The history of Yangyue Company can be traced back to the ninth year of Zhichang, and its founder is named Li Quan, a businessman who is skilled in human affairs, but can be called ruthless.

Li Quan does not see the habits of a feudal landlord, it can be said that he is a rare, real capitalist, and finally alienated himself into a slave of capital - serving to maximize profits, so that he died of middle-aged illness because of years of hard work.

With the birth of the Ford Model T, there was a car boom all over the world, and Daming was no exception.

However, the upfront investment in the automobile industry is too large, and the machinery and plant are easy to manage, but it is impossible for qualified engineers and skilled workers to grow out of the ground.

The imperial court invested heavily and spent many years to establish the Junda Automobile Company in Shanghai, and Yanjing's Xunjie Company was stabilized by many joint ventures of merchants and nobles in Beizhili and Shanxi provinces.

In contrast, Yangyue Company only had the support of the local government back then, and the Hubei Provincial Government and the Wuhan Government themselves were also shy, after all, there were too many places to spend money, so they could only vigorously cooperate in policy.

Li Quan started as a textile factory, starting with the establishment of an automobile repair shop in the automobile industry, and then imported parts for assembly, gradually increasing the self-sufficiency rate of parts and components, and finally establishing a more or less complete production capacity.

However, Yangyue company does not have the ability to manufacture engines, and has long been ordered from Junda and Xunjie companies, which have their own engine research and development and manufacturing departments; In addition, Tatola, Renault, and BMW are also major suppliers.

After completing a new round of expansion last summer, Yangyue Automotive's production has steadily increased, reaching a normal record high this spring.

Throughout the spring, a total of 4,584 trucks of various types, 40 Type 37 half-track armored vehicles, and 150 Type 34 Type C 4×4 wheeled armored vehicles were shipped.

"You don't build many full-track vehicles, and you don't have enough production experience, right?"

In the No. 2 final assembly shop, Perimeter Wind and a group of people walked between rows of armored vehicles waiting to be painted.

The manager behind him immediately replied: "Yes, the tracked vehicles are mainly made by a machine factory and Hangzhou Huifeng factory, and we can't compare." ”

The first machine factory refers to the Yanjing National No. 1 Heavy Machinery Company, which mainly manufactures tractors, cranes, and locomotives.

Of course, tanks are also included in their business, and the Type 38 medium tank is their work.

Huifeng factory is located in Hangzhou, which is a tractor manufacturing plant jointly owned by local businessmen. In 32 years, the first machine factory had a poor operation due to many internal and external reasons, and its production capacity declined, so it entrusted Huifeng Factory to help share part of the tank order.

Since then, the Huifeng plant has tasted the sweetness and began to expand its production capacity in this area.

However, the Ming army did not have a good impression of the Huifeng factory, because it was the first time to manufacture army-standard tracked vehicles, with poor quality control, and they were also Trinity light tanks, but the failure rate of the Huifeng factory was obviously higher.

It's a bit like when people buy the iPhone 15 and find that what they get is actually Made in India.

Zhou Changfeng opened the door of an armored car and looked at the seats inside, "The overall war is to tap the full mobilization potential, if you need to build as much as you need in the future, how far do you estimate it can go?" ”

"Did Zhou Zhizhao mean three shifts?" The manager shook his head and replied embarrassedly: "I'm afraid not, there are not enough people, but two shifts... Yes. ”

"That means the monthly production of trucks can double from the current 1,500 trucks?"

"Three thousand...... It's quite difficult, we estimate that it can be two thousand five. The gearbox is time-consuming, and the engine may not always be fully supplied. ”

In this way, the annual output of Yangyue Company reached 30,000 units, and counting the two companies of Xunjie and Junda, the annual output of trucks in the case of wartime mobilization should exceed 100,000 units.

[The previous article overestimated the production of trucks, so it was reduced by a part, and this is the subject of this.] 】

Historically, 480,000 trucks were built in Britain in 40 to 44, an average of 96,000 per year.

But this did not mean that the Ming automobile industry surpassed the British, as the more expensive tracked Bren machine gun cars were built a total of 113,000 units during the war.

And Da Ming obviously can't make so many tracked auxiliary vehicles, it's too extravagant. The limited production capacity of tracked vehicles will definitely give priority to tank building.

Considering the combat area after the Ming Dynasty, although the output of these trucks is completely insufficient compared with the United States, it is enough to make careful calculations, and it can even be said to be relatively sufficient.

First of all, there is no need for multi-front operations, there is no need to disperse forces, and it is possible to concentrate on supplying the battlefield where trucks are urgently needed.

In addition, the battle for the Pacific islands is not like a large-scale land battle on the Eurasian continent, where trucks are needed to transport supplies to the front line dozens of kilometers away, or trucks are needed to transport troops for long-distance maneuvers.

In the Pacific theater, the fleet arrives at the port to unload supplies and troops, and then it is only a short distance to deliver and maneuver.

Therefore, the battle for the islands can actually relatively limit the manifestation of the industrial superiority of the United States, allowing the two sides to engage in a brutal fight in a closer state.

After finishing the inspection of the production line, Zhou Changfeng pretended to ask casually: "How are you going to design that assault gun?" ”

The manager was stunned for a moment, and asked puzzledly, "Assault gun?" ”

"Oh, it's a self-propelled infantry gun."

"I see, I don't know about it...... If Zhou Zhizhao is interested, I will take you to the design department to inquire, right? ”

The name of the self-propelled infantry gun, although very straightforward, is not good at all.

No way! Be sure to correct the name to assault guns!

In this way, after leaving the factory, the group took a car to the adjacent place.

There is a pond about the size of a football field on the side of the boulevard, dotted with lotus leaves on the water, and a water pavilion in the middle.

The design department of Yangyue Company is in several buildings not far away, all of which are double-storey or three-story buildings with white walls and black tiles hanging on the top of the mountain, which look like ordinary houses.

It was early afternoon, the electric fan was whirring, and many people were lying on the table and resting on their chairs.

"Oops! Get up, and the people of the court are coming! ”

The group had only reached the front of the stairs when they heard a faint urging sound from above.

Zhou Changfeng glanced at the room next to the stairwell, and saw that the two people inside were still leisurely shaking their fans, drinking chilled mung bean soup, and reading newspapers.

It's a very leisurely day.

In short, after some tossing, Zhou got his wish and met the design team formed by Yangyue Company in response to the assault gun bidding.

After the initial debate, the team finally decided to design a 4×4 armored vehicle to improve performance while meeting the purchase price of 26,000 yen.

If the 6×6 chassis is used, the cost will be one gear higher, and the probability will exceed the psychological expectations of the Ming Army.

"Does a four-wheeler really guarantee off-road capability? In many cases, there is no paved road, and I feel that the four-wheeled bicycle may not even be able to get through some big potholes and big bumps. "Zhou Changfeng was very skeptical about the passage of the 4×4 wheeled assault gun.

The team leader was a middle-aged man who seemed to be very well-educated and knowledgeable, he stretched out his hand and pointed to a drawing hanging on the bracket in front of him, and replied lightly:

"I understand Zhou's concerns, please look at the drawings, in order to enhance the off-road ability, we plan to install a pair of steel drums at the head and in the middle."

"Grooves on the wheel face increase grip, so you can better use the four main wheels when passing through rough terrain."

"Ten years ago, we tried this design on some experimental vehicles, and it worked well; In recent years, there have been similar cars abroad. ”

[Picture]

Zhou Changfeng let out a "hmm", stared at the drawings with his hands on his chest, and then imagined in his mind what the real thing would be like for this type of armored vehicle.

By design, the tiny armored car, numbered "LQZ44-5", took on a load that it should not have had.

The length is 4.8 meters, the width is 2.35 meters, and the estimated total combat weight is 6.8 tons.

The front of the hull is 12mm inclined armor with an inclination of 30° relative to the normal, and the sides of the hull are 12mm inclined armor arranged in the shape of "〈" and "〉".

Case-hardened armor steel is well suited for this type of light vehicle, such as 12.7mm machine gun rounds, and the thickness required for case-hardened steel is thinner than that of homogeneous steel.

However, the welding of case-hardened steel is more difficult, which tests the welding technology level of the factory.

Yangyue Company has made considerable progress in welding technology in the past two years, so the design team tried to apply the welding process.

If the quality is not up to par, then change back to riveting for the time being.

The two-man turret was hexagonal, with the front three sides of 20 mm and the rear three sides of 10 mm, all with a 15° inclination, and two processes were planned.

The first turret is welded, while the second turret is cast instead. In order to compensate for the decrease in bullet resistance, the thickness of the cast turret on all sides was uniformly increased by 2mm.

In addition, there is a gun shield on the front of the turret, which is a piece of homogeneous steel armor with a thickness of 25 mm. If you're lucky, this shield can block small-caliber armor-piercing shells hit at a long distance.

The power configuration is planned to be equipped with a V-shaped eight-cylinder air-cooled gasoline engine produced by Junda, with a maximum output of 95 horsepower, four forward gears and one reverse gear, and a maximum range of 300km.

Zhou Changfeng intuitively believed that it was not enough for an armored car of almost seven tons to rely on such a small engine, "Isn't it less than a hundred horsepower?" I'm afraid it's not enough, right? What about the torque provided by the gearbox? ”

"The torque can reach 300 Nm, which is theoretically enough." The person in charge pushed his glasses and said helplessly: "Uh... Zhou waits for Zhao, there is only this option in the current energy-producing engine, and the Swift Company has a kind of one hundred and ten horses, but the size is too large to stop. ”

The existing conditions are average, and we have to try our best to meet the harsh requirements put forward by Party A, which is both cheap and easy to use, which is really difficult, and it is almost to the point where the people who hear it are sad and the people who see it cry.

In this regard, Zhou Changfeng could only sigh that the world is not easy, and bowed his hand.

The Ming Army planned to use this type of armored vehicle for two purposes, one was to provide infantry units with mobile support firepower - just like the name suggests.

Such a model will be equipped with a 12-type 80mm mountain gun, and instead of leaving this old gun in the warehouse to eat ashes, it is better to use it as waste, anyway, in terms of performance, it is very suitable.

The anti-explosive bomb weighs 6.8kg, has a muzzle velocity of 390m/s, and has a short rear seat stroke, which fits well in the already modest space of the two-man turret.

The other type of model is used as an armored reconnaissance vehicle to carry out in-depth reconnaissance and fire reconnaissance missions, and will be equipped with a modified Erlikon MS-cal.60 20mm anti-aircraft gun.

The Ming army liked this kind of light and easy-to-use small-caliber machine gun very much, and bought thousands of them that year, and produced thousands of them themselves.

In many border clashes, the Russian army suffered so much that it had to buy a batch from the Swiss to fight it.

Just imagine, between the wasteland and the hills of the frontier land, when you see the Ming army occupying a small hill in the distance suddenly set up a few anti-aircraft guns and strafing them, you can imagine how desperate the Russians were.

In recent years, as a large number of new Type 34 anti-aircraft guns have been put into service, many Erlikon anti-aircraft guns have been decommissioned and mothballed, and now they finally have a chance to go into battle again.

"You are really good at being in charge, and developing new things can't improve much efficiency, so it's really better to use old ready-made things directly." Zhou Changfeng exclaimed.

"Well, who wants to be so calculating? When it is developed in the future, we will also try to spend money lavishly. ”

In the next two days, Zhou completed his own work in Wuhan, and then accompanied Xia Xiaoshi to visit the Yellow Crane Tower, and then prepared to leave for Beijing.

Also on this day, in Hengshan County, hundreds of miles away......

At the entrance of a village in the north of Shiwan Town, dozens of people have gathered at this moment, and if you count the children who join in the fun, it will break 100.

The sound of "tutu tu" came from a long distance, and several motorcycles carrying officials from the county appeared in people's field of vision.

Today is the day of land division, and the county government has been delayed again and again, and it has been postponed for more than a month.

"Can you settle it today, you can't delay it any longer, right?"

"That's right, it's been more than six months, and I have to leave some days to figure out how to plant seedlings at the bottom of the field."

There is a lot of talk about how much of their clothing is made of cheap low-end machine-made cotton, and the colors are also very simple, mainly earthy yellow and indigo.

The standard of living of these landlord-dependent tenant farmers is certainly higher than it was in the past, but it is not comparable to that of today's yeoman farmers, who have little money left over to consume industrial products.

Although the public redemption policy implemented by the Ming Dynasty was a moderate means of land reform, there were still a lot of tricks in the implementation process.

The most common is to deduct the money to compensate the landlord for the purchase of land, in the past, the landlord was still the backbone of the Ming society, but now it is different.

The treacherous and greedy officials who have been treacherous and greedy since ancient times do not want to miss any opportunity to exploit - since it is a forced acquisition of land, it is not up to you landlords and old wealth.

Equally common are the extortion of tenant farmers who have been allocated land, and if they do not want to be squeezed out of the last few dollars, they will wait until the end to get the less fertile land.

(End of chapter)