The development of artillery was actually a rather slow process.

The artillery that could be considered the closest to modern artillery and could open firecrackers was not finished until the appearance of bombardment guns in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, and before that, there was not enough technical ability to solve the problem of firing flowering shells in long-barreled guns.

First of all, bore pressure is the problem, and long-barreled artillery means high bore pressure.

Flowering shells need enough gunpowder to ensure their power, but more gunpowder means that the shell is thin, and a thin shell will cause an explosion in the chamber, and the gun will explode and be scrapped.

The shell is thick and will not explode, but there is too little gunpowder, and it is not as powerful as an iron egg.

In other words, before the advent of French bombardment, before the advent of reliable fuses, the world's mainstream artillery fired solid shells.

For example, during the Napoleonic Wars, more than 90 percent of the artillery ammunition of European artillery was solid and scattered, rather than flowering.

In addition to the fact that long-barreled artillery cannot be fired, it is very difficult to determine how the flowering shells ignite and how to calculate the time to explode.

In the early days, flowering shells were fired with short, long-caliber cannons such as mortars and howitzers, and it was a two-step ignition, first igniting the lead of the flowering shell into the muzzle, and then igniting the projectile of the artillery, so as to fire the flowering shell.

But there is a serious problem with this.

In the unlikely event that the propellant does not have time to ignite and launch, then the flowering shell may explode in the chamber, triggering an explosion of the chamber, thus directly killing an entire artillery crew.

So the early members of the artillery crew, who used mortars and howitzers, were jokingly referred to in the West as the ones closest to God.

Until the invention of the wooden fuse and the wooden soft holder, the flowering bullet was an extremely unstable battlefield killer, not only injuring the enemy, but also the self.

So not only did the Qing army of the same period dislike to use it, but the Europeans also did not like to use it.

Wooden fuses and wooden soft supports were used to enhance the breath-holding properties of large-caliber howitzers, increase the range of howitzers' firebolts, and increase the power of flowering shells.

The so-called wooden soft support is to install a wooden plug with the same shape and the inner diameter of the gun chamber at the bottom of the spherical flowering shell, and connect the wooden soft support and the shell with iron sheets to form a whole.

In addition to effectively sealing the gas leakage, the wooden soft support on the tail of the shell can also play a buffering role for the flowering projectile when it is fired.

Moreover, the flowering projectile launched will cause the "badminton principle" to be heavy and light in the tail due to the wooden support, forming a self-stabilizing structure, making the trajectory more accurate, the range is a little farther, and the role of rifling can be achieved to a certain extent.

In the same way, this kind of wooden soft support can also be used on solid bullets, so that solid bullets have a longer and more accurate range, increase the power, and before the flowering bullet can not have enough power, it is also good to increase the power of solid bullets.

In order to increase the power of the flowering bomb, a complete set of industrial systems and chemical foundations are needed, and at present, the conditions are not yet available.

Although Xiao Ruxun looked at Xu Guangqi and what they were doing seemed to be impressive, the progress was not obvious.

Many times, Xiao Ruxun knows what it is, but doesn't know why, and can only provide them with the research direction and final results, as for the process, it depends on these professionals themselves.

The firearms department of the Ministry of Military Industry has concentrated more than 600 firearms experts, making it the strongest firearms research team in Daqin at present.

Xiao Ruxun has reason to believe that they can do something he didn't expect, even if they can't form mass production, at least make a sample first and make a standard.

It is precisely because of this that when Xiao Ruxun was observing the test firing of the artillery, he suddenly remembered the wooden soft support, so he found someone to draw the wooden soft support in his memory, handed over the drawings to Xu Guangqi, and told Xu Guangqi to make a few wooden soft supports that could cooperate with the launch of the Hongyi cannon.

Xu Guangqi saw this drawing, and immediately remembered that the principle of the bullet used in his Guangqi-style flintlock was the same as that of this wooden soft support, and he patted his head and scolded himself for not thinking of it together, and immediately did it.

However, looking at the simple drawings, it is not easy to really make it, how to make this wooden soft support fit the cannonball, and it can also perfectly fit the barrel of the Hongyi cannon.

This requires precise measurements and calculations, and thanks to the size-sized vernier calipers that Hsiao gave him in Myanmar, it seems that the measurement calculations are not difficult.

It took seven or eight days for Xu Guangqi to make five solid bullets connected to the wooden soft support, and began the first round of tests.

In order to ensure safety, the person in charge of security arranged them to a relatively distant place, and then arranged several gunners to be responsible for attempting to fire.

As a result, the artillery blew up.

None of the four gunners survived, all of them were blown to a bloody pulp, and this was clearly not the first time that an accident had occurred.

In Myanmar, there have been countless such accidents, and 56 Burmese researchers died because of experimental accidents, and it was only later that Xiao Ruxun was changed to prisoners of war or death row criminals to conduct experiments on his behalf.

But it was also quite dangerous to let these guys conduct experiments, because they were afraid that they would break out and do something with the firearms in their hands, so later they also specially arranged for soldiers with light-opening flintlock pistols to strictly monitor the whole process, and shoot them immediately if something went wrong.

Because of such a risk, this time Xu Guangqi still arranged a professional gunner to help with the experiment, but after an experiment, people and ghosts took different paths.

After the accident, Xu Guangqi immediately submitted a petition for guilt, and then organized people to improve the size of the wooden soft support, and polish the edges to a certain extent.

He knew very well that the wooden soft support must have failed to fire out and caused the cannon to explode, and the problem was with the soft support.

After Xiao Ruxun learned about it, he issued an order to reprimand Xu Guangqi, saying that he did not regard the lives of soldiers as his life, and could obviously use death row prisoners and prisoners of war instead, but he preferred to choose gunners, now that he is good, four gunners died for some reason, how can he explain to their parents?

A pension was issued, and some preferential treatment policies were given to the parents and families of the four soldiers, and some compensation was given to the army, which can be regarded as stabilizing the relationship between the army and the Ministry of Military Industry, otherwise the artillery team would have to bring people to the Ministry of Military Industry to make trouble.

Xiao Ruxun issued an order that Xu Guangqi should use death row prisoners or prisoners of war in future experiments, strictly monitor with soldiers holding Guangqi-style flintlock guns, and shoot them immediately if they find something wrong, but no matter what, they can't let the soldiers die in vain.

For the sake of his contribution to the country, he will not be investigated, but Xu Guangqi was still fined for one year, and the official was demoted to three levels and retained in his original position, and several entourages were also fined for half a year.

However, his research did not stop, and Xiao Ruxun did not allow him to stop.

After several polishes, he took out the new data to make a solid wooden pallet, operated it with a death row prisoner, and successfully fired three rounds, compared with another Hongyi cannon that did not use a wooden pallet, not only the range is nearly one-fifth farther, but the trajectory is also much correct.

It's really like what Xiao Ruxun said, the head is heavy and the tail is light, the shells have become stable as a whole, and the shooting route is more correct, and it is farther and more powerful.