Since he came back from the northern voyage, Hong Tao has not sailed much on the far sea, not because he doesn't want to, but because he can't, there are not enough sailors, if he takes all the skilled sailors away, then the other ship can't even do training, so he can only wait. The performance of this European sailing boat is good, but it relies too much on skilled sailors, especially sail handlers, and it is almost impossible to do so. Although there are many good guys in the new Tan family, and they are all masters who can sail alone at sea, but once they arrive on the galleon, many things have to be learned and familiar from the beginning, whether it is the rules or operating methods on the ship, they have to be cultivated little by little. This kind of cultivation had to be solved by short voyages again and again, so even if Hong Tao was very annoying, he had to pinch his nose and run out for a day or two with most of the new sailors on the boat. This work has to be done quickly, because the Wen family's shipbuilding technology is becoming more and more proficient, and the number of workers in the shipyard has also increased a lot, and it is already possible to lay the keel of the two ships and build them together, and the cycle is still about half a year. That is, in the summer, two new ships will be launched.

Originally, according to Wen Laoer's meaning, it was to build a larger ship, 50 meters long, two decks, and a displacement of about 1,000 tons. This ship type was still drawn by Hong Tao, mainly for use as a gunboat. However, this suggestion was rejected by Hong Tao himself, not because he doubted the Wen family's shipbuilding ability, but because it was useless to build such a large ship for the time being. Because there is no suitable weapon to use, you can't always have a shipload of slingshots to catch whoever is tightened, if you talk about using slingshots, it is more suitable for a fast cruiser like the Haibo, it is only one deck, and it is convenient to use a slingshot. If you get two decks. How to launch the next layer is a question.

To use such a large battle ship with multiple decks. It's better to wait for Qi Zu and them to get the cannon out, now the blacksmith has not given up the experiment of casting cannons with bronze, and with those few blacksmiths in the Mongolian sailors, it can provide them with some useful ideas. Hong Tao believes that as long as they are provided with sufficient raw materials and manpower, they will be able to test qualified artillery sooner or later, and they will not be able to achieve it a hundred times at a time! Anyway, there is copper ore here, tin and lead are not valuable, you can go to them and buy them in the Southern Song Dynasty. Let's toss it.

In June, Bo Xiaosan brought news of Luo Youde to Hong Tao, he had returned to Guangzhou from Lin'an, and he was very interested in Hong Tao's desire to squeeze sugar and sell it, and was waiting for Hong Tao to come over in Guangzhou to talk about it in detail. So Hong Tao simply brought out the two warships, or full sailors, he was going to have a halfway voyage, just now it was the typhoon season, Hong Tao planned to let these new sailors feel what it means to be a wild wave, and a sailor who has not been beaten by a strong wind and waves is not a qualified sailor.

Hong Tao's wish was soon realized. Just over a day after leaving Jinhe Bay, he was hit by a tropical storm. The sea and sky have turned leaden gray, there is no clear wind direction at all, there is wind in all directions, and the waves like a hill throw the dozens of meters long big boat around like throwing sandbags, and there is no one on the boat who does not vomit, including Hong Tao himself. There's no way, seasickness can't be completely avoided, it can only be said that the degree is better, and vomiting will not affect eating and drinking, let alone dizziness.

At this time, it is clear why the sail operators are important, they have to put away the sails one by one on the top of the mast that swings back and forth for more than ten meters, and they have to tie it up. Hong Tao himself has been on the mast, and that feeling is the same as standing on the edge of a building hundreds of meters high, the sea water below is swaying, and I want to vomit after watching it for a long time. Although there were safety ropes to use, there were still two novices who were disobedient, thinking that it would take a few seconds to walk a few steps, and they would be fine if they pulled the rigging, but as a result, a big wave crashed over, and the hull shook, and the two people on the mast were thrown away. In the face of nature, it is useless to rely on your hands alone, and no matter how strong you are, you can't grasp it.

"Shhh...... Little fish and shrimp, see it, this is the consequence of not listening to your uncle. One of the sail pilots fell into the sea and disappeared, and the other fell to the side of the ship, shattering his bones and making a clatter of broken logs, which could be heard clearly by the waves standing in the stern. This sound made the roots of his teeth itch, and that person must be hopeless, but he still had to take the opportunity to educate and educate Po Yu and Po Shrimp. The two children were already as old as Bo Jiao back then, and Hong Tao took them on board as midshipmen for training, and at the same time there were six or seven teenage children, both men and women, who were standing in the stern at the moment, and tied themselves firmly to the side of the ship with safety ropes.

"Uncle, that's my cousin...... His son had just gone to school. "Po shrimp not only itched at the root of his teeth, but also itched all over his body, while reporting to Hong Tao what he had observed, he touched his safety rope with his hand, for fear that it was not fastened.

"It's useless if it's your grandfather, no one knows the sea, it only knows people who listen to your uncle, what do you think?" Hong Tao watched as the sailors on the deck threw the sailman who had fallen to his death directly into the sea, and looked back at the group of children behind him.

"I think my cousin is the best, I listen to my cousin!" The girl of the Weng family has the sweetest mouth and is also the best at sycophancy.

"Hey, hey, hey...... Weng Ya is right, it's okay for Uncle Ming to find you a man as powerful as your cousin to marry? Hong Tao was happy in his heart, although he was only a 10-year-old child, he felt that what Wengya said was very correct.

"I want to marry my cousin when I grow up, Chen Weng Weng said that the local officials can marry several daughters-in-law, and the cousin is more powerful than the local officials, so he should marry more than them!" Wengya felt that this sycophant was in the right position, and she made Hong Tao happy, so she slapped it again.

“…… You're an old man who hasn't slipped away! The smile on Hong Tao's face immediately froze, what did his godfather teach in school! How can you still have the knowledge of marriage and funeral, and it's a bit early to talk about this with a teenager, right?

The storm blew all afternoon, and did not stop until the evening, and neither the Haibo nor the Flood Salamander could find anyone. At this time, Hong Tao came back to his strength, quickly took out the sextant, pointed to the sky full of stars, and taught the children how to use the constellations and the moon to locate the longitude of the ship. They've all learned this thing more than once, but the effect of sitting in the classroom and reciting the mantra is certainly not as good as the storm they had just experienced, and the ship didn't know where it was blowing.

Want to find a port? This is an exam question given by Hong Tao to the child, it is not enough to memorize the formula, you still have to be able to play the sextant, it is useless to play the formula and the sextant, and the comparison table between the moon and the stars to know. These are all right, even if Hong Tao passes the test, in fact, these things are still one step away from longitude, that is, they are calculated by trigonometric functions. At present, no one has taught Hong Tao this step, not that he refuses to teach, but he can't teach it. In the face of a group of people who can't play simple equations in junior high school, you have to let them learn trigonometric functions, it's too embarrassing.

When the Hong Salamander slowly entered the Pearl River Estuary, it was found that the Hai Bo had been parked at the berth, and it was obviously not all bearded and tailed, and the storm not only brought casualties to the Hong Salamander, but also brought damage to the Hai Bo. Due to the slow rewinding speed, one of the crossings of the foremast of the Hypo was blown off, but fortunately there was a rigging underneath, and the sail operator was lucky, but he broke his arm, and his life was fine after being tied to the splint. When the storm is over, the crew will replace it with a new one, and as long as the mainmast continues and the hull is not damaged, a sailboat like the Hypo will not lose its mobility.

Repair it slowly, anyway, there are no ships here in Guangzhou Port in this season, everyone knows that the sea is easy to blow strong winds in summer, and few merchant ships will venture to the South Seas, even if you learn to walk with yellow croaker, the ocean trade in this era is also once a year. It goes south in winter and returns in summer, and it is the most lively season in the southern port around the 15th of August every year. The eastern coast is better, ships to Japan and the Korean Peninsula can run twice a year, and there are monsoons blowing obliquely in winter and summer, so it is a good wind to go no way. (To be continued.) )