Chapter 21: Ultra-High Strength Alloy Steel
Leng Yueming and Xiao Dongping sighed that Qin Hai was a freak, while this freak was now doing even more freakish things in the casting workshop.
"Chromium steel No. 40, 500 grams."
"12 Chrome Nickel Steel, 300g."
"65 manganese steel, 1200 grams..."
Qin Hai held a piece of paper, reading out the numbers one by one. Ning Mo, Yu Haitao, Miao Lei, and Wang Xiaochen were busy searching for the specified models in a large pile of iron shavings and steel scraps that looked like garbage. They then used a balance to weigh them before pouring them into a ladle, preparing to smelt them.
It's already after work hours, the workers on the day shift in the workshop have all left. Due to insufficient production tasks at the factory, there are only three or four workers on the night shift in the casting workshop, and they're all busy with their own tasks, no one paying attention to what these young people are up to.
Wang Xiaochen was temporarily pulled over by Qin Hai to help, because measuring these metals requires the use of a balance in the laboratory, Wang Xiaochen as an inspector is also a laboratory operator and has the right to use the balance. In addition, Qin Hai also found that his few little partners were fine with doing some rough work, but when it came to precise measurement, it was more suitable for girls to do it.
Wang Xiaochen didn't know what Qin Hai and the others were up to, but as a single working woman, she had nothing better to do anyway. When Qin Hai asked for her help, she happily stayed behind. Seeing Qin Hai carefully sorting out these scrap metals, she felt that it was somewhat mysterious.
"Alright, it's finally balanced." Qin Hai put down the paper in his hand, wiped the sweat from his forehead and said with a sigh of relief.
Qin Hai wanted to refine this alloy steel, which was developed in the early 21st century as a super high-strength alloy steel. In this era, even the theory of this alloy steel had not been proposed yet. By precisely controlling the proportion of various elements such as chromium, manganese, vanadium, molybdenum, and silicon in the alloy steel, and adding special heat treatment processes, the strength of this alloy steel can be more than three times higher than that of ordinary high-strength steel. In later generations, it was used to manufacture important load-bearing components such as aircraft landing gear.
Relying solely on some scrap steel as raw materials, and with relatively simple smelting equipment, Qin Hai was clear that the alloy steel he refined would definitely not reach its theoretically best performance. However, for making a military dagger, it could be considered a waste of good material. He dared to guarantee that the barbarian military officer's nephew absolutely wouldn't be able to find better materials than this steel.
It took Qin Hai a lot of brain cells to come up with the formula for ultra-high-strength alloy steel by collecting various alloy steel scraps from all over. The metal elements contained in different alloy steels are different, and the amount of scrap is also different, which is equivalent to solving a linear programming problem with several constraints. Fortunately, Qin Hai's math foundation was still quite good, and he managed to solve such a complex problem.
"Can we smelt steel now?" asked Miao Lei eagerly.
"Alright," Qin Hai replied.
There was a small 150kg capacity intermediate frequency induction furnace in the casting workshop, which was normally used for casting some small workpiece blanks. Now it was being used by Qin Hai to smelt this ultra-high-strength alloy steel. At this point, Qin Hai was quite grateful to Wei Baolin. If Wei Baolin hadn't messed up the factory's management system, Qin Hai wouldn't have been able to use the workshop equipment so freely for his own private work.
The electric furnace started to work, the temperature rose slowly, and the waste steel in the furnace began to make a rumbling sound. This electric furnace has an electromagnetic stirring function, after the waste steel is melted into molten steel, it will be fully mixed in the furnace, making the distribution of various elements in the molten steel uniform.
Qin Hai's eyes were fixed tightly on the thermometer on the electric furnace, constantly adjusting the power of the electric furnace to ensure that the temperature inside the furnace was controlled at a specified level, neither too high nor too low.
The smelting process lasted for nearly half an hour. Qin Hai issued a warning to the crowd: "Alright, everyone step back a bit, we're about to produce steel."
Everyone retreated, leaving only a few sand molds on the scene. These molds were made by Ning Mo during his daytime work with the drawings designed by Qin Hai, and this small task was not worth mentioning in the foundry workshop.
In his previous life, Qin Hai had never personally done casting work, but in this life, his predecessor was a technical school student majoring in casting, so he was not unfamiliar with the operation of casting. He pressed the button, controlling the electric furnace to flip over, pouring the orange-red molten steel into the sand mold. The molten steel emitted scorching heat, flowing in the cavity of the sand mold, and then gradually cooled and solidified, turning into a blue-green metal.
"What are you doing?" asked a worker who was on his way home from the night shift, coming over to join in the excitement.
"Just doing something small." Ning replied quietly and vaguely.
"Haha, you're doing private work, if Director Miao catches you, you'll be in big trouble." The worker threatened with a smile.
"Master Chen, don't worry, I've already talked to my dad about it and he agreed." Miao Lei replied half-truthfully. He had actually informed Miao Funan beforehand, but the reason he gave was that he would be accompanying Qin Hai with some material experiments. Miao Funan knew his son often secretly did some private work on the side, and since all the workers in the factory were doing the same thing, he didn't bother to restrain his own son, so he usually turned a blind eye to such things.
After cooling, the workpiece needs to be machined first, that is, drilling and tapping on metal cutting machine tools such as lathes and milling machines. Qin Hai was a meticulous thinker who had considered the requirements of machining equipment in advance, so he chose this steel material with low strength before heat treatment, which can be cut by ordinary machine tools. The ultra-high strength of the material is achieved after machining through a series of heat treatments.
Machining this thing can only be done by finding the night shift workers in the metalworking workshop, Ning Mo took on this task and carried a pile of workpieces to ask for help one by one.
It's probably because of Ning Zhongying that Ning Mo has a very good relationship with the people in the factory, and almost everyone he asks for help will give him face. Of course, Ning Mo is not an ungrateful person, when someone helps him, putting a pack of eight yuan worth of cigarettes in their toolbox to show appreciation is the least he can do.
Because there were many places where he needed to ask for help, Ningmo spent a whole night sending out cigarettes and spent all the money he earned from selling farm tools the day before yesterday. However, Ningmo didn't mind at all, as Qin Hai had instilled in him the idea that: if you don't spend small money, you can't make big money. Originally, Ningmo was also a generous person, but after listening to Qin Hai's words, he became even more willing to spend money.
A few people were busy from the afternoon until late at night, and Zhang Lao San's desired military dagger and several other military equipment designed by Qin Hai were all made. Based on his own theoretical knowledge, Qin Hai performed heat treatment on several products and tested their mechanical properties, with a satisfied smile on his face.
"How was it, Qin Hai, did you succeed?" Several of his little friends asked him anxiously.
Qin Hai nodded and said: "It's a success. Although it didn't reach the most ideal state, this knife is absolutely harder than those few shovels of yours."
"Want to give it a try?" Yu Haitao asked.
"What if it doesn't work!" Ning Mo patted Yu Haotao's head. After putting in so much effort to make something, if it didn't work out, that would be too tragic.
Qin Hai smiled and said: "We've already tested its mechanical properties, so there's no need to use it to split bricks again, right?"
"No need to try, can Qin Hai's things be fake?" Ning Mo said. He held these few things, looking at the knife's steel mouth and color, his heart was delighted, and he couldn't help but look at them again and again.
"Fatty, stop staring and put these things away. Get in touch with Old Zhang later and ask him when that wild nephew of his is arriving in the county town." Qin Hai instructed Ning Mo.
Ning nodded silently and said: "No problem, I'll contact him tomorrow. However, whether he comes or not is irrelevant, this beautiful thing, we can keep it for ourselves to play with."
"Hey, don't think like that. We've gone to so much trouble, it's not just for our own amusement. These few things are the foundation of our business, we can't sell them too cheaply. Alright, when the time comes and the other party arrives, all of you just keep quiet and let me do the talking."
"Qin Hai, don't worry, we'll all listen to you." Several of his companions responded loudly, and they had become more and more infatuated with Qin Hai's charm.
The next morning, Ning Mo rode his bicycle to Zhang Lao San's blacksmith shop and told him that the dagger was ready. He asked Zhang to inform the nephew of Man Qiang to come and inspect the goods. Zhang agreed readily and made an appointment with Ning Mo to meet at the blacksmith shop at dinner time.
At this time, Xiao Dongping, who was too excited to sleep all night, also carried a canvas bag with 40 rotary tiller blades on his back and boarded the long-distance bus bound for Hongze City.
