When the Mongols made Lele carts, they usually hired special carpenters. When carpenters make Lele carts, they pay attention to comprehensive utilization and make the best use of everything. After a tree is felled in the phase, it is necessary to consider the production of various parts of the Lele car. It is best to use it without wasting materials. For example, the roots are thick and strong, and can be used as hubs. The curved part is used as the rim. The straight branches are used as horizontal linings, tooth chambers, and columns. The forked branches are used as saddle wood. The wood that is really worthless can also be used to make the lower yoke. The hub must be made of birch, purple birch is better, and purple birch has the best texture, and the carpenter always tries to find it. Cutting down a big tree can make the hub of several cars. It is best if the hub can reach more than four spans (diameter), and the shortest one should not be less than three spans and about two spans long.
1. Hub
After sawing off the part for the hub, immediately hollow out the middle (where the axle is installed) to let it dry faster. At the same time, peel off the outer skin, boil it in a boiling water pot, and bury it in the ground to dry it. Or use a fire to singe off the outer bark and dry it out. The general wood has six rims (or nine rims) and eighteen spokes, so eighteen rivets for the spokes must be chiseled. When opening these eighteen rivets, be sure to measure the distance so that the width between the spokes is equal. These rivet eyes are three fingers long, about one finger wide, and the distance between the spokes is about one finger. The rivets of the spokes must penetrate the hub, that is, they must reach the axle. The part of these rivets touching the axle is larger, and the outer part is smaller. There are two hubs, one on the left and one on the right, and the method is exactly the same.
2. Spokes
It is best to use oak wood for the spokes on the car, if you can't find oak wood, elm wood can also be used. The spokes are about two feet long, the part connected to the hub is three fingers wide, and the part connected to the rim is two fingers wide, but this is not dead, it depends on the thickness of the hub and the thickness of the rim. The spokes on a car must have the same length and thickness when they are broken. When they are used on both sides of the car, they must be processed and corrected. In fact, they are shorter than the original ones. When the spokes are mounted on the hub and the rim, the rim is thicker. When the spokes are inserted into the rivets on the hub, they really need to carve out tenons three fingers wide and one finger thick, so that they fit seamlessly. This place is where the level of carpentry skills is tested. The spokes made by skilled carpenters will not fall out even if the hub is rotten. After inserting the spokes into the rivets of the hub one by one, slowly smash them in. The spokes can't be hammered into place all at once, they have to air dry in the sun for a few days before hammering it all the way down.
3. Rim
The rim is generally made of birch. The rims are also cut out one by one first, and then fitted onto the wheels. After the spokes are riveted into the hub, insert a piece of wood in the middle of the hub (that is, the place where the axle will be installed in the future), drive a nail into the middle of the wood, tie a long rope on the nail, and tie the long rope to the hub. Tie a pencil tip, draw a circle with the nail as the center, and the length of the spoke as the radius, so that the rivet that fits into the rim can be made. The spokes must be tenoned on the outside (that is, the side of the wheel facing outwards), chopped from the inside and smashed into the rim. Three rivets are chiseled on one section of the rim, that is, three spokes are inserted. After all the spokes are inserted, connect the rim end to end one by one, and fit together. The rivet eye of the rim must be tightened with a wedge. Although it is said that new cars do not need wedges, it is better to fill up the rivets.
4. Iron ring, car key
After the spokes and rims are installed, the hole in the center of the hub should be drilled to make it easier to insert the axle in the future. Before inserting the axle, a large iron ring was inserted into this hole. The big iron ring is made of pig iron, and there are four wedge-shaped ears around it, which are all cast as a whole. Its diameter is exactly the same as the size of the circle of the hub. After aligning the two circles, compare the width of the iron with the outline of the ear, draw the size of the iron circle on the hub, and then use a chisel to match the iron circle with the ear. The ear was smashed in tightly. Then use a special hat nail to firmly lock the four ears of the iron ring. Two iron rings are used on a hub, one inside and one outside, because this is where the wheel wears the most when it turns. Correspondingly, these two parts on the axle are also embedded with a lot of square iron bars, commonly known as car keys.
5. Axle
The axle can be made of birch, elm, or oak, about thirteen spans long and two spans thick. When making the axle, the thickness of the diameter of the hub should be considered, especially the part inserted into the hub should be smooth and moderate in thickness. At the same time, the saddle wood should be seated according to the size of the shaft. After the key is punched into the axle, it is inserted into the front of the car. At both ends of the axle, pins (vehicle jurisdiction) should be driven vertically to prevent the wheels from falling off when they walk.
6. Shaft bar, tooth box, horizontal lining
The shafts are generally made of pine and birch, twenty-three to twenty-four spans long. This is the longest part of the Lele car, from the front to the rear. The root of the shaft is towards the rear of the vehicle, and the tip is towards the front of the vehicle. First chop with an adze, the root is cut into a square, and the tip is cut into a circle. Starting from the center of the shaft bar, open eight rivet holes (sides) to the back, which are used to place eight horizontal linings. In front of the front lining and behind the rearmost lining, at a distance of about one span, two riveting holes should be drilled. These two rivet holes do not insert things, commonly known as air rivets or air rivets (reserved for tying things in the future). It is also necessary to cut out four rivets on each of the two poles, which are used to install the four uprights of the tooth box. There are also rivet eyes of saddle wood, two on the left and right. That is to say, six rivet holes must be drilled on the top of a shaft. There are ten rivet holes to be drilled on the sides. There is at least one rivet hole at the front end of the shaft, which is used to insert the horn stake. Counting the empty rivet holes, there are 17 rivet holes cut into one shaft, and a total of 34 rivet holes are cut into two shaft bars.
The horizontal lining, columns and tooth boxes are all made of white birch. The horizontal lining is about eight squares, two fingers thick and three fingers wide. The length of the horizontal lining is determined by the width of the vehicle body. A car with a wide body can hold a lot of things, and it is also very convenient for a big steer to pull it up. The column is more than one span higher than the shaft, and the tooth chamber is more than eight spans long, covering the top of the column.
7. Saddle wood
The saddle wood is the thing that fixes the axle and the shaft. The forked wood is sawed off from one end, and the other end is shoveled to make a rivet, which is embedded in the shaft. The end with the fork is fixed together with the axle and shaft with pins. The saddle wood is generally about three spans long.
8. Niu martingale, lower yoke
In addition to the parts introduced above, the Lele cart also has ropes and harnesses on the bullocks that pull the cart. The upper yoke is also called the bull martingale, which is placed on the neck of the bull. It is made of bent wood, about four fingers wide, and the length should be less than the distance between two shafts. The lower part has to be very slippery, at least flattened after burning, so as not to wear the cow's neck. There are holes at both ends, and leather ropes are inserted into them, and they are tied to sheep horn stakes. The lower yoke is a relatively thin piece of flat wood that fits under the bullock's neck, and has holes at both ends, through which a high-quality leather strap is inserted and hung on the shaft rod. When the ox is not harnessed to the cart, the lower yoke is usually placed on the shaft on the right side. When harnessing the ox to the cart, pull it from under the neck of the ox and tie it loosely to the left pole. There are also some leather strips on both sides, in the form of a stick, and fastened together with the leather strips pulled down from the top of Niu Yangzi.