1855 United States Tycoon

Many years later, a series of similar venture capital investments by the McDonald Venture Capital Bank became a phenomenon that the entire business community was actively studying, but it was perplexing. In later business textbooks, there is even a proper term called McDonald's Venture Capital Miracle. Because for decades, McDonald Venture Capital Bank has achieved an amazing success rate in technology investment. Its success rate is so high that it even exceeds the general investment activities of many banks. This series of successful investments not only allowed McDonald Venture Capital Bank to earn a huge amount of capital, but also made McDonald Venture Capital the world's largest patent monopoly. So that in the future, any businessman who wants to make money on the new technology will have to face the patent exploitation of MacDonald Ventures.

Of course these are all things to do, and even Martin's open hearth is not something that can succeed immediately. However, Scrooge's steel plan had to be stepped up because of the needs of the Pacific Railway, armored ships, and new artillery.

In early 1862, on behalf of MacDonald Ventures Bank, Carroll bought the patent authorization for the "bottom-blowing acid converter steelmaking method" from the British. Meanwhile, in Cleveland, a new steel plant is under construction.

Before the construction of this steel plant started, there were already several small steel plants in Cleveland, and in Pittsburgh, there were even more such companies. To be honest, the entire Great Lakes region is very suitable for the development of steel. The iron ore in United States is mostly concentrated in these areas, especially on the shores of Lake Superior, which are rich in reserves. There is also part of the famous Appalachian coal field in Ohio. This is the largest coal field in United States, with abundant reserves, and the coal seams are basically distributed horizontally, and the burial is shallow. Nearly half of the coal can be mined in the open pit, and the coal produced is also very suitable for coking. Coupled with the convenient transportation around the Great Lakes, this is naturally a good place to develop the steel industry.

But because of this, a guy with a little money can start a steel plant. These steel plants are small in scale, poor in product quality, and few in variety, and they are not performing well in the competition with European products. However, since President Lincoln took office, he decisively raised tariffs. Coupled with the increase in demand brought about by the war, the life of these factories has suddenly become better. However, their good days are coming to an end. Because the huge McDonald Steel Company is about to be established.

In the original history, in 1873, the Carnegie-McCandries Steel Company, where the steel king Carnegie relied to dominate the world, had only 750,000 US dollars in total assets when it was just established. It is already a large-scale steel company. In 1862, the total assets of most steel companies did not exceed $100,000. The total investment in Scrooge's steel plant is as high as 1.5 million U.S. dollars.

The 1.5 million US dollars were mainly invested in several aspects, one is an iron mine on the shore of Lake Erie. This is an iron ore with abundant reserves and convenient mining. In addition, it is close to Lake Erie and is easily transported. Therefore, when this iron ore was discovered three years ago, many investors came to want a piece of the pie. However, soon after, it was discovered that the iron ore produced by this mine contained too much sulfur and phosphorus. Both of these elements are harmful elements in metallurgy. Sulfur will reduce the plasticity of steel. More importantly, it will make steel very brittle and easy to crack under high temperature conditions. For example, if a gun is made of this kind of steel, as long as it is fired for a period of time, once the barrel or barrel becomes hot, it is very prone to blasting accidents. Phosphorus is also a harmful element in smelting. It will make steel brittle in a cold environment and easily break when exposed to external forces. Later, the famous "Titanic" cruise ship hit an iceberg on its maiden voyage and then sank, which was related to the excessive phosphorus content in the steel used to build the ship. At that time, the steel plate immersed in the cold seawater became very brittle due to the influence of phosphorus impurities, and as a result, it easily broke during the collision.

Under the technological conditions at the time, people had few good treatment methods for these sulfur- or phosphorus-containing iron ore. Even if an iron ore is rich in reserves and the ore has a high iron content, as long as there is a problem of high sulfur or high phosphorus, It's worthless immediately. This iron ore has both options, and naturally it is no longer favored by people, so investors left one after another, leaving only the barren hills with a lot of caves dug.

Under these circumstances, coupled with Scrooge’s influence on the Cleveland municipality, he obtained 30 years of mining from this mine for a symbolic price of US$10,000 (paid in five years). right.

There is naturally a reason why Scrooge dared to buy such a mine. Because in his hands, there is a technology that has surpassed the times: steel desulfurization and dephosphorization technology. The mine itself did not spend much money, but the mining equipment, dedicated railways, and dedicated docks still cost a lot of money.

The other is a large coking plant and steel plant.

By the end of the year, this huge steel enterprise was finally basically completed and was about to start trial operation.

"How is the trial operation of the blast furnace? What is the progress of the hot metal desulfurization experiment?" asked Shi Gaozhi, who was inspecting the steel plant.

"Everything in the blast furnace is normal. As for the desulfurization experiment, Mr. MacDonald, according to your imagination, we sprayed lime and soda ash into the molten iron, and successfully reduced the sulfur content in the molten iron to the predetermined level, but we found that if it can’t Remove the generated slag as soon as possible. After a period of time, the sulfur content in the molten iron will quickly rise again. The removal of the slag will cause the temperature of the molten iron to drop, which will cause a little trouble for our next step of smelting. It makes us uncomfortable. Don’t add a bit of fuel artificially.” Carroll helped Scrooge, a metallurgical engineer dug from the UK, replied, “But this problem is not a big problem. We think that as long as we improve the ladle, we can solve this problem. ."

Scrooge nodded in satisfaction, then turned around and asked McCarthy, the director of the steel plant, "How is the refitting of the new converter going?"

"The new refractory bricks have been replaced, and the furnace is ready." McCarthy replied, "You can see the first furnace of steel being smelted soon."

The so-called new refractory bricks refer to alkaline refractory bricks. In this era, everyone uses acid refractory bricks in steelmaking furnaces. Acid refractory bricks interfere with the dephosphorization process during steelmaking, making it difficult to remove phosphorus impurities. In the original history, it was not until 1879 that British metallurgist Thomas developed alkaline refractory bricks, which made dephosphorization easier. And the method of making this kind of refractory brick is quite simple, and Scrooge knew it.

This kind of refractory brick is calcined at high temperature from natural dolomite, then mixed with a small amount of tar, and pressed into shape.

But even for simple things, when it comes to industrial production, there are still a lot of troubles. After more than ten tests, we barely produced usable refractory bricks.

"The main reason is that the raw materials of dolomite are not good enough." Scrooge thought. The best dolomite in United States is produced in the south. Although there are also in the north, the quality is too poor and contains too much Impurities. Even if the firing is successful, the performance is still not as good as the product made with the dolomite in the south. Fortunately, high-quality dolomite is also produced in Scotland. Scrooge has written to Carol and asked him to buy a batch of high-quality dolomite from the UK.

At this time, a man ran towards Scrooge and shouted to him: "Mr. MacDonald, it is ready over there. Steel can be made soon."

"All right, let's go and take a look." Scrooge said. So a few people led the way, and took Scrooge to a high platform in the workshop, overlooking the entire smelting workshop from a high level.

The huge steam-powered crane hoisted a heavy molten iron ladle and moved it to the top of the converter, and then the molten iron ladle began to release red hot metal. As soon as the hot molten iron was released, the temperature of the entire workshop immediately rose by a large amount, and the workshop immediately went from winter to summer.

Then the large blower began to blow high-pressure air into the converter. The molten iron containing a large amount of carbon immediately burned up. At first, the flame from the furnace mouth was still dark red, not too high, but then the color of the flame began to become blazing white, and the flame also rose high. At this time, under Stern’s command, it must be A large amount of lime is also put into the steelmaking furnace-this is used to remove the phosphorus element.

The raging molten steel exudes huge heat, even if it is more than a hundred meters apart, Scrooge still feels his face burned hot. Scrooge couldn't help but retreated a step to avoid the scorching heat. And Stern, who was standing beside him, opened his eyes wide, staring closely at the flame. Even the iron ore mined in a mine will be different, and the conditions of the molten iron smelted by them will be different. Steelmaking is to burn the excess carbon in the pig iron. Controlling the carbon content is the key to steelmaking. The amount of carbon in the molten iron can only be judged by experience. This is Stern's duty and an important reason why he can get a higher salary than others.

Watching the flames from the furnace mouth begin to fade, Stern stopped spraying high-pressure air into the furnace. The converter began to tilt, and several workers, wearing work clothes made of asbestos, approached the steelmaking furnace and began to take samples.

The results of sampling analysis showed that Scott's fire control was quite good, so the tap hole on the converter was opened, and hot molten steel flowed out and was injected into the ladle.

"Very successful!" Scrooge nodded and said, "Thank you, a great era has begun in your hands!"

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