In a blink of an eye, it was the twelfth day of the first month of the thirteenth year of Chongzhen. Although Ma Chaodong and the others have already reported on the fourth day of the new year, these days, they have only found a place in the county seat as a gunpowder workshop to build all kinds of equipment needed, but they are not ready to start work at all. The reason is that they have a shortage of raw materials and no sulfur, so they can't start working.

Although they also inquired about the source of raw materials in the firecracker workshop, they basically did not inquire about anything useful. The imperial court had strict control over sulfur, and it was difficult to buy it legally without the imperial court's citation. But as long as there is a profit, there will be merchants to do it. Just like salt and iron, although it is a monopoly of the government, there is still an endless stream of smuggling people. The same is true of the border trade with the Mongols and the Jurchens, even if the imperial court has repeatedly banned it, but the border generals have always earned endless money from the private border trade.

Li Yan took people to Zhuxian Town again, and found a stable source of charcoal, saltpeter, and sulfur in the town. Although it costs a lot of money, the most important thing is to be able to get it. He also looked at iron powder, lead, copper, tin and other metals, iron powder, lead and tin are relatively easy to get. But copper is not easy to get, after all, it is the raw material for making money, and it is more controlled.

On this day, Li Yan came to the blacksmith workshop, and Blacksmith Zhou finally made a gun pipe, but it was a three-eyed gun pipe.

Li Yan took the three-eyed gun and looked at it over and over. I saw that three pipes more than one foot long were fixed on a three-pronged bottom support, and there were three iron hoops on the three pipes, which bundled the finished pipes together in a zigzag. Each tube has a small hole at the end that is used to point the lead.

"Is this a single-layer pipe or a double-layer pipe?" Li Yan asked.

Blacksmith Zhou replied: "I made a single-layer pipe according to Gongzi's suggestion. Iron powder and toner are added when the interface is forged, and there is a margin on both sides of the iron sheet, which is stacked together, and after making a few sticks, the problem of air leakage is basically gone. ”

Li Yan nodded and asked, "What is the caliber?" ”

"Four minutes (probably less than thirteen millimeters), the wall of the pipe is one and a half minutes, and the tail is slightly thicker." Blacksmith Zhou said.

Li Yan had the three-eyed gun in his hand, and he felt that he had seven or eight pounds. He asked, "Have you tried it?" ”

"Tried it, launched five times, and every time there were no problems. Single-barrel launches, continuous launches, three-barreled salvos have all been tried. The lead that Wang Renhui brought back was very useful. Blacksmith Zhou said with a smile. They had already cast it several times, and they didn't dare to report it to Li Yan until there was no problem.

Li Yan said with interest: "Okay, let me see it once." ”

Blacksmith Zhou immediately asked people to prepare, and the gunpowder was directly used from the fireworks. Ma Chaodong and they brought nine back, and Li Yan left five, which just came in handy. There were fewer impurities in the gunpowder that was fired, so it was able to send the fireworks to a height of ten feet. And it was not a lead shot that was fired, but iron sand.

Li Yan was pulled far away by Blacksmith Zhou, and they watched Blacksmith Zhou's apprentice come to experiment. The tester first loaded the wooden pole, then filled it with a medicine spoon, then loaded it with iron sand, then with a lead, and finally filled the gunpowder and iron sand at the bottom with a through strip.

The apprentice glanced at Blacksmith Zhou, and after getting Blacksmith Zhou's signal, he used a fire medium to ignite Ning's lead. This lead is three different short leads, this time to demonstrate a burst of fire, they want to show the most powerful side of each Li Yan.

After igniting it, the apprentice grasped the wooden pole with both hands, stretched the three-eyed gun forward as best he could, and twisted his face as if he was afraid of exploding. Luckily, though, he also knew how to make the three-eyed gun as flat as possible, so that the iron sand could hit the big plank ten paces away.

With a bang, the gunpowder in a gun tube was launched, and the iron sand inside was emitted with fire and black smoke.

After one breath, there was another "bang", and the gunpowder from the second gun tube was also fired, and with another breath, the gunpowder in the last gun tube was also fired.

The firebolt's caster is shaken up by the recoil after each barrel fire. He always tried to press down on the mouth of the gun so that the next cast could still be basically straight, obviously doing a lot of training.

"Alright, Childe, let's go see the effect." Blacksmith Zhou invited.

Li Yan and Blacksmith Zhou came to the wooden board and found that the one-zhang square wooden board was full of iron sand embedded in the wooden board. Li Yan touched it with his hand and found that the iron sand was not very deep, only about one point.

"This power is not good," Li Yan said disappointedly: "There are eleven or twelve steps here, if you can deal with an enemy without armor, it is okay, but it is not good to deal with an enemy with armor." And we have crossbow arrows, the range and power are greater than this, and this one is better than the strike area. ”

Blacksmith Zhou was a little disappointed and said, "Otherwise, if you add some more gunpowder, you will be able to fight farther." ”

Li Yan shook his head and said, "Don't add indiscriminately, test slowly and find the best amount of propellant." It can not only make the fire gun hit far, but also not the danger of exploding. But why not try it without lead shots? ”

Blacksmith Zhou replied: "The mold of that projectile has not been made yet, so a suitable lead pellet has not been made yet." ”

Li Yan said: "Don't worry, you make it slowly, but the lead shot must be as close to the diameter as possible to four points, but it can't be greater than four points." If it's big, it can't fit in, and if it's small, the gap is too big, which is not conducive to shooting far. ”

"What I know is that I want to do better, so I haven't done it." Blacksmith Zhou said with some shame.

Li Yan comforted: "You have done a good job, give you thirty catties of meat and four horses of cloth, as for how to divide it, you decide, you must let the meritorious people get benefits, can you do it?" "Now there is still value for food and use, but no one wants silver and copper coins. Now there is a shortage of food, and the prices of meat and cloth have also risen, and you can't buy a bucket of wheat for two taels of silver.

"Gongzi Xie, I will assign it to them." Blacksmith Zhou thanked loudly. After that, he shouted loudly: "Listen up, the son will reward us with thirty catties of meat and four horses of cloth!" ”

When the seven or eight blacksmiths around heard this, they immediately cheered. After a while, more than 30 craftsmen in the entire blacksmith workshop shouted happily: "Thank you Gongzi!" ”

Li Yan instructed: "You must expand the production of the three-eyed gun, but you must ensure the quality. There aren't many ****** left, and you will use them to test the newly produced pipes. The lead shot should also be made out as soon as possible, the iron sand is a chicken rib for our infantry army, and after using the lead shot, it is still somewhat useful for the cavalry. You, on the other hand, are going to start trying to build a gun pipe, and the caliber will still remain four. ”

Blacksmith Zhou felt a little pressured, but he still agreed. In this world, it would be good to be well fed and clothed, and for the sake of this stable life, he would also try his best to build a pipe. Listening to the newcomers, there is already a cannibalism situation outside, which is really terrible.