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The so-called smokeless gunpowder manufacturing materials that were not given to the craftsmen of the gunpowder workshop were actually for the manufacture of sponges. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 info It is necessary to popularize science here, cotton wool, also known as powder cotton, the scientific name is nitrocellulose. Its explosive power is 2~3 times greater than that of black ~ gunpowder, and its combustion is stable and its ballistic energy is good. And it burns very completely, there will be no problems with carbon deposits in the barrel. In addition, the sponge burns without water, only a faint white smoke, so it is a type of smokeless gunpowder - in fact, this is the earliest smokeless gunpowder.

However, to make sponge, in this era is an extremely difficult thing, first of all, there must be a large supply of saltpeter, and secondly, it must be able to purify nitric acid, these two points alone, can basically make all the craftsmen of the gunpowder workshop stare at it, especially the latter, these craftsmen were originally engaged in steel, where do you know what nitric acid is? Not to mention how to make it, even if they don't have the information to give them, they will look like reading a book from heaven.

The zodiac does not have this problem, for the zodiac priest who originally traveled all over the world, specializing in extracting all kinds of grain reincarnation in the women's toilet, nitrate is not a stranger to this kind of thing, and the craftsmanship of making various Taoist tools after purifying it is ready-made, after reading the information provided by Buchen, he suddenly opened his mouth, and immediately knew how to start making nitric acid in large quantities.

In the soil near pigsties, toilets, etc., in rural areas, there is often a lot of organic matter. After these organic matter decays, it is then reacted to by nitrifying bacteria to form nitric acid. Nitric acid further reacts with arsenic, calcium, and magnesium in the soil to form potassium nitrate and its calcium and magnesium nitrate, which is nitrate. The amount of potassium nitrate in various nitrates varies, generally a few percent. The potassium nitrate content is high in the fluffy white mold that precipitates on the earthen walls of pigsty and toilets, and can sometimes be as high as 75% at certain times.

As long as the nitric acid naturally produced in these places is collected, and then through a process of boiling and purification, a lot of nitric acid can be obtained. For Bei'an Prefecture and Sili, which has a population of 3 million and dense countryside in the suburbs, nitric acid resources will naturally not be lacking, at least there is no problem in providing it to the military of the non-ministers.

Although the production process of sponge is much more black ~ gunpowder, it is not difficult in general, but I will not go into detail here, it will be harmonious if it is too detailed, in short, the final product is completely able to be used for small guns and artillery, for now, it is a great progress.

Buchen visited the laboratory of the Zodiac Priest, witnessed part of his process of making sponges, and finally relieved himself after repeatedly comparing it with the information he provided.

"Do you want to give it a try?" The zodiac asked with a smile.

Buchen naturally would not refuse, and after taking dozens of rounds of cotton paper shells that had been made, Buchen, Xue and Huang Daoshi left Zhuangzi and came to the shooting range outside Zhuangzi.

The tens of thousands of forbidden army captives who were originally imprisoned here were all released after Emperor Yun announced the disbandment of the forbidden army, so this place has long been restored to its original use.

At this time, there were only a few guns being tested in the shooting range, these guns were large and small, the small ones were six-pounder guns and eight-pounder guns, and the big ones were terrifying forty-eight-pounder guns, the purpose of these guns was very simple, the small one was to test which caliber of gun was more suitable as a field gun to fight with the army, and the large one was undoubtedly to defend the city or be mounted on a battleship.

Buchen looked at the artillery test for a while, and found that the six-pounder gun is the most suitable for field artillery, because this thing is light enough, and the power is not weak, after the realization of the all-steel body tube, not only the inner wall of the artillery is much thinner, but the charge has also increased greatly, and now the whole artillery and the gun carriage together are only a few hundred pounds in weight, and you can drag and run fast by just finding two pack horses, which is really a necessary artifact for home travel and invasion and robbery!

The small cannon is good, but the cannon makes Buchen a little disappointed, although the forty-eight-pounder cannon is large, but the increase in power is relatively limited, the damage to earth and rock targets is stronger than the previous trial of the thirty-six-pounder gun, and the reloading time is a lot longer, after all, they can't make an automatic loader at their current level of science and technology, and the shells are manually loaded by the gunner, which is a strange thing if it is fast.

Buchen decisively stopped the progress of the cannon, and ordered the workers of the steel mill who were on the scene to go back and bring a message to Blacksmith Li, the cannon will reach forty-eight pounds, and the ninety-six-pound cannon that was scheduled to be developed before will be shelved first, and now the whole factory will work hard to publicize the steel rifled cannon.

After watching the artillery test firing, Buchen finally remembered the purpose of his coming to the shooting range, and after asking the workers to insert the target ten steps away, Buchen asked for a steel pistol from Xuena, tore open a paper shell filled with gunpowder cotton, loaded it, and aimed it at the target ten steps away.

The trigger was pulled, and a "pop" sounded louder than usual with a gunshot! Suddenly, there was an extra hole in the chest of the humanoid target ten steps away!

"Whew!" Buchen wanted to habitually blow the white smoke from the muzzle, but found that there was not much white smoke floating out of the muzzle, which was much less than the smoke when using black ~ gunpowder before.

"There's really no smoke!" Snow exclaimed from the side.

Buchen looked at the barrel of the gun again and found that the gunpowder sponge was burned very well, and there was almost no residue left in it.

"Well done!" Buchen gave a thumbs up to the zodiac.

The zodiac priest smiled triumphantly and said, "The lord has praised it! ”

"Not fallacious, not wrong!" Buchen hurriedly waved his hand, "You don't know how long I've been bothered by the smoke of this shooting, by the way, how long will this smokeless gunpowder be put into mass production?" ”

Huang Daoshi originally wanted to be humble, but when he heard that Buchen raised a new question, he didn't dare to slack off, and immediately replied: "The processing steps of the sponge are more complicated than the black ~ gunpowder, and it will take a while for the workers to learn, about a month, in short, if it can be fast, the poor road will definitely be as soon as possible!" ”

"Well, come on! If it can be advanced, every day in advance, the originally promised bonus will increase by 10%! Buchen was in a good mood at this time, and raised the reward as soon as he spoke.

The Huang Daoist didn't care about money or not, and he just said: "The poor Dao thanked the craftsmen of the gunpowder workshop for the lord!" ”

Buchen's heart is very flexible, and when he heard Huang Daoshi say this, he immediately knew that he was not interested in money, so in order to compensate Huang Daoshi, Buchen gave him a special reward: "Huang Xianchang, as long as you can put smokeless gunpowder into mass production as soon as possible, I will hand over all the relevant chemical departments to you in the future, and all kinds of chemical technical data will also be given priority to you for research, how about it?" ”

Although I have never heard of the word "chemical industry", but since Buchen gave him a reward in the name of developing smokeless gunpowder, it means that these "chemical departments" are all related to gunpowder. ”

Buchen smiled and handed the gunpowder and smokeless paper shell shells to Xue, so that she could also enjoy it, and then sent the zodiac away and took Xue back to his residence in the manor. Fei Fei and Ai Ai are already there at this time, today the two sisters are mainly going to the palace to pick up treasures, it can be said that they are full of returns, now wait for a while Fei Fei to go to Lao Yuna to get people, and they are going to go to the capital to pick a place to hold an auction, Buchen told them about the progress of smokeless gunpowder, and they were also very happy, after all, compared to Buchen and Xue, the gun is still used more by the two of them.