Chapter 293 Dazhu's Thoughts

Three days later in the morning, ten women arrived at the brigade headquarters on time to hand in their work.

Wang Wu's family carefully examined each one and found that some of the stitches were fine and even, while others were crooked.

She hardened her heart and picked out the unqualified ones and returned them: "The textile factory said that we can't accept those that don't meet the quality standards."

"Fifth sister-in-law, we are all from the same village. Please relax a little. I am not trying to make money from you."

The daughter-in-law who was returned was embarrassed, but thinking of the five cents wage, she still argued with Wang Wu's wife.

"It's not that I'm being inflexible. We haven't finalized this yet. If the quality isn't up to par and it's returned, the whole thing will be ruined. Cuilan, tell me, we can't let our reputation be ruined because of these embroidery pieces of yours, can we?"

When the people around heard that this matter might fail, they no longer cared about the feelings and immediately helped Wang Wu's family to persuade Li Cuilan.

"Cui Lan, if this job is decided, it will take more than one or two days. Why don't you go back and practice first?"

"That's right. If the embroidery is not up to standard and it delays everyone from making money, you will feel embarrassed, right?"

Seeing so many people supporting Wang Wu's family, Li Cuilan had no choice but to go home in a bad mood no matter how dissatisfied she was.

Wang Wujia sorted out the qualified embroidery patterns and handed them over to Zhao Zhijian solemnly.

Zhao Zhijian did not dare to delay for a moment and immediately went into the city to deliver it to Jiang Haitang.

Jiang Haitang wanted to check herself, and Aunt Cai offered to help.

The two people carefully examined them one by one. The embroidery patterns had simple stitches and delicate workmanship, and the quality was indeed very good.

She nodded with satisfaction: "Great! I'll take it to the laboratory tomorrow."

Aunt Cai looked at Jiang Haitang with satisfaction, knowing that this was almost the end of the matter, and her face became even happier.

Zhao Zhijian was finally relieved.

He placed a cloth bag he was carrying on the table.

"Your aunt said you need nutrition now. Here is our own millet. You can make some porridge to nourish yourself."

Jiang Haitang was stunned for a moment and said, "Captain, there's no need for that. As long as the embroidery meets the requirements, we will accept it."

The team leader knew that Jiang Haitang had misunderstood, and immediately said embarrassedly: "Haitang, you misunderstood. I didn't mean that. I just felt that since you were thinking about our team members, our team should not be too ungrateful. These are just our little tokens of our gratitude..."

After hearing what the captain said, Jiang Haitang did not continue to refuse, but accepted the bag of millet.

The next day, Jiang Haitang took the samples to the laboratory and asked them to check the quality.

The head of the inspection department picked one up and looked at it carefully: "Wow, this is really well embroidered! It's much more lively than machine embroidery."

The production manager was there, and he was a little concerned: "Can the hand embroidery keep up? This batch of orders is urgent, and the demand for the goods we have already produced and are ready to ship is not small."

"It should be no problem." Jiang Haitang introduced the situation of the Qingshuigou Brigade. "They can do it anytime. As long as they are paid, they don't mind working longer hours."

After discussion, the factory decided to place a small order as a trial, one thousand embroidered labels, to be delivered within a week.

When the news reached Qingshuigou, the whole brigade was in an uproar.

Five hundred! Five cents apiece, that's fifty yuan! How many pounds of salt and how many feet of cloth can that buy?

Although it took more than ten women to work together and each person only earned a few dollars, you have to know that after calculating the work points at the end of the year, apart from the food they received, the whole family only earned a few dollars, and some people even owed money.

Zhao Zhijian immediately organized the women who passed Wang Wu's test to take on jobs.

The other women didn't think much of it before, but now that they know they can make money, many of them began to envy them.

Even the women from those families all asked for leave in order to catch up with the work. Fortunately, spring plowing has not started yet, so there are not many people who need to work, so it doesn't matter if some people ask for leave.

As for the women in other families, they also began to learn embroidery secretly in order to make money. Families with little girls, who originally only learned simple needlework, now also learned embroidery.

Wang Wu's family was even busier. They had to embroider themselves and check the work handed in by others.

She is ruthless and impartial. If a thread is crooked, it will be redone. The sisters call her "Iron Lady" in private, but they all respect her in their hearts. If she were not strict, how could they guarantee that they would have a job for a long time?

One thousand embroidery labels were delivered to the factory one day in advance.

The acceptance rate was 100%! The factory immediately placed an order for another 3,000 units.

A new round of embroidery craze has begun in Qingshuigou Brigade.

When they heard that there were another 3,000 orders, and thought that these ten or so women could earn 20 or 30 yuan each, the people in the team became even more envious.

Besides, Jiang Haitang was three months pregnant, her morning sickness gradually eased, and she felt much better.

Aunt Cai felt more at ease, and in her spare time, she began to embroider some labels.

Jiang Haitang originally wanted to let her take a rest when she had nothing to do, but then she thought that Aunt Cai was not someone who could sit idle, so she didn't persuade Aunt Cai in the end.

During this period, because Aunt Cai was in the city, Dazhu often came over.

Dazhu is now studying with Gu Yundi and has made great progress. However, due to his limited knowledge reserves, he uses his rest time to read and study, so he is extremely busy.

Aunt Cai felt distressed when she saw that her son was thinner than before, but she knew that her son was studying hard for a better life in the future, so she still strongly supported his hard work.

Because Jiang Haitang wanted to thank Aunt Cai for taking such good care of her, every time Dazhu came, she would prepare some meat and eggs and ask Aunt Cai to cook for Dazhu.

Dazhu is not an ungrateful person. Every time he comes, he brings something.

After a few interactions, the relationship between the two families became better and better.

There is another reason why Dazhu particularly likes to come to Jiang Haitang's house. Jiang Haitang can teach him a lot of knowledge about mechanics.

Jiang Haitang would chat with Dazhu whenever she had time. There were some knowledge that Dazhu could not grasp, but he quickly understood it thanks to Jiang Haitang's guidance.

That day, when Dazhu came, he took out a notebook made by flipping over old account books from his washed-out green canvas bag and flipped through it with a frown.

It was densely covered with pencil drawings of some simple agricultural tool structures, with many question marks and half-calculated formulas marked next to them.

Jiang Haitang came over with a cup of hot water. Seeing Dazhu's focused and distressed expression, she asked gently, "Dazhu, what are you thinking about? Have you run into a tough problem?"

Dazhu raised his head, his dark face showing the reality and confusion that were unique to farmers.

"Sister Haitang, I was just thinking about something, but I'm a little stuck."

"Didn't you ask Teacher Yun for advice?" Jiang Haitang asked.

The teacher Yun that Jiang Haitang mentioned was Gu Yundi. Because Gu Yundi's identity was rather special, he had always used a pseudonym when he was in the machinery factory.

Dazhu doesn't know Gu Yundi's true identity, but he respects Gu Yundi very much.

"The teacher said he wasn't too clear about this aspect either."

Jiang Haitang became interested. She knew how powerful Gu Yundie was. How could she make Gu Yundie confused? What on earth did Dazhu want to do?

"Oh, boy, what do you want to do?"

Dazhu said distressedly, "I've been thinking about how our team's old ox is getting less and less resilient. During spring plowing and autumn sowing, both the man and the animal are exhausted. Is there anything we can do to save some manpower and animal labor? Even if it can just help with harrowing or threshing the field, that would be fine."

He pointed to a page of sketches of a simple traction structure. "But when I think about it, how do we make this lump of iron move? A diesel engine is too expensive. The team can't afford it, and we can't afford the oil. Using an electric motor is out of the question. It's a dead end."

Jiang Haitang didn't expect that Dazhu actually thought of the problem of agricultural machinery.

This seems to be beyond Gu Yundi's knowledge. Gu Yundi is an expert in textile machinery, but he has never studied agricultural machinery and has not even been a farmer. It is indeed difficult for him to solve the problem raised by Dazhu.

Jiang Haitang became interested. Textile machinery is important, but the development of agricultural machinery is also very important. Dazhu's direction is indeed good.

However, she didn't know much about this aspect, but the mechanical principles were similar. In addition, she had been a farmer for many years and had some understanding of some machines in later generations, which might give Dazhu an idea.

Thinking in her mind, she pulled over a chair and sat down, then took the notebook and looked at it carefully.

The sketches were rough, but the intention was clear: practicality and low cost were the goals.

This kind of machine is really practical.

"Your approach is correct. We need to start from the practical possibilities," Jiang Haitang mused, fingering the powertrain. "Diesel engines are truly unrealistic. See if you can exploit 'leverage' and 'saving effort' to utilize the existing power more efficiently."

Dazhu was a little confused: "Leverage force? Save energy? Sister Haitang, you mean..."

"For example," Jiang Haitang gathered his thoughts, "with the old-fashioned walking plows we use now, the operator has to exert a lot of force to hold down the handle to ensure the plow reaches the desired depth. Could we add a simple adjustment lever or small wheel between the plowshare and the handle, allowing the operator to focus on controlling the direction and save the effort of pressing down on the plow?"

"Or, the stone rollers used in mills are currently pulled by people or animals. Could we make a frame to hold them, with a simple set of gears or pulleys, and have people crank them to turn them? While that would be strenuous, wouldn't it be less labor-intensive than just pulling them, and more even?"

Dazhu's eyes slowly lit up, and he slapped his thigh hard.

"That's right! Why was I just thinking about letting it run on its own? Let's start by making the existing tools more useful! Sister Haitang, your idea is so practical!"

The two immediately started discussing.

Although Jiang Haitang was not familiar with agricultural technology, he had many years of experience in using machinery for farming, as well as his familiarity and understanding of mechanical structure, and came up with some ideas for improvement.

Dazhu's mind was suddenly enlightened and he clapped his hands repeatedly.

"Adding an adjustment rod would be a good idea!" Dazhu gestured, coming up with a series of good ideas. "Use the old steering linkage from a scrapped tractor..."