Blacksmith Zhao was hammering a cylindrical iron pot with a diameter of about forty centimeters—the very distillation tank commissioned by Xia Huai'an.
This distillation tank was forged as a single piece from a sheet of iron. The main body was cylindrical, measuring forty centimeters in diameter and fifty centimeters in height. The upper part of the body gradually tapered inward, leaving a circular opening ten centimeters in diameter at the top.
A distillation tank of this size could distill fifty to one hundred and twenty catties of liquid at a time.
Chapter 21