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"The heavier the rain, the more the advantages of the metal shell can be revealed!"

Next to the gun emplacements near the dock, Zhu Yifeng said this, and several representatives of the military department stationed in the factory behind him also came up to observe these two alternative cannons, he looked at these officers, and turned to ask. Pen? Interesting? Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 ｉｎfo

"Which of you is an artilleryman?"

Holding a Western-style saber in his left hand, Lin Zihan took a few steps forward, bowed slightly and performed a standard military salute.

"Report to the principal, the student is the first phase of the artillery department of the Armed Forces Academy, and now it is the acceptance of the artillery in the factory!"

"So, okay, then let me ask you if it's raining so hard, is there a problem firing the cannon?"

"No problem!"

Facing the principal's inquiry, Lin Zihan replied truthfully.

"However, the action must be fast, and the shells must be waterproof, especially the gunpowder signal tubes of grenades and shrapnel shells, which must be soaked in water, and it is very likely that they will fail and become solid bullets."

He studied artillery in the military academy for eight months, but Lin Zihan had no problem with basic artillery operations, and because he also learned a lot of artillery knowledge in the factory.

"Okay, good, but he doesn't need to be waterproof for this cannon!"

The open shell box of his fingers, the brass shell inside the box, although full of water droplets, shimmered with gold and looked extremely shiny, but he still noticed that the shell seemed to be a little different, because the surface of the shell was not smooth enough.

"Chengyi, I'm afraid this shell is not extended processing!"

Seeing that Han Du saw through it at a glance, Xu Shushan said helplessly.

"Han Du, there is no way to make the bullet case, the press that makes the copper circle can indeed make the cartridge case, but it can only make the cartridge case in the rifle, and the cartridge case used in the shell needs a larger press, so the minister will temporarily change to casting, although the cartridge case is cast, that is, after casting, it is forged with a steam hammer, so there is no problem with using it, but the cost is slightly higher."

Of course, Xu Shushan's words have reservations, even an 88 mm bullet case weighs more than 2 kilograms, which means that just the raw materials are worth one or two or a half dollars.

"High cost? It doesn't matter, as long as it can be used, and the shells can be reloaded repeatedly. ”

"Reload?"

"That's right, it's repurposed, it's like a gun barrel, it's not a shot, it needs to be replaced, well......"

Taking out the cartridge of the 105 mm gun from the half box, Zhu Yifeng noticed that the bottom of this cartridge case was still a little different from the shell he was familiar with, it was more like the primer of the revolver installed at the bottom of the bullet.

"We can make a larger fire transmission hole at the bottom of the bomb, about two centimeters straight, with an internal rifle, and then make a special primer, tighten the primer with special pliers when using, and in the future each cannon can be equipped with a fixed firing cartridge, such as 20 per gun, and then the factory-produced shells only have cannonballs and ****** packed in cloth bags and primers, which are reloaded into the cartridge when used."

In fact, this is the poor man's way of playing, which can minimize the cost of using artillery.

"Han Du, your method is not bad, in this way, the cost of the shell can be included in the whole artillery, so calculated, its cost has not actually increased, although the rifled gun is more complex to manufacture than the smoothbore gun, its price is not expensive, the reason is that the wrought iron used in the rifled gun is cheaper than the bronze used in the smoothbore gun. Even the axles used to make the barrels of 105 mm guns cost only 65 pounds, or less than 200 taels of silver, and even if they were made into artillery, the cost was within 250 taels, while the 12-pounder Napoleon gun made of bronze cost 300 taels of silver. ”

As the director of the arsenal, Xu Shushan only thought about it a little, and then calculated the cost of the artillery and the factory price, which was one of his jobs.

"And when our large steam hammer is put into use, the axle can also be reforged, if my calculation is good, one axle should be able to make two, and even if twenty shells are added, the ex-factory price of the whole gun should be controlled within 200 taels, well, it is basically equal to half a Napoleon gun, if it is an 88 mm gun, the ex-factory price should be within 150 taels."

"It's so cheap?"

In surprise, Zhu Yifeng was stunned for a moment, and then said with a smile.

"If it were so cheap, it would seem that in the future every infantry regiment would have to set up an artillery battalion, an eighteen-gun artillery battalion! Well, just use the kind of light 88mm cannon you said! ”

Zhu Yifeng, who has always believed in firepower first, naturally will not reject the troops to increase their firepower, in his opinion, enough firepower is the most powerful tactic for the rebels to crush the enemy in the future, let his tactics change, and I only need to push the firepower all the way, the war is the simplest and most effective.

"Let's try it now!"

After Zhu Yifeng's order, the cannon was ready for test firing.

Qian Lei is still responsible for operating this artillery, and as an outstanding student majoring in artillery making at the Ordnance Engineering School, this kind of work is naturally unique to him. In fact, under the recommendation of his teacher, he has always belonged to the ordnance artillery test firing group, and it can be said that he is one of the best gunners in the entire factory.

Today's Qian Lei is wearing a straight overalls, who said that it is raining in the sky, and the rain will wet his clothes, but he looks arrogant with his gestures. This is because the position he is responsible for is quite noticeable, and everyone is watching him.

"Only Qian Lei has mastered the operation of rifled cannons."

Of course, this is just a rumor, in fact, the biggest difference between rifled rear-loading guns and front-loading guns is the way of loading, their aiming is the same.

Before the official test of the cannon, Qian Lei spent some time and briefly explained the structure and performance of the cannon. Then out of safety considerations, Qian Lei deliberately emphasized to Han Du in the distance.

"According to the safety regulations of the factory, please retreat to a bunker twenty-five meters away."

The factory's safety regulations were officially formulated by himself, and Zhu Yifeng, of course, said that he would abide by them, and retreated into the bunker composed of sandbags.

After the onlookers left, the official start of the test launch began.

Qian Lei first aimed the cannon at the man-made earth mountain 2,000 meters away, and then quickly fired five shells that triggered the letter tube, because the shell charge used black powder, so the power looked average. But the most striking thing about its power was the rate of fire, which fired five shells in just a few minutes.

Looking at the five dirt pits that were blown out on the dirt mountain, Zhu Yifeng thought thoughtfully for a moment, and then suddenly said to Xu Shushan.

"A heavy rifled gun like this, is there still a barrel in the factory now? How many artillery pieces can be supplied in the next two weeks? ”

"Ding!"

The long, loud bells rang across the river to get out of the way for Chinese ships along the river, and the sailors on the "Harmis" rang the bronze bells on the bow from time to time. The sound of the bell also attracted the attention of others, and along the way, whether it was the barefoot boatman on the civilian boat, the peasants ploughing the fields on the shore, or the Qing army patrolling the river and the Taiping army, all looked at the foreign ship, their eyes mixed with confusion, amazement, envy and curiosity.

And the sailors of the "Halmis" clattered and chirped, adjusted the spinnakers and sirlers as if they were skillful, and looked down on the boats in the river with a haughty attitude. Their faces were full of triumphant looks, but what disappointed them was the Chinese pilot who boarded the warship on Chongming Island, who turned a blind eye to all this, and only dutifully led the "Halmis" to sail on the Yangtze River, sailing all the way through Jiangning, Anqing, and all the way to Jiujiang.

When the "Halmis" arrived at Jiujiang, Wen Han stood on the side of the ship and raised his binoculars to look south, where the legendary rebels were busy on a hill by the river, where they were building forts and forts.

"Well, from now on, you just need to sail along the channel marked by navigation beacons in the middle of the river."

Because there are many shoals in the Yangtze River, it is difficult for Western-style spire-bottomed sailboats to come out after they run aground, so after controlling the Jiujiang River, at the request of Han Du, a channel was marked in the middle of the river with a pontoon with a lanyard to facilitate navigation. Now that the warship has arrived in Jiujiang, the work of the pilot is over, and when Shao Yunjie's voice falls, a small sailing ship comes from the river, and at that time the sailboat has a cannon installed in the bow.

After a symbolic inspection, the "Harmis" continued to sail forward, when suddenly Colonel Huber heard the sailors at the bow shouting loudly,

"Look, that'...... Ironclad! My God, I read that right! ”

"It's really an ironclad!"

The sailors shouted in surprise, for for them, it was the first time they had seen an ironclad.

"My God, the Chinese actually have ironclad ships!"

Not to mention ordinary sailors, even He Bo, who is the admiral of the Far East Fleet, was also stunned by the sailless ironclad ship on the river, only to see that the ironclad wrapped in the hull of the ironclad ship exudes a metallic luster in the sun, the smoke spewed out by the chimney in the center of the ironclad ship, and a red flag on the ship waving in the wind, sailing proudly on the north side of the Yangtze River, it is slowly sailing out of the north channel divided by the sandbar in the river.

"Colonel, I'm not mistaken, they actually have ironclads!"

Looking at the ironclad ship on the river dumbfounded, Wen Han's eyes were full of incredulity, you must know that even the Royal Navy does not have an ironclad ship, but there is an ironclad ship here.

When everyone looked at this ironclad ship sailing with amazement and incredulity, suddenly a cannon sound rang out on the river, and the moment they heard the cannon sounded nervously, everyone was stunned again.

"God, how could they be so accurate!"

In everyone's astonishment, they saw that the ironclad ship kept firing its cannons, and their target was at least one nautical mile away, a wooden ship on the river, and in its shelling, the target plate of the wooden ship was punched out of more than a dozen bullet holes, and what surprised them even more was its astonishing rate of fire.

“…… 25、26…… 8 guns, with a rate of fire of at least 4 rounds per minute, and their accuracy ......"

He Bo, who was holding the pocket watch, didn't even notice that a drop of sweat was running down his forehead as he spoke, and as a senior officer in the Royal Navy, he knew very well what such accuracy and rate of fire meant...... (To be continued.) )