"Is this the newly created Spontaneous Fire Bolt?"

In the "Shou Humble Garden" and "Huaihua Book House", Wang Song's fingers trembled slightly, and he picked up a dark fire gun in front of him.

Although the Loyal and Righteous Army has built tiger squat cannons, Franc machine guns, and heavy artillery of five or six hundred catties have also been put into the battlefield, for a long time, Wang Song has not developed a large number of simpler guns.

The reason is actually very simple, one is that the early fire gun, the arquebus has too many defects and is too troublesome, and the other is that it is worried that under the rapid attack of the Jurchen iron horse, the fire gun will not come in handy.

First of all, the arquebus requires a section of arquebus that has been boiled in vinegar or soaked in earth nitrate. Wireropes are dangerous when lit, and if you're not careful, Sparks can ignite the cartridge belts you are carrying, causing an explosion that injures the firecracker himself. At the same time, the lit fire rope easily exposed itself at night, making it almost impossible to sneak up at night.

The second is that the arquebus operation is very complicated, and the shooting process is very complex and slow. There are more than a dozen processes involved in the use of arquebuses. When a firecracker goes into battle, he must bring firearms, arquebuses, gunpowder, projectiles, etc.

Once there is an exchange of fire on the battlefield, the shooter has to be busy firing, reloading, and firing again, and his hands and feet must be very agile. The best shooters can only shoot two or three rounds per minute. Therefore, the musketeers usually lined up in three rows, the first on their knees, the second semi-standing, and the third upright.

Despite this, it often happens that the other party rushes in front of the firecracker in later generations. The firecrackers can't resist it, so they have to mix it with the sword, shield, and pikeman.

In addition, arquebuses are too affected by natural conditions. It cannot be used in rainy days, and the fire rope will be wet; It cannot be used when the wind is strong, because the wind will blow the gunpowder away from the fire door; Smoke will block the view of your troops when firing.

The last one is poor accuracy, the effective range is short, and it can only shoot at targets within 100 meters. The Jurchens' hard bows can shoot seventy or eighty meters, and the advantage of the fire gun is really not great.

It's only when defending the city that it's slightly more convenient to use. In the field, being trapped in the cold and harsh natural conditions of the north really did not have much advantage.

But the firearm is the dividing line between hot and cold weapons, and it can't go back to the basics, back to the Stone Age!

It said: "The reason why Yidi is afraid of China is that firearms are also in awe", that is, this firearm makes people fearful, and there is no reason why it should not be used in the army.

"Where the hammer bird is hammered, first take the iron straight as a big basket as the cold bone, and wrap it in a red iron hammer. The first is three connections, the interface is red, and it is trying its best to collide. After the combination, the quadrangular steel cone is used as a big one, and it is rotated through it to make the aurora clean, and there is no blockage in the medicine. ”

According to Song Yingxing, the bird's gun production process has been used for hundreds of years. Although the ignition technology of the fire gun was improved several times, the process of building the gun body was not completely abandoned until the rise of the Westernization Movement in the late Qing Dynasty.

The barrel is made of wrought iron, about 1.9 meters long, weighs about 12 pounds, has a front sight, a door, and is installed on a wooden support. Two inches out of the mouth of the wooden support, and seven inches after the support bend downward. Don't hold it up again, it weighs three taels, and there is a fire rope. Each time you fire, you will have three coins of gunpowder and three coins of buckshot. The caliber is 13 mm, and the firing range can reach about one hundred and fifty meters.

However, the first feeling for Wang Song was that the body of the fire gun was long, the caliber was small, the weight was light, and the power was not enough to pierce the heavy armor.

According to historical records, there were arquebuses in the Southern Song Dynasty, but now Wang Song has not seen the shadow of the legendary musket. However, under his own guidance, Lin Tianyou developed the first spontaneous fire gun of this era.

"Xianggong, this is the customized gunpowder bag you want."

Wang Song took the cylindrical paper bag handed over by Lin Tianyou, looked at it, and nodded: "Have you test-shot?"

"Xianggong, I have tried to shoot, but the effect of armor piercing is not good, that is, forty or fifty meters, I'm afraid it won't come in handy."

Lin Tianyou was a little nervous. The range of the firearm has not been able to go up, which has become a bottleneck in the quantitative production of firearms, but it has not been able to be overcome.

The paper-wrapped gunpowder is a rotten stalk on the Internet in later generations. Wrap the amount of gunpowder and projectiles together in oiled paper. During the battle, the soldier bites open the paper bag with his mouth, pours a part of the gunpowder into the fire door, and uses it as a primer, and the remaining gunpowder in the paper bag is stuffed through the mouth of the fire gun along with the projectile.

The use of this fixed gunpowder bullet made the reloading procedure of the non-commissioned soldier simpler, shorter and more lethal of the firearm shot.

"Is this projectile easy to make?"

Touching the smooth projectiles, Wang Song frowned and asked, but he thought in his heart, can such a thing, sixty or seventy steps, really break the iron armor of the Jurchens?

"Xianggong, the projectile is easy to make, the iron mold can be done, and the size can be the same."

Lin Tianyou picked up a sword and handed it over, and said, "There is no way to make this kind of sword into a thin blade, only to fight like this."

Wang Song took the sword and looked at it carefully. This 40-centimeter, sleeve-shaped prismatic sword is actually the bayonet of later generations. In view of the fact that the current iron-smelting technology could not be reached, in order to ensure the strength of the bayonet and not break on the battlefield, Lin Tianyou and others had to create this triangular bayonet.

A good bayonet, both toughness and strength, must be guaranteed to a certain extent. Lin Tianyou's choice of this sword was also a last resort.

"God bless, according to your description, this armor-piercing ability is still insufficient!"

Lin Tianyou shook his head and said: "Xianggong, if you want to increase your power, I'm afraid you have to increase the amount of medicine and expand the inner chamber like artillery." It's just that in this way, the firearm will inevitably be cumbersome, and it may not last on the battlefield. ”

Wang Song nodded and said: "You can try, not only must it be suitable for soldiers to use, not too heavy, but also to strengthen the power, at least 50 steps to break the armor, otherwise you will really not be as good as an archer."

"Let's go to the shooting range."

To see is to believe. There is no room for sloppiness in major military affairs, so Wang Song still decided to go to the shooting range and observe it for himself.

The range was in a clearing at the back of the ironworks, about the size of half a football field in later generations, and was surrounded by a fence. During each test firing, there are special soldiers around to guard it for secrecy and security.

There are a lot of targets in the open space, and the distance is different, it seems that Lin Tianyou and others come to test the fire gun on weekdays.

"God bless, I'll try it myself."

Wang Songtong's heart was still unsettled, and he suddenly became interested. He stopped Lin Tianyou, who was about to come forward to test shoot the firecracker, grabbed a leather bag with fixed ammunition, put on a helmet with facial protection, and stepped forward.

Wang Song picked up the slightly heavy fire gun and walked to the white line of lime. He opened the fire door on the firecracker, took a paper-wrapped bullet from the leather bag, and tore open the corner of the paper bullet with his teeth, and a faint smell of ink entered his mouth.

He carefully poured some gunpowder into the fire door and closed it. He pointed the muzzle of the gun up, and then stuffed the remaining gunpowder from the paper bag into the barrel along with the projectile.

He removed the through-strip from the butt, reached into the barrel, tamped the paper pack, inserted the through-strip back into the butt, and lit the arquebus.

Wang Song fastened the fire rope to the fire rope clip. At this time, the lid of the primer pot is closed, so he doesn't have to worry about the sparks of the arquebus igniting the primer and causing a fire. Besides, he's wearing protective gear.

Everything was ready, Wang Song blew the fire rope, aimed ahead, pulled the trigger, the fire rope fell, and the lid of the primer pot was opened. The primer ignited the paper-wrapped bullet, the fire was dazzling, and Wang Song quickly closed his eyes.

With a "snap", a puff of white smoke rose and the projectile shot out.

Just after a test shot, Wang Song sweated on his forehead and shook his head frequently, this procedure is too complicated.

Despite the heat, he shot several more times in a row, and slowly became proficient. Basically, one or two hits a minute should be no problem.

There is no problem with the range of the firebolt, which can reach more than 100 paces. It's just that this armor-piercing ability, only about thirty or forty steps, can penetrate the armor on the target.

No matter how far you shoot, it is useless if you can't break through the armor.

"God bless, this fire gun will definitely not work now!"

Wang Song shook his head and said: "The front gun tube is too long, and it is inconvenient to load ammunition, so it must be truncated, at least a small half." God forbid, I want you to make a musket, not a spear, and you can't just look at the length. ”

"The other thing is ......"

Wang Song pinched the lead pellet in his hand, shook his head and said, "With such a small projectile, it must be very difficult to break the armor." Increase its weight, at least one or two times. Increase the size of the lead pellet, increase the dosage of medicine, and increase the caliber of the fire gun, so as to better pierce the armor. ”

A light arquebus of the 16th century, weighing about 9 catties and with a caliber of about 15 mm. And a 16th-century Spanish heavy arquebus, weighing more than 15 pounds, with a caliber of 17.8-23 mm. This means that a light arquebus fires 14g heavy lead bullet, while a heavy arquebus can fire more than 56 grams of lead bullet.

Heavy arquebuses can pierce armor up to 90 meters away and kill people or horses up to 450 meters away. A heavy arquebus in the later Graz, Austria arsenal, after being loaded with 14g of gunpowder, fired a 38g lead bullet and penetrated a 2mm thick steel target 100 meters away.

I think of history, the Jurchens attacked the indispensable Tiefutu, and the iron harriers of the Tangut people. To deal with these heavy cavalry, if you don't have a strong armor-piercing ability, it is better to use a long knife and a heavy axe.

"What does a standard flintlock pistol look like?"

After careful consideration, the information of the two flintlock pistols in later generations appeared in Wang Song's mind.

The infantry flintlock pistol caliber 20 mm, the length of the gun is 156 cm, the gun weighs 11 pounds, and the projectile weighs 32 grams.

Cavalry flintlock pistol, caliber 17 mm, gun length 121 cm, gun weight 9 pounds, projectile weight 21 grams.

Compared with the flintlock pistol in front of him, the caliber of 13 mm, the caliber of these two muskets that I can think of has reached 17 and 20 mm, and there should be no problem in breaking armor in about 100 steps.

Wang Song thought for a while, converted the size and specifications of the two muskets, wrote them down on paper, and then said: "God bless, as we discussed earlier, the firecrackers are made of two sizes, one for cavalry and one for infantry, which are about these two sizes."

Arquebuses to flintlock guns, breech guns, to breech guns, metal bullets......

Wang Song can remember the development process of the musket, and this is probably it.

However, the technical difficulties from arquebuses to flintlock pistols are not very easy to solve.

A piece of flint is clamped between the jaws of the hammer, and an iron stone is placed on the side of the fire hole. When firing, the trigger was pulled, and under the action of the spring, the flint smashed heavily on the iron stone, sparks emerged, and it fell into the pool of fire. The gunpowder burns up and shoots directly.

In this way, the firing process is greatly simplified, the rate and accuracy of firing are improved, and the non-commissioned officers are also simple and convenient to use. In addition, the low cost is convenient for mass production, so that it can be equipped with the army.

Otherwise, if only twenty or thirty muskets can be produced in a month, it will not be able to form a scale and platoon of guns to kill, and it will not play any role on the battlefield.

Wang Song also felt a little regretful. If he had invested more in muskets earlier, perhaps a new spontaneous musket would have been applied to the battlefield.