Fox of France

Francois did not refuse Rothschild's request. But he still said to Rothschild: "Mr. Rothschild, I personally think that this should not be a problem. We also need your experience and talent. However, as I mentioned earlier, we may get no more than a hundred Five-fifths of the common stock. This amount is not much, but it is inherently liquid. Therefore, this part of the shares, I think, do not need to be placed in the name of this company."

Rothschild listened, nodded and said: "This is completely understandable. Indeed, there is no such need."

Rothschild understood that, no matter how you say it, the common stock of a promising company like "Bonaparte General Electric", even if it is only less than 5%, is still very precious. It not only represents money, but also represent a certain power. If Francois and the others really need cash urgently and need to sell part of their shares for cash, they would definitely be more willing to sell preferred shares rather than common shares. If the ownership of the common shares is also recorded in the name of the new company, then when the shares of the company are sold, will not some of these common shares be sold? Moreover, although Rothschild came up with such an idea for them, it is already very worthy of him to allow him to participate in the preferred shares.

The two chatted a few more words casually, and Francois got up to leave. When he returned to his residence, he wrote a letter about these things and asked someone to quickly send them to the country, and then waited here for news and authorization from the country.

As for the French, they are not in a hurry, because for the French, especially for Napoleon, their kind of things really don't rank high.

The thing that Napoleon is most concerned about today is the advancement of the "City That Never Sleeps" project. The second is the experiment of the world's first steam locomotive.

More than half a year ago, Joseph personally reached an agreement with Watt to jointly develop steam locomotives. Since then, the research project has progressed quite smoothly. This is a very natural thing. Although Joseph did not put much effort into this research because of other things, he still played a very key role——with his extremely high efficiency and amazing Intuitively, more than ten design proposals were quickly eliminated, leaving only two proposals.

This is actually nothing special, because in his previous life, although Joseph was born a little later, he had no chance to see steam locomotives spewing smoke on the railway line, (in fact, the steam locomotives in Chitu Kingdom were decommissioned very late In some places, it was even used until around 2016. It is said that many times, when Hollywood wants to make movies, and scenes involving steam trains, they often come to Chitu Kingdom to find props, because Chitu Kingdom is almost owned by the whole world. The country with the most steam locomotives that can continue to run at once. But in most places, Joseph really can’t see steam locomotives that can run.) But in various movies and TV shows in his previous life, and in parks everywhere, Joseph I don't know how many steam locomotives I have seen. So just looking at the appearance, Joseph was able to eliminate many solutions that did not meet future needs.

In fact, these two programs are very similar in most places. The only difference is that the transmission mechanism is different.

Option 1 is called the British model, which completely uses Watt’s planetary gear system to transmit power, and Option 2 is called the Continental model, and uses a simpler crankshaft drive in many places—because of the patented technology of the crankshaft drive has expired.

Therefore, there is not much difference between these two solutions in essence, they are almost the same solution. The reason why these two plans came up is entirely because of Watt's insistence. Although the patent for crankshaft transmission has expired, Watt still insists that he does not want to use crankshaft technology.

However, in some places, using a simple crankshaft can significantly save costs, so although Watt hated the crankshaft, the French still insisted on using a lower-cost crankshaft. As a result of the dispute, two models of steam locomotives appeared.

In addition, Watt belt particularly emphasized that the British model must be tested first and must become the world's first steam locomotive. Napoleon was actually very reluctant about this, but Joseph thought it was okay. Anyway, although the British model was first tested, the location of the experiment was still in France.

Compared with those steam locomotives that Joseph saw in later film and television programs, the first steam locomotive parked on the test track today is obviously much smaller. This is the result of Joseph killing a lot of plans that only intended to install a small steam engine with five to ten horsepower on the steam locomotive-at the beginning, some guys only wanted to get a steam-powered carriage. . This level is simply not as good as Stephenson's traveler.

Naturally, such a plan could not be passed by Joseph. At a meeting of the design department, Joseph suddenly appeared on the stage, and then quoted Danton's famous quote, shouting to the engineers: "Bold, bold, always bold, your design can be in our hands. Pass here!"

So those engineers had the courage to prepare a large steam engine for this steam locomotive, and designed a thing as big as a monster around this huge steam engine. They originally thought that this plan would definitely be shot by Joseph, but after knowing it, after Joseph saw it, they still thought it was a little small.

But Joseph also knew that the steps should not be too large, so as not to drag something. So although this thing is still a little small in his opinion, it is far from the "forward" steam locomotive driven by the Japanese or the slightly smaller "upstream" steam locomotive he saw in various anti-Japanese dramas. Spectacular, but at least it is no longer like the "Voyager", which looks like a Dongfanghong tractor.

According to this plan, the front of the locomotive is huge, at least people at the time thought it was a huge horizontal cylindrical boiler with a high chimney on it, behind the boiler is a wide driver's cab, and behind the boiler is a tender . The entire locomotive has five pairs of wheels, large and small, on the bottom. Although it is still a little small in Joseph's eyes, it still has the shadow of an "upstream" locomotive more or less.

So this plan was passed after some modifications were made according to Joseph's wishes.

The radicalness of this plan surprised Watt, but after careful calculation, Watt found that this plan seemed to be really feasible. So he said to his assistant William Murdoch: "William, have you noticed that we are still not used to using the best steel as pig iron..."

Yes, before this, more than one person in England had experimented with steam locomotives, and a large reason why they continued to fail was that they could not use steel in this way. Even in the original history, the first practical steam locomotive "Voyager" manufactured by Stephen Sun was so small, which was largely limited by the performance of materials. Among other things, his train only has wooden tracks covered with wrought iron, unlike the rich and powerful French, who directly planned to use steel to make steel rails. Just one meter of track requires 20 kilograms of steel, which is simply...

After the plan was approved, it took another half a year to complete the six-kilometer experimental track and two experimental locomotives built by the newly established "Bonaparte-Watt Company" in Lorraine. Because Watt also wanted to participate in the first experiment in person, Joseph also left everything at hand to the students, and rushed to Lorraine with Napoleon.

On the carriage to Lorraine, Joseph asked, "Napoleon, why are you so interested in this thing?"

"Ah, it's nothing, it's just that I came to look for you in your office that day, and you happened to be away." Napoleon said, "I was bored waiting, looking for something on your table, and then I saw what you drew" armor Train imaginary map', well, although your drawing skills are far behind Lucien, but I have to admit, that thing is very interesting, it is like a battleship on land. If you really get it out in the future, Let's just call him a land battleship."

"Bah!" Joseph said, "Land battleships, land cruisers, they don't sound good at all. Besides, a few days ago, I heard you say that Lucien's painting skills are poor?"

"Lucien's level is not high, but it depends on who you compare with. At least, when Lucien draws women, he won't get the proportions wrong and draw his eyes as big as one-third of his face... Ah, by the way, and the train cannon you drew, can that thing really be made?” Speaking of this, Napoleon’s eyes sparkled, “That thing really looks more majestic than the Urban Cannon, full of The evil beauty is really good. Can this thing be made? Also, why do you call him Gustav? Although His Majesty Gustav is very good at using cannons, he is always good at using 3-pound small guns. Something. I think we should change the name to Augustus Cannon..."

"Napoleon, don't worry, your land battleship will be produced soon. As for the 'Gustav' cannon, well, I drew that thing for fun. Of course, the theory is not completely impossible, but really If you want to make this, I'm afraid it's really a lifetime... Besides, if this thing is really made, it doesn't seem to be useful."

"It's useless." Napoleon also nodded, "There is no need to use it to hit anything, but this is also a spectacle..."