"This is the Royal Supershop?" Looking at the oval building not far away covering an area of nearly one hundred acres, Kennedy couldn't help but asked in surprise to Jenny, who was sitting opposite the carriage.
"Yes, sir." Jenny replied with embarrassment.
Considering the scale of this building, it is not very appropriate to just translate it as "Royal Super Store". If it were in later modern times, they would naturally call it "Royal Mall", that is, "Royal Mall".
But the word "Mall" was not coined until the 1990s. Now Jenny really can't find an English word that can accurately describe this place, so she can only use her limited vocabulary to simply translate it as "Royal Supershop".
After passing a simple checkpoint, the carriage slowly moved towards the parking lot at the south gate of the Royal Mall.
The Royal Mall is divided into four gates: east, south, west and north.
There are also dedicated parking pick-up and drop-off points at each gate. In addition, there are corresponding special carriage and horse stalls not far away for the temporary parking of vehicles and horses.
The road is still on the right in both directions.
In addition to the lanes for vehicles and horses, there are also several pedestrian lanes on the roads.
Everywhere you look, there are crowds of people on every sidewalk. The carriage and horse driving roads are also busy with traffic, and the prosperity is self-evident.
"When I read books by Marco Polo and others, they said that China, an ancient oriental country, was extremely prosperous, with gold everywhere, and the people were extremely rich. At that time, I thought they were exaggerating. There should be no country in the world except France. It would be better to be richer than the British Empire." Kennedy couldn't help but sigh.
"Now it seems that what they described is correct. We are too arrogant. What's funny is that the Spaniards are more arrogant than us. They said that they could conquer this country with 2,000 people. They are really not afraid of laughing to death. The Virgin Mary Ya.”
"Spain? It's great if they can protect themselves now and conquer others." Jerry also laughed after hearing this.
"However, this place is really unbelievable. When I came here before, most of the people here were indeed dressed in rags, their faces were full of food, and they looked malnourished. In addition, their faces were numb , lifeless, like a living slave."
"Looking at it now, everyone's face is shiny. They are talking and laughing when walking, and they are filled with happiness. I can only say that this emperor is really amazing."
"Haha... Jerry, you are talking about your tricks again. But speaking of these, it is this 'Royal Mall' that shocked me. If there is such a mall in London, I believe the people around London will be like this too." Kennedy said with a smile got up.
"Kennedy, if you don't believe me, you can ask Jenny and the others to see if I'm lying. Oh, by the way... isn't there still a part of the country in the north that is controlled by the Tatars? Let's go and take a look when we have time. Then you'll know I didn't lie to you." Seeing that Kennedy still didn't believe him, Jerry defended anxiously.
"Okay, my brother..."
…
During the conversation, the carriage in which Kennedy and others were riding quickly arrived at the "drop-off point" specially set up at the south gate of the "Royal Mall". All customers who arrive here by carriage will disembark from here.
The Royal Mall is a commercial building integrating supermarkets, food, fabrics and clothing, accessories, beauty salons, teahouses, restaurants, theaters, cinemas and other leisure and entertainment areas. The industries inside almost include most of the currently known commodity and service industries.
The Royal Mall is divided into three floors, each floor is nearly one foot high.
Its ground floor is mainly for supermarkets, snacks and delicacies, as well as various decorative accessories, gouache, etc.; the second floor is mainly for clothing and fabrics, gouache, beauty, etc.; the third floor is for teahouses, restaurants, theaters, and cinemas, etc. Lord.
Unlike traditional stores that have closable doors, the South Gate is an open doorway with a ceiling. At first glance, it looks like the entrance to a wide cave.
And its door is simply a low steel fence, and there are no other door panels that can be closed.
As a royal property, the Royal Mall is naturally not ordinary.
Starting from the drop-off point, the floor is paved with smooth tiles fired from clay and other high-grade materials. Looking from near to far, the entire space is smooth and flawless, looking extremely luxurious.
Even Kennedy, a British aristocrat, did not dare to use such luxurious decoration materials in his home. But he was really shocked that such materials could be used in such a large area for decoration.
"What an eye-opener!" Kennedy exclaimed again. He had forgotten how many times he had made such a sound of admiration.
"Indeed..." Jerry couldn't help but agree.
Alice, who was also born into a noble family, felt a little cowardly from the moment she stepped on the tiles on the floor.
"Jenny, where should we visit first?" Alice asked, holding Jenny's hand with some hesitation.
"Madam, I think we can go to the supermarket to buy some juice or mineral water first and then go to the second floor to buy some clothes suitable for here. After all, the weather is hot and you will easily get thirsty when shopping." Jenny suggested with a smile on her face. .
"Okay, I'll listen to you." Alice had no other thoughts and responded with a natural nod.
Under the leadership of Jenny, the group of them officially crossed the south gate and entered the Royal Mall.
Under normal circumstances, large buildings generally have poor lighting, but Kennedy and others did not find this problem along the way. When they took a closer look, they discovered that a strange light was used here, and it had no flame.
"Jenny, what kind of lights are these? They are so bright, but there is no flame?" Kennedy asked Jenny, who was leading the way.
"Sir, that's an electric light," Jenny replied.
"Electric light? What is it? Does it use lightning electricity?" The emergence of a brand new thing once again subverted Kennedy's understanding of China. He felt that at this moment he should be like a countryman from England entering London!
"Yes! Sir." Jenny didn't know much, so she was a little unconfident in her answer, but she thought she was right.
Incandescent lamp, the latest research product from the Royal Laboratory.
The research on this thing benefited from the discovery of tungsten mines in Jiangxi. ①
Historically, tungsten was first discovered from scheelite by Swedish chemist Carl William Scheele in 1781 (the forty-sixth year of Qianlong's reign). It was not until 1783 (the forty-eighth year of Qianlong's reign) that tungsten metal was extracted from wolframite ore by the Spanish Depuya②.
…
Anyone who has gone through nine years of compulsory education basically knows that one of the most important materials for incandescent lamps is tungsten filament.
If Jiangxi was still under the jurisdiction of the Manchu and Qing Dynasties at this time, it would be useless to discover the entire tungsten metal, let alone the discovery of tungsten mines. Fortunately, Jiangxi was under the management of the Yi Dynasty at this time, and Zhang Rui provided strong support for all kinds of scientific research.
With the discovery of tungsten ore, under the guidance of Zhang Rui③, incandescent lamps were quickly produced by technicians from the Royal Research Institute. All this success was also due to Zhang Rui's in-depth understanding of electric lighting related knowledge when he was studying.
With tungsten, tungsten wire can be made. Place the tungsten wire in a high-heat glass cover coated with red phosphorus, use a vacuum machine to extract the air inside, and then perform final welding to obtain an epoch-making incandescent lamp. ④
With incandescent lamps, electricity is naturally needed.
Currently, there are two types of electricity coming out of the Royal Research Institute.
One is a chemical battery. Batteries made by metal redox strength sequence ⑤. Such as carbon batteries in later generations.
One is to use hydraulic or steam engines as power to drive DC or AC motors to generate electricity.
Today, the Royal Mall uses a steam engine to drive a DC motor to generate electricity.
The biggest problem with steam engine technology is the problem of sealing, which is also a difficulty with breech-loading guns.
However, with the emergence of oak trees, as long as the rubber is harvested through large-scale planting and then vulcanized, high-temperature resistant rubber can be used, which can be used to solve the high-temperature sealing problem.
Of course, the amount of rubber used will increase in the future. The best way to obtain rubber is to distill petroleum to obtain various products and then conduct a series of systematic synthesis. Otherwise, it will be difficult to meet the demand for rubber by planting alone.
However, when it comes to synthetic rubber, this technology is difficult to achieve without nearly a hundred years of accumulation. The most important thing is that no oil fields have been found in the Yichao area, and the less oil currently can only be obtained through sea trade and trade with Sichuan and other places.
Therefore, Zhang Rui could only propose relevant plans and set up a group to conduct petroleum-related research.
All in all, under Zhang Rui's general guidance, the steam engine has been initially perfected and there is no problem in using it.
As for motors, anyone who knows basic junior high school physics will understand.
When a part of a conductor in a closed circuit moves in a magnetic field to cut the magnetic field lines, a current will be generated in the conductor.
As long as you have attended junior high school, your physics knowledge is relatively passable. Motors can be easily produced.
The biggest problem is that the voltage produced may be unstable.
But the current electricity consumption is only used for electric lighting, so this is not a problem, it is just a slight flicker.
Moreover, as long as the rotation speed is set properly, the 50 Hz problem can be stabilized. And it can also be roughly adjusted by making some simple capacitors and other original components.
Generally speaking, the electricity problem can be solved.
If the technology is initially perfected, it must be put to use and then improved during use. If you don't use it all the time, it may be lost over time.
…
Note ①: China has the largest number of tungsten mines in the world. Currently, the proven tungsten mines account for more than 70% of the world's total. Among them, Dayu County in Jiangxi Province is known as the "Tungsten Capital".
②: Extraction method: Metal tungsten can be obtained by eutectic melting wolframite and soda ash, decomposing it with hydrochloric acid and then roasting it, and finally reducing the tungsten trioxide with carbon.
③: Of course, that’s not to say that other materials can’t work, such as the carbon fiber filaments that have been used before improvements, but where do you put the desperate research of Edison and others?
④: The incandescent lamp here is not perfect. After all, the vacuum machine is just like a vacuum machine, and there is no inert gas filling. It is not very good, but it is not too bad. It is comparable to Edison's. Moreover, if it breaks, just replace it with a new one. chant!
⑤: That is: potassium, calcium, sodium, magnesium, aluminum, zinc, iron, tin, lead and hydrogen, copper, mercury, silver, platinum→