In Dawei, there were two institutions that Zhao Hongrun was more interested in.

One is the "Soldier Casting Bureau" under the Ministry of War, which is responsible for building the weapons, armor, etc. required for all applications of the Great Wei Army; There is also the "Metallurgical Bureau" under the Ministry of Industry and the Department, which is responsible for iron smelting, manufacturing equipment, and so on.

It is no exaggeration to say that the "Bing Casting Bureau" and the "Smelting Bureau", two government agencies, have the top technology of the Great Wei Dynasty. "Note: Actually, there is an internal bureau subordinate to the Inner Chamberlain, but I won't introduce it here."

The difference between the "Arsenal Bureau" and the "Smelting Bureau" is that the technology of the "Arsenal Casting Bureau" tends to be military, while the technology of the "Smelting Bureau" tends to be non-military.

It stands to reason that Zhao Hongrun should have transported these chariots to the "Soldier Casting Bureau", after all, the craftsmen of the "Soldier Casting Bureau" are better at transforming this kind of chariot into a war weapon, but unfortunately, there is a rumor that there is a news from the military department that he Zhao Hongrun insulted the military department, so the officials of the military department generally do not look at Zhao Hongrun so kindly.

Therefore, Zhao Hongrun could only transport these carriages to the "Smelting Bureau" of the Ministry of Industry, and ask the "Smelting Bureau", which had dealt with him a lot, to transform the chariots into weapons that fit his heart.

Like the "Miscasting Bureau", the chief of the "Smelting Bureau", also known as the "Bureau", is an official position of Hishiro, and is held by an official in the Ministry of Industry who has mastered the multi-faceted skills.

At present, the bureau leader of the "Smelting Bureau" is called Wang Fu, who has dealt with Zhao Hongrun and his guards a lot, and he can be regarded as a person who is more familiar with each other.

When he heard that Zhao Hongrun had transported the more than 200 chariots to the Smelting Bureau, Wang Fu of the Bureau immediately greeted him.

After all, Wang Fu had also heard the news that the imperial court was going to use troops against the Chu State, and at the same time, he had also learned that Zhao Hongrun, the eighth prince who had contributed to the matter, was going to the front line in person, so he guessed that most of these chariots would be used in the Yingshui battlefield.

"Your Highness...... Oh, no, now it's time to call His Royal Highness King Su. ”

In the courtyard of the Smelting Bureau, Wang Fu greeted Zhao Hongrun with a smile.

"Hehehe." Zhao Hongrun returned the salute with a smile, walked with Wang Fu, and said with a smile as he walked: "Lao Wang, I have another business for you this time...... Do a good job of transformation, and the labor and materials spent will be reimbursed by the household department. ”

Wang Fu smiled humbly.

There is no way, after all, the Ministry of Industry is at the bottom of the status of the six departments, and the Smelting Bureau is far inferior to the War Casting Bureau of the Ministry of War, to be honest, the status is really embarrassing.

Obviously, the Smelting Bureau has various technologies, but in the eyes of ordinary people, the biggest role of this organization is to smelt iron, forge iron embryos that meet the wishes of the War Casting Bureau, and then hand them over to the War Casting Bureau, and they accept and build weapons.

To put it bluntly, the current smelting bureau is purely for the war casting bureau.

How many people know that the Smelting Bureau is also responsible for manufacturing measurement and calculation tools, and even the large-scale tools used by the Ministry to smelt and mint national currencies are actually from the hands of the Smelting Bureau?

Wang Fu circled around a chariot a few times, carefully inspected it a few times, and then said to Zhao Hongrun hesitantly: "Your Royal Highness King Su, do you plan to use the chariot against the Chu army?" However, as far as the lower officials know, both the military department and His Majesty have long abandoned the chariot......"

Indeed, the Great Wei has long abandoned the chariot, and this is not a matter of this generation of emperors, as early as the reign of the previous emperor, when the northern Korea large-scale cavalry as the main force in the wilderness, their Wei chariot has been eliminated by history, reduced to now can only accumulate dust in the treasury of the military department.

Once upon a time, Great Wei had thousands of chariots, but now, there are only a few or so of them left in the treasury of the military department, and they are still used for hunting in spring and autumn, and they have long been no longer visible on the battlefield.

After all, in the painful defeat of Shangdang decades ago, the chariot that Great Wei had regarded as a heavy weapon on the battlefield was beaten to the ground by the Korean cavalry and lost its armor and was embarrassed.

Although the Wei people generally did not want to admit it, they had to admit that in the face of the North Korean cavalry, the Great Wei's chariots were simply powerless.

"I know what Lord Wang means." Zhao Hongrun smiled, patted the wheel of a carriage, shook his head and said, "These chariots are indeed useless in front of the Korean cavalry, but the state of Chu ...... There are more boat infantry, and using these things to deal with the Chu infantry who got off the ship and landed can still play some role. ”

Wang Fu thought about the situation in Chu State, and then nodded: "This is also true." …… How does His Royal Highness King Su plan to transform? ”

Hearing this, Zhao Hongrun looked at the chariot in front of him and pondered.

The history of the chariot has evolved from a single chariot, a two-wheeled chariot, and a square chariot (cart box) to the present, and the horses that have been pulled have also developed from the earliest horse to the final four horses, which is the so-called "horse chariot".

Because of the mobility of the chariot, there are generally only three to five armor soldiers on the chariot, one in the middle is responsible for driving the car is called the "Goshi", one or two armor soldiers on the left are responsible for long-distance shooting, called "shooting left" or "shooting zuo", and one or two people on the right are responsible for fighting at close range and protecting the people who are riding together, called "Rong You" or "Rong You"

Generally, the captain of the army serves as the "Emperor" and commands the other four armor soldiers who ride together.

One by five, that's the limit.

It is said that once Dawei also studied the chariot of six horses and eight horses, which could ride ten armor soldiers, but it turned out that the effect of the ** chariot was not as good as that of the horse chariot, and various problems often occurred, such as the bearing under the carriage was broken, the wooden wheel burst, and the horses could not be uniformly dispatched.

Unfortunately, the idea of a six-horse chariot and an eight-horse chariot was abandoned in a short period of time, and only the horse chariot remained until it was eliminated by the cavalry.

It is precisely because of this that the horse chariot seems to have been developed to the extreme in the successive improvements of the Great Wei craftsmen. For example, the bearings under the carriage were embedded with iron sheets, and the shaft rods were also wrapped with iron sheets, but these were then eliminated in favor of hardwood, which was extremely tough after repeated immersion in oil and exposure.

"Great Wei's iron-smelting technology is still insufficient...... It's a pity that I only know a general direction in this regard, and I don't know the specifics, but it's a pity that ......

"Remove the taper blades on both sides of the wheel."

Zhao Hongrun pointed to the cone blade on the outside of the chariot wheel.

It is undeniable that this taper blade, mounted on the outside of the chariot's wheel, is undoubtedly a killing weapon for killing enemy soldiers on the battlefield, but its weaknesses are also obvious.

"By the way, there's a baffle on the outside of the wheel."

Cho Hong-run kicked the wheel of the chariot, and once, this kind of spoked wheels was the biggest weakness of the North Korean cavalry in defeating the Great Wei chariot.

The cavalrymen, in the process of galloping, accurately threw their spears into the spokes of the chariot, which directly caused the chariot to overturn and collapse due to inertia, so that the North Korean cavalry almost effortlessly routed thousands of Wei chariots.

At first, Zhao Hongrun also thought about simply using a complete log as a wheel, but after thinking about it carefully, if the log wants to carry the weight of the chariot, it will inevitably be very heavy, which is not conducive to the mobility of the chariot, so Zhao Hongrun had to settle for the second best thing, install a baffle on the outside of the chariot, and cover the inner reel as much as possible, so as not to make a fuss about this weakness.

"Two more wheels in front."

“…… Yes, that's what I mean, horses are only responsible for pulling chariots, and they don't need them to resist ......."

"No, no, no, when I say four-wheeled chariots, I don't mean four wheels under the carriage and two wheels in front of the horse...... That's right, there is also a carriage installed on the front side, which is the position of the emperor, and another position is left to protect the emperor......"

"The latter compartment is heightened, well, to minimize the weight, just to increase the height...... That's where the shooter is. ”

According to Zhao Hongrun's wishes, Wang Fu of the Bureau immediately called the craftsmen in the Smelting Bureau to transform one of the carriages.

More than half an hour later, the chariot that had been initially transformed made Wang Fu feel awkward no matter how he looked at it.

First of all, the modified chariot has two compartments, the former is lower and the latter is higher, the former is the position of the emperor and the right of Rong, and the latter is the position of the shooter.

Secondly, this is a four-wheeled chariot, and the war horse pulling the cart seems to be hidden in it from the outside, in front of them, Zhao Hongrun ordered the compartment of another chariot to be removed, the base was merged with this chariot, and the head was reinforced, so that this ** car had a certain impact performance.

Jucheng Wang Fu's eyelids picked, and he couldn't help but remind: "His Royal Highness King Su, if you transform like this, the speed of the chariot will be greatly affected...... Moreover, it is not conducive to the chariot to turn, and besides, carrying such a heavy chariot, the physical strength of the war horse is probably also a problem......"

At this time, Zhao Hongrun was instructing the craftsmen to install dense cone blades on the front end of the chariot, and when he heard the reminder of the bureau Wang Fu, he said with a smile: "Lord Wang's meaning, this king understands, this king doesn't need how fast this chariot is, this king only needs to ...... The enemy troops standing in front of it were terrified......"

Jucheng Wang Fu glanced at the terrifying blade in the front of the transformed chariot, and his eyelids couldn't help jumping slightly.

Looking at Wang Fu's strange face and the appearance of wanting to speak, Zhao Hongrun did not elaborate, after all, most of the cavalry in the world are still only light cavalry, and Zhao Hongrun uses this improved chariot as a "heavy cavalry", or rather, the most rudimentary tank prototype.

Yes, Zhao Hongrun doesn't need this kind of chariot to be fast, he just needs this chariot to have the ability to impact the infantry formation of the Chu army, or rather, the ability to crush the ordinary infantry, so that the enemy infantry will have psychological fear.

As for killing the enemy, the Junshui Battalion also has cavalry, and there are also such mainstream troops on the wilderness battlefield, so why bother to go far?

If it weren't for the limitation of power, Zhao Hongrun would have been eager to transform the chariot into an impregnable fortress, after all, the Chu army was almost dominated by infantry, and there was no need to worry that the mobility would not be as good as the Chu army.

"Don't worry, this kind of chariot is only going to be used once......"

Zhao Hongrun smiled and dispelled the concerns in Wang Fu's heart: "Let's transform it like this." ”

"Use it once...... Isn't His Royal Highness King Su planning to fight?"

Jucheng Wang Fu looked at Zhao Hongrun with a look like a gain or loss, and finally nodded and agreed.

“…… Xia Guan understood. ”