"Huyan, these questions you said are very important, they are related to the success or failure of the Ming fleet, you can discuss freely, and you can even build Western warships to confirm the advantages and disadvantages of warship technology, don't deny the inherent advantages of your own warships, of course, don't be complacent, the technology that the West has, you can directly copy it and absorb it!"

Zhu Jie said slowly.

Hu Yanlei hurriedly agreed.

Zhu Jie continued: "There are only two trends in the future warships, one is the giant ship, and even in the future, with the increase of our steel production, the giant ship can be covered with a layer of iron, so as to avoid the artillery fire to burn our battleship, and at the same time increase the solidity of the battleship; The second trend, that is, the improvement of the power of artillery, artillery combat power, one side depends on the number of artillery, on the other hand, is to increase the power of artillery single shells, now the power of our artillery has obviously gone to the front of the West, we developed the flowering artillery, as well as rifled guns, have been ahead of the West, in the short term, they can not catch up with us, this is the advantage of our fleet, what we have to consider now is how to maximize our advantage with the maximum! ”

The manufacture of giant ships, is now proceeding step by step, presumably after ten years of technology accumulation, the Ming Empire can develop a two-thousand-ton giant ship, especially the idea of process standardization, will undoubtedly bring great help to the Ming Empire to manufacture giant ships, this Hu Yanlei, can not be said to be ahead of the foresight.

"Your Majesty!"

Mao Yuanyi on the side said in a low voice: "I think that we can recruit a group of scholars to study and design the latest giant warships and artillery, as for the number of artillery of battleships, it is better to limit it for the time being, after all, if the number of artillery is too much, resulting in the rapid destruction of the battleship, this price is really too great, our warship, together with the artillery, I am afraid that it will not be able to go down without 50,000 taels of silver, if it is destroyed in only three or five years, this amount of grain can't help but be built like this......"

Zhu Jie smiled and said: "What Mao Gong said is reasonable, the decree is that the Ministry of Science and Technology has set up a separate Ship Research Institute and a Firearms Research Institute, and the two institutions are parallel to the various departments and bureaus, allocating heavy sums of money and recruiting scholars to study warships and muskets and artillery, especially our musket artillery, although it can depict rifling now, but the speed of manufacturing is too slow, we must improve the efficiency of production, concentrate manpower and material resources, and we must overcome this difficulty!" As for limiting the number of artillery, this can also be done, from today onwards, the number of guns carried by each battleship for heaven-class warships and earth-class warships will be reduced by two percent, and if it is found that the battleships in service are damaged, they will be immediately transferred back to the treasure shipyard for repair......"

Reduced by two percent, now the heaven-class battleship is equipped with eighty guns, and the ground-class battleship is equipped with sixty guns, the number is indeed too much, reduce by two percent, the day-class battleship will retain sixty-four guns, and the ground-class battleship will retain forty-eight guns, and the power has been reduced a lot, and now the number of artillery guns on the main warships of the Western powers is also more than eighty, and the King of the Seas has even carried more than a hundred guns. If the solid problem of the hull construction is not solved, the battleship will be even more dangerous in naval battles.

"However, this is only a stopgap measure, we cannot reduce the number of artillery because the hull is not strong, one, we can increase the ribs, enhance the strength of the hull, and second, we can find a way to reduce the vibration of the artillery; The third way is to replace the large number of heavy artillery with more powerful flowering cannons, and develop new artillery, I demand that more powerful gunpowder be developed as soon as possible, and equipped with cannonballs, when the power of one cannonball exceeds the power of the opponent's solid bullet by more than ten times, our flowering cannon, even if it is loaded with twenty, can pose a deadly threat to the opponent's artillery! ”

Everyone was a little confused, the emperor's vision was different, but why was it so messy?

Looking at everyone's confused eyes, Zhu Jie felt helpless for a while, was he not clear about what he was talking about, or could these people's heads not keep up with their own thinking?

"So be it!"

Zhu Jie replied: "Walking on two legs, one leg is, what we need to do now is to make every effort to enhance the sturdiness of our hull, so that we can carry more artillery, and at the same time we can also develop a device to reduce the vibration of artillery. The other leg is to develop more powerful artillery, we need more powerful gunpowder, we need to overcome the difficulty of rifled gun barrels as soon as possible, the straight gun chamber is only the first step, I hope you can overcome the difficulties of rifling manufacturing, and in the future, you can create spiral rifles, effectively increasing the range of our artillery! ”

Zhu Jie stayed in Longjiang Bao Shipyard for three days, regardless of the urgency of the relevant personnel to hold a meeting to discuss the development of warships and artillery, and in the end, in order to be able to have a more in-depth discussion, the president of Yingtian Academy and several famous scholars were specially invited to expand the scope of research.

"Your Majesty, this, there is a saying in your China, called under heavy reward, there will be brave men! If the emperor can use this as a bait and take out a heavy reward to mobilize the enthusiasm of Western engineers, the minister thinks that it must be twice the result with half the effort! Otherwise, just relying on two research institutes, I'm afraid that I won't be able to catch it......"

The vice president of Yingtian Academy on the side, the Frenchman Descartes, said in a deep voice.

Zhu Jie's eyes lit up, and he laughed: "Haha, Mr. Descartes, you are right, in this world, anything can be refused, but there are two things that cannot be refused!" That's money and status! You're right! I should have arranged a big reward! ”

Zhu Jie looked at Mao Yuanyi and said with a smile: "Mao Gong, after returning to Beijing, immediately negotiate with Fang Yizhi and Gao Hongtu to set up a royal science bonus, well, it can include special inventions, physics, metallurgy, and many other fields, promulgated once a year, once selected as the winner, then this person can get 50,000 taels of silver, the imperial court bestows a knight, and enjoys the Ming court for life!" In addition, the Ministry of War can also set up its own science and technology bonus project, and select useful inventions for everyone, as for how much silver to come up with, let Xu Yifan look at it himself, with silver, with a knighthood, I thought, these people won't be desperate, right? ”

Fifty thousand taels of silver!

You must know that in the Ming Dynasty, today's Shoufu University scholar Sun Chuanting, the official residence is a product, and the salary for a year is only 8,000 taels of silver, half of which comes from the real thing, not all of them are silver, 50,000 taels of silver, which is equivalent to the income of a first-class master for several years, and he can become a local tyrant with a lot of money!

If the local tyrant is not attractive enough, then the title is different, it is a symbol of status, in the Ming Dynasty, but there are rules, and those who are not knighted for non-military merits! Even if it is a dignified general soldier, it is only a baron, or the title of an earl! Even if it is the Shangshu and the squire of the court, most of them do not have titles!

Descartes said excitedly: "Your Majesty, with your decision, I think that in less than a year, the engineers who come from the West to Daming will be like a carp crossing the river!" ”

(End of chapter)