Chapter 451 The Crystal of Wisdom

In fact, to be honest, Gawain occasionally reflects on whether there is something wrong with the way he recruited people and built his territory, so that the people (balls/fish/light bulbs, etc.) gathered around him are so distinctive. There's certainly no doubt about the ability of guys with distinctive features, but their distinctive features can make a good thing embarrassing from time to time - and Nicholas Egg is unquestionably an expert at it.

This ball will even change its square, which makes no sense.

After this new printing press comes out, it is not easy to write a credit book - other project leaders, you said that people are conscientious and dedicated, what can you say about overwork, so tired that you vomit blood, and you can't get off the line due to minor injuries, and then write about mechanical research. So here it is written that the director has grown twelve edges due to excessive exhaustion - if this is not accompanied by seven or eight illustrations and two pages of explanatory text, you have to suspect that the brain who wrote this article was caught in the door...

"You... You've worked hard..." Gawain looked at the Iron Ball star with a twitch in the corner of his eyes, "You should rest for two days after this project ends..."

"Hey, don't worry, the little problem will be restored soon," Nicholas Egg seemed to have no idea how many people he was frightened by his current shape, "let's see how this device works first - you will definitely feel satisfying."

Gawain tried his best to divert his attention from the twelve newly grown sides of Nicholas' egg and began to focus on what was really important here.

The "Arcane Printing Press", whose working principle, structure and shape were different from the printing presses he knew, was ready.

"Let's start," Gawain nodded, "start with the original editing. Rebecca, you can do it yourself."

Rebecca, who came with Gawain to check the results, had been waiting for this moment for a long time. She immediately responded happily, and then walked briskly to the small cabinet next to the arcane printing press.

She pulled a lever on the side of the small cabinet, and a very slight buzzing sound came from the inside of the device. The surface of the projection crystal inlaid at the top of the cabinet appeared a little light, and then, a light blue A halo appears at the top of the entire device.

It is very similar to the holographic picture of the magic web communicator that is not connected to the signal and is in standby state. The difference is that the edge of this picture has a circle of bright square lines, which should be the restricted area of ​​the layout.

At the same time as this small "cabinet" was activated, a crystal inlaid on top of a metal platform also lit up at the connection between the cabinet and the main body of the printing machine. Only then did Gawain realize that this was used to connect the two The structure of this device is actually the "scanning device" of the arcane printing press.

The assistant who was on standby came forward,

A piece of white paper that had been written on long ago was placed on the metal platform.

In the holographic projection above the "small cabinet", the image of the white paper immediately appeared - up to this point, every step is a scene and phenomenon that the magicians of this world are all familiar with. This is nothing but illusion. It is the most common technique in magic and crystal crafting.

But as Rebecca hit the first key on the "keyboard" at the top of the small cabinet, Gawain saw something that had never appeared in conventional illusion magic

In the holographic projection at the top of the cabinet, under the image of the white paper, the characters entered by Rebecca appeared.

A series of characters were quickly typed out by Rebecca, forming a sentence "The above is the entity scanning function, this sentence is the function of text editing."

Then Rebecca moved a handle next to the keyboard, and a slight mechanical sound came from the small cabinet. She continued to input characters, and new characters appeared below the previous sentence.

"Speaking of which, how did you enter text in an illusion projection?" Gawain asked this question that he had ignored before. This question made him extremely confused. With the current progress of Cecil's rune logic, computer technology is still far away. Indefinitely, the technicians have not been able to create a magic array with data processing capabilities, and Jenny has no clue about it. So how did Rebecca achieve word processing on such a device?

Is this a purely mechanical process? So how does a purely mechanical process transform into a symbol on a holographic projection?

"Oh, this, in fact, the principle is not complicated, but the structure is complicated. There are only 28 letters in total, and there are more than 30 commonly used punctuation marks, so we made 37 directly in this cabinet. A piece of white crystal pre-engraved with characters, these thirty-seven white crystals are very small, arranged with connecting rods into a fan-shaped disk, the front end of the fan-shaped disk has a small window, and the other end of the window is a thin cardboard that can move , behind the cardboard is another crystal for scanning that moves with the cardboard. When a rune trigger is pressed on this 'keyboard', the corresponding white crystal will be bounced to the front window of the fan-shaped disk and activated, A black character is ablated on the cardboard - then the crystal behind the cardboard illuminates the pattern. Also, by adjusting the distance between the white crystal and the cardboard, the size of the character can also be adjusted..."

While speaking, Rebecca opened the cover on the side of the small cabinet. Gawain saw the intricate and astonishing mechanical structure inside. The mechanical structure was vaguely similar to the mechanical typewriter he remembered.

Rebecca continued to say, "However, its shortcomings are quite obvious. First of all, it consumes a piece of cardboard every time. Of course, this consumption is not large and acceptable. Second, be careful when typing. If you make a mistake, there will be traces on the cardboard. If there are fewer mistakes, you can return the cardboard and cover it with a black block key.

"Unbelievable..." Gawain looked at the complex mechanical structure in amazement. Those cleverly designed connecting rods, springs, gears and slide rails seemed to have a strange charm. They were the wisdom of human beings at the stage when digital technology had not yet appeared. Crystallization is the pinnacle of mechanical craftsmanship. He stared at Rebecca, "Did you think of it?"

"I made it with the assistants," Rebecca scratched her hair, "Strictly speaking, I just came up with an idea, and the design was completely done by the assistants - two of the new magicians are from the capital. They are very good at designing such intricate mechanisms - but they didn't have the opportunity to design such strange things when they were in the capital."

Nicholas Egg next to him made a muffled voice, "I originally planned to bring those two watchmakers to the Mechanical Research Institute - they turned out to be more interested in magic technology."

watchmaker...

Gawain looked at the intricate mechanical structure in the small cabinet, and nodded slightly with admiration, "Very good, very good - the two of them are talents, the same talents as Cohen, and we need to focus on cultivating them. Now you can continue. "

"Hey," Rebecca nodded happily, "the only thing left is to pass these edited things to the arcane transfer cylinder, and then print them out!"

As she spoke, she pulled another lever next to the cabinet, and with the sound of the dense rotating parts in the cabinet, Gawain saw the core device in the middle of the printing press - the surface of the arcane transfer cylinder. A neat blue shimmer appeared.

That's the printed pattern that Rebecca edited.

After two seconds of preheating and curing, the pattern on the surface of the transfer drum stabilized, and then the rest of the press began to operate, and the flat, clean white paper was sent to the center of the press and covered on a black "ink board" , the transfer cylinder is pressed on the surface of the paper under the operation of the mechanical support, and it is quickly brushed from left to right.

The printed paper is quickly taken away by the roller, followed by the next paper...

In the sound of the operation of the printing press, Rebecca explained to Gao Wen its follow-up work process: “It can print 300 sheets per continuous operation, and then rest for about a minute to allow the roller to recharge, heat, cure, and replace it at the same time. The ink plate below starts a new round of printing, and the ink plate that has been replaced during this process is sent to the heating table to be fully heated to restore the ink surface to a flat surface, and it will be replaced after cooling.”

At this moment, Gawain was completely attracted by the running machine, the paper that was printed quickly, the repeated, efficient and orderly mechanical structure, and the sound of the gears and connecting rods coming from the machine. , he couldn't help but think of the scene when the first magic energy engine was started, a high-spirited emotion filled his thoughts, he couldn't help but exclaimed, "Okay...very good, good beyond my imagination! "

"Actually, I think there is still room for improvement," Rebecca said with a proud expression of "Master Ancestor praised me", but she still held a face that was not afraid of honor and shame, and said with her head raised. , "I think the one-minute rest time in the middle of it is the most wasteful - if you improve the coating formula on the surface of the transfer cylinder or the projection crystal inside, it should be able to work continuously for a longer time, and the ink board below When you use it, it will become uneven due to the consumption of ink. It must be reheated, leveled and cooled before it can be used. I think this should be changed..."

Gawain heard Rebecca's words, but before he could speak, he heard Hetty breaking the silence next to him, "I can't say the first improvement direction, but I have an idea for the second one - why don't you The ink plate is made into an 'ink ribbon' that can be rotated under the ink pad? Then, a device for heating the ink ribbon and smoothing the ink surface is set on the side of the machine, such as a hot roller, which should solve the problem. You can try the substrate of the ink ribbon. Try the blue-patterned moonlight cloth, which has now been mass-produced in the factory, the cost is very low, and it is sturdy and not easy to deform."

"Oh yes!" Rebecca slapped her hands and looked at Heidi with bright eyes, "Aunt, you are amazing! Sure enough, older people are wise..."

Hetty "..."

Gawain "..."

"Great day, great day," Gawain hurriedly reached out to stop his great granddaughter before Hetty lifted the staff with the nail head and steel edge, and looked at Rebecca again. "In short, improvement must be improved. New machines and equipment must have imperfections. You have limited ideas, you can do it together with a team, and you can even listen to the opinions of workers who use printing presses in the future. Ge What do you think of this machine, Mr. Devin?"

Godwin Orlando, a scholar from the capital, who is now the head of the press and publication department, stared wide-eyed from the start of the new printing press, staring at this complex, intricate and incredible machine. At this moment, he finally After sobering up and hearing Gawain's words, the old scholar couldn't help but exclaimed, "What an incredible thing... If only I were younger, I have to figure out how it works. But now... I am most All I want to do is write an article and try my best to introduce this thing to everyone, even if many people can't understand the principle of this machine, I hope they will know that there is a group of brilliant geniuses in the field who have created such a thing. Great machine!"

"Then go write," Gawain nodded with a smile. "After the news of the war in Rock Fortress is over, it's time to post something that will relax people's minds and arouse their curiosity."

(There is a book called "I'm the Big Brother Behind the Scenes". I don't know if anyone has read it. The beginning may seem a bit tricky and dry, but the creativity is very good. You can look forward to it later. You can read it in the book shortage period.)