Chapter Eighteen: The Railway

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Indeed, it was a full-scale railway, laid with iron tracks capable of running trains! This was not because Li Qingsong had nothing better to do, but because there were ample and necessary reasons behind it.

The reason was straightforward: this steel mill produced around 270 tons of steel daily, which translated to a daily requirement of at least 1,000 tons of iron ore.

And that was just for the steel itself. The steel mill also needed an accompanying power plant.

There was no coal on the planet Luoshen, and torlin—a local mineral—could not be used for steelmaking. Therefore, all steel production activities had to rely entirely on electricity.

This made the steel mill a massive power consumer.

Calculations showed that producing one ton of steel consumed approximately 600 kilowatt-hours of electricity.

At 270 tons per day, that amounted to 162,000 kilowatt-hours daily!

Its power consumption even exceeded that of the entire current main base.

Such enormous power demand could not be met from the existing power grid; the load fluctuations would cause the grid to collapse.

A dedicated power plant had to be constructed to supply it.

At present, producing one kilowatt-hour consumed 1.2 kilograms of torlin ore and 0.5 kilograms of oxygen ore, totaling 1.7 kilograms.

For 162,000 kilowatt-hours, roughly 300 tons of torlin and oxygen ore were required daily.

Adding the iron ore, the steel mill and power plant together needed an average daily supply of at least 1,300 tons of materials.

Transporting such a volume with tractors was impractical, even if all existing tractors were put to use.

Moreover, even if there were enough tractors, sufficient drivers would be needed, which posed another drain for Li Qingsong.

After careful consideration, Li Qingsong decided to build a dedicated railway.

This railway would not only connect the Number One Iron Mine but also link several nearby oxygen mines and even extend to torlin-rich deposits, copper, and aluminum mines in the vicinity. By adding a few branch lines, all could be interconnected.

While 1,300 tons was too much for tractors, one train could easily carry that load.

And a railway could handle more than one train at a time. With proper scheduling, a dozen trains could run simultaneously. Eventually, the railway’s capacity would far exceed a mere few thousand tons.

This would fully support the current steel mill and power plant needs, and even accommodate future expansions—more steel mills, power plants, and additional smelting factories for gold, silver, copper, and aluminum.

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This railway was imperative.

Li Qingsong had already completed the preliminary surveys.

The knowledge needed to build a railway was well within reach, gleaned from studying the basic principles aboard the Deep Space vessel and accumulated through the clones’ diligent labor and practical experience.

Everything was ready; it was time to build.

The total length of the railway was 33 kilometers, crossing three hills and two ravines, with four stations set up: the main base departure station, the iron mine terminus, and intermediate stations at the oxygen and torlin mines.

From then on, Li Qingsong devoted his main production capacity to manufacturing steel rails and connectors.

Although the steel mill could not operate at full capacity yet, the current output sufficed to meet construction needs.

Eight hundred clones worked simultaneously from multiple points to accelerate progress.

One team arrived at a hill about 100 meters high—a mere small knoll by Luoshen standards—where the railway would pass.

The clones first used electric heating devices to remove various solid gases from its surface, then drilled holes and packed them with explosives produced by the chemical plant, several meters deep before detonating.

With a faint tremor of the earth, massive rocks cracked and the hill was blasted open.

The clones swarmed in, each with great strength, hauling away giant boulders and throwing them aside.

Low gravity on Luoshen made moving rocks relatively easy.

Larger stones were moved by a group of clones working together, while the biggest ones were pushed aside by steam-powered bulldozers billowing black smoke.

Li Qingsong did not have to worry about debris disposal as on Earth—no environmental regulations were enforced here.

Under such conditions, road-cutting and earthworks proceeded smoothly and rapidly.

While explosives roared on one front, dozens of clones gathered at a ravine on the Luoshen surface.

The canyon was about a hundred meters wide; bypassing it would extend the railway by more than ten kilometers.

Unwilling to complicate matters, Li Qingsong decided to build a bridge instead.

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He could not construct a modern bridge like those on Earth, designed with rigorous calculations, advanced mechanics, and high-performance materials.

But that was unnecessary—Luoshen’s low gravity increased the load capacity of the same bridge design by more than tenfold.

Consequently, the material performance and construction requirements were drastically reduced.

To support trains, a simple steel frame was more than sufficient.

This was Li Qingsong’s reasoning—and his approach.

He did not build steel columns from the canyon floor to support the bridge; instead, he anchored steel frameworks into the rock walls on either side, using an arch bridge structure to support the span.

This saved time and steel—important given the limited steel production.

As for performance and load-bearing capacity, there was no doubt it could sustain the bridge and trains.

Even two fully loaded trains passing simultaneously, combined with the bridge’s own weight, would total around 4,000 tons, with the bridge weight only a few hundred tons. Being a steel structure, it could easily handle such loads.

Laying the rails was even simpler and more straightforward.

Thanks to Luoshen’s extremely cold surface, which froze the ground solid, Li Qingsong only needed initial leveling; no further road hardening was necessary.

He simply laid two pairs of rails on supports, securing them, and fixed the rails together every few dozen meters.

This saved both effort and steel.

Guardrails were unnecessary—there were no wandering people or animals on Luoshen.

With a completely utilitarian construction style, the bridge, rails, and earthworks progressed rapidly.

While this advanced smoothly, Li Qingsong devoted significant attention to the Number One Machinery Factory.

There, he planned to build two locomotives.

But these would no longer be steam-powered—they would be electrified!