While Frederick was beginning his determination to build a more powerful armored cruiser for the British Empire with a telegram from the port of Durban from the Sitis, the Germans were also learning their lessons.

First of all, the Lufthansa's run out of coal after arriving in Maputo Bay made the German navy top brass extremely worried, although the calculation of coal consumption at various speeds was carried out during the sea trial, but the actual coal consumption of the Lufthansa was much higher than the calculation for more than 6 days.

There are many reasons for this problem, such as the loss of power caused by the long-term mechanical wear and tear, and the combustion rate of coal burning is not ideal, but as a result, if it does not enter the Portuguese port to replenish coal, then it is likely that even if the Lufthansa has a smooth voyage, it will be difficult to meet the German coal carriers that come to meet it. This possibility was fatal for the German naval hierarchy.

The Lufthansa would then return to Germany via the Suez Canal with Herzog, and the Lufthansa would go to the STT shipyard for overhauls, looking for reasons for the higher fuel consumption rate than the calculated number jù, and finding ways to increase the boiler combustion rate and reduce the work losses of the power pack.

However, these methods were not effective for a while, so how to solve the problem of the endurance of German ships as quickly as possible became the most important thing. The German navy was a late starter, and for a long time it was trapped in small ponds in the Baltic and North Seas, and the ease of navigation in the open ocean did not take much.

Although the German Navy ships have now been developed, the endurance is not bad in horizontal comparison, but considering the situation faced by the German Navy, it is more severe than other countries. Germany is not Britain or France, and overseas bases are all over the world, and you can add coal wherever you want. It's not Italy either, it's enough to guard the Mediterranean with peace of mind.

Germany, which had overseas colonies, but the number of colonies could not meet the needs of naval voyages, had to pay a greater price than others to solve this problem.

The German Navy came to the conclusion that the problem would be solved by building more auxiliary ships, and that Imperial auxiliary ships would be deployed on the routes between the colonies, so that the Navy's ships could be more easily resupplied and that they could be neutralized in wartime. Thus concealing their purpose.

But this has become an additional expense of the Navy's shipbuilding program, although it is an additional expense, but it is not entirely a disadvantage for Jochen, and how to find the positive side from the disadvantage is the biggest golden finger of the traverser.

How could such a good opportunity be missed, Jochen simply took advantage of the topic and once again forced a new idea for the Germans: "It is a huge expense to build a large number of coal carriers to deploy on the shipping routes, and of course in view of the situation in our country I admit that this expenditure is indeed necessary to be spent. But can we think about it differently, why are we building a large number of auxiliary ships to deploy on the route, and not using this money to build auxiliary ships that can act with the fleet?

Of course. Trying to keep up with the fleet means that these auxiliary vessels are more demanding and the price will naturally increase, but I don't think even if they are expensive, they will not be much more expensive than building a large number of auxiliary ships and then spreading them out. And if you can follow the fleet, then I think it should be more efficient than having to rendezvous at a certain location before you can resupply. ”

"Your Highness, your idea is indeed very good, but you should know that even if the coal carrier moves with the fleet, it will not improve the efficiency of coal supply, and the various constraints in practical use will not be much different from the coal ship deployed in a specific area after rendezvous with coal." Tirpitz objected to this.

In fact, the concept of a fleet coal carrier is not new, and the British tried it at a very early age. An attempt was made to use cables to resupply ships longitudinally at sea. However, when the British tried, they found that the time it took to transport coal, a solid fuel, through a wobble cable, to fill the massive coal tanks of an ironclad ship. Not only is it a waste of time, but it also has no real combat value.

The British were the first to try it, so everyone knew that it was not reliable, so the supply of coal was still done in the form of a dock or a gang, in a moored state, so Jochen's construction was not feasible in the eyes of a professional like Tirpitz.

Of course, these Jochens knew that he dared to make such a request, and naturally there was a way to deal with it: "Of course I understand this. Not only that, but there are many, many problems with coal burning, such as the difference in the combustion efficiency of different qualities of coal that has a great impact on the speed of ships. Coal is also inefficient to burn, which also limits the speed and range of ships.

The volume of coal also takes up a lot of space and carries a lot of weight, and the billowing smoke from the sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides emitted by incomplete combustion can also be an excellent reference for the rangefinder. Moreover, our boilers should also regularly clean up the cinders, otherwise it will further affect the combustion efficiency. In that case, why don't we switch to a different fuel? ”

"What do you mean? Fuel oil? Tirpitz asked cautiously.

"Of course, the combustion efficiency of fuel is much higher than that of coal, and there will be no billowing smoke, weight and space are also more advantageous than coal, and more importantly, the fuel is flowing, our supply ships need to pressurize the oil tank with the pressure pump, and then the fuel can be easily transported to the ship that needs to be replenished, so that it can be replenished during the voyage."

And our sailors don't need to shovel cinders into the boiler more often, isn't that a big advantage enough to make us excited? Jochen was bewitched.

"However, coal is still the mainstream fuel now, no matter which port can replenish coal, but the fuel is almost gone, even if the fuel has many advantages, but the inconvenience of replenishment is still a difficulty."

Tirpitz's idea could not be said to be wrong, and this idea also influenced the design of German ships in a large part of history, and the German navy was not unaware of the advantages of fuel oil, but German ships still stubbornly refused to use all-oil boilers, which led to a large number of performance constraints.

In addition to the fact that Germany itself is a major coal-producing country, not to mention that its own oil reserves have not been discovered, and even if it is discovered, it cannot be extracted with the technology at that time, and there is also the popularity of coal.

Tirpitz is right, you can get coal in any port, you really can't do it, the reason for the complete demise of Spee's Far East Fleet in history is seen by future generations as Spee's own complacent after the Battle of Coronelle, and a series of misjudgments made in the Battle of Falkland.

However, the root cause of this result is that Spee wants to go to Port Stanley to get a ticket so that he can grab the ignited coal and come back. Such a decision was naturally the result of Spee's complacency, but it also proved that attacking the port and grabbing coal was also a viable means of breaking up the engagement at sea, and if you were using fuel, it would be useless.

However, from Jochen's point of view, breaking the diplomatic relationship is secondary, as long as you can get the main force of the British Navy in a head-on decisive battle and gain sea supremacy, then it is easy to say, but you can't do it, no matter how much preparation you make, it will only be Spee's end.

In this case, the advantages of fuel are self-evident, but even naval technologists like Tirpitz are hesitant to use fuel, let alone others, and it is difficult to get it all at once, so Jochen can only continue to take a step back as a compromise.

"Alfred, in my opinion, a boiler that burns only heavy oil is the best choice to get the most out of the ship's performance, but I can understand the concern about using all aspects of fuel all at once, but new technologies always have to be tried.

I have an idea here to install both coal-fired and oil-fired boilers in the ship, and only use coal-fired boilers when sailing at lower speeds, so that the coal can be easily replenished and can help the ship gain greater endurance, and then use oil-fired boilers when it needs to sail at full speed.

Moreover, the coal-fired boiler has also made certain improvements, and the nozzle is installed on the traditional coal-fired boiler, and only coal is burned in the general navigation state, and heavy oil is sprayed on the coal to support combustion when it is sailing at full speed, so as to improve the combustion efficiency.

This can be tried first on cruisers that require high speeds and are deployed overseas, and if an oil-fired boiler can prove its worth, then how about an all-oil-fired boiler? At that time, we will consider whether there is value in a special fleet oil and water supply ship.

And before that, I needed the cooperation of the technical department of the Navy. ”

Tirpitz asked, "Your Highness, what do you need to cooperate?" ”

"Although the Navy has now chosen the Dürer boiler as the power system for the various types of cruisers being built and designed, we are now developing our own boiler in an attempt to combine the advantages of the Sulzer and Sannikrovt boilers.

I hope that new ideas can be added to this research and development plan, based on the coal-fired boiler that we are currently developing, and the oil-coal mixed firing boiler and the heavy oil special firing boiler can be developed, so as to ensure the unity of the basic technical details, which is beneficial. ”

"It's worth a try, even if the new naval boiler is successfully developed, it is not ready to be equipped on heavy cruisers for the time being, light cruisers will be the first users of the new boilers, and the two concepts you proposed, we can try them first with light cruisers." Tirpitz agreed.

"Well, hopefully we're moving fast enough, I don't want to wait too long." Jochen nodded, the British began to use oil-coal boilers extensively in 1906, and in 1910 the first generation of fleet oil tankers was born, leaving not much time for Germany. (To be continued......)