If the goal can be achieved by just shouting slogans with its mouth, then the crossing group, which has a lot of mouth cannon resources, should have dominated the world a long time ago. (.) Whether it's manpower or coal, it's not something that can be reached by slapping the table and smashing the bench, and even if everyone knows that Annam's domestic form has an opportunity to take advantage of, there is no way to reach for it immediately.

"What about the boats? There are only a few ships that we can move, can we all send them out to transport coal?" Ning Qi poured a basin of cold water on Tao Donglai, who was excited: "From Hongji Port to Sanya, even the straight-line distance at sea is more than 200 nautical miles, if it is a Fuchuan Guangchuan that we have captured, the fastest one-sided voyage will take four to five days, counting the time for loading and unloading goods at both ends, it is already very smooth to run a round trip in about half a month." The displacement of those two ships is less than 100 tons, so how much coal can they load even if they are all dispatched? If we only need to load dozens of tons of coal after one trip every half a month, will the price of our tossing and turning so hard be too great?"

"How is the shipbuilding project of the Ministry of Shipping progressing now?" Tao Donglai, who had calmed down again, asked Yan Chujie. At present, the most closely related to the Ministry of Maritime Affairs is the Military Police Department, in fact, most of the sailing sailors trained by the Ministry of Maritime Affairs are subordinate to the Military Police Department, and the functions of the Ministry of Maritime Transport themselves are also assigned to the command of the Military Police Department in wartime. That is to say, for a long time to come, the boundary between the Ministry of Shipping and the Navy will not be very clear, and the sailing ships of the Ministry of Shipping, which are used as cargo or patrol missions in peacetime, may become troop carriers or even gunboats in wartime.

"It's pretty smooth. I went to the shipyard the day before yesterday to see that the ship built now is basically an enlarged replica of the captured Haicang ship, with a design displacement of 200 tons, and the keel has been paved at present, and the ship's materials have been prepared. Yan Chujie saw that everyone didn't speak, so he had to continue: "I know that you all think that this shipbuilding speed is too slow, but the problem is that we only have about a dozen professional shipwrights now, and the largest ship they have built is only 400 materials, with a displacement of more than 200 tons. I also want artillery battleships of several thousand tons, but the scale of the current shipyard is simply not possible, and it is not even possible to start building two ships at the same time. ”

"A two-hundred-ton ship, so the few cannons we have built now can be put on board?" Tao Donglai was very keen to grasp the information in Yan Chujie's words.

"There's no problem getting on board, the gun carriage has already been made. However, the guns can only be arranged on the deck, and the number should not be too large, otherwise it will affect the operation of the sails and make the stability of the ship worse. The opinion of the Ministry of Shipping is four to six, and the specific number will be determined after testing after launching. In the case of larger-caliber artillery, this number would have to be lowered even more. Yan Chujie said with some regret.

Having a navy composed of gunboats has always been the expectation of the Military Police Department, and although after several months of hard work, the problem of putting cannons on board the ship was finally overcome, but the embellishment of only a few small-caliber guns obviously could not satisfy Yan Chujie, a giant ship artilleryist. Even so, it will have to wait a few months before it can be realized, so it is no wonder that Yan Chujie will feel regretful.

"Can't you build several decks to arrange artillery like a Western-style sailing ship?" Ning Qi suddenly regretted a little after asking, didn't this question directly show that he was a novice in this regard?

Sure enough, Yan Chujie immediately cast a disdainful gaze: "Ning Qi, you don't know about this, the structure of Chinese-style sailing ships is very different from Western-style sailing ships, and there is no way to set up an all-through gun deck at all." ”

The shape of the hull of the Chinese sailing ship is very different from that of the Western-style sailing ship, for example, the Fuchuan type is wide at the bottom, and the hull section is very similar to the V-shaped type of modern ships, and the wider it is to the top deck, so the guns are generally arranged directly on the top deck. The lower part of the hull was equipped with a watertight compartment and the already small area, so it was impossible to arrange more artillery. When Zheng Chenggong conquered Taiwan, the main warship, the Daqing Tou, was about ten zhang long, more than two zhang wide, and had a draft of eight feet, so such a Dafu ship was only equipped with two large-caliber guns in the bow and stern. And the largest three-masted gunboat he used, with a length of 20 zhang, was equipped with 8 Hongyi cannons and 40 thousand-pound Franc machines, and this kind of firepower still could not be compared with Western warships, and could only suppress the opponent in terms of the number of warships.

The solution of Western designers is to use a large number of ribs and thicken the hull, so as to make the whole hull stronger. The hull section of the Western-style sailing ship is U-shaped, and the bottom is large and small, and the spacious gun deck at the bottom is used to arrange the gun with the heaviest gun body and the largest caliber, and the weight and caliber of the gun are reduced in turn layer by layer, so that the center of gravity of the hull can also be stabilized, and the narrow top deck can also reduce the contact area when the two ships are close to each other in hand-to-hand combat. Such a hull structure also determined that the weight and number of guns that could be carried by Western-style sailing ships greatly exceeded those of Chinese-style sailing ships.

In terms of the maritime armed forces of this period, the combat effectiveness of Western-style sailing ships did surpass that of Chinese-style sailing ships by a lot. But in terms of design concept alone, Chinese sailing is far ahead of this era. Hundreds of years later, modern warships finally adopted the hull design of Chinese sailing ships, relying on watertight cabin technology to increase sinking resistance, and the arrangement of guns was similar to that of Chinese sailing ships of this era, with only a small number of large-caliber guns on the deck as the main firepower. And the sail battleships of the West, from the point of view of the evolutionary history of battleships, are more like a comical design that has gone the wrong way. Unfortunately, the intelligence of the Chinese was ultimately limited by the level of shipbuilding and artillery construction at that time, otherwise the balance of maritime power between the East and the West would not be so great.

Of course, bringing Zenith technology to this era will definitely change the course of history, advanced shipbuilding concepts and weapons manufacturing technology will certainly greatly enhance the combat effectiveness of Chinese sailing ships, but this change will take a long time to slowly realize, at least for the time being, the Crossing can only hope that the shipyard can build its own armed merchant ships as soon as possible. As for the construction of battleships, that is not yet achievable.

After listening to Yan Chujie's introduction, Ning Qi said angrily: "So let's say that we will still have to avoid the white-skinned sail warships at sea for a long time in the future?

"Not really. Yan Chujie shook his head and said: "Western-style sailing ships do have their natural advantages in design in this era, but the disadvantages are also obvious......

Western-style sailing ships need to use a lot of high-quality wood as ribs, and this directly leads to the fact that the cost of Western-style sailing ships of the same tonnage is much higher than that of Chinese-style sailing ships. The soft sails used in Western-style sailing ships require higher masts and more sailors, which invisibly increases the cost of sailing boats. The worst thing is that the Western powers are very limited in the Far East, and the advantage of firepower in Western-style sailing ships is not enough to compensate for their numerical disadvantage, especially against East Asian opponents who are good at water jumping, because the disadvantage caused by the disparity in the number of ships and sailors will be even more prominent.

"Wait!" Ning Qi interrupted Yan Chujie's introduction and said, "The shipborne artillery of this era can fight for a few hundred meters anyway, how can it be helpless in the face of the jumping gang?"

"It's true that you can hit a few hundred meters, but it doesn't mean that you can be accurate when you hit a few hundred meters away, and the shipborne artillery of this era has no sighting and fire control system, it all depends on the gunner's intuition and experience. Yan Chujie patiently explained: "Besides, it is difficult to defeat four hands with two fists, it is really surrounded by hundreds of ships, even if there are cannons, how many can be sunk? This is not a Michael Bay movie, everything is directly exploded, and many times even if it hits, it is just a hole in the hull, and it is not so easy to sink a ship, and more has to rely on luck." ”

The naval battles in this era are indeed as Yan Chujie said, the power of the solid bullets fired by the artillery is difficult to completely sink a large warship, and most of the naval battles are still like the scene in "Pirates of the Caribbean", the ships of both sides are close to each other with artillery, and the planks and blood are flying, which looks very lively, but in the end it is still necessary to rely on the jumping gang to solve the opponent.

Although the British navy defeated the Spanish Armada with artillery combat in the Anglo-Spanish naval battle in 1588, thus beginning to change the ownership of maritime supremacy, the inefficient combat method of gang fighting still continued at sea for a long time, until the Battle of Trafalgar in the early 19th century, the English navy led by Admiral Nelson defeated the French navy under Marshal Napoleon, and the broadside battle still played an important role in this great battle.

"No matter how powerful it is, it can't be worth the word 'more'. How large can the Portuguese, Spaniards, Dutch, and British who have come to East Asia now have their fleets? And with so much advanced technology at our disposal, it's only a matter of time before we build a warship with more efficient combat performance. Yan Chujie was full of confidence in his own technical reserves, and he was not too worried about the fleets of the Western powers. Of course, there is another reason why he can be so confident, that is, Sanya's location is not on the main trade route in Southeast Asia, and it is almost impossible to encounter merchant ships or warships from the West, and naturally there is no maritime conflict.