Malin was extremely excited by earning 5,000 pounds of silver a month. You know, this is equivalent to 416.6 pounds of gold, and it can mint silver coins worth more than 53,000 gold coins!

However, considering that this was the result achieved by the hard work of 50,000 to 60,000 strong men, Marin was unhappy again - what should we do when these people were sent to America? Without enough miners, this output would not be achieved...

However, when asked the mine manager Galz, Marin felt much more relieved. Galz told Marin that in fact, the energy of these 57,800 miners was not released, and at most it only released less than 20,000 miners.

Why? Because the mine channel is narrow, no matter how many people you have, you can't squeeze in. Therefore, most miners are actually not digging ore, but digging new mineways, and then installing load-bearing wood frames inside the mineway to prevent the mineway from collapse. Moreover, generally speaking, it is necessary to wait until the mineway appears stable for a period of time before miners will enter and mine.

Of course, in the mine cave in Beihai Kingdom, mine truck tracks will be laid at the same time when the wood frame is secured. Once the mine cave is built, a group of miners can be sent to mine.

However, the choice of mine channels is not to dig casually, but to excavate under the supervision of engineers. The engineer will first take samples and estimate the direction of the ore veins based on the survey results. Then, a new mine channel will be dug according to the direction of the ore veins. At the same time, the groundwater system must be avoided.

Groundwater is not evenly distributed, it also has some water systems. Simply put, groundwater systems are like blood vessels on humans, with large arteries and small branches. If you dig the main vein of groundwater, you either try your best to block it or give up this mine.

As for digging some small groundwater branches with small water flow, they will pump water out of the mine while trying to block them. For example, the steam engine is much better than manual water pumping in this regard.

It's okay here in Goslar because it is located in the Harz Mountains in the inland area, and the groundwater system is not very developed. The Tara lead-zinc mine in Ireland that Marin planned before is relatively pitiful. Ireland's water resources are too rich, and the Tara lead-zinc mine is hundreds of meters deep. Even if you use a steam engine to pump water, it is difficult to deal with the surging groundwater. In this era when people need to go down to mine in person, this underground mine that cannot be controlled by groundwater will have no mining value unless it is a gold and silver mine with a very high taste.

Therefore, in ancient times, surface mines were generally mined. In addition to high-grade gold and silver or high-value copper ores, most people disliked going down the well to mine.

Goslar has been mined for hundreds of years, and there is no surface silver mine to mine, so he has to go down the well to mine. The main task of these 57,800 Hungarian prisoners of war and the original seven or eight thousand miners is actually to dig new mine caves and find new veins. At the same time, they are also carefully detecting and avoiding the groundwater system. However, over the past few hundred years, the craftsmen have become roughly familiar with the groundwater system here. At least, there is no problem avoiding the main vein of the groundwater. As for the small branches, they can only rely on pumping water.

In fact, less than 20,000 people were digging ore. Others were mainly digging new mines to find new mines. Once a large number of new mines are dug out, the output will double. Then, there will be a high yield period of several years or even more than ten years.

Then, when the potential of this batch of new mines is exhausted, it will fall into a trough again. At that time, a large number of engineers and a large amount of manpower and material resources are needed to find new veins and dig new mines. If found, a new wave of high yields will be ushered in, otherwise the mine will begin to decline...

Marin remembers that the silver mine in Harz Mountain seemed to be mined until the 1980s. Therefore, under the existing mining conditions, it is difficult for the Goslar silver mine to decline. Because the resources are there.

Nowadays, the problem of mine pumping has been solved by the steam engine and the pump. So, as long as you avoid the main vein of the groundwater, you can continue to mine.

However, it is too difficult to mine underground dozens of meters or even hundreds of meters. Among them, underground lighting is a big problem.

In this era, underground lighting generally uses torches. Miners take torches down the well, and then, when mining, insert the torches on the walls of the operation area to provide light. Or, use candles or oil lamps. But in terms of light, the torches are more effective.

However, it is very taboo to moisten the torch inserted on the wall. If the top of the mine channel is wet and seeped, the torch will easily be extinguished by dripping water.

Therefore, after the mines of this era were dug out, they needed to be ventilated and dried for a period of time before they could start operations. In addition to safety reasons, there are also reasons to prevent water seepage on the top of the mines from extinguishing the torch. After all, without lighting, there is no way to work in a deep well worth tens of meters or hundreds of meters.

For example, the new mine dug by tens of thousands of Hungarian men will have to wait a long time to start mining...

Marin frowned - lighting moisture-proof? In addition to the electric lights of later generations... By the way, horse lanterns!

Malin suddenly remembered that in the 1990s, rural electricity was very unstable. Therefore, every household had kerosene lamps. In that era, the oil price in China was very cheap and there were very few cars. Using kerosene lamps was much more cost-effective than flashlights. Because at that time, flashlights could only use dry batteries, and when they were out of power, they had to buy new batteries, which was not small. Therefore, except for traveling far away at night to do business, most people do not use flashlights very much at night, but use the most suitable type of kerosene lamps - horse lanterns!

A horse lantern is actually a kerosene lamp that can be carried in hand or hung on the wall. The reason why it is called a horse lantern is that it seems to be hung on a saddle by cowboys from western America who drove away at night in the 19th century for lighting, so it is called a "horse lantern".

Because the wick of the horse lantern is surrounded by a glass cover, the horse lantern is not afraid of wind and rain. When I was a child, Marin even saw fishing boats hanging horse lanterns outside to light the boat. They could even use horse lanterns to attract fish into the net at night...

Speaking of which, the structure of the lantern is very simple - the bottom is a metal base and is also the place where kerosene is contained. Then, the lamp head and wick are connected on it. Around the lamp head is a glass cover fixed with metal strips, which can be lifted up and replaced. On the top, there are air outlets to the surroundings to exchange air for the lantern and the outside world. At the same time, due to angle problems, raindrops are prevented from entering the interior...

In the last life, when Marin was a few years old, she often carried a horse lantern to help her parents illuminate in the middle of the night. Especially in the autumn harvest season, in order to harvest rice and wheat and avoid the rain season, adults often brought rice and wheat to harvest rice and wheat at night. At that time, Marin, who was only a few years old, was responsible for carrying a horse lantern to provide lighting next to her...

Therefore, Marin is so familiar with horse lanterns that he can’t be more familiar with. After all, he was a professional lanternist when he was a child...

When he was a child, he was influenced by a chicken soup article made up by unknown third-rate author (the 1990s was an era when chicken soup articles were rampant), and he heard that Edison loved to tear off things. So he foolishly broke up everywhere, like a husky.

At that time, Marin removed the lanterns many times and was very familiar with the structure of the lanterns and could easily assemble the lanterns. However, Marin became very immature and began to dismantle the TV at home... Then, because it was too difficult and could not be assembled back, he was mixed with doubles by his parents and men for a long time...

The past is unbearable to look back on, but when I was young, I learned to tear down the house and became familiar with the structure of the horse lantern. Then, with the help of craftsmen, Marin easily restored the horse lantern.

However, the biggest problem with using a horse lantern is actually not a technical problem, but an energy problem - there are too few sources of kerosene!

Before, he used most of the oil Marin obtained from the Galicia region of Poland to extract gasoline. Even because there was not enough gasoline, Marin also extracted the kerosene part and mixed it into the gasoline to enhance firepower.

But if you start using kerosene lamps, you should pay attention to controlling the separation of gasoline and kerosene in the future. In fact, the distinction between gasoline and kerosene is somewhat vague. Oil near the critical points of the two can be used as gasoline or kerosene, which depends on which one you prefer. In later generations, gasoline demand was greater, so naturally it was more inclined to gasoline. In the 19th century... it is said that gasoline was directly disposed of as dangerous waste... until the emergence of gasoline engines...

The human oil industry was actually the first to provide kerosene to kerosene lamps. As for gasoline and diesel, they were useless by-products at that time. It was not until the internal combustion engine appeared that gasoline and diesel were "used by waste"...

However, from a military perspective, Marin has always been more inclined to gasoline. However, underground mining has huge uses. Therefore, after a struggle of thought, Marin chose to "invent" the horse lantern. At least, promoting the use of horse lanterns at the Lammersberg silver mine in Goslar is very valuable. After all, Marin is short of silver now...
Chapter completed!