Historical allusions to innovation

As an ancient country with a long history, countless inventions have been born, which reflect the innovative spirit of the working people. Here are the historical allusions about innovation that I have compiled for you, I hope it can help you.

Lu Ban invented the saw

Lu Ban was an excellent craftsman, and it is said that the saw was invented by him. Legend has it that when Lu Ban was building a palace at one time, he took more wood, but with the ancient technology, the wood supply was not enough to be used for the construction, and he was inspired to invent the saw based on the edges of the toothed blades of thatch. Let's take a look at the full story below!

Legend has it that Lu Ban was given the task of building a huge palace. A lot of wood was needed, and Luban sent his disciples up the mountain to cut down the trees. The apprentices used axes to cut down the trees, which was inefficient. Craftsmen every day to get up early in the morning and work hard to do, but also can not cut down the number of trees, so that the progress of the project is delayed again and again, see the project deadline is getting closer and closer, Lu Ban is very anxious. For this reason, he decided to personally go to the mountain to check the situation of felling trees. When he went up the mountain, he inadvertently grabbed a handful of a kind of weeds growing on the mountain, and his hand was scratched.

Lu Ban thought it was strange that a soft grass could cut his hand. So picked a leaf to carefully observe, found that the leaves on both sides of a lot of small teeth, with a gentle touch, these small teeth are very sharp, Lu Ban learned that these small teeth cut his hand. Later, Lu Ban saw a large locusts in a grass to eat leaves, two large teeth are very sharp, one open and one closed, and soon ate a large area, which also aroused the curiosity of Lu Ban, he grabbed a locust, carefully observe the structure of the locusts mouth, and found that the locusts of the two large teeth are arranged in the same way as a number of small teeth, locusts are relying on these small teeth to bite off the blade of grass.

As a result of these two things, Lu Ban was very inspired, into a deep thought. He thought, if you make a sawtooth-shaped cutting tool, whether the same sharp? So he used a large bamboo to make a bamboo blade with many small serrated, and then try to saw a small tree, the results are good, a few times to pull the bark broken, and then pull a few times, the small poles on a ditch, Lu Ban is very happy. But because the bamboo is relatively soft, the strength is relatively poor, can not be used for a long time, pull a while, the small saw teeth some broken, some blunt, need to replace the bamboo.

This affects the speed of felling trees, using too much bamboo is also a big waste. It seems that bamboo chips should not be used as a material for making saw teeth, and should look for a material with higher strength and hardness to replace it, and then Lu Ban thought of iron chips. So they immediately went down the mountain, let the blacksmiths to make iron with small saw teeth, and then went to the mountain to try to saw the trees. Lu Ban and his apprentice each pulled one end, pulled up in a tree, only to see them both back and forth, in a short time to saw the tree, fast and labor-saving, the saw was invented in this way, greatly improving the efficiency of work.

Cai Lun improved papermaking

Cai Lun lived in the Eastern Han Dynasty and the Emperor, from the early years of the Eastern Han Dynasty to the period of the Emperor of the Han Dynasty and the handicraft industry are constantly progressing. Socio-economic development, the production of paper put forward higher requirements.

At that time, Cai Lun saw that it was inconvenient for everyone to write, bamboo and wooden slips were too bulky, silk was very expensive, and it was impossible to produce silk paper in large quantities, all of which had shortcomings. So he researched ways to improve paper making.

Cai Lun summed up the experience of the previous papermaking, and led the craftsmen to use the bark of hemp, rags and broken fish nets and other raw materials to make paper. They first cut or cut off things such as bark, hemp head, rags and broken fish nets, put them in water to impregnate for a considerable period of time, and then pounded them into a pulp, which may also undergo steaming, and then spread them into a thin sheet on a mat, and put them in the sun to dry in the sun, which will become paper.

Paper made in this way, light and thin, very suitable for writing, was welcomed by the people. In the first year of Yuanxing of the Eastern Han Dynasty (105 AD), Cai Lun reported this great achievement to Emperor He of Han, who praised him. From then on, paper was made in this way all over the country.

Bi Sheng's invention of movable type printing

Bi Sheng was a great inventor in ancient China, and his invention of movable type printing took China's printing technology a step further.

Bi Sheng used cement to make a four-sided long column, one side of the carving of a single word, and then burned hard with fire, which is a living word. Print the book, the first to prepare a good piece of iron plate, iron plate on top of rosin and wax and other things, iron plate surrounded by an iron frame, in the iron frame densely filled with living words, full of an iron frame for a version, and then baked with fire under the iron plate, so that the rosin and wax and other melting. In addition to a flat plate in the row of good letters above the pressure, the words flattened, a movable type plate is ready. It is the same as the engraved plate, as long as the word on the ink, you can print.

In order to improve efficiency, he prepared two iron plates, the organization of two people working simultaneously, one plate printing, another plate type; wait for the first plate printing, the second plate is ready. The two iron plate alternating with each other, printed very quickly.

Bisheng to each single word are carved several; commonly used words carved more than 20 encountered no provision for the cold and remote characters, on the temporary carving, burned with a fire into a very convenient. After printing, the iron plate and then put on the fire hot, so that rosin and wax and other melting, the living word down, the next time you can use.

This is the first invention of movable type printing. This kind of clay movable type, called clay movable type, Bisheng invented the book printing method two compared with today's, although very primitive, but the three main steps of movable type printing technology a manufacturing movable type, typesetting and printing, have been available. Therefore, Bi Sheng's contribution to printing is very remarkable. Shen Kuo, a famous scientist in the Northern Song Dynasty, wrote about Bisheng's invention of movable-type printing in his book Mengxi Bianzhan (梦溪笔谈).

Huang Daobao improved textile technology

Huang Daobao was born in a small town called Wu Nian Baptist in Songjiang, and was sold as a child bride because her family was poor and could not support themselves. Huang Daobao had to work in the fields during the day and return home to do endless chores. Despite all this hard work, she was repeatedly blamed, abused and even mistreated by her in-laws and husband. Later, Huang Daobao couldn't stand it any longer, so she ran away. After leaving home, Huang Daobao hid to a sea boat moored in the Huangpu River, and then she drifted with the boat to the island of Hainan. After arriving at Hainan Island, Huang Daobao met the kind-hearted local Li people and was taken in by them. Hainan Island has a long history of cotton cultivation, and the local people's cotton weaving technology is more advanced. Under the guidance of the Li sisters, Huang Daobao quickly mastered the local cotton spinning technology.

More than thirty years later, Huang Daobao returned to her hometown from Hainan Island, back to the Wu Nai Trail. At this time, cotton has become one of the main crops in the Songjiang area, the development of the cotton industry has reached the point where almost every household weaves cotton cloth. However, people's textile technology was still very backward. In the Songjiang area, most people still use the traditional foot spinning wheel, and a few people even still use the oldest hand-cranked spinning wheel. After seeing the backwardness of the spinning operation in her hometown, Huang Dao Po taught her own spinning techniques to the people in her hometown and was determined to improve the spinning tools. In order to improve the efficiency of spinning, Huang Daobao drew on the principle of the Li foot-operated cart to create a new type of spinning wheel. The spinning wheel by the twisting and winding, transmission and the original motion of the three parts, so also known as the "three spindle cotton spinning wheel". The spinning wheel of the prime mover is a hand-cranked spinning wheel and rope wheel similar to the large round wheel, pedal up more labor-saving. In addition, the axle is equipped with a crank, spinning only one person side of the car will be cranking, another person to fill between the axle seed cotton can be. The new spinning wheel requires only two people to operate, and can spin three yarns at the same time, than the old spinning wheel to reduce a labor force, spinning efficiency has increased two or three times. The new spinning wheel was very popular, and soon spread in the Songjiang area.

In addition to reforming the tools of cotton spinning, Huang Daobao also innovated in the weaving process. She drew on the weaving techniques of the Li people, combined with the characteristics of traditional Chinese textiles, and further improved the wrong yarn, color matching, heddle threads, sincere flowers and other processes, "in order to weave into the quilt, mattresses, belts, yue, which on the folded branches, group phoenix, chess games, characters, beams as if written." The Yuan Dynasty poet once praised that "a thousand axes and paths are made in heaven". After the reform of Huang Daobo's textile process is competing for utility, Songjiang area woven quilts, mattresses, clothes, etc. were resold to other places after a great deal of praise. For a while, "Wu Nai Trail quilt" is famous throughout the country, with "Song County cotton, clothing the world" reputation. The development of cotton textile has made Songjiang become the center of cotton weaving industry in the country, and also became the gathering place of cloth merchants in the country at that time. Afterwards, Shanghai and Taicang near Songjiang competed with each other to imitate Songjiang's cotton textile technology. Until now, Songjiang and its neighborhood still maintains the prosperity of the textile industry. With the improvement of cotton textile technology, the Yuan Dynasty government paid more attention to cotton production. By the middle and late Yuan Dynasty, cotton had been widely planted throughout the country, and the cotton textile industry became a major part of the economy at that time.