Cha Zhu hurriedly wrote it down, revising the Navy Regulations, this is not a trivial matter, it involves all aspects, especially the arsenals under the Firearms Bureau, they need to make drastic adjustments.

"Bi Dengfu!"

Zhu Jie continued: "You say, if our warships are covered with a layer of iron plate now, will the defense capability of our warships be greatly improved?" ”

Forehead......

Bi Dengfu was frightened, and said with a wry smile: "Your Majesty, if you put all the warships on the iron plate, you really dare to think about it, we now have more than 100 main warships, just to lay these 100 warships with iron plates, how much steel will it consume?" Even if the steel plate is only one point thick, the main warship of the whole fleet will be at least thousands of tons or even tens of thousands of tons of steel, and now the imperial court is fully supervising the manufacture of artillery, and the cost of steel is too great, even if our steel production has increased exponentially, it is just barely enough, where is the excess steel used to lay a layer of armor on the battleship? What's more, laying so many iron armor will bring a huge load to the battleship, greatly reducing the speed and flexibility of the battleship, and how to splice these iron plates together? It's all a problem......"

Zhu Jie's face darkened, this is a problem, he patronized the majesty of the armored ship, but he forgot that the current steel production can't keep up at all, Daming's steel production is the best in the world, and the annual output is only twenty or thirty thousand tons, of which the casting artillery alone consumes one-third of the output, plus guns, vehicles, and so on, all aspects need steel, even if it is twenty or thirty thousand tons of steel, the country is still in short supply, and the entire fleet is laid with steel plates, as Bi Dengfu said, Even if it is only a steel plate one cent thick, it will consume at least tens of thousands of tons of steel, and the imperial court will not be able to raise it at all!

"Alas......"

Zhu Jie sighed and said: "Bi Dengfu, the battleship can be overcome because of the problem of increasing the weight of the armor, our flowering cannons are more and more, the power is huge, then the battleship does not need so many artillery, and a lot of load is vacated, but it has little impact on the speed and mobility of the battleship, the iron plate can be spliced together through the tenon, it is not impossible, although it is not strong enough, but it can also achieve the purpose of strengthening the defense, now the only tricky thing is that the steel production can not keep up, the Mining Bureau seems to have to work hard... …”

Bi Dengfu did not answer Zhu Jie's words, after all, it involves the Ministry of Commerce, which is a matter of the Ministry of Commerce, but he can't put his beak too much, and if he doesn't do it well, it will affect the relationship between colleagues.

"Li Yan, I intend to establish a Ministry of Industry in addition to the Thirteen Ministries, which is responsible for mining development, encourages the development of meritorious work, and separates the Mining Department from the Ministry of Commerce, so that it can increase the output of coal, iron and other industries more quickly, and discover mineral deposits, what do you think?"

Zhu Jie asked Li Yan.

Li Yan nodded and replied: "What the emperor said is very true, the minister seconded the proposal, now that industrial production such as coal and iron is becoming more and more important, and there are more and more industrial machines, the establishment of the Ministry of Industry is the right time to facilitate overall management......

"Well, that's it, after you go back, discuss with the waiter, and take out a piece of Chen, there are many coal and iron resources in the north, but we can't sit on Baoshan and not know it......"

Zhu Jie said in a deep voice.

"Your Majesty, there is one more thing!"

Bi Dengfu said: "The steamship studied by Shuntian Academy has begun to sail on the Chaobai River, the steamship is 8 zhang long, four zhang wide, double-decked, and has a displacement of about 100 tons, if you don't raise the sails, the sailing speed can reach twenty-four miles per hour, and if you sail downwind, in one hour, the steamship can travel nearly fifty miles, and these people from Shuntian Academy ran to the front of Yingtian Academy this time......

"Oh?"

Zhu Jie was shocked and asked, "The displacement has reached a hundred tons?" And this was done with a few steam engines? The progress of this steamship is fast enough......"

Driving a ship with a displacement of 100 tons forward, this shows that the technology of steamships has gradually matured, which can be hundreds of years earlier than steamships in another time and space, and now that there are the first and second steamships, and the performance is extraordinary, then the momentum of building steamships will definitely be promoted.

Think about it, an hour to sail with the wind, travel fifty miles, such a speed far exceeds the boat, you must know that on the Grand Canal, when the wind is calm, many boats are pulled forward by the slender man, its speed can be imagined, an hour, can advance more than ten miles is good, even if it is downwind, an hour is only a dozen miles away, this steamer is more than twice as fast as the boat!

Once the problem of steam turbines or steam units with more powerful horsepower is solved in the future, even a steamship with a displacement of more than two or three hundred tons can reach a speed of 20 miles per hour on the canal, and the result is half the effort!

Bi Dengfu replied: "Shuntian Academy has used two steam engines, one in the front and one in the back, and now Shuntian Academy is studying the technology of combining several steam engines to generate power, I believe that it will not take long to make a breakthrough, Your Majesty, once our steamships can reach a displacement of three hundred tons or five hundred tons, they can almost equip warships, and at that time, with the power generated by steam engines, the speed of our warships will be more than twice as fast as now, facing Western warships." , will have an overwhelming advantage! ”

"Hahaha......"

Zhu Jie laughed and said: "Yes, once we can equip the battleship propelled by a steam engine, then we will face the fleets of various powerful countries in the Western Ocean, and we will have the absolute upper hand in the battle, even if the fleet is not as large as the other party, we can also use the absolute speed to complete the division and encirclement of the enemy army, and break through each one, the teachers and students of Shuntian Academy, this is a great achievement, however, this year's reward is not their share, although their steamships have made great progress, but this skill is from Yingtian Academy, they are out of play......

Bi Dengfu nodded and replied: "Yes, what you said is reasonable, but today's royal reward is only afraid that it will still fall on the head of Shuntian Academy, the teacher of Shuntian Academy has actually researched a set of bizarre things, called electricity, like lightning in the sky, it is really incredible, the sage said that the son is silent and strange and confused, this kind of ethereal thing, my uncle and I didn't believe it, who knew that when I arrived at Shuntian Academy, I saw it with my own eyes, relying on a few coils and a magnet, and then the copper wire extended out, I can't help but believe that I can make my whole body numb......"

(End of chapter)