On the evening of 8 May, after the day's regular meeting, the Executive Committee convened some relevant personnel for another small meeting. The content of this small meeting is to discuss the artillery casting plan proposed by the Military Police Department, consider the military needs and production technology, and brainstorm to determine the future development plan of artillery weapons that will penetrate the public.

Discussions about the manufacture of self-made artillery have not been interrupted since the day the Military Police Department was created. Thanks to the influence of the bombing doctrine pursued by the People's Liberation Army in later generations, keyboard military experts will expound their views on the artillery development route that should be adopted by the public at forums, dinner tables, and in the office, regardless of time, place, and occasion. In this lively atmosphere of discussion, everyone agreed that artillery was definitely one of the most important weapons for crossing the city by land, dominating the seven seas on the water, and ensuring that the crossing regime could expand its territory smoothly.

However, due to the limitations of objective conditions, the matter of manufacturing artillery had to be temporarily shelved by the Executive Committee. Until recently, the Tiandu Iron Mine was put into operation, and the ironmaking workshop had begun to be put into operation, and this matter was once again put on the agenda by the anxious Military Police Department.

The military police department's anxiety is understandable, the only heavy weapons currently in the hands of the crossing are two PP89 60mm mortars, and the ammunition reserve of only 20 shells makes the storage of these two small cannons more like a kind of self-psychological comfort. The last time the pirates attacked, the Military Police Department had to use iron-hulled fishing boats to engage their opponents in hand-to-hand combat at sea, and in the end it was only by relying on the sturdy hull of the ship to win the battle, which was a good result, but it was a disaster for the vast number of great navigators who wanted to build a heavy artillery fleet.

Build artillery! Build more artillery! Build more large-caliber heavy artillery! This has become a hot topic of discussion in recent forums, and even pacifists like Gu Kai have had to participate in it, and have been invited to translate the English military literature in the large database for some half-baked military houses, so that they can come up with some dry goods in the debate between front-loading and rear-loading guns at this stage.

Since the materials and manpower required for the manufacture of artillery were quite large, the Executive Committee also attached great importance to this and decided to convene a special meeting to discuss this plan. In addition to all the members of the Executive Committee, the main members of the Military Police Department, relevant personnel of the Maritime Department, metallurgical technicians, machining technicians, and a number of military enthusiasts of different levels were invited to attend the meeting. More than 30 people packed the small executive committee meeting room, and a considerable number of these men were smoking guns, and the smell of sweat mixed with smoke in the conference room was even worse than the cement kiln, which is now called the number one polluter.

Tao Donglai, who presided over the meeting, first used a whiteboard marker to write a few lines of large characters on the whiteboard at the front of the conference room.

1. Actual military needs

2. Technical implementation difficulty

3. Artillery tactics and establishment

After Tao Donglai finished writing, he put down his pen, sat back in his seat, raised his hand and pointed to the whiteboard and said, "That's the agenda for today's discussion, let's come one by one." The comrades who smoked were a little more leisurely, and now it was like a fire in the house, so be careful to wait for someone to rush in and splash water. ”

After a low burst of laughter, a few old smokers embarrassedly extinguished the cigarette butts in their hands.

"Let me begin with the first question on behalf of the Military Police Department. As a veteran, Tao Donglai also held a concurrent position in the Military Police Department, so he became the spokesman of the Military Police Department.

"I know that there are many people who think that we should directly make breech-loading rifled guns, and that we should pursue the suppressive effect of large caliber, long range, heavy firepower. Leaving aside the technical problems of artillery manufacturing, I think that first of all, we should have a clear understanding of the armed forces that may become our opponents in this era. ”

"What kind of artillery was the level of artillery in the 17th century, I think those of you here today have enough knowledge from various film and television works and related written materials. Black powder, front-loading guns, and solid artillery shells, whether it is the design and manufacture of artillery, or the practical application of artillery technology and tactics in the army, are still in a situation where they are groped with existing experience and have not been standardized. Our advantage lies in our thorough understanding of the development trends of various weapons technologies and military tactics, and we can avoid mistakes in the process of exploration and avoid many detours. ”

"It is true that the artillery technology that is ahead of the times can be easily suppressed on the battlefield in this period, but is that kind of technical level really what we need now? I don't think so. Our current military needs mainly come from both land and sea, with ship-mounted naval guns at sea, shore defense artillery on land, and infantry artillery needed by future troops. What are the artillery tactics in naval warfare in this era? It is a tactic of bombardment at a distance of 200 meters or even 100 meters, and it is a tactic that relies on pure superiority in firepower output; we have not yet been able to build large battleships, and it is very difficult to gain superiority in the number of naval guns, so our naval guns must pursue better accuracy and stronger destructive power. ”

"But at the same time, we must also recognize that in this era, there is still a lack of accurate artillery sighting systems and fire control systems, and shelling at a distance of more than two kilometers at sea with visual correction is basically a waste of ammunition. The shipbuilding technology we have at hand is enough to make our warships far ahead of the speed in this era, so the effective range of our naval guns only needs to be more than double that of contemporaneous naval guns, which is enough to gain an advantage in naval warfare, and I personally think that this reasonable effective range is less than a thousand meters, in this range, in fact, there is no need to equip the more difficult to produce breech-loading rifled guns......"

Tao Donglai was about to continue, when he saw Yue Zhiyun raise his hand, he nodded and signaled that he could speak.

Yue Zhiyun got up and said: "First of all, I agree with what Mr. Tao said about the effective range of naval guns, the British Royal Navy also clearly stipulated in the firing specifications of the 19th century that the maximum firing distance of the 24-pounder gun is 400 yards, that is, a distance of less than 400 meters, and too large a range is actually an unnecessary waste of performance for naval warfare in this era." ”

"But we must also take into account the carrying capacity of the ship when designing the artillery, like the 12-pounder front-loading gun, the caliber is 70mm, although it looks very small, and the gun body is only four or five hundred kilograms, but if we really want to equip the ship, the displacement of the ship must reach a certain standard, otherwise the cabin cannot provide enough space for artillery operations. As for the tonnage required to use a 12-pounder gun, our shipping department believes that it must be at least twice as large as the Haicang ship in Shengli Port, that is, a displacement of about 300 tons, and I think that a ship of this tonnage will not be able to be built within the year. ”

"If you use a breech-loading rifled gun, then the situation is different. According to the number I found in the large database, if a 12-pounder rear-loading gun uses a conical shell, not only will the effective range greatly exceed that of the front-loading gun, but also the accuracy and destructive power will far exceed that of the same caliber gun, and the armor-piercing power in the effective range can be equivalent to that of a 24-pound front-loading shell. If we can build a tube-retreat rear-loading gun, then even the Haicang ship can be directly equipped with a 12-pounder gun. ”

"I'll interject!" Bai Kesi of the Ministry of Industry raised his hand: "The mechanical structure of hydraulic recoiling will only remain on paper for a long time to come, and you can temporarily ignore the barreled recoiling artillery when designing naval guns." ”

"Isn't it okay to use springs instead of hydraulic brakes?" said a half-soldier fan in the crowd.

"Theoretically, we can, but first we have to build the springs. "Considering the strength of the material, we have to use special spring steel to make this kind of processing spring, but this spring steel will have to wait until we mine the manganese ore in Damao at the earliest." Moreover, the buffering capacity of the spring-loaded brake machine is very small, so it was quickly eliminated in history. Rather than considering the spring brake, it is more practical to consider the muzzle brake directly when building the cannon. ”

"The muzzle brake did not work on the naval guns of this era. Yan Chujie of the Military Police Department shook his head and retorted: "The muzzle brake will affect the accuracy and aiming of artillery shooting, with our current artillery-making technology, it is better to use the erection technology, we also have a lot of time-tested mature technology available." ”

Tao Donglai saw that it was about to lose order and turn into a chaotic war, so he quickly knocked on the table and motioned for everyone to calm down first: "Have you ever thought that rear-loading rifled guns can be built, but what about the problem of shells and fuses? Is there a way for the industrial sector to solve it now?"

Bai Kesi shook his head and said: "A small number of shells can be made, and the projectile body can be slowly driven out with a car, but it is difficult to manufacture it in batches, and the process flow is not the same at all." You must know that there is special equipment for making shells and bullets, and there are dozens of pieces of equipment in a production line, and it is difficult for us to replicate the existing conditions. This is still a solid armor-piercing projectile, and if it is a grenade, it also involves the manufacture of a fuse, which our industrial sector cannot solve. ”

"We can copy the oldest breech-loading guns. "Someone from the shipping department shouted again, it was actually Xie Chun, who was engaged in shipping management, and no one knew how he would come to participate in this seminar.

"The oldest breech shells were cast iron and lead, and black powder was still used as the propellant, with no primer, which was basically the case with breech guns in the 19th century. It's always okay to make cast iron projectiles and black powder, right?" Xie Chun didn't seem to be without a purpose, and he had prepared in advance.

But someone immediately refuted his claim: "Aren't you talking about the Armstrong cannon that was a terrible defeat for the Qing army in the Second Opium War? If we can't solve the problem of the adhesion of the lead skin, the lead fragments will scatter and splash in front of the muzzle when the cannon is fired, and it may cause injury to our soldiers, which is a real situation in history, and the British have also gone back to the front loading cannon and made a detour for a while." ”