Wang Yaqiao won this round of competition. It's good to get the boat, but it's more important to win face and prestige!
This victory was a great help from King Kong, so Wang Yaqiao was going to give Jiang 'an to his brother Light. King Kong hurriedly declined, but Wang Yaqiao said that they couldn't do anything at the moment and the ship was not easy to handle in their hands. So King Kong agreed to help them deal with the Jiang 'an ship.
King Kong reached out to Lu Zuofu, the owner of Minsheng Steamship Company, who is from Sichuan.
Lu Zuofu, a very capable and very progressive management talent, started from scratch and raised 8,000 yuan as capital to establish Minsheng Company. At this time, Lu Zuofu's Minsheng Company, after years of hard work, took advantage of the conflicts among warlords to unify shipping on the Chuanjiang River, expanded the company, and was thinking of extending the shipping route to Shanghai and further expanding the company.
King Kong converted the Jiang 'an vessel into shares and invested in Minsheng Company. He also helped Lu Zuofu connect with passenger and cargo terminals in Shanghai. The passenger terminal was located at the China Merchants Wharf on the Bund, and the cargo terminal was at Shilipu.
At that time, the cargo terminals were all controlled by large and small guilds. However, many people in the circle knew about King Kong's defeat of Zhang Xiaolin, and it was naturally much easier for him to handle the matter.
This made Lu Zuofu very happy. Otherwise, it would have been quite difficult for him to get things done in Shanghai.
King Kong handed over the Minsheng shares he had received to Wang Yaqiao. The two of them made some excuses and finally split the shares equally.
Both King Kong and Lu Zuofu were business owners, and both were deeply concerned about the country and the people, and very worried about the current situation of the motherland. They shared many common views and truly felt as if they had known each other for a long time. Though they did not call each other brothers on the lips, they regarded each other as confidants in their hearts and secretly admired each other.
Nissin, Swire and other foreign shipping companies sensed the competition from Minsheng and came together to suppress Minsheng by lowering prices or even offering free services.
Minsheng, in response to the bad habit of foreign ships looking down upon Chinese people, played the national card and the equal service card and gained public support.
In this fierce competition, King Kong gave Lu Zuofu a helping hand. King Kong called in Guan Liqing and other inland waterway shipping bosses, and they all contributed their ships as shares to form "Ping An United Transport Company". King Kong invested in the shipyard he bought and some newly repaired small boats. At first, the share was small, but later the shipyard produced new ships and joined in, and the share grew larger.
Ping An adjusted its shipping routes to avoid competition among its own Chinese merchants and opened up new routes. It also established a connection relationship with Minsheng Company on the Yangtze River, enabling the goods to be transported directly and quickly to more places.
Guan Liqing became the manager of Ping An Intermodal Transport.
After King Kong bought the shipyard from Guan Liqing, he went over to take a look. He wanted to see if the shipyard could be used to produce submarines in the future.
It's on the upper reaches of the Huangpu River, diagonally opposite the Jiangnan Manufacturing Bureau. The equipment capacity is relatively low, and it can only produce medium and small boats with a maximum width of seven or eight meters. At present, the main products are the repair and construction of inland steamships and tugboats of the same specification that are less than three or four meters wide.
At this time, the hulls of the "Firewheel" ships were made of iron at the bottom and of wood at the top. The tugboats at the back were all made of wood.
This shipyard can produce both motorboats and tugboats, including boilers and steam engines. But there's no welding at the shipyard; the boilers and hulls are all riveted!
King Kong now knows that arc welding has been around in Europe and America for a few years. At first, it was done by melting steel with a carbon arc as the heat source, and the quality was not good. The weld is not strong enough and cracks occur from time to time because carbon has seeped into the weld. So even in Europe and America, this arc welding is not trusted. It is often a combination of riveting and welding, with riveting as the main method and welding as the auxiliary. Later, electrodes came into being and were of better quality, but they were too expensive and not very popular.
King Kong used the workshop that originally made power frequency transformers to produce AC welding machines. Technicians have successfully produced electrodes that are much cheaper than European imports.
Applying the design theories of the 21st century, I independently guided the design of a new type of horizontal boiler with a fully welded structure, which is much lighter in weight and has a high thermal efficiency.
Steel was expensive at the time, so Ping An's "motorboat" used reinforced concrete for the cement hull, which was rust-resistant and cheap.
Wood is cheaper than cement. So the inland tugboat is still made of wood, but the boat has a new design, somewhat like a train sleeper, partitioned into compartments, with doors on both sides that lead to the decks on both sides of the boat. Inside, there are two opposite beds, a small coffee table in the middle, and the upper bunk can be flipped up during the day. Each boat has a toilet and a "tea room", and at this time the attendant is called the "tea room". This way, long-distance passengers won't be too tired, and the capacity of a ship won't be reduced much.
Ping An Interline has no problem with the route arrangement between southern Jiangsu and Zhejiang. The participating bosses are all from this area. But King Kong wants to extend the route to northern Jiangsu, along the canal. And then to the Huai River, to the Yellow River! The work will be difficult, as the spheres of influence vary from place to place.
Fortunately, a great man came at this time. He was Huang Honglin, the big brother of the Hongmen in the suburbs of Wuhan.
Huang Honglin, who looked about thirty-five or sixties, was dressed in a way that was afraid others wouldn't know he was a man from the martial arts world: he was dressed in a short Chinese dress, with a wide belt tied up neatly and no buttons on his coat. But the face looked more like that of a teacher, and it didn't match his clothes as if they were borrowed.
Huang Honglin's preaching skills are more than one grade higher than Qu Guoliang's. Fortunately, he is not like Qu Guoliang who just chases after people and starts talking about the rules of the Hong Gang.
Huang Honglin first learned about King Kong's situation and started with topics that King Kong was also interested in. This man has traveled far and wide for years and can talk about all kinds of people. Thinking that King Kong believes in God, he talks about God. Seeing that King Kong was not interested in God, he immediately changed his mind and talked about the economy and the stock market in Shanghai. Now King Kong must be interested!
You say, why didn't he teach Qu Guoliang? Qu Guoliang doesn't care if you're interested or not, he just keeps talking about his stuff.
After the conversation began, Huang Honglin gradually brought the topic to Hong Bang. He was much more flexible than Qu Guoliang.
Many of the old rules of the Hong Gang are out of date, but the Hong Gang was once a revolutionary force and participated in the Xinhai Revolution. Now, the revolution is not yet complete, comrades still have to work hard (this is the most popular political slogan at present!) .
Now the situation is beset with internal and external troubles. The rise and fall of the country concerns every man! How much more so we, the descendants of the Hong Gang!
I am not a descendant of the Hong Gang!
It doesn't matter whether Mr. CAI Mi is a descendant of the Hong Gang or not! Just look at what the gentleman has done. He is a model for us fellow Hongmen! Saving the country and the people, being loyal, brave, benevolent and righteous, is a model of practicing the spirit of the Hong Gang! We fellow workers...
Wait, wait! What I did doesn't seem to have anything to do with the Hong Gang?
Sir, what you do is to save the country and the people, isn't it? Yes, I know. This people are suffering and everyone should try to help, and you have done a great job. Yes, yes, I know that you are helping the hardworking masses and saving the people from the fire and water!
The spirit of our Hong Gang is to unite all those with aspirations across the world, including the working masses, and all forces that can be united, to strive together for the country and the nation! This is the spirit of the Hong Gang, and this is what the gentleman is doing!
To unite everyone to the Hong Gang? This patriotic and people-loving Hong Gang... ? Does it seem different from what Qu Guoliang said about the gang rules?
You're so right, Sir! As I said earlier, the rules of the Hong Gang are questionable. The rules of the Hong Gang are more enlightened than those of the Green Gang. They do not emphasize seniority as much as they do. Those who are capable can set up their own incense halls. Because of this, there are now so many branches, each of which can revise its own rules... .
Yes! What a wonderful speech, Sir! Our group of rules are going to be changed, and some friends mentioned this before. I'm also thinking that it's time to revise our rules properly to adapt to the current social development and to keep up with The Times... .
What time and space is this guy from?