The Luliang Mountains stretch for more than 800 miles from north to south, and its north is the famous three major passes of the Great Song Dynasty - Yanmen Pass, Partial Pass, and Ningwu Pass, which are the "Screen Domain of the Three Jin Dynasty", "the key to the north of the Jin Dynasty", and are also an important barrier for the Great Song Dynasty to resist the Khitan, extending to the south to the south of the Jinning Army. Pen? Interesting? Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 The Info Volcano Army, the Baode Army, Lanzhou, the Jinning Army, Shizhou and other places all belong to the Luliang Mountain area.

Jingqiang Village is actually very close to the Luliang Mountain Area, the east of the Yellow River is the Luliang Mountain area, and the Jingqiang Village is close to the east of Xingxian County on the main vein of Luliang Mountain, Zhong Hao met Zhu Kui cut the path of the stone monkey mountain belongs to the main vein of Luliang Mountain,

However, Zhong Hao was only in charge of the training of troops in Tuntian, and the Cave Ye River would flow when it reached the Yellow River, and the Luliang Mountain area was east of the Yellow River, so Zhong Hao naturally had no right to lead troops to cross the border to the east of the Yellow River. Therefore, if Jingqiang Village wants to go to Luliang Mountain to suppress bandits, it has to communicate with the local government where Jingqiang Village wants to go to suppress bandits, and of course, it must also be reported to the Shuai Si for approval.

However, these things are not difficult to do, the Pingxi Army wants to go to other prefectures and counties to suppress bandits, and the officials of those prefectures and counties are naturally welcome, and they can still make the local areas appeased without their efforts, so why not do it. As for the approval from Shuai Si's side, for Zhong Hao, it is naturally a very simple matter.

However, this matter is not urgent, now the soldiers of the war battalion are familiar with some skills and cooperation of infantry combat and mountain warfare, and after training for more than a month, the weather is completely cold, and then it is the right time to suppress the bandits.

Zhong Hao asked the craftsmen of the gunpowder workshop to make ** bags and earth-shattering thunder, the more such things, the better. The more these ** bags and the earth-shattering thunder are brought to suppress the bandits, the easier it will be to conquer the cottages of the bandits in Luliang Mountain, which is the most important reliance of the war barracks.

…………

Zhong Hao recently studied steelmaking with craftsmen in a workshop by the Kuno River.

The iron embryo promised by Fu Bi has already been delivered, but the documents for casting weapons and armor are still being approved by the imperial court.

However, although there was no approval document for casting weapons and armor, Zhong Hao didn't wait, and first smelted the good steel.

Besides, even if the blacksmith shop can still make a few swords, there will be no problem in Jingqiang Village to build a few test swords. Besides, Jingqiang Village is located in a desolate place, and there are no people around, even if they build weapons openly, it is estimated that no one will know.

The blast furnace for smelting iron embryos by the Kuno River has also been built, and this blast furnace for refining iron embryos is modeled after the blast furnace for smelting coke, but the heat of coke burning molten iron ore is greater than that of charcoal, so a layer of refractory bricks has been added to the inside of this blast furnace, and of course it is also added for molten iron to flow out of the trench.

The test went smoothly, although the first furnace test was unsuccessful, but the second furnace melted the molten iron. Zhong Hao watched the molten iron melt out, and couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. The iron formed by the cooling of these molten irons is definitely the best malleable iron compared to the malleable iron that the Great Song Dynasty could not burn.

Zhong Hao also instructed the craftsmen to set up several pairs of hydraulic forging hammers on the bank of the Kuye River, and after several adjustments, these hydraulic forging hammers were also installed.

The impurities floating in the molten iron are filtered out, and then the molten iron is introduced into the finished weapon mold, and the weapon embryo can be cast. Then, after it is melted, it is forged with a hydraulic hammer, and so on many times, and you can get a good weapon.

The molten iron melted by blast furnace smelting has fewer impurities than ordinary malleable iron in the Great Song Dynasty, and with the hydraulic forging hammer, it can be easier to complete the forging, and I believe that it is easy to smelt the steel of 100 forging steel quality. You must know that a blacksmith's manpower is always limited, forging a weapon requires considerable physical strength, making a hundred forging steel sword, repeatedly burning and forging a hundred times takes more than ten days to complete, completely unable to mass-produced, and with a hydraulic forging hammer, it can be completed more easily. The weapons and armor made of 100 forged steel quality steel, Zhong Hao believes that they will be very sharp.

After setting up the hydraulic forging hammer, I am afraid that the rest of the things will not help much, and the matter of forging weapons depends on the skills of several blacksmiths, Zhong Hao can only wait to see the results.

…………

The war camp is about to go to Luliang Mountain to suppress bandits, and it is naturally too late to wait for the weapons and equipment made by Jingqiang Village's own workshop. Of course, even if it was in time, Jingqiang Village did not have the permission to manufacture weapons on a large scale. Besides, with the amount of iron embryos sent by his old man Taishan, even if all of them are weapons, they are not enough to be equipped with war barracks.

Fortunately, there were a lot of weapons and armor captured in the front camp of Xixia Mountain during that war, and Zhong Hao also asked the Yang family caravan to help Jingqiang Village buy a lot of armor and weapons from Yinxing and the city, plus the weapons and cavalry bows allocated by the commander, the equipment of the three hundred soldiers in the war camp is quite complete, and the long and short weapons, armor, and riding bows are basically guaranteed to be equipped by everyone. In terms of one battalion alone, it is the elite of the forbidden army of the Western Army, and many of them do not have such complete equipment as the war barracks.

Zhong Hao felt that he was training the soldiers of the war battalion to be all-round soldiers, not only to be able to use long and short weapons, but also to be able to ride and shoot.

The cold-forged armor and the Xia sword of the Western Xia are both very famous. Although the Xia Ren Sword is extremely sharp, the short blade of the sword is too unsuitable for use on the battlefield, and the sword is a double-sided blade, and it is easy to hurt himself when encountering heavy weapons such as iron rods and maces, and it is easy to break, so Zhong Hao is not very interested in this Xia Ren Sword. However, Zhong Hao is very interested in the cold forging armor of the Western Xia people, it is said that the most famous Qizi armor in the Western Xia is difficult to shoot through even the crossbow.

However, the control of the Xixia people over this cold forging armor is very strict, and it is difficult for the Yang family caravan to bring it out of the pass, and the production of cold forging armor of the Xixia people itself is not large, so Zhong Hao has not been able to get his wish. The armor purchased by the Yang family caravan for Jingqiang Village was all leather armor.

However, although the protection ability of leather armor is lower than that of the moon iron armor, it is better to be light, and it is enough to wear light leather armor to go to Luliang Mountain to suppress bandits, anyway, those bandits basically have no long-range weapons such as bows and crossbows, and it is difficult to fight in the mountains wearing heavy iron armor, but there are many drawbacks.

The armor captured in the defeat of the Xixia Mountain Front Battalion was basically leather armor, and the only pair of iron armor was a real pair of Poor Armor, which was worn by the commander of the Shan Qian Battalion, which was captured by Yang Huaiyu, and now this pair of Poor Armor belongs to Yang Huaiyu.

Only a few large and small officers in the barracks had iron armor, which was allocated by the commander.

Although it is quite advantageous to wear leather armor to suppress bandits in the mountains, when it comes to real field battles, whether it is infantry or cavalry, an iron armor can still add a lot of protection and security guarantees, and can increase a lot of combat effectiveness.

Zhong Hao planned to wait for the steel-making technology of Jingqiang Village to mature, and after the approval of the imperial court to allow the casting of weapons came down, he would first equip the soldiers of the war camp with sophisticated equipment. Since the cavalry and archery skills of the soldiers in the war battalion will not be able to improve for a while, they will supplement the equipment.

…………

Several blacksmiths from the weapon workshop by the river came out with weapons made from the first furnace of molten iron, and the first weapons made from the molten iron of the blast furnace were twenty swords.

Several old blacksmiths came to ask Zhong Hao to try the knives, and according to them, the quality of these twenty knives was completely comparable to the quality of hundreds of forged steel. Of course, part of the reason they were so happy was that they were happy to build the best weapons, and even more because of the bounty that was about to come.

Zhong Hao went to the training ground of the barracks, and called Cui Feng and Yang Huaiyu to go to the Jingqiang Village weapon workshop by the Guye River to try the knife.

Seeing Zhong Hao and the three of them coming to the weapon workshop, several old blacksmiths hurriedly took out a few newly made horse chopping knives for the three of them to try.

Zhong Hao and the three of them each picked up a battle sabre to check.

The horse chopping knife in Zhong Hao's hand is a Song Dynasty shaped horse chopping knife, the blade is three feet long, the blade glows with a cold glow, the handle is more than a foot long, the handle and the blade are cast in one piece, you can hold the knife with one hand, you can also hold the knife with both hands.

The Song Dynasty horse chopping knife and the ancient horse chopping knife are not the same thing, the Song Dynasty horse chopping knife originated from the Tang Dynasty horizontal knife, the total length of the body is about four feet, it is a short weapon. In ancient times, the horse chopping knife was a long-handled weapon, which belonged to a long weapon, and the famous Mo knife in the Tang Dynasty was derived from the Han Dynasty horse chopping knife. The Mo knife weighs fifteen pounds, eight feet long, the blade is three feet long, the handle is five feet long, the horse step waterway can be used, it is a powerful long weapon, especially when riding on foot, it has a great deterrent effect.

Zhong Hao was a little puzzled, since there was a shortage of war horses in the Great Song Dynasty and cavalry was scarce, why didn't he build more Mo Dao and train Mo Dao Formation to fight against the cavalry of Western Xia and Khitan? But thinking about these things, those self-proclaimed smart Song Wenchen should have thought about it a long time ago, and the reason why they don't use it, Zhong Hao estimates that the main reason is that the Modao Formation has too high requirements for the quality of individual soldiers.

"Good knife technique!" Yang Huaiyu, who was beside him, cheered loudly, and pulled Zhong Hao back from his scattered thoughts.

Zhong Hao came back to his senses and saw Cui Feng holding a newly made horse chopping knife, dancing beside him with both knives in his hands.

Yang Huaiyu and Cui Feng are both quite strong in martial arts, and they admire each other very much, plus they have been mixed together in the war camp all day long, and they have already become very familiar with each other. At this time, seeing Cui Feng's set of knife skills dancing vigorously, he couldn't help but applaud from the bottom of his heart.

After Cui Feng finished a set of knife strokes, he arched his hand to Yang Huaiyu and said with a smile: "Haha, my brother is ugly!" However, this knife is quite easy to use. ”

Zhong Hao said to the two: "Whether it is easy or not is secondary, the key is to be sharp, let's mainly try whether it is sharp or not." Zhong Hao felt that sharpness was the most critical place.

Yang Huaiyu and Cui Feng looked at Zhong Hao with disdain. When rushing into battle, the high-speed galloping war horse, even if the back of the knife is flat, it is easy to cut off the enemy's head, and both of them think that sharpness is not the most important thing in cavalry combat, and it is very important to be smooth, thick, and not easy to break.

However, in foot combat, this slashing knife is sharp, but it takes a big advantage.

Zhong Hao looked at the disdainful gazes of the two, and couldn't help but smile bitterly: "Even if I am not completely right, but no matter what, the war knife is sharp, and it always has a great advantage!" ”

Only then did Yang Huaiyu and Cui Feng retract their disdainful gazes.

Zhong Hao asked a few blacksmiths to find a standard single knife equipped by the Song army, held it with both hands, and asked Cui Feng to try it with all his strength.

Yang Huaiyu looked at Zhong Hao from the side, Cui Feng was extremely powerful, if he used all his strength to cut Zhong Hao's knife, maybe it would shock Zhong Hao's tiger mouth open; If it is cut off, Zhong Hao will not be able to control his body, and he may hurt himself. At that moment, Yang Huaiyu stepped forward to take the horse chopping knife in Zhong Hao's hand, and said with a smile: "Big brother, I'll do this job, don't hurt yourself!" ”

Zhong Hao also knew his ability, and he was not polite to Yang Huaiyu, so he handed the horse chopping knife in his hand to Yang Huaiyu at the moment.

Yang Huaiyu and Cui Feng both put on a posture, nodded to each other, and at the same time exhaled and shouted, slashing the knife in their hands hard.

With a sound of "dang", only the lower half of the single knife in Yang Huaiyu's hand remained, and the upper half of the knife body was cut to the ground by Cui Feng's horse chopping knife.

"What a sharp knife," the two said loudly at the same time.

Zhong Hao saw Cui Feng cut off the Song Army's single knife in Yang Huaiyu's hand, and couldn't help but be very excited, it seems that the steel made in this blast furnace is really sharp.

Zhong Hao had already heard a report from a few old blacksmiths just now, and this horse chopping knife had only been beaten with a hydraulic forging hammer for a day for the time being, and it had been repeatedly burned and forged more than a dozen times. However, the sharpness of the test just now has exceeded the sharpness of the sword made of 100 forged steel. It is a sword made of 100 forged steel, and I am afraid that it cannot easily cut off the standard single knife of the Song army.

Zhong Hao couldn't help but wonder~ Lewd Dao: This forging more than a dozen times, it is already so sharp, if it is forged a hundred times, is it a sharp and incomparable divine weapon? !

Of course, Zhong Hao knows that he is just meaning ~ lewdness, in fact, forging is mainly to remove impurities in the steel and enhance the toughness of the steel, in fact, after the ordinary malleable iron has been forged, the impurities have been basically removed, and the sharpness after opening is a certain number. And like the steel billet of Jingqiang Village, because it is cast with molten iron, there are fewer impurities, and forging more than a dozen times can basically ensure the removal of impurities in the steel, it is estimated that it is forged dozens of times, which may be slightly better than the current effect, and it is not too sharp.

In fact, the Great Song Dynasty also had a relatively clever casting process at this time, and it was also possible to cast very sharp swords, which were manufactured by the steel-clad method, which was very time-consuming and laborious, and had extremely high requirements for steel and technology, and those steel-covered casting swords needed frequent maintenance, which was difficult to produce in large quantities, and even more difficult to install in the Great Song Army. Therefore, those swords and swords forged by the steel-clad method can only be used as the playthings of the rich.

The weapon casting in Jingqiang Village has to take a practical path, and it must be able to be produced in large quantities to be effective, so Zhong Hao does not plan to increase the forging time. The hydraulic hammer forging a day's worth of weapons is already very useful.

You must know that a hydraulic hammer can only forge one weapon a day, which is already very slow, and the forging time cannot be increased. If you want to increase production in the future, you will need to install more hydraulic forging hammers, and now the current weapon workshop in Jingqiang Village has only installed ten hydraulic forging hammers, which is already the limit. There is not much material resources to install more hydraulic forging hammers in Jingqiang Village for the time being, and a hydraulic forging hammer is also quite expensive. Moreover, there are only a limited number of blacksmiths in Jingqiang Village, and each hammer needs at least one blacksmith and one apprentice to guard. If you want to scale up, you'll have to wait until later.

In any case, Zhong Hao was already very satisfied with being able to make such a sharp horse chopping knife, and immediately fulfilled the bonus he promised to the old blacksmiths.

Zhong Hao asked Hou Quan to go to Hedong Shuaisi again, and sent five newly cast horse chopping knives to his Taishan father-in-law, and let him see that he said that Jingqiang Village can cast sharp weapons is not nonsense, and I hope he can help Jingqiang Village get the text of casting weapons as soon as possible. (To be continued.) )

...