Li Hui's purpose in doing these experiments was just to let the Beiyang Naval Division understand the special features of picric acid explosives, so as not to be caught off guard as in history, but he also did not want to overly demoralize the Beiyang Naval Divisions or even cause panic, so he immediately added, "You don't have to worry too much, picric acid explosives are so expensive, and the problem of safety is difficult to completely solve, and the Japanese Navy cannot be equipped with too many explosive shells with picric acid charges." And as long as the characteristics of picric acid combustion are understood in advance, its harm can be greatly reduced."

After brushing a few strokes and writing the chemical equation of the picric acid explosion on the pre-prepared white paper, Li Hui analyzed to the admirals who came over, "You should have noticed that picric acid will produce toxic and flammable carbon monoxide after the explosion, so our personnel must not get too close when fighting the fire, on the one hand, to avoid inhaling too much carbon monoxide and causing poisoning, and on the other hand, to avoid the secondary damage caused by the flame after the carbon monoxide is mixed with the air." In addition, the temperature produced by the combustion of picric acid is extremely high, and it is difficult to extinguish the flame if the amount of water is not enough, so it is necessary to use high-pressure water guns, and the means of manpower to transport water to extinguish the fire can only be used after the initial control of the fire. Oxygen isolation methods such as sand should also be used with caution, especially when the coal bunker is on fire, as this will lead to more carbon monoxide production, and the fire will occur inside the ship's hull, and the toxic gas will escape very slowly. Of course, if the deck is on fire, then it is still feasible to extinguish it with sand."

Hearing this, Ye Zugui, the pipe belt of the Jingyuan, quickly frowned and said, "If you rely on high-pressure water cannons to extinguish the fire, the number on the ship is not enough now."

"In other words, the purchase of a high-pressure water cannon is a necessary expense?" , Li Hui said "oh", and immediately picked up his pen and found this on his proposal and made a mark

After some discussion, the generals of the Beiyang Navy Division basically figured out the arson effect of picric acid, and also summed up some countermeasures, but because of the layout of the coal bunker, the threat of picric acid shells was not too small, so their faces were still full of solemnity.

But at this time, Lin Taizeng, the pipe leader of the Zhenyuan who had a high position but had no sense of existence, said with hesitation, "In fact, as long as it is not continuously shot, the fire is not enough to be fatal, and as long as the Dome Clipper catches fire in time to fight the fire, it will not be in danger of destruction."

"Although this Lin Taizeng has an indecisive personality and is not a qualified captain of a capital ship, his business ability seems to be fine, and he can see the key to the problem at a glance." , Just when Li Hui secretly praised it in his heart, he saw Deng Shichang, the pipe leader of the Zhiyuan, and said, "If the warship catches fire, it will withdraw from the battle, with so many rapid-fire guns from Japanese ships, isn't it that most of our ships will run away before the battle lasts long?" At that time, there was a huge disparity between the enemy and us on the battlefield, and the speed of the Japanese ships was so fast that the remaining warships could not retreat if they wanted to, and they could not fight them, so wouldn't they be lost? ”

Although Lin Taizeng has a good temper and usually has a good relationship with Deng Shichang, his face can't help but be a little ugly when he is so popular with Deng Shichang, but he still patiently explained, "Zhengqing, what I'm talking about is that the dome armored clipper should not be strong, and the four ships of Dingzhen Jinglai (Pingyuan is an offshore ironclad ship, with poor seaworthiness, and in principle, she will not be taken to the far sea to fight. It should still be possible to hold on for a long time, and with the sturdiness of the ironclad ship, it should be enough to wait until the burning dome clipper is extinguished and returns to the battlefield."

But what no one expected was that Li Hui, who caused this topic, suddenly interrupted Lin Taizeng's words at this time, "The second ship is not so durable, it is known as an ironclad ship, but the waterline armor belt is pitifully narrow, and the waterline armor belt of the second ship is not complete, if it is hit in an unprotected area, even a blasting bomb can blow up a big hole in the waterline and cause water ingress, a little more will cause the waterline armor belt of the second ship to completely submerge into the water and become an unarmored ship, and then the waterline will be completely undefended. Considering that their reserve buoyancy is insufficient, the second ship at this time may not be able to resist the beating, and in addition to the central ironclad fort, the second ship is equipped with dome armor in the front and rear sections of the ship, and the coal bunker is also arranged outside the central ironclad fort because of this design, once it is hit by a picric acid cannonball, the situation will not be any different from the dome clipper being shot. When the time comes, the sailors will have to extinguish the fire and drain the water, and if they don't do anything well, they will be destroyed."

Therefore, among the ten large ships of the navy, only the Dingzhen 2nd ship can withstand a long-term siege by the Japanese ships. As long as the potential safety hazards of the bow and stern unprotected zone are solved, the Japanese Navy will not be able to sink these two ironclad giants under any circumstances unless they use torpedoes, and even if they run out of shells. If it is only compared to the survivability under artillery attack, all the other warships of the navy combined cannot compare to one of them", Li Hui said this, and unceremoniously put forward his own suggestions on the combat strategy of the Beiyang Naval Division, "Even if all my suggestions are realized, our firepower will not be stronger than the Japanese Navy, so our only chance of victory is to use the super defense power of Dingzhen to fight a protracted war with the enemy, let the second ship contain the enemy, give our wounded warships time to save themselves, and finally consume the enemy to death." If a warship like Chaoyang, which has almost no armor protection, is damaged and does not retreat, the result will only be that the Japanese ships quickly kill our two unprotected warships and three dome clippers, remove these obstacles, and then besiege Jinglai, which will not last long when all the enemy's firepower is concentrated on attacking. When these two ironclad ships also sank, the Japanese could rely on their numerical superiority to forcibly approach Dingzhen and fire torpedoes, so that the general trend would go! ”

However, this kind of anti-ear advice is not acceptable to everyone, Liu Buyun was displeased and said, "Dongyang, you are too alarmist, right?" Even if our firepower is weaker, it is impossible for the Japanese side to lose nothing? As long as the problem of blasting shells can be solved, those thin-skinned cruisers of the Japanese people can withstand my eight twelve-inch guns? ”

On the day he came to the Dadonggou base, Li Hui saw the three 305mm caliber original long flowering bullets that many people thought were purely fabricated before the crossing, and the weight of the bullet reached 455 kilograms, no wonder it could hold 90 pounds of black powder.

Although there are some grievances on the 25 times the diameter of the modified naval gun with a shortened barrel in Dingzhen, the impact of the large charge on the explosion power is real, if the charge is replaced with the KClO3 Vaseline explosive that Li Hui just made, it is even more fierce than today's torpedoes (but the explosion power is exceeded, and the damage ability is still inferior, after all, the threat of underwater attacks to warships is much greater than that of water attacks.) ）