The results of cavalry training were highly recognized by Zhuge Liang.

These cavalrymen were not simply using scarecrows to conduct simulated battles, but were engaged in all-round tactical training.

They themselves were all elite knights when Liu Bei formed the cavalry in Hanzhong in Liangzhou, and they were composed of excellent Han knights in the Yongliang region in the northwest and a few Qiang elites.

In the battle of Guanzhong with Cao Cao, they had a wonderful performance.

Therefore, the cavalry are all elite in a hundred battles and have been on the battlefield. It's just that in the past, Zhang Feima Chao fought as a cavalry general, and fought according to his own intentions, lacking certain tactical training and organizational skills.

Therefore, to retrain here now is to improve their tactical execution, and to unite them from elite veterans of a hundred battles into a group of strong troops who obey orders.

Under such hard training, the cohesion of the soldiers has been strengthened very quickly. Shen Chen also used many of his disciples as middle- and lower-ranking officers, doing political propaganda courses, telling the soldiers what they were fighting for.

As a result, the low-level soldiers have faith, and they understand that they are fighting hard for the people of the Han Dynasty, for peace in their hometown, and for their wives, children, and families, so their morale is quite high, and their training is extremely hard.

Zhuge Liang stayed in the military camp of Fuxu Township for three days, walked all over the camp, and then, accompanied by Shen Chen and Li Yan, went north to inspect the Baochuan Road, Chencang Road, Fu Luo Road and Meridian Road, and truly understood the difficulties and dangers of the four roads in Hanzhong.

By June, after a three-month inspection in the mansion of the county government in Baozhong County, Zhuge Liang twice traveled back and forth between Chencang Road and Baochuan Road, and this morning, just after returning from Jigu, he held a meeting on the issue of grain transportation.

Zhuge Liang sat on the main seat, Shen Chen, Huang Zhong, Li Yan and others sat down one after another, and after everyone arrived, Zhuge Liang said seriously: "In the past three months, along the Chencang Road, Bao Chuan Road, Fu Luo Road, and Meridian Road, I thought that the only people who could transport grain were Chen Cang and Bao Chuan Road. ”

"yes, brother is the same as I thought."

Shen Chen first agreed, and then sighed: "The road of Chencang Road is spacious, it is an open avenue, and when Yuan Zhi was the Taishou of Hanzhong, he has been resting the road and trying to ensure that all the roads are almost flat. Although there are some difficulties in it, it is still easy to walk overall, and there is even a part of the water in the west that can be transported by ship, and some of the grain and grass can be sent to Wuxing with the water. The only problem is that it is too far, to transport from Nanzheng to Yangping Pass, and then from Yangping Pass to Hechi, and finally go north to Chencang, there are 1,200 li, and it is solid and goes around a big circle, so that the grain and grass run very slowly, and the grain is transported by ox carts and horse carts, which is only 20 miles a day. ”

The army did not transport grain at one time, but transported grain in a continuous stream. According to the record of "Juyan Han Jian", Han soldiers consume three stones of grain a month, but that is based on corn and wheat, and Hanzhong is now a rice-producing area, so a soldier consumes two pieces of grain per month, that is, two stones.

If 100,000 troops are sent, the amount of food consumed in a month is 200,000 stone. However, this is only the basics, people eat horses and chew, and the people and auxiliary soldiers who transport grain also need to eat, even if they are discounted in half, they will cost 100,000 stones, not to mention salt, pickled vegetables, etc.

That is to say, the overall consumption of an army of 100,000 people will consume more than 300,000 stone of grain a month, and in the Han Dynasty, one stone is 120 Han jin, and one Han Jin is about 223 grams, which is about 27 kg today, and the army has to eat 810 tons of grain in a month.

There is also a record in "Juyan Han Jian" that an ox cart can pull 25 stone millet, and 300,000 stone must be pulled by more than 10,000 ox carts.

Frankly speaking, even if there are so many ox carts, they can only take the Chencang Road, 1,200 miles, and the ox carts travel 30 or 40 miles a day, and it will take a month, and then they will be transported back and forth, and there will be a long gap in the middle, and the front-line troops will have to starve to death.

The most important thing is that this is only from Hanzhong out of the Guanzhong, after the Guanzhong to Chang'an there are more than 400 miles of road, even if out of Chencang is a plain area, not as difficult to walk as the mountains, the speed will be much faster, but it will also greatly extend the supply line and grain line, aggravate their difficulty in providing grain and grass.

This is also the reason why Shen Chen felt that the grain road problem was tricky.

Although he improved the deer cart, that is, the wheelbarrow, no matter how much he improved the load of the wheelbarrow, it was still far inferior to the ox cart, and there were more people to be mobilized, and at least 70,000 or 80,000 people had to continue to transport grain back and forth to ensure the continuous supply of food for the 100,000 troops on the front line.

So it's hard to do.

However, Shen Chen remembered that he had watched the Romance of the Three Kingdoms TV series, Zhuge Liang's invention of the wooden ox and flowing horse was very powerful, Sima Yi was once very amazed, an ox cart can actually walk on its own, carrying one-year-old grain, traveling dozens of miles a day, and traveling twenty miles in a group, and people are not very tired.

This shows that a wooden ox and horse can carry 24 stone of rice, even if you only walk 20 miles a day, build more wooden oxen and horses, each wooden ox and horse is equivalent to half an ox cart, and only 40,000 or 50,000 people are needed to ensure the transportation of grain on the front line.

In addition, he remembered that it was said in the TV series that the wooden cow and the horse took the slope.

The ramp is too close.

Six hundred miles.

Walking 20 miles a day, 20,000 wooden oxen and horses, 25 days can send 500,000 stone of grain to the front line, is this enough?

Therefore, Shen Chen hurriedly looked for Zhuge Liang to solve this problem.

However, Zhuge Liang did not give an answer immediately, and he did not immediately bring it up with the wooden ox and flowing horse that Shen Chen was thinking about, but asked first: "Xiaoqing, have you made any plans before?" ”

Shen Chen thought for a while and said: "Yes, Chencang Road is suitable for large-scale grain transportation, so I once thought about building a four-wheeled vehicle, which has a greater weight, but its shortcomings are also obvious, that is, it cannot steer, and its flexibility is far inferior to that of a two-wheeled vehicle." I haven't figured out what to do with the steering shaft, and maybe even if I did, the wooden steering stem wouldn't work, and I'd have to use iron. ”

There were few four-wheeled vehicles in ancient China, not because they could not be built because of technical thresholds, but because four-wheeled vehicles were far less flexible than two-wheeled vehicles. The steering shaft used in later generations of automobiles was made of gears, and Shen Chen was engaged in architectural design, not automobile technology, and was a pure layman in this industry, so he could only explore it by himself.

"Turning to a four-wheeler?"

Zhuge Liang shook the feather fan lightly, pondered for a while, and said, "I remember that Xiaoqing told me about gears before, and this thing may be made with gears." ”

"I think so too, in fact, it's not so troublesome to make gears, just make a mold and fill it with molten iron. The problem is that I still don't know how to use gears for steering, alas, I already knew the theory."

The last sentence, Shen Chen's voice was much quieter.

Zhuge Liang was surprised: "What? ”

"Nothing."

Shen Chen shook his head.

He is an architectural designer, majoring in fine arts, and he also studied liberal arts at the beginning.

And the application of gears can only be done by science students.

In other words, it is not so troublesome, and the mechanics of junior high school physics can be built using gears to steer four-wheeled vehicles.

It's been I don't know how many years since Shen Chendu graduated from college, and the knowledge of junior high school has already been returned to the teacher.

That's why he felt a pain in his skull.

Zhuge Liang thought for a while and said, "Maybe I have a way, you let the craftsman make the gear I want first." ”

"I have some ready-made."

Shen Chen turned his head to Shan Yi outside the door and said, "Yide, send someone to the ruins and bring all the gears." ”

"Yes."

Shan Yi went to send someone to get it.

It is more than 100 miles to the ruins, and it is already afternoon, even if the horse goes to get it quickly, it will not be there until tomorrow, so the question of turning to a four-wheeled vehicle will be put on hold for a while.

Zhuge Liang said in a deep voice: "I thought that Chen Cangdao could use a cart to transport grain, and I would think of a way to turn to a four-wheeled vehicle later." The ramp can be carried by a trolley, the plank road is often dozens of miles parallel, there are stairs up and down, every dozens of miles to set up a camp, with a four-wheeled car on the square bag, the grain and grass are transported to the camp, back and forth, what does Xiaoqing think? ”

Dozens of miles camped?

Shen Chen pondered, according to Zhuge Liang's theory, it was to build a small base every few miles to store grain. Then the soldiers used the supermarket-like stuff like a small cart to constantly go back and forth from the front and rear camps, and sent the grain and grass in the back camp to the front camp, forming a streamlined operation, which will greatly reduce the time and cost of transporting grain.

The main thing is that the plank road is basically based on the plank road, there are three or four hundred miles of plank road in six hundred miles, after Zhao Yun broke off in history, burned down the plank road for more than 100 miles, and the Shimen plank road repaired by Hanzhong City in later generations can get a glimpse of the style of the plank road of the year.

Therefore, Zhuge Liang proposed to use a small cart to transport grain back and forth on the plank road, so that there is no need to worry about the problem that the grain truck cannot climb up the ladder on the plank road, and directly build a stronghold near the ladder, or transfer the grain to exchange, send the grain behind to the empty cart in front, and continue to transport grain forward.

In this way, there will be a constant supply of food.

The only drawback is that the scale of grain transportation is relatively small, and it is estimated that it is only two or three hundred catties each time, and the load is only one-fifth of that of a cart. But the benefits are also obvious, one is the speed of grain transportation, and the other is naturally low cost and high efficiency.

"Hmm."

Shen Chen felt that it made sense, nodded and said, "You can give it a try." ”

"That's it."

Zhuge Liang said: "I will draw the drawings and items first, Xiaoqing can go to the slope to arrange the stronghold first, and after I make the real thing, I can try it." ”

"Okay."

Shen Chen responded to this matter.

At the moment, the two acted separately, Zhuge Liang began to make the utensils for transporting grain, and Shen Chen went to the Baochuan Road to select a stronghold.

This matter is related to whether the Northern Expedition can be carried out smoothly, and it must not be sloppy, so Shen Chen is very attentive.

In the next half a month, he went north again along the Baochuan Road to Xieyu Pass, 600 miles along the way, and ordered the soldiers to choose a non-plank road and build a camp.

In order to prevent the wheels from passing, he ordered to use a chisel to open a stone cave on the chisel wall, and the soldiers who came to deliver the grain had arrived, but the empty convoy that came to pick up the grain had not yet arrived, so the grain could be placed in the stone cave stronghold first, and then go back and forth.

Compared with building a plank road, opening a stone cave can be much simpler. Because the plank road is to dig a stone hole in the cliff, and then use wood and list the road, and dig a hole below, and use a mortise and tenon structure to connect the supporting wood below with the wood above.

The ancient ancestors were not only impressive in wisdom, but also amazing in the results of their labor. At least the plank roads opened up on the cliffs like this may not be able to do a good job even if the machine comes, but the ancients can make hundreds of miles, which shows how much manpower and material resources they used to build these roads.

By the time Shen Chen returned to Jigu from Xieyuguan in June of the fourth year of Zhang Wu, he had already seen Zhuge Liang set up a camp in Jigu, and four-wheeled wheelbarrows were placed on the road outside Jigu, with two square bags on the trolleys, and then pushed onto the trestle by the soldiers and transported to the front line.

On foot, people can walk about 4 to 5 kilometers per hour, and the whole journey is 600 Han Li, which is converted into kilometers, which is about 250 kilometers, and the walking speed is calculated at 12 hours a day, and you can walk 5 to 60 kilometers, and you can walk it in five days at most.

The advantage of the ramp is that it is close, and the disadvantage is also obvious, it is too narrow. It can only accommodate two people in parallel, next to the cliff, and even the handrails and the rain shield on his head were all made by Shen Chen when he ordered Li Yan last year.

Li Yan sent people to re-open holes in the top of the plank road, one hole every few meters, connected them with wooden sticks, and then used wooden sticks to connect the plank road below, and laid wooden planks on top.

In this way, there is a vertical wooden stick as a handrail on the cliff side of the plank road, and then an iron chain is used in the middle to thread it. In this way, the wooden planks on the top can prevent rain, prevent the wood from rotting due to moisture or wetting the grain and grass when transporting grain, and it will be more stable for the plank road below.

At this moment, below the Keigu camp, Zhuge Liang took Shen Chen and others to the entrance of the Bao Slope Road, and pointed to the uphill road: "You see, this cart uses four wheels to transport grain, which is stable and safe on the plank road, with two square bags on it, five Hu Hu loads, and six hundred miles of Bao Chute Road, with a stronghold every thirty miles, people can go back and forth to the base once in two hours, six to eight hours a day, and one person can transport at least fifteen Hu grains and grass. ”

Shen Chen looked over and saw hundreds of soldiers lined up in a row according to a long snake formation, pushing small four-wheeled carts like supermarket carts along the road. Thirty miles is 12 kilometers, and the round trip is 24 kilometers, and people can indeed walk in four hours if they go quickly, and with the scale of a cart of 500 people, it can transport 7,500 stone of grain every day.

And the 600 miles of the slope road is twenty strongholds. Each base is equipped with 500 people, and 10,000 people carry 7,500 stone of grain back and forth every day, which is about 230,000 stone of grain in a month. Although it is not enough for the 100,000 army to consume in a month, the problem is that they can still add people.

For example, if 500 more people are added to each stronghold, the grain transported in a month can be doubled to 460,000 stones. There are 20,000 people pushing food back and forth throughout the entire Baochuan Road, and the grain and grass on the front line are naturally in a constant supply.

Seeing this scene, Shen Chen was surprised, and at the same time felt ashamed.

As a later generation, I didn't expect this kind of flowing water grain transportation method, which is really a bit embarrassing for the traverser.

But he also admired Zhuge Liang's wisdom, so he said: "Brother, this method is really good, so that each person transports fifteen stones a day, one thousand people per stronghold, and the daily grain transportation is fifteen thousand stones, and only 20,000 people need to go back and forth three times a day on the plank road, which is enough for 100,000 troops to use food every day." ”

Zhuge Liang said with a smile: "Because it flows on the plank road every day, I named this grain transportation method Liuma." ”

"Flowing horses?"

Shen Chen was confused.

When he watched the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, it said that the wooden ox and the flowing horse were a kind of thing that looked like an ox cart walking automatically, so why did he push the cart in one hand? Besides, isn't the wooden ox and the horse a thing? Why are they named separately?

Did he change history, or is Sima Yi riding a wooden cow in the TV series nonsense, and the wooden ox and flowing horse in real history are not the shape of the TV series at all?

In addition, the flow refers to the flow on the plank road every day, so why is it called a horse?

"Not bad."

Zhuge Liang nodded and said: "I also developed a kind of wooden ox that can be turned according to the gears made by Xiaoqingling, which can carry one-year-old grain and travel thirty miles a day, and people don't work much, just over there, Xiaoqing, you come with me to take a look." ”

Shen Chen followed the direction he pointed out and came all the way to the back of the Keitani army camp, and saw a kind of chariot on the camp, with a huge carriage on the top, a four-legged carriage below, which is an axle frame, and four wheels below, a bit like that kind of office chair, but much larger than the office chair.

"It's a wooden cow."

Zhuge Liang pointed to the car and said.

Shen Chen was even more puzzled and asked, "Has my brother solved the steering problem?" ”

"Yes."

Zhuge Liang nodded: "I installed a rack inside, and used gears to turn the front two wheels into movable wheels, and when steering, the axle will automatically rotate back and forth according to the road in front, so as to achieve steering." ”

"Don't talk about it."

Shen Chen only felt a headache, remembering the tragic memories of being tortured by the physics teacher back then.

Why don't you go back in time and learn the Confucian classics well?

Isn't he a liberal arts student yet?

Zhuge Liang smiled: "Xiaoqing can try it, after adding gears, the speed is indeed a lot faster." If you don't add gears, you can also make four wheels, but you can only increase the load of two small wheels in parallel on each side, unlike now, you can use four large wheels and have a larger load. ”

Shen Chen walked over and tried to push it, it was indeed more labor-saving, dragging the cart back and forth, and it could also be steered, so he said: "This wooden cow can turn and push, it is not bad to take Chencang Road." Brother's method is indeed a good way, but it is a bit costly. Then again, why is it called a wooden cow and a flowing horse? ”

"I see."

Without waiting for Zhuge Liang to answer, Shen Chen suddenly realized: "The person who pushes the wooden ox and the horse is the cow and horse, and my brother means this." ”

"Nonsense."

Zhuge Liang couldn't help but roll his eyes and said: "The ox is slow and the horse is fast, the horse can travel a hundred miles a day, and the ox can only travel thirty miles a day, isn't this a wooden ox and a flowing horse?" ”

"I see."

Shen Chen was overjoyed and said: "If you send troops to the Northern Expedition, arrange 20,000 flowing horses on the Baochuan Road, send 10,000 wooden cattle to Chen Cangdao, and only need 30,000 people to conscript, the grain transportation in one month can reach more than 600,000 stones, and the problem of grain and grass will be completely solved!" Hahaha! ”

He laughed.

Everyone was also smiling.

Now that the biggest problem of the Northern Expedition has been completely solved, then they will no longer have to worry about running out of food and grass.

Zhuge Liang waved his feather fan, also smiling.

Although he has always undertaken the work of the chief steward in the rear, it is a pity that he did not personally go to the front line to help.

Now that he has helped Shen Chen complete the most difficult grain transportation problem in Han, and feels the joy of the virtuous brother from the heart, why not make him feel happy in his heart?

"Report!"

It was also when everyone was happily celebrating that the grain road problem was finally solved.

The rear quickly reported: "The king of Yuewangyi, Gaoding, united with Zhu Bao to rebel, and Li Dudu's lone army went deep and was surrounded by enemies in Dianchi County!" ”

Zhuge Liang suddenly frowned.

Shen Chen said angrily: "Nanzhong's rebellion is really rampant, I was about to verify the strength of the cavalry, brother, you take the iron cavalry south." ”

"It doesn't matter."

Zhuge Liang waved his hand: "Nanzhong is all mountainous, cavalry is not of much use, I have ordered Wang Ping to wait for me in Jiangzhou, although the counties and counties are in rebellion, the county soldiers in Yizhou are enough to deal with it, you actively train new soldiers, prepare for the Northern Expedition, I will set off immediately, go to Nanzhong." ”

"Okay."

Shen Chen knew that this matter could not be delayed, so he said, "I'll send my brother." ”

At that moment, he sent Zhuge Liang all the way to Nanzheng Wharf, and the Prime Minister's Guards escorted him across the Han River and headed towards Micang Road.

(End of chapter)