Chapter 313： Large flat glass

Romeni was a glass craftsman who had previously signed a lifetime contract to Marin in Venice, and was the main person in charge of the glass greenhouse arranged by Marin.

Before that, Mozgen and Butter brought a batch of seeds of oriental herbs, and ordered Romeni to build a glass greenhouse to cultivate these seeds. So Romeni took on this task.

On Texel Island, Romeni built a small glass greenhouse to cultivate various herbs brought by Morggen and Butler.

Later, these successfully cultivated herbs were also tested outside Texel Island, and most of them survived. In addition, the most inconspicuous bug, Artemisia, was specially arranged by Marin for planting.

Umarine is very clear. That is the legendary artemisia annua, the source of artemisinin for treating malaria. Therefore, after Marin occupied East Friesland and established Orich, he built a new manor on the side of the horse farm in the north of the city, which was used to grow Artemisia annua. Of course, other herbs have also been planted. It can be said that this manor on the side of the horse farm has become a herbal medicine base.

Alas, Marin recently came up with a whimsy to grow spices and vegetables. As a result, Romeni was called to Orich from Texel and asked him to build another glass greenhouse to test ginger, pepper and other spices. In addition, Marin can eat fresh vegetables until winter.

The taste of Marlin is very different in this era. Europeans of this era, especially hard-nosed, especially male aristocracy, especially like to eat pepper. Grilled meat is dipped in pepper. If you eat bread, you like to dip some spices. It seemed as if they did not eat spices and could not show their aristocracy.

Moreover, most men like to eat meat, but do not like vegetables. No wonder, because Europeans of this era eat vegetables raw. What is the taste of raw vegetables? Of course it's bad. So, no one likes to eat vegetables.

But Marin knows that eating vegetables helps to supplement vitamins and is good for health. Moreover, the vegetables are well fried and delicious. Especially in winter, when vegetables are scarce, eating meat all day is very uncomfortable. In recent years, Marin has always wanted to eat vegetables ...

Before, I couldn't make glass on a large scale because of the need to grow herbs and add little alkali. But now it's different. Marin bought a lot of sodium carbonate from Venice and came back. So Marin planned to start looking at glass products and build more glass greenhouses.

As a result, Romeni took a group of Venetian glassmakers and began to make glass for the construction of a new glass greenhouse in the north of Orich.

When Marin was okay, he went to watch them burn glass and build greenhouses. However, after arriving there, Marin discovered that the glass block made by Romeni and others was a bit small ...

How small is it? Bigger than a slap ...

Why is it so small? The reason is also very simple, that is, artisans such as Romeni, when blowing glass, are blown ...

Yes, these glass products are blown by artisans. Each glass craftsman uses a special tube to blow the glass liquid that will condense with a special technique before the glass liquid cools down, and blows them into the shape they want ...

Under the processing of these skilled craftsmen, the glass liquid is blown into the shape of a cup, bottle, or other artwork ...

However, the flat glass pieces are so small that when a glass greenhouse is built, a glass greenhouse is made up of many glass pieces. Therefore, the glass greenhouse built by Romeni is so densely framed. Then, the space between the frames is so small that it fits in a larger piece of glass ...

However, because the frame density is too large, the light transmission is greatly reduced ...

Su Marin suddenly remembered that the technology for the production of large glass appeared to have only appeared in 1688, as if using the roll method. It is to roll the softened glass of glass that is to be cooled horizontally with a metal roller to make it smooth.

Although the upper surface of the metal roll will be a little rough at the end, but it's fine. It can be polished with sandpaper. Unlike the previous blowing method, because the liquid glass cools quickly, there is no time to blow a large piece of glass.

Because of the appearance of the rolling method, not only the large glass can be produced, but also the cost is low. After all, blowing glass is a relatively advanced technique that most people can't do. If every glass is blown out by a master craftsman, the cost is indeed high. The rolling method can be easily done by ordinary craftsmen, and the efficiency is extremely high, and the natural cost is low.

Marin mentioned the rolling method, which immediately aroused great interest in Romeni. So they made a parallel groove and a smooth copper rod.

When the molten glass melts in the crucible, the craftsmen will pour the molten glass into another container, and wait until the liquid molten glass begins to thicken, and then pour it into the groove. Then, the copper stick was on the side of the groove that was flush with the two sides, rolled over like a stone goblet, and pressed the protruding surface down. In this way, a whole large glass block like a flat plate is formed.

Next, the formed large glass block is sent into the annealing furnace for annealing with the groove. After the annealing was completed, the craftsman took out the large flat glass with a flat bottom and a slight burr on the top, and sanded it with sandpaper. This kind of sandpaper is not the sandpaper produced by the later industry, but the shark skin. Shark skin itself is very rough and can be used as natural sandpaper ...

After the upper surface was polished by sandpaper, a piece of flat glass was born. Of course, because of the process ~ www.novelhall.com ~ Sometimes the whole glass may have problems, but even so, most of the glass is qualified and can be used as door and window glass.

The most important thing is that his productivity has been greatly improved. An ordinary artisan can quickly produce large pieces of flat glass. Unlike before, the size of glass is purely based on the vitality of glass craftsmen. The glass craftsman with large vital capacity blows out a larger piece of glass, and the small vital capacity can only blow out a large piece of glass ...

With the large flat glass, the glass greenhouse in Marin Farm was immediately modified. The original dense glass frame was removed and replaced by a large glass frame. In this way, the larger the glass sheet, the less the frame, the better the light transmittance of the glass greenhouse ...

As for growing tropical crops in glass greenhouses, it requires high temperatures. This is also easy. When the weather is cold, just get a briquette stove to boil water in the greenhouse. The water vapor of hot water permeates the entire greenhouse, which can completely increase the temperature. It is during the daytime that in order to get better light, some women need to be sent in and often use rags to wipe the glass surface inside the glass greenhouse. Because water vapor adheres to the inside of the glass, it can cause blurring, which prevents sunlight from entering. This is not necessary at night, and the glass paste is just pasted. Just wait until the sun rises the next morning to send a few serf women to come and clean the glass regularly.

Although the cost of building a greenhouse is quite high. The cost of using coal as fuel is also considerable. But what could be better than transporting spices from distant India?

In fact, Marin is only slightly interested in growing spice crops in glass greenhouses. And he is more interested in growing off-season vegetables to satisfy his appetite ...

The big piece of flat glass just appeared because Marin wanted to eat off-season vegetables ...