Under the guidance of Priest Nader, the first cannon in Shuangyu Port was finally cast, and today it is ready to test the cannon, but although the workshop of casting the cannon is in Nanyang Town, the place where the cannon is tested cannot be here, first, the place is too small, and secondly, it is too dangerous, after all, even Priest Nader does not dare to guarantee that this cannon can succeed.

In addition, Zhou Chong didn't go alone when he tried the artillery, but brought Wu Shi and Ma Liang with him, speaking of which it is a big crime to privately cast artillery, Zhou Chong should hide it from Jinyiwei anyway, but Shuangyu Port is so big, as soon as the sound of his test cannon sounds, the entire port can almost be heard, and he can't hide it at all, and he has tested Wu Shan with words before, but the other party told him very directly, if someone else will definitely arouse the suspicion of the imperial court, but Zhou Chong doesn't have to worry, As long as these cannons he cast are not transported back to the territory of the Ming Dynasty, then there will be no problem.

It was precisely with Wu Shan's guarantee, and there was no way to hide it, so Zhou Chong simply showed the artillery workshop very generously, and he didn't expect that Wu Shi and Ma Liang had actually come into contact with artillery when they were in the capital, and when they heard that Zhou Chong's artillery here was actually made by Franco, they were also very interested, and they had to follow to see how it was different from Daming's artillery.

The location of the artillery test was in a small valley to the east of Nanyang Town, which was inaccessible and separated by mountain cliffs on both sides, so that the sound of the artillery would be much smaller and would not disturb ordinary people.

When Zhou Chong, Ma Liang and the others arrived in this valley, Priest Nader was leading a few craftsmen involved in the casting of artillery to make the final adjustments to the artillery, and Zhou Zhong and the others did not come forward to disturb, but stood aside to look at the artillery in front of them.

"Childe. How could this man-made cannon of the Franc machine be so peculiar. It looks completely different from our Ming artillery. But it's a lot lighter. Before Zhou Zhong could see the structure of the artillery, Ma Liang next to him took the lead in saying, he had a brother who was on an errand in the Shenji Battalion in the forbidden army, and the Shenji Battalion was a special firearms unit of the Ming Dynasty, so he was no stranger to artillery and muskets, so he looked at it for a while, and found the difference between the artillery in front of him and the Ming artillery.

At this time, Zhou Zhong finally looked the entire artillery up and down a few times, and then looked at the several parts placed around the artillery. Although he didn't understand artillery, he had hundreds of years of knowledge more than the people of this era, so he quickly figured out the operation principle of the entire artillery, and also understood the difference between this artillery and the Ming artillery.

To put it simply, the Franc cannon in front of Zhou Chong's eyes is actually a rear-loading smoothbore gun, while the Ming artillery is the most primitive front-loading smoothbore gun, and there is naturally a huge difference in the structure of the two.

For example, the most important thing in the Daming artillery is a barrel, and then there is a fire door on it, and when it is used, put the shells and gunpowder into the barrel, and the rate of fire of the gun is very slow. But the structure of the Franc cannon in front of Zhou Chong is much more complicated. The whole gun is composed of a barrel, a belly and a sub-cannon, into which a gunpowder projectile is first filled when the cannon is fired. Then load the sub-cannon into the belly of the cannon and ignite the sub-cannon fire door for firing.

Compared with the artillery of the Ming Dynasty, the rear-mounted Franc cannon barrel is thinner, the caliber is smaller, the weight is much lighter, of course, the power is relatively poor, but this kind of artillery realizes the fixed ammunition, a gun is equipped with a plurality of sub-cannons, when used, it can be fired continuously, the rate of fire is several times faster than the ordinary front-loading artillery, and the sub-cannon is also cast iron, and the pressure of gunpowder explosion is borne when fired, which reduces the damage to the belly of the gun, even if the sub-cannon is damaged, it can be immediately replaced with other sub-cannons, which improves the life and operability of the artillery.

For this kind of Franc cannon in front of him, Zhou Zhong has seen it in the history books of later generations, but as far as he knows, this kind of artillery seems to have been introduced in the Wanli period, and the Ming Dynasty generally called it a sub-mother cannon, this kind of artillery is relatively safe to use, the key is that it is not easy to blow up, which is undoubtedly a great news for the Ming Dynasty with poor iron quality, so in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, this kind of sub-mother cannon has been widely used, and together with the Hongyi cannon, it has become the most commonly used artillery in the Ming army.

Zhou Zhong waited for a while, and Priest Nader finally adjusted the cannon with the craftsmen, and then saw him walk up to Zhou Chong and bow down and say, "Dear son, the cannon has been debugged and can be fired at any time, now I will explain the structure of this cannon to you!" ”

Zhou Zhong nodded when he heard this, although he was very familiar with the structure of this Franc cannon, but Ma Liang and Wu Shi and others around him were still not clear, Zhou Zhong had already planned to give this Franc cannon as a gift to Emperor Zhengde, and now let Ma Liang and Wu Shi understand this kind of artillery, so that they can prove it for themselves in the future.

Next, I saw Priest Nader pointing to the Franc cannon and explaining the structure of the artillery, which was basically similar to Zhou Chongzhi's Dao, and the three parts of the entire cannon were cast separately, and it was only after the end that it formed a complete artillery. Ma Liang and the others were very interested in the strange artillery in front of them, and even asked Priest Nader a few questions, and finally urged Priest Nader to hurry up and test fire.

Zhou Zhong also wanted to see how powerful this cannon that had just been successfully trial-produced, and when Priest Nader saw him nod, he immediately picked up the sub-cannon next to the cannon, and then loaded it into the belly of the cannon, and then put an extremely long gunpowder lead in the fire door, which made Zhou Zhong and the others retreat.

Because the priests were not sure about this attempt, and it was even likely to cause an explosion, so for the sake of safety, Zhou Zhong and they all retreated to a few dozen steps away, there was a temporary earthen wall here, which was very thick, and even if the artillery was blown up, it would not hurt the people behind the earthen wall.

After Zhou Zhong and they were all hiding behind the earthen wall, Priest Nader, who was alone next to the artillery, immediately lit the fuse, and then threw down the torch and ran over, just as he hid behind the earthen wall, he heard the sound of "boom~" from the artillery not far away, and when Zhou Chong stuck his head out from behind the earthen wall, he found that the entire artillery had been surrounded by gunsmoke, and he couldn't see the artillery at all.

"How's it going, did it succeed?" This was the first time Zhou Zhong had watched the artillery fire up close, so he naturally didn't know if the cannon was successful, so he immediately asked the priest Nader beside him.

I saw Priest Nader stretch his head to look at the direction of the artillery fire, and then turned his head to look at the artillery surrounded by gunsmoke, and said a little strangely: "Qiqi Zhou Gongzi, listening to the sound of artillery firing should have been successful, but I didn't see the cannonball fall to the expected landing point, which is a little strange!" ”

Priest Nader said and stood up, the first to walk towards the artillery, Zhou Chong and they also wanted to see what was going on, and they all followed at the moment, at this time the smoke of gunpowder was almost dispersed, when Zhou Chong and they walked to the cannon, they found that the entire surface of the cannon looked intact, and there was no explosion problem that they had worried about beforehand, which made everyone breathe a sigh of relief, regardless of whether the artillery test firing was successful or not, at least the artillery itself was still very strong.

However, compared to Zhou Zhong's optimism, Priest Nader frowned, only to see him walk to the cannon and take out the sub-cannon inside, take a closer look, then observe the muzzle of the barrel, and even after waiting for the barrel to cool, he reached out and touched the two ends of the barrel a few times.

Seeing Priest Nader's performance, Zhou Zhong was also very worried and asked: "Priest Nader, the artillery is also very good, and the cannonball has also been fired, so it seems that the test firing of the artillery is still very successful, right?" ”

Hearing Zhou Chong's words, Priest Nader couldn't help but laugh and said, "Zhou Gongzi, artillery is a weapon, we need to shoot cannonballs where we need them, not just shoot them." ”

Zhou Zhong actually understood what Priest Nader said, but he didn't have much hope for the first test firing, in his opinion, as long as the cannonball could be shot safely this time, then this test firing would be successful, as for any other problems that could be solved later, but now it seems that Priest Nader has much higher expectations for this first test firing than him.

At the moment, Priest Nader and several other craftsmen carefully inspected the artillery, and at this time, the man who had run out of the cannonball to look for the cannonball finally returned, and at the same time carried back the cannonball that had been shot away, and the test shell only shot more than 200 paces away, far less than the range estimated by the priest Nader between one and three miles, no wonder he did not see the cannonball fall to the estimated landing point.

Priest Nader also finished inspecting the artillery at this time, only to see him walk up to Zhou Zhong with some frustration and said: "Qi Qi Zhou Gongzi, this test shot failed, although the cannonball was successfully thanked, but the range is extremely short, and there is no power, as a result, our inspection found that there is a problem with the connection between the sub-cannon and the barrel, there are problems such as air leakage, and the speed of the cannon ejection does not meet expectations, and the firing range is naturally much shorter." ”

Hearing Priest Nader's explanation, and seeing that the other party and several craftsmen were all depressed, Zhou Zhong smiled and comforted: "Priest Nader, you don't have to be too discouraged, although this test shot failed in your opinion, but it has met my expectations, after all, this is only the first test firing of the first artillery we tried to make, as long as the cannonball can be shot out, I am already very satisfied, as for the problem, you already know the reason, then the next thing is how to solve this problem, I'm sure you guys will be able to solve this problem as quickly as possible! ”

Zhou Zhong said the above words as he stepped forward and patted Priest Nader and several craftsmen on the shoulder, a sign of trust in people. After hearing Zhou Chong's comforting words, Priest Nader and the others really looked much better, and immediately assured Zhou Chong that they would definitely solve the problems found this time within a month, and strive to put the artillery into practical use as soon as possible. (To be continued......)