Zhu Youzhen didn't know that Sun Heding was unhappy about forcibly interfering with his research direction.

Now he thinks about the next industrial development of the Ming Dynasty because of smokeless gunpowder.

Zhu Youzhen took the Chongzhen Type 22 breech-loading rifled gun shaped like a Martini-Henry rifle from Bi Maokang, and looked at it very carefully.

On the whole, the biggest feature of the Chongzhen 22 rifle is that the lever principle can make the shooter rotate the bolt by pulling the lever, exposing the chamber, plus the firing pin is automatically retracted into the front of the bolt, and the trigger is embedded in the iron blocking groove, which can make the firing pin fire cotton and cause the ammunition to explode and launch when pulled.

Compared with the rotation method of the Chongzhen Type 21 flintlock pistol, the difference is that a lever is added.

In addition, flint is replaced with fire wool, and then a spring structure can be added, which can automatically fly out as the gun body descends after firing, and thus speed up the reloading process.

"Yes, with such a sharp weapon, the victory of the Northern Expedition will be more certain, immediately determine the standard of the system, put it into mass production, how much time can it be to equip the army at the earliest?"

Zhu Youzhen asked Bi Maokang, and Bi Maokang pondered for a while before he said:

"It can be put into production at the end of May, and now after the steam engine is applied to the boring machine instead of hydropower, the production efficiency has been improved a lot, and it is estimated that it will be able to produce 5,000 Chongzhen Type 22 rifles by then."

"Very good, I am going to inspect the southwest in June, so I can first equip the Janissary Infantry Battalion of Zhang Tongchang of the Second Army, and go to the southwest battlefield with me to verify the actual combat ability of the rifle."

Zhu Youzhen said this to Lu Jiude, the person in charge of the General Armament Department of the Generalissimo's Office.

The most advanced weapons and equipment of the Ming Dynasty were directly controlled by the Generalissimo's Office, in order to prevent civilian officials from getting involved.

Lu Jiude replied yes, while Zhu Youzhen continued to inquire about the development of artillery.

And the person in charge of the Artillery Bureau, Tang Ruowang, took Zhu Youzhen to the artillery test firing base, pointed to a cannon with a grass green body and a base carried by a four-wheel drive iron-wheeled vehicle, and said:

"Your Majesty the Emperor, this is the rifled rear-loading cannon made by Weichen for you, that is, the Ming 22-type infantry light field gun, using the principle of the mother and son of the Franc machine, this artillery is also divided into two basic structures, the mother cannon is a rifled cannon, the front section of the mother cannon is bored by the steam boring machine threaded rifle, the rear section is hollowed out to load the sub-cannon, and the sub-cannon shell is not fired with the cotton wool, because the cotton production is too small and a small amount of cotton is difficult to fire the shell, it is still fired with the fire rope to ignite the black powder.

However, the primer is nitrified explosive, so it is easier to detonate and the explosive force is stronger, and Weichen has transformed the shell into a conical shape, and the use of medium carbon steel clad brass can make the nitrification explosive explode when the shell explodes, and the shell is made of high-hardness steel, so that when the shell is highly killed, it can also make the gun body explode to form a greater destructive force. ”

In the early years of the Ming Dynasty, John Tang was mainly responsible for the manufacture of artillery, and had a wealth of experience in artillery manufacturing.

Zhu Youzhen can see that there is still a big gap between the breech-loading rifled gun mentioned by Tang Ruowang and the modern breech-loading rifled gun, in essence, it is still a breech gun, because the sub-cannon is still loaded from the breech, but because of the improvement of rifling and propellant and the improvement of shell materials, it is enough to improve the current Ming infantry field artillery.

"Blossom shells and rifled guns, in the field, artillery can completely cause great damage to the cavalry, now give me a test shot!"

Zhu Youzhen said and retreated to the pavilion.

At that time, the test team of the Artillery Bureau came over and began to operate a newly developed rifled rear-loading gun.

Boom!

The loud vibration almost toppled the roof on Zhu Youjian's head, and the entire earth shook a few times.

When Zhu Youzhen and a group of officials rushed to the location of the bomb crater, they saw that there were metal pieces and a huge crater everywhere.

"This Ming Type 22 infantry light field cannon is also very effective, good you Tang John, you just don't preach, just make a good cannon for me, I will definitely not treat you badly, maybe I can help you when the time comes, you usurp the throne of your king, and let you be the king!"

Zhu Youzhen couldn't help patting Tang Ruowang on the shoulder.

"Wechen does not have the ideal of being a king, Wechen only hopes that after the Ming Dynasty can be unified, His Majesty can allow Wechen to resign from his official position and continue to preach!"

John Tang bowed his head and said.

"Okay, I promised you the freedom to preach, and naturally I won't stop you, but you can preach, but you can't try to hijack the church to participate in politics, otherwise I won't be polite!"

Zhu Youzhen said and returned to the topic of the artillery itself: "When will this Ming Type 22 infantry light field gun be put into production, and when will the Ming Type 22 infantry heavy field gun be manufactured?" ”

"Back to Your Majesty, artillery is no better than rifles, the output of nitric acid and nitrification explosives are limited, and the primer of the shell requires a higher density of nitrifying explosives, so it is more difficult to manufacture such high-density nitrifying explosives, so even if the standard is produced now, it will not produce much, and it is expected that only 100 will be produced by the end of July this year, and it will not be possible to exceed 200 per year in the future."

"For such heavy artillery, if you simply increase the weight of the shell, it is easy, just thicken the barrel and increase it, but in that case, because the proportion of steel in today's artillery has increased, and then it will lead to inconvenient transportation, if you want to create a heavy gun that is light and can have great destructive power, you have to go further in the material, this depends on luck and time, Wechen dare not guarantee whether it will take a year or ten years."

When Tang Ruowang said this, Zhu Youzhen could only nod his head.

From Chongzhen's seventeenth year to the south, it has been nearly five years now, the manufacturing industry of the Ming Dynasty has advanced by leaps and bounds to the original history of two hundred years later, and then if you want to take a step forward, everything has to return to the material itself in order to make progress.

"I also understand that guns already have rifling and rear loading methods, and in order to improve firearms in the future, we need to design new gunarms manufacturing concepts, and we must introduce new materials to improve the rate of fire and ease of operation, and the same is true for artillery, even including the gunpowder itself, since then, I can no longer provide you with a clear direction of development.

"Now you not only have to mass produce the most advanced firearms available, but also keep the experimental records and the summary of relevant experimental experience, and after the victory of the Northern Expedition, the organization of the Society will compile teaching materials based on these experimental materials and build a complete knowledge system, just as there are four books and five classics in science, and the practical sacred studies taught by Taizu must also be divided into categories to construct a theoretical hierarchy system from Mongolian to profound.

"In many years, I and you will all be old, these things have to be passed on, the three laws of mechanics, the three laws of thermodynamics, and the electromagnetic theory that has not been empirically proven, as well as organic chemistry and even biology, many of you do not understand, and you have to try to learn and understand, and what you learn must be taught."

(End of chapter)