Chapter 31 Section 11 Ma Jun, a mechanical manufacturer with "peerless ingenuity"

Ma Jun, whose name is Deheng, was born in Fufeng (now southeast of Xingping, Shaanxi) during the Cao Wei Dynasty of the Three Kingdoms.He studied hard all his life and had a particularly strong interest in mechanical manufacturing. He devoted himself to research and finally became a generation of outstanding mechanical inventors.There are many creations and inventions in his life, among which the famous ones are as follows: Improved looms.my country has used looms to weave jacquard fabrics for a long time.From the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period to the Qin and Han Dynasties, a kind of multi-pedal loom gradually formed. "Synthetic" is the mechanism that controls the warp, which can make the warp on the loom open and close, move up and down, so as to shuttle; "tow" is the tread.During the time of Emperor Xuan of the Han Dynasty (73 BC-48 BC), the number of heald looms and the number of heald looms reached 120 each, but in the Eastern Han Dynasty it was reduced to 50 or 60 each.There are so many comprehensives and trails, the operation is very complicated, and the production efficiency is very low.In order to simplify operations and increase productivity, Ma Jun made major improvements to the loom.He greatly reduced the number of heddles, and made looms with 12 sheds, 50 sheds and 12 heddles, 60 sheds.This not only greatly simplifies the operation and improves the productivity, but also improves the performance of the loom due to the reduced process requirements, and the pattern of the woven fabric is more exquisite.

Build guide cars.The guide car is a major mechanical invention in ancient China.Legend has it that there were two tribes in ancient times, one was surnamed Jiang, and its leader was Yandi Shennong; the other was surnamed Ji, and its leader was Huangdi.There is another Jiuli tribe, whose leader is Chiyou, who often invades tribes surnamed Jiang and Ji.In a battle between Chiyou and Shennong, Shennong was defeated because he lost his way.So Shennong asked the Yellow Emperor for help, and the Yellow Emperor built a compass chariot to resist Chiyou together with Shennong.Because of the compass car to guide the direction, they finally defeated the Jiuli tribe and captured Chiyou alive.There is also a legend that during the time of Duke Zhou, the Yueshang clan living in Southeast Asia sent envoys to meet King Cheng of Zhou. When returning home, Duke Zhou built a compass cart for them so that the envoys would not get lost.

Of course, legends cannot replace historical facts. When and who invented the guide car?It is impossible to know yet.Once Ma Jun heard someone at a court meeting that the guide car was just a fiction in the history books and did not exist at all.He disagreed with this view, and believed that there was a guide car in ancient times, but it was lost. As long as you are willing to study, it is not difficult to recreate the guide car.Those who thought there was no compass car laughed at him and said: "Mr.'s name is Jun, and his style is Deheng. Jun is a model of a utensil, and a scale is used to determine the weight of an object. Can a model be made without a standard of weight?" Ma Jun He was not good at eloquence, and he didn't retort. He just said: "It's useless to argue with words. It's better to do experiments to get results." So Ma Jun developed a guide car.This is a pointing mechanism consisting of a car and a wooden dummy. The car is equipped with a gear transmission device that can be automatically clutched and connected to the wooden dummy. The wooden dummy has a finger pointing forward.No matter which direction the vehicle is going, under the action of the automatic clutch gear device, the wooden man's hand points to the south.

Create a keel waterwheel.Ma Jun lived in Luoyang, the capital of the Wei Dynasty. Once he saw a piece of land that could be used as a garden, but because of the high terrain, irrigation was difficult, so he made a new type of water diversion tool, the overturned car (keel waterwheel), "irrigating water". Self-covering, more in and more out", it can continuously lift water, "its ingenuity is a hundred times better than usual" ("Three Kingdoms·Fang Ji Zhuan·Ma Jun Biography"), it is light and labor-saving in operation, even children can operate it, and its efficiency is higher than other water-lifting tools Much higher.

Make a water play.At that time, someone gave Wei Mingdi a wooden toy with various dramatic characters and animal shapes on it, beautiful in shape and exquisite in production, but it was fixed.Emperor Wei Ming ordered Ma Jun to reform.Ma Jun made a big wheel out of wood, and used water as the driving force to drive the wheel, and then used the gear device to connect the characters and animals in the play to make them move, becoming a "everything ever-changing" water play. In addition, Ma Jun also improved the Liannu (a crossbow that can be fired continuously) and the Stone Chariot (a weapon that fires stones).

These inventions of Ma Jun are remarkable even from a modern perspective, let alone more than 1700 years ago.At that time, someone used "ingenious thinking and peerless" to evaluate him, which could not be more accurate. In ancient China, another mechanical invention called the compass cart was the Ji Ligu cart.It was invented in the Han Dynasty. It is a machine that uses the reduction gear system to drive the wooden man on the car to report the mileage of the car.Every time the car travels one mile or 10 miles, the wooden man will beat the drum, and the number of times the drum is played can tell how much distance has been traveled.Together with the guide car, it embodies the brilliant achievements of ancient Chinese mechanical technology.