Chapter 121: Chapter 120: Glassmaking (Fourth update upon release, please subscribe!)
Richard was unaware of the incident at the jewelry store, but after obtaining the ruby, he had finally gathered all the ingredients necessary for making Cobalt Blue. The next step was to produce the Cobalt Blue itself, followed by crafting the actual Cobalt Blue Glass. Thus, Richard and Gro headed to their final destination for the day—the Glass Factory in the Jade Kingdom.
This place was not one that just anyone could enter, not even Gro could co and go as he pleased.
This was mainly because glass, especially high-quality glass, in the current world, similar to the dieval era, was considered an absolute luxury. Large sheets of glass mirrors cost more than gold, and the small pieces of colored glass used for church window decorations were also of considerable value. Even broken glass shards were not sothing ordinary people could obtain, often coveted by Noble ladies to be inlaid into their sumptuous evening gowns to wear to dinner parties. In their eyes, broken glass shards were more radiant and representative of status than any gemstone rings or pearl necklaces.
Simply put, civilians almost never ca into contact with glass; it was entirely exclusive to the Nobility and involved enormous profits. For this reason, a country would tightly control its Glass Factory, placing it in a remote location, guarding it with heavy soldiers, and craftsn were not allowed to leave the Glass Factory for their whole lives, to prevent any leakage of their techniques.
In fact, this was also a true reflection of modern Earth’s history.
In Earth’s history, around the twelfth century, Venice—as the glass manufacturing center of the world at that ti—kept all glass artisans confined on an island known as Murano Island for several centuries, to monopolize glass-making techniques.
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In the current world of the Jade Kingdom, things had not reached such an extre, but Gro had used his status as a Prince and went through much trouble to finally obtain permission to bring soone into the factory.
After several identity checks, Gro led Richard into the interior of the Jade Kingdom’s Glass Factory.
Inside the massive wooden shed, with pools everywhere, furnaces lined up, and the heat rising to the sky, a multitude of workers and craftsn bustled about non-stop, clambering up and down the racks, with a constant din of shouting.
“Shake, hurry to furnace number one, see if it’s gone out!”
“Babes, go to furnace number four, check the fuel.”
“Nusi, there’s a problem with pool number fifteen, quickly call Master Monghaqi over…”
The factory manager of the Glass Factory—a man in his forties with brown hair and high cheekbones, nad Vichis—led Richard and Gro through the wooden shed with a respectful attitude. After all, the strict security of the Glass Factory was one thing, but as the manager, he was still no more than a lowly commoner in front of Gro. If he dared show any disrespect, Gro had the authority to throw him into the pool and turn him into glass.
With such an attitude from Vichis, the process went smoothly, and Richard was soon brought to a temporarily halted lting furnace. Using so techniques, he combined the Cobalt Ore, ruby, and phosphoric acid to create the Cobalt Blue pignt.
He then handed the Cobalt Blue over to Vichis, instructing him to incorporate it into the unfinished glass in a specific ratio, ultimately producing the Cobalt Blue Glass that t their requirents.
Vichis quickly got to work, and after a short ti, he brought over the product.
“Lord Richard,” Vichis offered a palm-sized sample of glass to Richard and said, “This was crafted just now according to your instructions; please take a look… are you satisfied?”
Richard took the glass sample, glanced over it briefly, and saw that it exhibited a sea blue hue, basically eting the requirents of Cobalt Blue Glass, but…
Richard slightly tilted the glass, changing the angle of the incident light. He could see a faint green color seeping through the glass, and his brows imdiately furrowed.
This was… an indication of impurities in the glass.
Richard thought.
This wouldn’t be sothing Vichis had done on purpose, as he neither had the courage nor the motive for it. It was purely an issue with the crafting process. In this world, similar to the dieval era, glassmaking hadn’t achieved the modern Earth standards. They used a more traditional thod, employing silica (SiO2, mainly found in quartz and sand) as the raw material for making glass.
The lting point of silica is about 2000 degrees Celsius, which ordinary lting furnaces can hardly reach. To reduce the difficulty of production, sodium carbonate (Na2CO3, also known as soda) and potash (K2CO3, potassium carbonate) were added to lower the lting point to around 1000 degrees Celsius. However, sodium carbonate caused the glass to be soluble in water, so usually an appropriate amount of calcium oxide (CaO) was also added to ensure the insolubility of the glass.
In this process, many raw materials and minerals were unable to achieve a hundred percent purity and would invariably contain so impurities, with iron being the most common mineral elent to be inadvertently mixed in. Through a series of reactions, ferrous ions would be produced, giving the glass a pale green color of ferrous ions.
This was an unavoidable phenonon unless the whole crafting process was improved and unless all raw materials and minerals achieved absolute purity; otherwise, the problem couldn’t be solved at the source.
Generally speaking, this wasn’t too much of an issue. In fact, on modern Earth, many low-cost glasses exhibit a faint green hue. Beer bottles, designed to protect beer from ultraviolet light damage, are intentionally made using iron elents to achieve a dark green color.
But what Richard was trying to create, the cobalt blue glass, was ant for conducting a fla test experint. Cobalt blue glass needed to eliminate potential color interference to ensure the true color of the flas was observed; hence, it should ideally have no color difference.
In that case…
Richard’s brows deepened in thought. After a mont, he flipped his hand, revealing a small glass bottle in his grasp filled with half a bottle of grayish-white tallic powder—manganese powder.
Since the problem couldn’t be resolved at the source, it had to be dealt with at the final stage. A small amount of manganese could counteract the faint green tint caused by ferrous ions within the glass. However, the concentration had to be carefully controlled, as too much manganese would turn the glass from light green to light purple after the green was canceled out.
Richard handed the manganese powder in the glass bottle to Vichis, and said, “Make another batch of the blue glass pieces I need. This ti, sprinkle this powder in during production. The concentration should be…”
After speaking at length, Richard looked towards Vichis, who appeared slightly stunned, and asked, “Do you understand?”
“Uh, yes I understand, but… what’s the use, Lord Richard?” Vichis inquired with a hint of confusion.
“You don’t need to worry about that. Just do as I said,” Richard replied.
“Uh, okay.” Vichis glanced at Gro, who seed a bit bored on the side, took the manganese powder given by Richard, and went off to find soone to carry out the task.
After a while, Vichis returned with the newly made cobalt blue glass, looking very composed, but his hands were trembling, unable to conceal his excitent.
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