April 1878

Prince of Berlin. Palace Study

A handsome and cute little guy was holding a book that he knew should not be read by a little ghost of this age at a glance, the sun shining on the soft golden brown hair, and the pink little face looked serious. Time flies, and in a blink of an eye, our little Yoheng is 10 years old.

"Jochen, how about trying to go out and have fun, it's not good to stay in your room all the time." Crown Princess Victoria (Note 1) said worriedly, but her eyes were extremely doting on her little son

"It's okay, Mom, I'll exercise if I need to, I don't stop exercising every day, isn't it, wouldn't it be better to spend my precious time reading, and besides, those games are really boring"

"But you really don't look like a child."

"Don't worry, Mother, play is for relaxation and fun, and I find the same ease and fun in reading, but in a different way."

"Okay, don't forget if you don't want to play, but pay attention to rest." Crown Princess Victoria reluctantly gave up persuasion.

"I know, thank you, Mom"

I don't know if it's because I'm too strict with my eldest son and second son, and the mother-son relationship is cold, in order to make up for the shortcomings, of course, it may also be because little Yoheng is extremely obedient and sensible, so the crown princess's discipline of this youngest son is very lenient.

In the eyes of many people, the 10-year-old Prince Joachim is an out-and-out genius, showing amazing learning ability and understanding ability since the age of 3, does not like to play, is interested in reading, and covers a wide range of books, all kinds of books are read, and often can put forward their own doubts and opinions on books, proficient in German, English, French, Russian, Chinese 5 Chinese. And there is no willfulness and naughtiness of children, the character is quiet, gentle and polite, and very persevering, from the age of 6 insisted on long-distance running and fencing, so he was deeply favored by Crown Prince Frederick and his wife, even his grandfather William I was very close to this little grandson, and although he was not very close to his two brothers, the relationship was quite harmonious.

Because of this, with this kind of favor, Jochen began to satisfy his small desire to collect in his previous life, which he was not qualified to do.

Jochen has a large collection room, in which there is a row of glass cases (Note 2) in which he holds his collection of models of German naval warships, and the walls are covered with various firearms, and there is also a filing cabinet containing photos of ships from all over the world (Note 3) and performance data released to the public, and Jochen's favorite thing to do in addition to reading is to run into this collection room, then look at the models, flip through the materials, touch the guns, and stay for a long time.

On the one hand, it is a very common hobby for European nobles to collect weapons as a collection, and the preference for military affairs is also regarded as a tradition of the German royal family; On the other hand, Jochen's whimsical ideas are sometimes very valuable for reference. So it's basically responsive, and even some of the less classified structural design drawings are in the collection.

And our little Yoheng sometimes deliberately runs to his father, Crown Prince Frederick or his grandfather, Emperor William I, to sell cuteness, and then show some of his opinions and show off his "talent" a little.

"Oh, little Yoheng, are you done with the book? What kind of books do you want to get from your grandfather? ”

"Grandpa, are you busy right now? Doesn't bother you? ”

"Oh, that's all that is done, what new ideas does my little Yoheng have to talk to grandpa?"

"Grandpa, I heard that the Winchester M1866 repeating rifle used by the Ottomans in the battle of Pleven City last year suppressed the Russian attack because of its high rate of fire, and the performance is very good, right?"

"Yes, Jochen, the Ottoman Winchester used a barrel-fed lever rifle, so it had a very big advantage in the rate of fire, so it suppressed the Russian attack with dense fire in the battle with the Russian army, but this rifle still has disadvantages, firstly, the edge primer ammunition it uses has a thin bottom and is easy to break; Second, its bullet power is insufficient, and its lethality and range are not ideal."

"If the Gew.71 (Note 4) single-shot rifle we use has an advantage in power and range, and the situation is actually the same as that of the Russians, so if the Gew.71 is equipped with a similar reload design, wouldn't it also increase the rate of fire? In this way, our Gew.71 will be able to overwhelm the Grasse rifles of the French with the main mechanism unchanged (Note 5)"

"Hmm...... That's a good idea, so I'll ask a professional to ask you in a few days, and you can also take out your idea and see if it's feasible. ”

"Good! Thank you grandpa! "Sell cuteness successfully!

A few weeks later, in the study of Wilhelm I, Jochen met Paul Mauser, one of the designers of the Gew.71 and the designer of the Gew.98, the main German rifle of the First World War, and the younger brother of the Mauser brothers. Unlike his brother William Mauser, who had a large beard, Paul Mauser only had a curly and upturned upper lip mustache, and his facial contours were more handsome than his brother's, and he looked suave and personable. After a brief introduction and politeness, the exchange quickly got to the point.

"Mr. Mauser, I have summoned you here because my grandson has some questions about firearms that I would like you to answer, and I have some ideas that I would like to get your advice, Jochen, tell me what you thought the other day."

"Yes, Your Majesty, I will do my best to solve your highness's doubts."

"Thank you, Mr. Mauser, first of all, I would like to ask you a few questions, first, whether the barrel feeding mode used in the Winchester M1866 rifle, which was excellent in the Russo-Turkish War last year, is the main design structure of the current repeating rifle; second, will such a long barrel make it difficult for the soldiers to maintain their firing posture because of the destruction of the center of gravity of the whole gun; Third, although the barrel feed has the advantage of rate of fire in shooting, whether it is very slow to reload; Fourth, because the bullet tube feeds the bullet, in order to prevent the bullet warhead from triggering the primer of the previous bullet, the warhead should be smoothed, which has a great impact on the performance of the bullet; Fifth, is there a similar design in China? ”

Paul Mauser was surprised to see how a 10-year-old could ask so many professional questions in the field of firearms, but he still gently answered Jochen's question.

"Your Highness, your knowledge is really very rich, since the American Walter Hunt designed the barrel-fed lever-type repeater in 1848, the barrel feed is indeed the current main repeating pistol feed mode (Note 6), and the subsequent Henry-style rifle and last year's excellent Winchester M1866 rifle did have this problem because the barrel is in the front and the center of gravity is shifted forward, but not all barrel feeds have this problem, and the barrel of the Spencer 1865 rifle is in the rear, so there is no such problemMost of the cartridge feed ammunition does need to be reloaded when it can only be reloaded one round at a time, but the Spencer rifle is different, you can replace the preloaded barrel, so it is not slow, and the barrel feed ammunition although the bullet does have to be sharpened and smoothed, which will increase the resistance of the bullet and make the flight unstable, but the increase in the rate of fire can greatly make up for this problem, and I did add the idea of a burst function on the Gew.71, but I have not officially started the design yet. ”

After listening to the answer, Jochen secretly breathed a sigh of relief, in history, Paul Mauser improved the Gew.71/84 repeating rifle on the basis of the Gew.71 in the past few years, and at the beginning he used the design of the cartridge feed, but because the problem of double feed ammunition could not be solved, he finally returned to the old way of barrel feeding, if his design work has begun, then the ideas he can provide will be greatly reduced, fortunately.

"Thank you for your explanation, Mr. Mauser, but if as you said, the length of the replacement barrel of the Spencer rifle should not be short, and it is certainly not very convenient to carry, I had an idea some time ago, that is, instead of using the barrel to feed the ammunition, but to use a magazine like a box, the bottom of the magazine is connected to a bullet plate with a spring, and the bullets are stuffed into the magazine side by side, and then the cartridge case is drawn after a bullet is fired, and then the bullet plate rises, and another bullet is sent to the chamber, and in order to prevent two bullets at a time when loading, There should be a partition surface at the mouth of the magazine, and this partition surface should also have the effect of throwing shells, but I can't say the specific design, so I hope to be able to borrow your expertise, because the bullet of the Gew.71 is relatively large, so the magazine may have to be extended downward, and if a group of 5 bullets are fixed with a bridge clip, the bridge clamp is a new word I invented, and then it can be stuffed into the magazine at one time, so that the loading speed is also improved, and it is also very convenient to carry. I have a sketch here (Note 7), and I can draw it casually, so please advise me. ”

This finally made the gentle smile on Paul Mauser's face disappear, such a professional construction and extremely high feasibility can never be proposed by a child, and his grandson's expression Xiàn also made William I's face full of smiles.

"Your Highness's talent is truly incomparable, your idea is highly feasible, I will try it according to this idea when I go back." After reading the sketch, Paul Mauser solemnly said that although the structure on the sketch is very unprofessional, the overall idea is very clear, and Paul Mauser, who is extremely good at firearms, can certainly see the value.

"Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Mauser, I'm really glad that my whims have been recognized by you, so if I have any new ideas in the future, can I go to you for advice?"

"With pleasure, Your Highness."

Gun designer Paul Mauser hooks up! By the way, by the way, can you count me as a technology shareholder?! The little guy had to think about it.

Note 1: After the establishment of the Second German Empire, Frederick III became the Imperial Crown Prince and the Crown Prince of the Kingdom of Prussia, and his wife Victoria became the Imperial Crown Princess and the Crown Princess of Prussia, so it was renamed the Crown Princess

Note 2: Flat glass was made in 1874, so it is not an exaggeration to use glass cabinets here.

Note 3: In 1841, the Englishman William Henry Fox Talbot developed the Caro photographic method, which resulted in re-developed negatives, while the drawings and specific performance of warships were not available, and photographs and publicly available materials were still fine.

Note 4: Gew is the abbreviation of German Gewehr, which means rifle, and is the number of the German standard rifle, such as the Mauser 98 rifle, which will be called Gew.98 if it is selected as the German standard rifle, which is the same as the United States No matter which company produces the firearm is selected as the standard gun, it will give a new number starting with M.

Note 5: The Grasse rifle is an improved version of the French Chasepo rifle that was changed to a metal fixed cartridge, and a large number of Grasse rifles equipped by the French Army are directly modified from the Chasepo, and began to equip the French army in 1874.

Note 6: The magazine feed was designed in 1885 by the Austro-Hungarian designer Ferdinand Manlisca and applied to the Manlisca M1886 rifle, so before that, the barrel feed was the mainstream multi-round reloading mode, although there were also revolvers, but they were basically unsuccessful.

Note 7: The sketch structure is actually the Mosin Nagan M1891, because of the inline magazine, so there is no holding port, plus the partition surface, it is a relatively simple design to prevent double intake, while the "restraint feed" shell hook designed by Paul Mauser to prevent double intake does not appear until 1892. As for the leaky clips used by the Manlisya M1886 and Commission 1888 rifles, forget it, and the mainstream will be the bridge clip in the future, so it's better to do it in one step. Picture see: Technical Related: Structure of the magazine in Mosinaghan