Chapter 1941： Twenty knots!

What is the concept of a one-way trip in two weeks in the broad Atlantic Ocean? You should know that on land, if you don't change horses, Marin and his men will take two horses, and they will march for more than 100 kilometers a day. In two weeks, it was only over a thousand kilometers.

The width of the Atlantic Ocean is more than 2,000 kilometers, so the flying shears run faster than one person and two horses, and the load is large. Of course, for road goods like grain, they will definitely not be transported by flying shears. Flying shears are generally valuables. For example, in the 19th century, flying shears were generally used to transport high-value commodities such as crows and tea leaves. For example, the Cutty Sark flying shear that drove back to London from Guangzhou around the Cape of Good Hope in 100 days was specially used to transport tea. Because the most popular black tea in Britain at that time had a shelf life of only about one year. If it is transported by an old boat, it will take 10 months for a single journey. Even if new tea is imported, it will soon be out of shelf life when shipped back to the UK. Therefore, the clipper that can run one way in 100 days has become the first choice for transporting black tea.

It is precisely because of the shelf life of black tea that even Marin does not know how to produce black tea. In the Ming Dynasty, black tea didn't come out until about 1568. The reason was that the local tea farmers were scared by a passing army and had no time to dry the freshly picked tea in time, causing the tea to ferment, and then dried and processed, and black tea was born.

In fact, the green tea that Marlin later drank the most was Longjing Biluochun. But the shelf life of green tea and black tea is not much different, or even shorter. Therefore, from the perspective of economic interests, Marin finally chose black tea bricks that can be preserved for more than ten years. Nothing else, just that long shelf life.

Moreover, the "Earl Milk Tea" invented by Marin is not brewed, but co-cooked with milk, sugar and so on. In this way, the problem of poor brewing taste of black tea can also be covered, so it does not matter.

In addition, Marin ’s “invented” honeycomb coal stove is too great to be able to cook milk tea or provide hot water at any time. It has become the standard equipment for wealthy Europeans. Anyone who does not have a honeycomb stove to cook milk tea to entertain guests will be embarrassed to say that they are rich and wealthy.

The profit of tea is also extremely amazing. At first, in Western Europe, a black tea brick of 2 and a half pounds was purchased in Daming for fifty or sixty texts, but when shipped to Western Europe, it can be exchanged for a horse, which is worth dozens of gold coins, or dozens or two silver. This profit is more than a hundred times?

However, as the import of tea bricks increased sharply, and the Portuguese also began to enter the coast of Daming, they could also sneak in some tea, knowing the low price of tea. Marin had no choice but to cut the price drastically, but a tea brick was also worth 10 gold coins, that is, 4 gold coins per pound of black tea. This price is a uniform price that Marin negotiated with the Portuguese.

After all, no matter whether it is smuggling or other ways, Portugal will always get tea. In order to prevent the two sides from suppressing the price too low because of vicious competition, Marin took the initiative to negotiate with the Portuguese to set the price of black tea bricks at 10 gold coins each. Although the price is more than half cheaper than before, but in the future can take the volume, the profit is still not low.

However, the Portuguese did not know that, like the Anhua area, which is rich in black tea bricks, Marin had already let Kongtai businessmen arrange in the past to control the supply of goods. The Portuguese have a source of goods even if they want to share a piece of soup. If the ordinary black tea and green tea are imported back, at the speed of the Portuguese ship, even if the tea is transported back, it will soon expire.

In addition, Marin had already sent Kongtai to steal tea. Moreover, there are already experimental tea gardens on the island of Cuba. At that time, Beihai can drink its own tea without importing it from Daming.

However, Marin has doubts about the cost of Cuban tea. Because, in this era, no other country has lower labor costs than Daming. The production of tea is very labor-intensive, making Marin feel that the cost of his own tea will be much higher than that of the Ming Dynasty ...

Marin remembers that historically, in the 17th century, British sugar production on Barbados had a wholesale price of up to 60 shillings per British dan, which was almost 137 liters per pound of sugar. Shipped back to London, it can be sold for 100 shillings per British dan.

However, during the same period, Daming's sucrose price was only 30 articles. This is still the price in the north, and the production areas of the two provinces in the south.

The wholesale price of the place of production is several times higher than the market price of Daming, which is the embarrassment of Europeans. Therefore, Marin intends to dig workers from China to make tea as much as possible in order to reduce costs.

Moreover, with flying shears, the Pacific route will be faster. At three times the speed of the flying shears, from Panama City to Keelung, it was smooth sailing. It used to be 3 months, now it is only 1 month. Even if you go from Keelung to Panama City in a big circle, if it is three times faster, it will be 2 months.

In this way, for some labor-intensive products, Marin is too lazy to produce it by himself, and it is sufficient to purchase cheap ones directly from the Ming Dynasty. Of course, limited to non-essentials. For example, high-end consumer products such as tea and sucrose, Marin will choose to import from the Ming Dynasty. If it is grain, sisal and other strategic materials, it is sure to be at home only.

...

However, the experienced shipbuilders are skeptical of the flying shears proposed by Marin that can run three times faster. After all, the ships in the North Sea can now run at a speed of 10 knots. Would n’t it be possible to run a speed of 30 knots three times faster?

In fact, they also misunderstood. The triple speed that Marin said is not the maximum speed, but the average speed. After using the upper-edge slant sails of the 20th century technology, even if the shear barge is upwind, its speed is about 50% lower than the downwind speed. Unlike traditional horizontal sailboats, the headwind speed is three or four times slower than the downwind.

That is to say, the flying shear ship using the upper edge slant sails can run at a high speed of more than 10 knots even against the wind, which is faster than the current maximum speed of the Malin Galen ship. Only in the absence of wind or breeze ~ www.novelhall.com ~ the speed of the ship will be less than 10 knots. As a result, the average speed of the ship is terrifying. Unlike traditional horizontal sailing boats, tailwinds and headwinds are completely two situations, with a huge difference.

In order to verify Marin's "tide high speed", the master shipbuilders specially built small flying shears for testing. However, because the processing was not well controlled, the hull was made too thin and a bit like a canoe. Even if it uses fin stabilizers, it is a little scary. Because the hull is too narrow ...

When Marin saw the "canoe" they built, he suddenly got a whirlwind-it seemed that the earliest catamaran in the world was the Polynesian catamaran ...

This catamaran canoe, because the two small boats are connected, makes it very stable like Cao Cao's serial boat in the Red Cliff. It is not easy to overturn and is very stable.

So, Marin simply let the shipbuilders experiment with the catamaran, connect the two test boats with crossbars in the middle, and repair a deck. Then, a very smooth catamaran was born ...

After hanging three small upper-edge girder sails, the catamaran went out for sea trials. As a result, its speed is amazing-20 knots! This was the biggest speed the shipbuilders had ever seen, and they almost stunned them ...