should check the blast furnace first." Lu Gangtie placed the mutton and vegetables on the steamed bun, then took a bite with the vegetables. "Oh, it smells so good! The mutton tonight is really good, much more delicious than the fat lamb rolls I had a few days ago."

"No, that's freshly slaughtered. I heard that the fat lamb rolls are made to preserve the lamb for a long time. They're made of frozen lamb, so they're definitely not as delicious as fresh lamb."

The food quality at the steel mill has improved dramatically recently. I don't know why, but there are a lot of new things, such as bananas, pineapples, white-fleshed dragon fruit, etc., and there are more green leafy vegetables that are not easy to eat normally. The taste of the meat seems to have decreased slightly - but the quantity is much more sufficient. For example, the food standard for the special heavy physical post such as the furnace worker mentioned that they can eat meat every day. Du Youlin felt that he had gained weight.

"Old Du, let me tell you, the most difficult time for a blast furnace is the first three months. We started up the furnace around February, and now we've passed the most critical period and entered the smooth operation period. We've already achieved a phased victory." Old Lu finished his lunch box and started working on the bananas. He grabbed one banana and handed the other to the young worker next to him. "But we still can't relax at work... Oh, I never thought we could still eat bananas in China."

Tonight's night shift at the blast furnace is led by a veteran worker and several new young workers, responsible for releasing the hot metal from the furnace. The blast furnace at No. 2 Road has entered its normal operation phase, with a slag crust forming inside. Production is also improving. To accommodate the initial 12-hour half-cycle and 24-hour full-cycle steelmaking cycle for the twin-hearth furnaces, Blast Furnace No. 1 is releasing hot metal twice daily, averaging over 300 tons per cycle.

That is to say, in addition to the 8 tons of molten iron that will be transported away and mixed with scrap iron and steel into the double-hearth furnace, there are nearly 220 tons of molten iron that will be turned into cast iron and then processed into products such as grenades, 60 mortars, and agricultural tools.

To put it more simply, the Huinong Iron and Steel Works, managed by Lu Ganggang and Du Youlin, is a "Minnie Iron and Steel Joint Enterprise" with a planned annual production capacity of 30 tons, a designed annual output of 10 tons, and an initial production target of 5 tons of steel per year. Without factoring in the loss of finished products, it has already reached a daily output of 450 tons of iron and over 200 tons of steel!

This was a preliminary estimate of steel production, given that the open-hearth furnace hadn't been fully commissioned yet, forcing the cycle time to be reduced. According to the manual's design, a fully operational open-hearth furnace would have a much faster full cycle speed than the current one. "That's not enough! You can't make a ton of steel from a ton of iron!"

Lu Gangtie blew at the tea in his large teacup, stretched out his fingers, and pointed to a number: "When I was in Germany, the yield rate of their best steel mills was less than 80%! Comrades from the Central Committee told me that our yield rate should be around that level, but in the beginning, everyone was unfamiliar with the process, so the yield rate couldn't be high. In the first few years, it was probably below 60%. I think it was about two-thirds."

"Multiplying this, the final output of steel will not be that much. Iron is still a bit better, but the steel we can provide to the outside world in a year is less than 50,000 tons! How can this be enough?

"Tell me the truth, Senior Engineer Lu."

Du Youlin also filled his teacup with tea: "Our new factory has reached this level, which is really good. Our Jinyang steel output is only about a thousand tons a year... In Huinong, we have opened a factory with an output of 50,000 tons. What else can we not be satisfied with..."

"Hai! How can we compete with Lao Xier? We're planning to produce 30 tons of steel a year. That's nothing compared to the Western powers! Currently, we only have cast iron and carbon steel. Counting the alloy converter that's almost finished, we can only produce an additional 20 tons of alloy a day... Are we satisfied with that output? What kind of Iron Man are we?

"If we can use Huinong's technology, what can we do with 3 million tons or 30 million tons of steel a year!" Lu Gangtie became excited again, but then lost his temper. "It's a pity that Jinyang is now occupied by the Japanese, and Anye has also been handed over to the devils. If it were still in our hands, how much could we contribute..."

The duty room fell silent. When talking about the loss of the country and the fall of the factory, the workers present were not very happy. Even someone like Du Youlin, who only wanted his wife and children to live a safe life, now felt that driving out the Japanese invaders and recovering the country was an urgent matter.

The alarm in the duty room rang, signaling the evening's ironmaking season was almost here. The young workers on duty said hello to the veterans, donned their thermal suits, and headed out. "Engineer Lu, we still have to eat one bite at a time. It's a long journey from nothing to something, from something to excellence."

Du Youlin wasn't very good at persuading people, so he could only utter something like this, somewhat awkwardly: "One day we'll be able to drive the Japs away, and then we'll be able to safely build our own large steel mill. So, let me go and watch them produce the iron. The young workers' group has only been around a few times, so I'm quite knowledgeable about this."

He patted his chest with confidence and assured his old friend.

-------one