Chapter 1003: It

It has snowed quite frequently this winter. Less than ten days after the first heavy snowfall, an even larger one followed. This snow fell for a day and a night, reaching a depth of at least fifty centimeters.

No one came to the purchasing station, so Gu Bo Yuan, Liang Shuang Cheng, and their neighbor Sun Jia Qiang spent an entire day clearing the snow from the station.

Li Long and Sister Yang spent the better part of the day clearing the snow from the front courtyard of the main compound, and they hauled it out to dump it as well.

The snow in the backyard was more troublesome. Li Long first cleared a large path, then piled some of the snow into a snow wall, shaping the top like the battlements of the Great Wall, and even made two rather crude-looking warriors.

Although they were a bit crude, Mingming and Haohao were thrilled. In the past, after it snowed, they only ever built those simple, silly snowmen. This time, with a new design, the two children were excited to join in and help build.

A portion of the snow was hauled directly into the greenhouse, though only a small amount, otherwise the stove in the greenhouse would have been burning in vain.

Winter days are short, and Gu Xiaoxia left early and returned late. When she came back wanting to help clean the courtyard, Li Long stopped her. He knew that even if Gu Xiaoxia went to her unit, she would still have to sweep snow and work, so he could handle the chores at home himself.

"Sigh, if only that snow-clearing machine you mentioned earlier could be made," Gu Xiaoxia said, thinking of Li Long's previous words as soon as the snow-sweeping season arrived. "These two snowfalls this year are so heavy; we spent half the day sweeping snow without doing any other work. Every unit in the county is like this; even the people from the artillery regiment and the supply station are out, and it's still not enough."

The troops stationed in Maxian County were not regular field troops and didn't have that many personnel, so besides clearing the snow in their own units, they also had to go out to clear the snow on the streets.

Students were the main force, but other units had to send people out as well. At this moment, Gu Xiaoxia thought of the snow-clearing machine Li Long had previously said he wanted to research, thinking that if there were such a thing, wouldn't clearing snow be much faster?

However, it was a bit late to talk about it now. After all, the research, design, and production of a snow-clearing machine take time, and by the time it was produced and tested, it would probably be January, right?

But this thing could only be developed in winter; there would be no way to test it in other seasons.

Li Long wondered if he should call Factory Manager Du to talk about this matter.

After all, this would be a huge market in the future, a very large market.

If he could really get this made, then, relatively speaking, things like the pesticide sprayer would be trivial.

However, if he were to talk to Factory Manager Du, he would at least need to have a basically complete design on his side. Otherwise, even if he told Factory Manager Du his idea, the final product would have, at most, a dime's worth of connection to him.

So, for the past two days, he had been holed up at home, starting to research the snow-clearing machine.

Li Long prepared to research two types. One was a push-type, equipped with a gasoline engine. You add gasoline, pull the cord to start it, and then, just like a pushcart, you push it forward. The roller would spin at high speed, and with the brushes on the roller, it would directly scoop up the snow under the snow-clearing machine and fling it out, mainly in the direction of the upper right.

This snow-clearing machine was more suitable for clearing the snow in the large squares inside units; you just sweep back and forth. Moreover, this thing could be operated by one person, requiring only gasoline. At present, it could be said that gasoline in our country was at its cheapest, so using it shouldn't be painful.

The other type was a snow-clearing machine carried on a small four-wheeled tractor. Just like a harvester, it used the diesel engine of the small four-wheeler as power, driven by a belt pulley. It also had a large roller with many iron brushes on it. When in use, you lower the large roller to directly scoop up the snow and fling it away, and when not in use, you lift the large roller up.

This was more suitable for clearing snow on the roads.

The principle was relatively simple, but it was not easy to make. The main issue was using many steel wires as brushes on the roller; the brushes wouldn't last two days before the bristles were gone. Iron wires wouldn't work either, because when brushing, the iron wires lacked resilience; after turning twice, the iron wires would fall to one side, failing to provide a continuous brushing effect.

Only steel wires could be used. Steel wires had strong resilience; as the roller turned continuously and brushed the ground, the steel wires would bend when hitting something particularly hard, but they would immediately recover.

Besides this, there was the difficulty of getting a gasoline engine. In this day and age, engines were considered hot commodities and were definitely not cheap.

Relatively speaking, the one on the small four-wheeled tractor was simpler because it didn't need an engine; it directly used the power from the tractor, requiring only a belt to drive it, so it was actually simpler.

Li Long guessed that if he took this design to Factory Manager Du, he would focus on the second design. It was mainly because tractors were already starting to become popular. Li Long felt that Factory Manager Du's vision was still not far-reaching enough; his mind was mainly on designing auxiliary machinery and auxiliary agricultural machinery, and he wouldn't think at all about conducting pioneering research on things like engines or electric motors.

Of course, Li Long himself had concerns in this regard. He had used or researched these auxiliary machines in the past and knew their principles. He had also used the electric three-wheelers that would become popular all over the world in later generations, but he didn't know how to design that thing; after all, he didn't understand motors and batteries at all.

It was like a driver from the eighties or nineties driving a car from twenty years later; some system faults couldn't be repaired and required a computer.

Mechanical principles were easy to understand, easy to design, easy to make, and easy to repair. Things inside a computer required code. If you mentioned the fault directly, you might know it, but if you had to turn it into code, most people would be stumped.

Li Long spent three days designing both types of snow-clearing machines, and then he called Factory Manager Du.

Factory Manager Du was also quite surprised to receive Li Long's call.

"You said you designed a snow-clearing machine? Is it real or fake? Let me tell you, we are also working on this right now. The snow this year is a bit too heavy; it's excessive! We thought of the same thing—"

"Then how is your design coming along? If it's already designed, then I won't come over." Li Long thought to himself that this Factory Manager Du still had some skills; it was clear that he hadn't been working in vain all these years, seeing the business opportunity in the snow all at once.

"No, no, no, the thing we designed, it doesn't work."

Li Long suddenly remembered something and asked:

"The one you designed, could it be an iron plate directly carried on the front of the tractor, like a bulldozer blade?"

"Hmm... that's about it," Factory Manager Du said with some embarrassment.

Li Long was speechless.

That shouldn't be.

"Haven't you checked foreign literature and materials regarding the design of snow-clearing machines?" Li Long asked.

"There's nothing like that," Factory Manager Du shook his head and said, "We looked for it, but we really couldn't find it."

Li Long vaguely remembered reading a Japanese detective novel in the nineties of his previous life. A middle-aged man died mysteriously, his upper body stuck in a snowdrift, with only his two legs left outside. There were no human footprints or animal tracks around, no traces at all.

It was finally deduced that it was the scooping effect of a nearby railway snow-clearing machine that had scooped the man up and flung him, causing him to fall headfirst into the snowdrift.

In later generations, this thing was easy to understand, but at that time, it was link by link, and it wasn't like the information volume of the internet in later generations, so it was relatively novel to Li Long, and he remembered it.

And it was clearly recorded there that the railway snow-clearing machine used the principle of scooping, not direct pushing. If it pushed directly, the snow would still remain on the tracks; if it scooped, the snow would be directly cleared and flung to both sides, not affecting the tracks.

Of course, Li Long didn't know the specific structure of the snow-clearing machine; he only got the information from this detective novel that a snow-clearing machine could have a scooping function. This way, the cleared snow was also clean, and it reduced the transportation link, saving trouble.

Factory Manager Du asked again:

"Comrade Li Long, your design... is it not like a bulldozer blade? Can you tell me in detail?"

"No, this time, we have to cooperate," Li Long said with a smile, "The thing I designed, the idea should be mature. With the snow-pushing blade, if you are too high from the ground, the snow won't be cleared clean; if you are too low from the ground, when you hit a place that is uneven, you might ruin the road and possibly ruin the machine, right?"

"Yes, yes, yes, that's exactly it."

"Rigidity is easily broken," Li Long smiled.

"But we used soft rubber, like a tire, to make the snow-pushing blade, and that had other troubles. It didn't affect the road, but once the snow was pushed too much, this rubber blade would easily leak snow..."

"Hahahaha, don't worry, Factory Manager Du, I have a different approach." Li Long knew that Factory Manager Du saying this was to remind him that changing materials wouldn't work either; they had all been tried.

"That's good, bring the design over, and we'll talk in detail. We have the foundation of cooperation on the harvester. Let me tell you, this snow-clearing machine will definitely give you a suitable patent licensing price. Our country's patent law has also come out. Don't worry, you can apply for the patent directly for this aspect."

Factory Manager Du had great confidence in Li Long. With the harvester and the cultivator, as long as it was something he worked on, Factory Manager Du felt it would work.

After all, coming from the grassroots, he definitely focused on the basics and things that the common people really wanted.

Li Long wondered if he should go to the Patent Office to file a patent?

But to be honest, firstly, it was hard to say whether there was a Patent Office in Urumqi now, and secondly, even if he reported it to the Patent Office, it probably wouldn't have any effect. After all, at present, copycatting and imitation were the mainstream, and this mainstream would last for at least twenty years.

Ordinary people and merchants really didn't have this concept of patents. Even if a patent was applied for, if no one used it, it would be equivalent to nothing. ===== CHAPTER 1004 =====