After the First Sino-Japanese War, the distance of engagement at sea had exceeded 2,500 meters, and simple sights could not meet the needs of such long-distance needs.

As a result, a large number of experts from Beiyang Science and Technology Heavy Industry began to conduct relevant research. Soon, the first fire control system consisting of gyroscopes, optical instruments and slide rule was born. A gyroscope is a must-have, and he is used to solve the primary problem of shooting. Because it is impossible for a battleship to stop in an engagement, even if it stops to shoot, the impact of the wave will inevitably cause the hull to sway, affecting the accuracy of artillery shooting. The function of the gyroscope is to determine a horizontal reference plane, detect the deck tilt caused by the horizontal and horizontal swaying of the hull before firing, and correct its effect on gun shooting, so that no matter how the hull sways, the naval gun can shoot from the horizontal plane. The large shipborne optical instruments were imported from Germany and installed on warships by the Beiyang Science and Technology Optical Laboratory to measure sea targets at a distance of 5,000 meters.

The fire control system was originally intended to be tested on the battleship Daji, but the Admiralty believed that once this advanced fire control system was in place, the engagement distance could be extended to 5,000 meters, so that the Chinese navy could fire before the enemy and seize the initiative.

This advantage was self-evident, so the Admiralty stepped up the process of testing this new fire control system on the Daji in order to install it on the Jianwei-class battleship before it was outfitted.

It can be said that the Jianwei-class battleship is ahead of the current warships of the navies of various countries in terms of design, although it is the first battleship designed and built by China itself, but the wisdom of Chinese engineers has been brought into full play, making this battleship an important symbol of the Chinese Navy becoming a maritime power. Of course, the Admiralty's degree of secrecy about the Jianwei-class battleships is very high, and the specific construction parameters are strictly kept secret from the outside world, especially the China Special Steel and advanced fire control systems are in top secret.

The Jianwei-class battleships are in a world-leading position in all indicators, but the cost has also become high. The budget for each battleship was increased to 7,500,000 dragon coins, equivalent to 1,500,000 pounds. Fortunately, the shipyard started to build three battleships of this class at the same time, unifying reasonable interests and allocating resources and manpower, which can effectively reduce some costs, but if you want to finally complete the construction project, it is impossible to be less than 7.3 million dragon coins.

The budget was limited, and in order to make up for the budget allocation squeezed out by the three battleships, the Ship Administration had to find a way to work on other warship projects.

Following the Jianwei-class battleship, the designers of the General Administration of Ships planned to design a heavy armored cruiser based on the Hunter and Daji, but because the budget was squeezed by the battleship project, the budget for the heavy armored cruiser project was less than 5 million dragon coins. As a result, the designers had to abandon the construction of heavy armored cruisers with greater tonnage and greater firepower, and could only make appropriate improvements to the Hunter class.

The improved heavy armored cruiser was classified as the Catcher, with the addition of four oil-fired coal-fired boilers and an improved steam engine to the Hunter class, increasing its power output by 15% and increasing its speed to 23 knots. In terms of armor protection, China special steel is also used, which improves the protection ability of its armor. There was no change in firepower, but the hull was lengthened and widened due to the addition of boiler and steam engine equipment, and the original 152 mm single-mounted secondary gun was changed to a turret type, which improved combat effectiveness and protection. As for the fire control system and communication command system, the technical standards of the Jianwei class are still adopted to comprehensively enhance combat capability.

Shanghai Shipbuilding Industry Co., Ltd. is responsible for the final finalization of the plan for the six large capital ships of the 33 Fleet Project, and plans to complete the construction work in 26 months. The remaining three 5,000-ton armored cruisers still use the design scheme of the Haiqi class, because the scheme has matured, as a 5,000-ton armored cruiser, the various performance indicators of the Haiqi class are in the world's advanced ranks, and will not be outdated in a short period of time, especially for the sea missions in the Far East Pacific region is more than enough, so a little improvement can be done.

Five Haiqi-class warships have been built, and there is ample construction experience in China. In order to allow the shipbuilding capacity of other shipyards to catch up with the level of Shanghai Shipbuilding Industry as soon as possible, the Navy Shipbuilding Administration has built two additional Haiqi-class armored warships by Zhigu Shipyard and one by Dalian Shipyard, and Shanghai Shipbuilding Industry has sent technical engineers to assist the two shipyards in completing the construction of the project.

In order to balance the technological gap between the shipyards in the north and the south, to achieve the simultaneous progress of China's major shipyards, and at the same time to squeeze into the forefront of the world's shipbuilding industry, the Mawei Shipyard and Huangpu Shipyard in Nanyang won the order to build a total of 18 hunting ships for the Chinese Navy in three hunting fleets.

Among them, the Mawei Shipyard is responsible for the construction of six lightning destroyers, and the Whampoa Shipyard is responsible for the construction of six artillery destroyers.

In the field of hunting ships, the technical cooperation between China and Britain has entered a new stage. British Sea Secretary Fisher presided over the program and actively developed a number of D-class hunting vessels. On average, the UK launches a new type of hunting destroyer every five months, and now it has built more than 100 warships such as the Despair-class, the Huanavel-class, the Lady class, and the Bucks-class. These four destroyers have obvious characteristics from the outside, that is, the three chimneys of the C-class destroyers will be two chimneys, because the initials are D, so they are collectively referred to as D-class destroyers.

Although the Chimney of the D-class Destroyer is missing, this does not mean that the surname of the Missionary of this class can be reduced, but it proves that its surname can be improved.

The biggest technical advantage of the Destroyers is their speed, and the C-Class destroyers are all three-chimneys, as they use the first-generation Parsons steam turbine system, which uses high-quality coal to increase their speed. The new D-class hunting ship uses the Parsons II steam turbine system, which has been improved by British professional engineers, and its turbine efficiency has been greatly improved compared to the previous one, and the problem of bloated equipment has been improved, so that only two chimneys are needed.

The chimney was reduced to two, but the speed did not decrease because of this, and it was still at a high speed of thirty knots. Moreover, the tonnage of the D-class destroyers has been increased, reaching 600 tons, which is 125 tons more than the previous C-class destroyers, and the space saved has increased the caliber and number of guns, and torpedo tubes have been added, which can carry more ammunition and coal.

China is a partner in this technology, and the technology of the British to build the relevant D-class destroyers is completely open to the Chinese Navy, and the Chinese Navy has obtained the technology of the British D-class destroyers and began to deploy them in China's coastal waters.

The Chinese version of the British D-class destroyer is the Mistral class, which is taken from the British in the northwest of China.

The Mistral-class hunting ship has a displacement of 600 tons, the ship is designed to be 65 meters long and 6.5 meters wide, with one 88 mm rapid-fire gun, three 47 mm rapid-fire guns, four 18-inch torpedo tubes, a steam turbine power of 7,000 horsepower, and a design speed of 30 knots.

The modified safari destroyer does not strictly distinguish between uses, and can be used as both an artillery bombardment and a lightning destroyer. Since then, the Chinese Navy has no longer strictly distinguished between lightning strikes and artillery bombardment in terms of hunting ships, and has replaced them with general-purpose hunting ships.

In the design and construction of surface combat ships, the Chinese Navy has obtained the ready-made mature technology of the United Kingdom, and it has stood on the shoulders of the giant of the British Navy at the initial stage, and has naturally made rapid progress. However, for the Chinese Navy's submarines operating under the surface, because they are groping their way forward, they will inevitably encounter bumps and setbacks.

Holland and Lake led their submarine technical team, and after successfully designing the Xia-class, Shang-class and Zhou-class submarines one after another, they encountered a huge setback in the design of the Qin-class submarines.

Since Wang Chenhao encouraged the two of them to build large-tonnage submarines, according to Wang Chenhao's idea, if the two of them could build a submarine with a displacement of more than 20,000 tons like the Typhoon class, then they could go sideways all over the world. Wang Chenhao had high expectations for them, and it was precisely because of this high expectation that Huo Lan and Lake had the mentality of blindly carrying out the Great Leap Forward under flattery, which eventually caused the two to suffer a huge setback on the Qin-class submarine.

The test boat of the Qin-class submarine suddenly increased its displacement by half from the 300 tons of the Zhou-class submarine to 600 tons. The sudden increase in displacement by half carried away the duo of Holland and Lake, who took the opportunity to increase the diesel engine and electric motor equipment, increase the oil storage, increase the torpedo tubes, increase the number of torpedoes, and increase the configuration in almost every aspect. As a result, the duo's underestimation of the increment led to problems in all aspects of the test boat.

The displacement of the test boat of the Qin-class submarine (surface / underwater): 528t/635t, the surface speed reached 14 knots, the underwater speed reached 10 knots, the endurance suddenly increased from the original 9.6 knots / 1700 nautical miles to 10 knots 2200 nautical miles, 6 450 mm torpedo tubes (including 4 in the bow and 2 in the superstructure), and 12 torpedoes. The safe diving depth is 61m, and the number of submariners: 35.

Interestingly, this submarine Holland cooperated with Lake for the first time, and according to Lake's design, it was changed to a double-hull. In this way, two torpedo tubes can be arranged in the superstructure, and three horizontal rudders are installed on the left and right sides, in addition, what is even more peculiar is that the test boat of the Qin-class submarine is also equipped with wheels at the bottom, which can make the boat walk on the bottom of the sea, and when the wheels are not in use, the wheels are recycled.

Lake's design undoubtedly impresses his imagination, and Holland is not far behind, he installed a 47mm rapid-fire gun on the exterior of the submarine's superstructure, so that the submarine has a certain offensive and defensive capability when sailing on the water.

However, this submarine has some indigestion because it fuses too many things from Horan and Lake at once. The installation of various equipment soon exceeded the carrying capacity of the submarine's displacement, and the potential safety hazards were huge. At the same time, it is extremely obvious that in response to Wang Chenhao's call for replacing the oil extractor with an oil extraction engine that is not suitable for gasoline engines, they installed two Diesel 4-stroke diesel engines on their submarines, and the main engine system composed of these two diesel engines and electric motors vibrates very seriously during operation, and it is impossible for submarine personnel to rest at night. Moreover, after the tonnage of the submarine was enlarged, its aerodynamic layout was not improved, and as a result, the submarine had to float in less than half an hour, which was extremely dangerous in actual combat.

The design of the Qin-class submarine failed, and the technicians such as Holland and Lake repaired and modified the test boat for more than three months, which can be said to have made up the Lucy Wall on the east wall, and finally failed to complete the relevant planning indicators of the Qin-class submarine within the planned time.

When Wang Chenhao learned about this, he first sighed, knowing that he expected them too much. Many things cannot be done by pulling out seedlings and helping them to grow, they need to be done gradually.

The unprecedented failure of Holland and Lake in designing the Qin-class submarine inevitably affected their fighting spirit and confidence.

In order to cheer them up, Wang Chenhao threw a great temptation to them, that is, to allow them to visit the Jiaolong submarine.

Since the Jiaolong submarine followed Wang Chenhao around the world and returned to China, it was displayed in the Beiyang Science and Technology Test Base and was classified as a top secret.

Previously, Wang Chenhao had taken Tesla to visit the inside of the Jiaolong submarine, and Tesla signed a lifelong service contract with Wang Chenhao before being allowed to enter the Jiaolong. The contract stipulates that once you enter the Jiaolong and see the secrets inside the Jiaolong, Tesla will keep it secret for life, and will not leave Beiyang Technology for the rest of your life, and will serve Wang Chenhao and his Beiyang Technology for life.

Tesla was looking forward to visiting Wang Chenhao's Jiaolong submarine as early as in the United States, when Wang Chenhao promised to provide him with scientific and technological information beyond the times, and Tesla was only interested in high-tech cutting-edge technology all his life, so he didn't care about the agreements on the contract that were equivalent to "selling himself" and "losing his freedom", and signed it happily, so Tesla became the second person in the world to learn the secret of the Jiaolong after Wang Chenhao's wife Li Youyi.

Now Wang Chenhao repeated his old trick and threw this temptation to Holland and Lake, and the two hesitated when they looked at the "selling their bodies" agreement, but in the end, the two still couldn't resist the temptation of the Jiaolong, so they signed it.

After Holland and Lake entered the Jiaolong submarine, they were immediately stunned by the super-era technology inside, and all kinds of advanced instruments made the two salivate, so their self-confidence that had been hit was restored again, and even better than before, they began to study the various technologies inside the Jiaolong. Under Tesla's guidance, Holland and Lake gained a deeper understanding of the Jiaolong, and at the same time became friends with Tesla, and learned a lot of the technology and knowledge they needed from Tesla, and re-designed and improved the Qin-class submarine with his help.

(To be continued)