Volume 2 Chapter 62 Engine
Entering the magic machine development workshop, he was not surprised to see Bordeau and the other dwarves crowded together, talking while they surrounded a strange looking machine.
Xu Yi walked over to take a listen and found that they were currently researching a problem with the kinetic energy parameters of this Magic Punch Press.
According to Xu Yi’s initial design, this Magic Punch Press’ kinetic power came from the Fourth Grade Flame Magic Array, the Burst Magic Array. It relied on the explosive force of the Burst Magic Array to drive the head through the mold.
In the beginning, there was no problem with this design.
But after it was used for a while, the dwarves gradually found that the force of the Magic Punch Press wasn’t strong enough. Moreover, the recovery time before each explosion of the Burst Magic Array was rather long, so it seriously limited the efficiency.
As the Frestech Chamber of Commerce received more and more orders, increasing the amount, the Magic Punch Press’ efficiency clearly couldn’t keep up.
Although they could produce a few more Magic Punch Presses to solve this problem, this required a few more workers to operate these Magic Punch Presses which indirectly increased the cost.
So while the dwarves led by Camby were researching new Magic Punch Presses, they didn’t stop improving the old Magic Punch Presses.
As for improving the Magic Punch Presses, Xu Yi had already given a new design to provide mechanical power for the Magic Punch Press.
But because Xu Yi only knew the machine structures from earth, he needed to change the entire structure for it to work with Magic Arrays, so he had Camby and the dwarves finish the research for this.
Bordeau and the other dwarves were currently studying the kinetic energy parameters of the old Magic Punch Presses to determine the force specifications of the old Magic Punch Presses. Then they would use this to design the new Magic Punch Presses.
This was work that required precise calculations. This was not the customs of the dwarves before, but after working for the Frestech Chamber of Commerce for a while, they were gradually influenced by Xu Yi.
Seeing Xu Yi come in, Bordeau and the others stopped talking and handed over the estimates they had made to Xu Yi to let him take a look.
Although Xu Yi tried to participate in this research as little as possible, whether it was to the dwarves of the magic machine development workshop or Evita and the other researchers of the magic research lab, he was the best magic mechanical engineer in their hearts.
Xu Yi carefully looked over the results of the dwarves and pointed out some mistakes. He then gave them a bit of explanation on where to proceed next before not saying anything else.
He reduced his involvement to let Evita’s group and the dwarves to develop their own minds for research and to build up their knowledge.
After Xu Yi finished talking to Bordeau’s group, Camby who had been waiting on the side asked, “Chairman, since you are here today, do you have some new research for us?”
Hearing Camby’s question, the other dwarves realized something and all looked over at Xu Yi.
Xu Yi couldn’t help smiling, as he thought that all dwarves were workaholics.
“Right, it’s a new task this time and it’s quite the difficult one. Do you want to take it?” Xu Yi asked with a smile.
Camby curled his lips, “Chairman, why are you asking this nonsense? We like difficult tasks the most. Speak, what is it?”
“Alright, there are a total of two tasks and the first one is rather easy.” Xu Yi took out two blueprints and spread the first one, “I talked to the Fersen Carriage Company’s chairman Pompeii yesterday and I promised to help him design some tires, replacing the wheels of his horse carriages. Look, this is the design.”
The dwarves came over to look and Bordeau said in surprise, “Chairman, this tire design is so simple, why do you need us to research this? We just need to change our current production magic machines up a bit.”
“So I said that the first task is rather simple.” Xu Yi spread the second sheet of paper, “As for the second task, it’s much more difficult.”
The dwarves looked down at the paper and they all knit their brows.
There was a very strange thing drawn on the second sheet. It was in the shape of a cube and had many leather belts tied together, as well as a series of complicated and messy mechanical parts.
With just a single look, the dwarves were certain that this thing was very troublesome.
“Chairman, what is this?” Bordeau couldn’t help asking.
Xu Yi laughed, “This thing is powerful. If you can develop this, I dare to guarantee that there will be a giant change on the entire Sines Continent!”
Camby disdainfully curled his lips, “Chairman, you’ve said these words countless times. Whenever you have us develop something, you will say this.”
“Then do you admit if what I said is a fact or not?” Xu Yi said with a smile.
Camby was stunned before looking at the other dwarves, finding that they had no way to refute Xu Yi.
The current Chamber of Commerce did not just rely on their few products to change Banta City and the surrounding cities.
If they were given time, being able to affect the Sines Continent and changing the Sines Continent was a foreseeable matter.
“This thing that I’m having you develop this time is even more powerful than the things I had you develop before and it can change the continent even more.” Xu Yi laughed, “Because it has a powerful name. It’s called the engine.”
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Developing the engine was a difficult thing even if they were on earth.
This is because the engine had high requirements. It not only required a high level of mechanical knowledge, it also required powerful foundation in materials, not a single one could be missing.
But the engine was just a general term. If they were to be divided, there were car engines, boat engines, airplane engines, spaceship engines, etc……
On this Sines Continent with a weak technological level, Xu Yi naturally couldn’t expect to develop everything in one step, directly reaching the level of being able to develop a spaceship engine.
What he had given to Camby and the other dwarves to research couldn’t be considered a real engine, rather it was a crude gasoline engine model.
In the engines on earth, the driving force used was burning of fossil fuels, but one the Sines Continent, Xu Yi hadn’t even seen fossil fuels before nor had he ever heard of fossil fuels being mentioned before. Naturally he couldn’t develop the same kind of engine.
Of course, without fossil fuels, that didn’t mean that they couldn’t design an engine. Rather because they weren’t limited by having to use fossil fuels as the driving force, Xu Yi could make a more natural engine design.
For example, the engines on earth relied on internal combustion of fossil fuels to turn fan blades which transferred the energy through mechanical devices. The most important part of designing an engine was to consider how to best use the power of burning the fossil fuels, so the designs were quite complicated.
On the Sines Continent, with its specialty of magic, Xu Yi’s job in designing this was much easier.
He even had two different choices to choose from.
One was to imitate the engine design from earth, using Fire Magic to provide the force required, replacing the combustion of burning fossil fuels to provide energy in moving the fans to provide moving force.
To put it simply, he was using Magic Crystals to replace fossil fuels and a Fire Magic Array to replace the internal combustion.
It should be said that with Xu Yi’s rich mechanical engineering knowledge, it was easier for him to choose this design. Xu Yi just needed to design an appropriate Magic Array to replace the internal combustion unit.
As for the other choice, it was the same as the Magic Fan. He would use Wind Magic to move the fans to generate power.
This way Xu Yi could directly use the Wind Magic Array to provide the driving force, avoiding designing the complicated structures of an engine.
The problem was that compared to Fire Magic Arrays, Wind Magic Arrays were lacking in terms of explosive power.
Just like how the Magic Punch Press could use the Fourth Grade Burst Magic Array. If they used a Wind Magic Array to produce the same effect, they would have to use at least a Sixth Grade or higher Magic Array.
In short, the Fire Magic Array design had a ready made example and had enough power. As for the Wind Magic Array design, it was simpler and easier to design, but it was lacking in power.
What Xu Yi gave the dwarves to study this time was the wind powered design.
There was no relevant knowledge on the Sines Continent, so if he wanted to succeed, naturally it was better to start simpler.
Moreover, Xu Yi didn’t have much confidence in the fire powered engine design.
After all, he didn’t specialize in designing engines, so there were some concrete details he wasn’t certain about.
There was also the possibility of danger with this kind of research and Xu Yi didn’t want any accidents to happen to these valuable dwarves. He decided to study the wind powered design first and when the dwarves had enough knowledge, he would consider studying the fire powered design.
When Xu Yi mentioned that the horses of the horse carriage could be replaced to chairman Pompeii, he was referring to the engine.
In the history of earth, the development of engines had gradually replaced horses and things like horse carriages became things of the past.
Now on the Sines Continent, with the appearance of Xu Yi, as well as his strong discomfort from sitting in horse carriages, the engine was developed ahead of time. The time that horse carriages disappeared into history had also been brought forward.
Xu Yi wanted to research tires and engines because he wanted to stop the discomfort to his butt from sitting in horse carriages. He wanted to return to the comfort of sitting in cars like on earth as soon as possible.
But if he wanted to solve this problem, there was still an important problem that needed to be solved first.
Xu Yi left the magic machine development workshop and entered the horse carriage he hated, heading off to Great Magician Camilla’s Magic Tower.