As the team progressed, Zhang Qiang spent more than twenty days around the bay to inspect some important places near Yanjing, and then went directly to the royal fleet station.

The Royal Fleet now has thirty-six warships, in addition to the thirteen mentioned earlier, the thirteen old warships that have been replaced and updated, and the new additions are all those that have been added in the last two years, twenty-three warships.

As the Royal Fleet, as a fleet that shows the presence of majesty, the Royal Fleet is very close to the commercial and civilian ports, while the First Fleet, the fleet port in the Yellow Sea is on an island dozens of kilometers away, and at the same time it avoids the prying eyes of some foreign details, because the Royal Fleet is a fleet that shows majesty, and the real combat fleet is the fleet that wants to maintain a mysterious existence, and cannot let people discover the true performance, quantity, and size.

To put it bluntly, the royal fleet is far from the same in terms of face and fleet combat effectiveness, but it is also compared to the fleet combat effectiveness of the Huaxia Empire, if compared with the fleets of other countries that do not have steam engine propulsion and do not have iron armor, this royal fleet still throws them away by 108,000 miles.

It was not until the 18th century that the American ironclad monster came out, which caused a trend of ironclad ships, and it was not until the 19th century that the development of steam engine warships was in full swing, like clockwork, rapid upgrading, and the British Empire had 100 warships and 1,000 other auxiliary warships, dominating the world.

Now in this historical line, the British, Spaniards, and Dutch have seen the sail ironclad ships of the Chinese Empire thirty years ago.

Thirty years have passed, the British must have progressed, look at the British merchant ships are some wearing iron armor, but they are still sails, so as to push the section, the British warships should be better, or more advanced, and the steam engine has appeared in China for more than ten years, when the Qing Dynasty fought with Britain and Russia, the British must have learned that in recent years, the steam engine has been changed to charcoal trains, horse-drawn trains.

Whether it is Russia, Turkey, or Sweden, they all know quite well, it is impossible for Britain not to know, they must have been conducting relevant research, or exploring, although they do not know, but Zhang Qiang and the people of the Military Intelligence Department agreed that maybe it is only to reach the level of boilers, and if it is transformed, it may be able to carry out the application of charcoal trains, but in fact it is still too far away.

The study and application of the Englishman Charlie Ding, maybe a year or two later, Britain may also have a leap in development, such as learning the steam engine technology, or seeing the finished steam engine, which cannot be stopped, and the British will definitely appear in Britain and continental Europe with the finished steam engine, which will lead to the acceleration of the development of the steam engine.

However, it may take five or six to ten years, compared with the exploration and development of China, as well as the guidance of Zhang Qiang, a traverser, the British will definitely not be able to catch up with the technical level of Huaxia.

Of course, this is Zhang Qiang's judgment, after all, the Military Intelligence Department is an Asian face, and when he goes to the West, he wants to integrate into Europe, and in Europe, where he treats nobles and pays attention to identity, where the hierarchy is quite strict, even if he recruits from Turkey, Sweden, and Russia, he can't integrate into the local area at once and get much favorable information.

But no matter what, the Huaxia Empire is the owner of the best steam warships, at least now there is no one in the world that can compete with the Huaxia Navy fleet.

Thirty-six warships of the Royal Fleet are about to usher in a new round of refitting, 3,000-ton steam warships.

Maybe the 3,000-ton steam warship will laugh at Zhang Qiang in the historical line of later generations, and the German and British warships we bought are all bigger and more advanced than this, but in this world, two hundred years after the invasion of the Qing Dynasty and the colonization of the Qing Dynasty by the Western powers in later generations, the Chinese Empire is now single in science and technology, but it is at the forefront of the world.

With a long whistle, the largest flagship, 3,200 tons, set sail like a hill, with thick black smoke wafting overhead, and two large chimneys that were one meter thick and more than ten meters high spewed out thick smoke to cover the sky and the sun, but brought the power to the 3,000-ton steam warship to discharge 10,000 tons of seawater.

Standing on the foredeck, the two 150-millimeter single-barreled guns made by the Chinese Empire behind them can take care of the firing range of the angle of 210 degrees on the left and right sides at the same time, and they can also fire up and down in turn, striking targets within a range of 210 degrees in front of the battleship, with a firing range of five thousand meters, ten miles, an effective firing range of 1,200 meters, and an optimal firing range of 800 meters.

The cruising speed is six knots, and the maximum speed is 16,5 knots, which is also the maximum speed that can be reached in this era.

The heavier the hull, the greater the power, but relatively speaking, the current steam engine power is still a little small, on four boilers, two axes to get this 3,000-ton battleship, two axles one output ten knots of speed power, usually use one, two take turns, when the war pursues or escapes, use two propulsions, two propellers, the maximum speed of 17 knots, However, the maximum output of general combat is only the use of twelve to fourteen knots of speed is enough to deal with any warship or fleet in this world, to the maximum power output, that is the time to escape, and it is not allowed to use two axles and two propellers at the same time when pursuing, because the technology is not up to par, and the failure rate will destroy all the power with the frequent use, and without the steam engine, the ship will go with the flow.

This is not the experimental steam battleship with sails that was experimented a year ago.

The kind of burning coal and charcoal, with three huge masts sandwiched above the head, and soft sails dozens of meters wide hanging high overhead, even if the steam engine is turned on to the maximum horsepower, to reach the speed and flexibility of the current 3,000-ton steam warship, it is necessary to hang two or three pieces of canvas on the main mast, and only by the wind can not damage the steam engine and the ship's axle, and the maximum speed is only 12 knots, and the general cruising speed is 6 knots, but the speed is only 10 knots or 89 knots when fighting.

Compared with the pure iron sail battleship, the operation of the steam warship not only increased the personnel, but also became more complicated, and the current three-thousand-ton battleship, the personnel is slightly reduced, although the reduction is not much, but it saves the sailors from when the weather conditions are unfavorable, do not have to climb all the masts to collect the sails, hang the sails, the wind is stronger, only the mast can be chopped off, otherwise the storm may overturn the ship.

In short, the new warships have not only caught up with the speed of the ironclad steam giants that can only appear after 1880, but also have a lot of combat effectiveness.

It was just such a ship, with two 150-millimeter cannons on the front knapsack, two boilers on either side, each with a 150-mm main gun, and a main gun at the back, and on the deck there were two original eighteen-pounder guns, and on the foredeck there were also two, but twelve pounder guns, with stitches on both sides, basically neatly arranged, with a total of eighteen twelve-pounder guns.

(End of chapter)