Chapter 24 Grandma Zhang enters the Grand View Garden (13) to test the gun

"It's amazing, it's fun! Hey, you have such a powerful artifact, why are you still frowning? At this time, Zhang Xingcai finally noticed that Liu Hou was frowning and pondering on the side, so he stopped jumping and asked.

"Didn't you see the problem?" Liu Hou asked.

"What's the problem?" Zhang Xingcai asked suspiciously.

"50 steps is very powerful, and the enemy will be killed regardless of whether they are wearing armor or holding a shield. But a hundred steps, the accuracy and lethality are very limited. ”

"So what?"

"Then it will be a big problem, if against the cavalry, if they have already rushed close to 50 paces, it will probably be too late to suppress them. Also, the range of a bow and arrow is generally 100 steps, and an archer like General Huang Lao can shoot 300 steps. So what is the use of the 50 steps range of our musket? The old general Huang in Liu Hou's mouth refers to Huang Zhong.

"Che, there are a few people in the world whose archery skills can compare to General Huang's." Zhang Xingcai said disapprerovingly.

"At least the range of the bow and arrow shot by ordinary archers must be compared, otherwise there is not much advantage on the battlefield."

Liu Hou said in his mouth, but he had already thought of several plans in his heart, such as: improve the smelting level to make the material of the barrel stronger, so that the barrel does not have to be so thick, so as to reduce the weight; For example, if you find a way to get the rifling out, you can also improve the accuracy and range, and so on.

After all, there was no problem at all with the flintlock rifled guns of later generations to hit 100 yards, and it is said that even the earliest breech-loading rifled guns had an effective range (aiming and being able to hit) at more than 200 yards, and good guns made by skilled craftsmen were said to have good accuracy at 300 yards. Civil War-era rifled rear-loading black powder guns have a kill record of more than 700 yards.

Zhang Xingcai didn't care whether she could improve the musket or not, but she was excited to snatch the musket in the hands of a musketeer, wanting to try to fire a few shots to play. Liu Hou was frightened when he saw it, and hurriedly stepped forward to try his best to dissuade him.

The musket they are trying now weighs more than a dozen pounds, plus recoil, it is estimated that with the strength of a 12-year-old girl, it is difficult to control it, Zhang Xingcai went to play this, what if there was a good one?

Under Liu Houhao's dissuasion, Zhang Xingcai finally agreed to give up the gun and switch to the gun. The artillery is fixed on the gun carriage, and the strength of the shock is directed to the ground, and generally does not hurt people, Liu Hou is still relatively relieved.

I saw five golden cannons lined up in front of Zhang Xingcai. These guns had 2 lugs on each side of the middle section, and 4 lugs helped to secure the gun to the gun mount. And the gun carriage had two wheels on either side. In this way, as long as you put on cattle, horses and other livestock, it is very convenient to pull the cannon to the place where it is needed.

The five guns were 95 mm in caliber, about 1.7 meters long, and weighed 1,200 jin (300 kg). Several hoops are also cast on the gun body, so that the gun body can withstand large bore pressure and not be lightly exploded.

Since there had been no breakthrough in steelmaking, and the quality of the steel was not up to the mark, the five cannons were all made of copper. Sparkles in the sun.

Copper is hard currency, Liu Hou looked at these five cannons and his heart was dripping blood, this is piled up with copper coins! This is also all Liu Hou's belongings, with the output of Liu Hou's current factories, monopolizing the operation of this era with a variety of products, there is only enough money to cast such five copper cannons.

Of course, this is also related to the fact that the "Ministry of Industry" had to spend money everywhere in the early stage of construction and the current factory capacity is not too large. Now that the construction of the base of the "Ministry of Industry" has basically taken shape, the resettlement of displaced people has come to an end, and the places where money is spent have been reduced; when the market for all kinds of novelty commodities produced by the "Ministry of Industry" is opened in the future, money and grain will continue to be imported, and we will not be afraid that we will run out of money to cast cannons and make guns.

The effective range of these guns is up to 400 meters with live ammunition and up to 200 meters with shotguns. The shells weigh up to 4 kg (live), and if they are replaced with shotguns, they can reach 8 kg. Each gun is equipped with 8 gunners, one of whom is the gunner. A well-trained gunner could fire one shot per minute.

I saw that the gunners of each cannon were busy, charging and stuffing the shells, and compacting the shells with a strip. After loading the charge, the gun commander personally stepped forward, adjusted the angle, and aimed at the target. After all the preparation processes were completed, a captain stepped forward and reported: "Report to General Zhennan, the five guns of the artillery team are ready for firing, please instruct." ”

Liu Hou almost forgot that he still had the name of "General Zhennan", and when he heard the captain talk about it, he was stunned for a while before he realized that he was talking to himself. So, he waved his little hand and said, "Take a break." ”

All the members of the artillery team who were originally standing upright made a posture of taking a break. Liu Hou beckoned, Zhang Xingcai took the torch, and rushed towards the five cannons.

I saw that she took turns igniting the gunpowder twist of the five cannons, firing one cannon after another, and screaming as she put them back. After she finished firing the first cannon, she ran to the other gun, ready to put the second cannon, and the artillery she had emptied immediately had artillerymen come up to reset the cannon, clear the chamber, charge, load, compact the ammunition, and re-aim, the poor artilleryman, who had not lasted long in a resting position, immediately threw himself into the intense reloading work, and the last one was exhausted.

Zhang Xingcai was like a child setting off firecrackers and fireworks during the Chinese New Year, holding torches and scurrying between several cannons, his excited face glowing as white as ivory. In the end, even Guan Yinping forgot to be afraid, took the torch and lit a few shots.

Liu Hou watched them set off the cannons, and his heart was so painful that sweat flowed down. It's not that he is heartbroken about the gunpowder, but that he is worried that his five baby pimple copper cannons will be tossed and broken, which is all his current net worth!

It wasn't until the five guns were overheated and there was a risk of exploding that Zhang Xingcai stopped messing around and reluctantly went back to the watchtower to rest accompanied by female soldiers. Liu Hou saw her brutal appearance in her original form, and regretted that his intestines were blue, and he knew that he would not take her to see the firearms drill.

The layman looks at the excitement, the insider looks at the doorway, Zhang Xingcai and Guan Yinping are watching the excitement and having a lively time, but Liu Hou has never gone up to light a cannon, but he can see that many doorways are coming.

He found that the hit rate of these guns was pitifully low, about less than a third, and this was the result of the experienced gunners personally aiming at them.

He looked at the copper cannon for a long time, and the more he looked at it, the more he felt a little unnatural, and the more he looked at it, the more he felt that something was wrong. After thinking about it for a long time, it finally dawned on me that the cannon body was bare, and I didn't see the crosshair and the door!

Liu Hou slapped his thigh, yes, why did he forget this. Not only artillery, but also muskets, without crosshairs and illuminators.

The importance of rifling for the quasi-head is self-evident, but rifling is not something that can be done, involving many technical factors, as well as a series of problems in materials and tools that need to be solved.

However, the front sight and the front sight are not very technical, the front sight is located above the muzzle, and the light door is on the rear edge of the barrel, near the eye. The use of the door is to let the shooter's line of sight through it to aim at the crosshair, and then the crosshair is aimed at the target and then fire, so that a three-point line can be formed for aiming, which greatly improves the accuracy of shooting.

Later firearms generally also had a ruler, and the light door was made on the ruler, which was used to correct the trajectory. Because the bullet is affected by gravity, the flight path is a parabola, and the bullet will drop a certain distance when it exits the muzzle and when it hits the target, which requires the muzzle to be slightly raised to hit the target correctly.

The gauge is to raise or lower the shutter through guò, so that the muzzle is slightly lowered or raised, so as to correct the trajectory to ensure the hit rate. Of course, the actual trajectory is very complex and will be affected by gravity, wind direction, temperature, humidity, geomagnetic deflection and other factors, those are all snipers discuss, in this ancient world where everything was rudimentary, we can only consider gravity.

Even now Liu Hou's musket doesn't even use this ruler, because the range is too close, the application range is very limited, and it is currently a range of 50 meters, so just make a fixed door specifically for 50 meters.

But the artillery is different, now it has a range of 400 meters, if you add rifling, it is estimated that more than 600 meters is no problem, even if it is a kilometer away, it is estimated that there is still a certain lethality. Black powder guns, the power is limited, the initial speed of flight will not be fast, such a long distance, the projectile in the air for a long enough time, then the effect of gravity on them needs to be seriously considered.

For example, the Type 81 automatic rifle of later generations dropped about 10 cm at 100 meters. Then, Liu Hou's black powder cannonball, flying a few hundred meters, its descending distance is considerable.

Liu Hou thought about the key to the matter, hurriedly ran to Zuo Ci, and explained the matter of the door, the front sight and the ruler. During this time, Zuo Ci had already learned the knowledge of gravity, and also learned the parabola calculation method for the fall of an object after releasing it at a certain initial velocity, so he naturally quickly understood the significance of the sight.

However, Liu Hou did not let him set the ruler according to the calculated number, because in addition to the influence of gravity and wind resistance, it would be unimaginable that the calculation would be difficult if all factors were considered. He asked Zuo Ci to arrange for people to do a large number of live ammunition shooting at various distances, and set sights according to the actual drop of shells, so as to avoid the situation of talking on paper.

As for rifling, Liu Hou also asked Zuo Ci to arrange for someone to develop it. But this matter is not in a hurry, so we can only wait for the researchers and craftsmen of the institute to slowly develop it. Fortunately, the number of guns made now is not much, and if the rifling is to be re-cast, Liu Hou is estimated to cry.

At the last stop of the visit, Liu Hou took them to see the shipyard. In recent years, Liu Hou sent people to Dongwu to gather a lot of shipbuilding talents to come back, and he has already begun to build warships. Liu Hou took them to see how the big ships under construction in the shipyard were progressing.

The ships of this era were all flat-bottomed boats, which were very different from the big ships that Liu Hou saw in later generations. Although Liu Hou does not know how to build ships, he still knows some basic concepts and knows that the sharp-bottomed ship has its advantages.

Based on the impressions of the pirate ship seen in films such as "Pirates of the Caribbean", Liu Hou drew a general idea of what the pointed bottom ship would look like. According to Liu Hou's prompts, the shipbuilders from Soochow built the first model of a pointed bottom ship for testing.

In fact, this small boat is not a model, this boat is about 3 meters long and 1 meter wide, which can already carry several people. However, artisans have found that there are many restrictions on the use of culets on rivers, and that flat-bottomed boats have their own advantages and disadvantages.

Wide, flat-bottomed boats keep the ship's draft small, making it easy to cross the shallows and anchor close to the sandbar. Suitable for inland river navigation.

At the same time, when the tilt angle of a flat-bottomed boat and a sharp-bottomed ship is the same, the displacement of the buoyancy action point of the flat-bottomed boat in the direction of inclination is greater than that of the sharp-bottomed boat, and the recovery moment is also larger. In this case, there is no need for the punt to have a very low center of gravity, and the wind and waves on the river are generally smaller than those at sea, so there is no need to worry about the boat being overturned by the wind and waves.

The characteristics of the ocean are that the water is deep, the sea is wide, the wind and waves are large, and there are many small islands and reefs, so it is easy for the sharp-bottomed boat to sail through the waves. A keel with a culet's bottom is easy to turn on a reef and is not easy to rest on a reef (and if it is on a reef, the bottom is not easily damaged). Heavy ballast can also be installed under the bilge of the pointed bottom ship, which plays a role that is not easy to overturn like a "tumbler".

Therefore, those experienced craftsmen strongly build a flat-bottomed boat, there is no need to build a pointed-bottomed boat, otherwise as soon as the ship becomes bigger, there will be a lot of shallow rivers that cannot be crossed, and many existing wharves cannot be berthed, and deep-water wharves must be rebuilt for it to dock.

Liu Hou thought about it for a long time, and then felt that there was indeed no possibility of sailing in the short term, so he still wanted to take care of the things in front of him. And the biggest role of the ships in front of him is to fight against Soochow, and the battlefields are obviously inland rivers, more specifically the Yangtze River basin and Yunmengze. So Liu Hou agreed to the craftsman's construction, gave up the pointed bottom boat, and agreed to build a flat-bottomed boat.