Whether in modern times or in later generations, an order for a warship is enough to make those shipyards break their heads, because in that era, the cost of large warships was very high.

The value of hundreds of thousands of yuan in this era is not much worse than the hundreds of millions of dollars in later generations.

Normally, when the Imperial Navy orders warships, it is enough to make those shipyards in the country break their heads, not to mention foreign trade warships.

When the imperial military purchases weapons, it often keeps the price very low, and it does not say that it leaves too much profit margin for the manufacturing enterprises, and if it is some enterprises with weak technical capabilities and just set foot in the defense industry, let alone make money, sometimes it is simply a loss to make money.

Last year, when the Songhu Shipyard first set foot in the manufacture of large warships, it was the best plan to do it at a loss.

But the foreign trade warship is different, its sale price is naturally higher than the military's direct procurement, don't look at the high price is not much compared to the total price of the ship, but for the shipyard, the extra tens of thousands of yuan is a profit, and the price of the warship is hundreds of thousands, and the construction cost is often fixed, which can be sold for tens of thousands more, which represents tens of thousands more profits.

Don't look at the extra profit of tens of thousands of yuan, but tens of thousands of yuan in these years is not a small amount, in this era when the average income of urban workers hovers around seven or eight yuan, tens of thousands of yuan is a very large amount.

Therefore, in recent years, several large domestic shipyards are very eager for orders for foreign trade warships, even the Qingdao Naval Shipyard, which belongs to the navy, is also very interested in foreign trade warships.

Early 1869. Under the impetus of the Pacific Trading Company, under the liaison of the Imperial Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Royal Navy and several major shipyards in the country jointly invited representatives of the Argentine Navy to visit the Empire.

In April, a naval expedition led by senior admirals of the Argentine Navy arrived in Shanghai. In order to win orders for warships from the Argentine Navy, the Pacific Trading Company organized a welcome reception for a number of large shipyards in China, manufacturers of major warship parts suppliers, and a number of high-ranking generals of the Navy.

At the reception, the senior admirals of the two countries talked very happily, and the Imperial Navy even took it as a promise and was willing to exchange personnel with the Argentine Navy on a regular basis.

After all, the Imperial Navy is currently one of the few in the world that has combat experience in large-scale ironclad fleets and maintains a fleet of ironclad ships of acceptable size, which has great reference and learning value for the Argentine Navy, which is just starting out in the navy.

Furthermore. The Imperial Navy also presented the Argentine Navy with a model of the Empire's newest commissioned Quadrance!

After the completion of outfitting last year and the factory trials, the Kwafu officially joined the active service of the Navy in March this year, although this official service does not mean that it has combat effectiveness, after all, the Kwafu ironclad ship is a new warship model, and the internal structure and even many subsystems are different from the previous warships, which still requires a period of training and adaptation, and it takes about half a year to be able to form combat effectiveness.

The combat effectiveness that can be formed in the past half a year is considered fast, and this is because of the foreshadowing of the Tianwu before.

The development of the Imperial Navy since the Tianwu. There is a very clear difference.

That is, since the Tianwu (eight-year armor ship), the main warships of the empire have great innovations in design and some subsystems, the power systems are newly developed, and the main guns of 250 mm are still used. And began to adopt a fully enclosed rotating turret.

Although the test ship Tianwu was officially commissioned in 1868, the navy has been conducting sea trials and training for a very long time, providing the navy with all aspects of the performance data of the new warship and the distinction between advantages and disadvantages.

So these new ships are sometimes officially commissioned. However, it does not mean that they will be able to exert their combat effectiveness immediately, and the navy will also have to carry out adaptive training. Look for the best tactics that will bring out their combat effectiveness.

In order to demonstrate the Empire's ship-building prowess, the Imperial Navy even invited the Argentine Navy to board the Quafu for observation. This kind of observation is not a casual look on the deck, but also allows them to see some details.

As for the technical leakage, there is no need to worry too much, to be honest, the current level of shipbuilding in the empire is still a certain level gap between the level of shipbuilding power like Britain, and the level of steam engines is still slightly inferior to that of the British.

And the difference between the Imperial battleship and the British battleship is also very obvious, you don't need to go deep into the interior to see it, for example, those rotating closed turrets, others can see from a distance, such as the two hundred and fifty mm rear-loading naval guns, and people with high myopia can see the cannon barrel.

The difference between the Imperial Navy and the British Navy lies not in some technical details, nor in some differences in hull design, but in the theory of naval strategy, the two sides have different theories of naval warfare, which has caused some specific differences in the capital ships of the two sides.

When the Argentine delegation saw the four 250-millimeter cannons on the Quafu, they all showed a look of shock.

The Imperial Navy did not hide too much from this artillery, but said generously: "This 1868 naval gun, with a total weight of 25 tons, a caliber of 250 mm, and a barrel length of 22 times, is absolutely the most powerful in modern times!" ”

In recent years, the main guns on the main battleships are generally about nine inches, because the British have taken the initiative to give up the rear-loading guns in recent years, and returned to the front-loading rifled guns on the new warships, and even the rear-loading guns have been withdrawn one after another, so the rear-loading rifled guns of the nine-inch and ten-inch levels are currently the only one in the world.

Of course, the commentators on the imperial side did not say that this 1868 naval gun, which is not only powerful, but also cost-effective, using a large-caliber breech-loading rifled gun, and with a rotating turret, the cost of its weapon system will account for about a quarter to a third of the cost of the entire ship.

Although the Argentine admirals were drooling at the Quafu, these people were also very wise, and these people could be regarded as having seen the world. Know that there are more powerful 10,000-ton giant ships in this world.

It is a pity that the Imperial Navy also took them to visit the second ship of the Chiyu-class battleship, the Fengbo, which was being built. However, the current Fengbo has not yet completed the hull construction, and now it looks like a huge steel frame. I can't see anything at all.

Relatively speaking, these Argentine navies were very interested in the cruiser Cullen, which was under construction at the Songhu shipyard next door to the Shanghai shipyard.

This is not because of how powerful the cruiser Cullen is, but because the tonnage of the cruiser Cullen is only about 3,000 tons, and two or three thousand tons or even more than 1,000 tons, and these tonnage warships are potential targets for the Argentine Navy.

Therefore, how good those 10,000-ton giant ships of the Imperial Navy or those large ironclad ships of five or six thousand tons are have nothing to do with the Argentine Navy, at most they are shocked and shocked, and sigh a thing or two.

At the same time, they are also very interested in the Zhenguang-class small ironclad ships of the Imperial Navy. Before and after they came, they also collected detailed information, and knew that among the warships exported by the Chinese Empire in recent years, the main ones were the 500-ton ironclads improved from the Zhenguang-class ironclad ships.

However, although they were very interested in the Zhenguang-class small ironclad, they also believed that this ironclad ship was too small for the Argentine Navy in tonnage and too weak in firepower to be used as the main force for coastal defense.

Before you come to investigate. It was to the Pacific Trading Company that the Argentine Navy proposed some of their performance requirements for the new warship.

First of all, the tonnage of the capital battleships they procured could not be less than a thousand tons, the caliber of the installed main guns should not be less than seven inches, and the speed should not be less than ten knots. With the cooperation of shore defense artillery, it can effectively fight those ironclad ships of two or three thousand tons.

After several days of intensive visits, the two sides entered into a more formal exchange. Pacific Trading Company also organized major shipyards to submit their respective designs.

Although the Imperial Navy's warship design is generally the responsibility of the Navy's Naval Ship Master's Department, this does not mean that those shipyards do not have the ability to set up warships. Even if you have weak design ability, you can directly cooperate with the designers of the Ship Administration Department.

Several large shipyards in China have submitted designs based on offshore ironclad ships. There are also a small number of ocean-going ironclad ships, ranging from 1,000 tons to more than 3,000 tons, and the price ranges from 60,000 pounds to 200,000 pounds.

In order to compete for the orders of the Argentine Navy, the Songhu Shipyard directly approached the Navy Ship Administration Department, and came up with five design plans in one breath by purchasing the design, and the Songhu Shipyard is clearly positioned, that is, the cheap offshore ironclad ship, not the same as the Qingdao Shipyard, directly took out the ocean-going ironclad ship with a displacement of 2,800 tons, which design Although the Argentine representative drooled when he saw it, but when he looked at the quotation behind, they didn't even have the courage to ask the details directly, The direct price of this design is eighteen pounds, which is certainly expensive based on the annual budget of the Argentine Navy.

And the Qingdao Naval Shipyard is even more exaggerated, they directly took out the design plan of the Kuafu-class ironclad ship, and then pushed it out after slightly modifying it, and quoted 320,000 pounds, you can't make up so much money if you sell the entire Argentine Navy.

On the contrary, although the five designs launched by the Songhu Shipyard are high and bottom, they generally adhere to the phalanx of cheap offshore ironclad ships.

For example, in the first design, they directly referred to the hull design of the Zhenguang-class ironclad ship, and then enlarged to 1,000 tons, equipped with a front-loading rifled gun, and the speed was eight knots.

The same is true for most of the others, with the best performance of the fifth design, which has a displacement of only 2,000 tons, and is based on the design of the Ironclad Ship Offshore Deku, with a low freeboard design, a 250 mm naval gun and several 150 mm naval guns.

The Argentine Navy has repeatedly studied the many warship designs submitted by the Empire, and those that are too expensive have been directly abandoned, and what is the standard for the too high price? 100,000 pounds, no matter how good the performance is, above this price is directly vetoed.

Then those that were too poor were also rejected.

In the end, they were hesitating around the several proposals offered by the Songhu Shipyard and the Tianjin Shipyard, and then passed the word through the Pacific Trading Company, hoping to have a second round of negotiations with the Songhu Shipyard and the Tianjin Shipyard respectively, preferably with the designers face-to-face, in order to achieve the best results. (To be continued.) )