1855 United States Tycoon

Chapter 93 New Propellant and New Weapons

Brandt’s so-called new propellant inspired by Italian macaroni looks a bit like Italian macaroni. It is a kind of propellant made with collodion as a matrix and added with other stabilizers. It looks like dark brown gunpowder. It is not much different from other gunpowder, but the shape of the gunpowder particles is very unique. The shape of this gunpowder is thin and tubular, just like the middle of the Italian macaroni is empty, the middle of this kind of gunpowder is also empty. In fact, this is exactly the shape adopted by later generations of rifle propellants.

“Well, the design is very interesting. This is to keep the burning rate constant, right?” Scrooge asked.

“Yes, Mr. MacDonald, look!” Brandt took out a burning vessel and placed some commonly used flake gunpowder on it.

“Look, Mr. MacDonald. This is a traditional granular gunpowder. It burns quickly, but because it burns, its burning area is getting smaller and smaller, so its burning speed will be slower and slower. To facilitate observation, I made the particles very large, so that the burning speed will be much slower. So you will find that after a closer look, the ignited flame will rise very high for an instant, and then quickly drop.” Said, Brandt ignited the gunpowder. Without airtight conditions, the gunpowder would not explode. It was just that the flame suddenly jumped up and down. Then, before people could see clearly, the flame went low and then extinguished. NS.

“Mr. MacDonald, if such propellant is used in a rifle, the chamber pressure will be very high at the beginning. To reduce the risk of blasting, we must either make the barrel very thick or just Can reduce the charge. The former will make our rifles heavier, and the latter? There will be such a problem: at the beginning, the chamber pressure is appropriate, and the bullet starts to move forward under the propelling of the gunpowder gas. However, It burns too fast. When the bullet has not had time to fly out of the muzzle, it burns out, so the chamber pressure drops rapidly, causing the muzzle velocity of the bullet to drop severely when it shoots out of the muzzle. Therefore, we need a gunpowder with a relatively constant burning speed. The burning speed of gunpowder largely depends on its burning area. So I think if it can be ensured that during the burning process, the burning area can remain the same, or change very little, then we can get a kind of combustion. The speed is constant, and it can provide a stable pressure gunpowder for the long barreled weapon…” Brandt began to show off his own creativity triumphantly, just like a child showing off his new toy.

“So you made this kind of macaroni?” Scrooge said, “In this structure, the outer surface of the tube is burned with a smaller surface area, and the inner surface is indeed burned with a larger surface area. Such a balance is indeed a good idea.”

“I will ignite it for you to see.” Brandt quickly put some gunpowder similar in shape to his new propellant into another burning vessel, but was obviously larger by several sizes, and then ignited it. The flame soared high, then stabilized a little, and then suddenly went out.

“Look, there was no obvious change in the size of the flame until it went out.”

“Very good, impressive.” Scrooge said. With this, the performance of the rifle can rise again. Think about it. At the beginning of the war, when the arrogant Yankees armed with front-mounted rifles attacked the south, which was equipped with at least tens of thousands of McDonald’s 1857 rifles, they would surely be beaten up and pissed off. The Macdonald 1857 can be sold to the Union Army at a patriotic preferential price. So the war will enter a stalemate. The Northern Army will continue to buy MacDonald 1857 from here, or buy patents to make it in Splinfield, but considering the time of conversion, the number of direct purchases is absolutely not Will be less. Where’s the Southern Army? Well, they will also buy the British version of 1857 from the British. For every one they buy, the British will give themselves 2.5 dollars. When the war lasted until the first term of President Lincoln was approaching, at that time, if the Northern Army could not open the situation, Lincoln would be under greater pressure. At that time, he would come up with a variety of new gadgets with excellent performance that could overwhelm the weapons in the hands of the Southern Army. Would he dare not buy them? At that time, sixty dollars a cartridge rifle using smokeless powder, five-cent smokeless powder bullets, ten dollars a hand grenade, and new artillery and high-explosive shells at the price. We will decide later, anyway, we must let the United States government emptied the entire treasury. Well, he really has no money at that time, MacDonald Bank can also provide him with a large loan for the aftermath, and let him use customs duties as collateral!

“How is the pull fuse developed?” Scrooge asked.

“A lot of progress has been made. But Raphael and the others are working on this project. I am not very clear about the specific progress.” Brandt said.

“Mr. MacDonald, we have developed two types of fuse, one is mechanical, which relies on the spring to push the firing pin to hit the flash hider. This is basically mature, that is, the cost may be higher. There is another one. This is the use of friction to pull the fire tube, the effect is also good, but there is still a gap between the reliability and the mechanical type.” The researcher Raphael who followed by the side replied.

“How big is the difference?” Scrooge asked.

“Mechanical now probably fails once in every 100 fires, and now the success rate of pulling the fire tube is less than 90%.” Raphael replied.

“That is to say, one or two out of ten will not explode?” Scrooge asked.

“Yes, Mr. MacDonald.”

“I think this is enough. Oh, how much more expensive is a mechanical torch?” Scrooge asked.

“If the pull tube is mass-produced, you can probably make at least five cents per cent. The spring-type ones cost five to ten cents each.” Raphael replied.

“Then stop developing the spring type, and concentrate on improving the fire tube type. Oh my God, the cost is so bad. Oh, yes, do you have a sample of the grenade? Take me to see it.” Governance said.

According to Scrooge’s prior instructions, there are two types of grenades under development. One is the so-called offensive grenade, which has more charges and less shrapnel when exploded. It is mainly wounded by the air waves of the explosion. The kill radius is of course relatively small, at least much smaller than the throwing distance. It is suitable for soldiers who are on the offensive when there is no concealment around them. The other is the so-called defensive grenade. This kind of grenade is equipped with a shell with prefabricated fragments. It explodes with a large number of shrapnel. It is mainly killed by shrapnel and has a larger killing range, even close to or beyond the throwing distance. This grenade is suitable for defenders who have existing concealed objects nearby.

Raphael put the samples of both grenades in front of Scrooge, and asked Scrooge: “Mr. MacDonald, would you like to try it?”

Scrooge thought for a while and said, “Forget it. Just let the people from Heishui give it a try.”

So Raphael took Scrooge into a safe bunker far away from the test site, and then a blackwater mercenary skillfully threw the two grenades out one after another. Both grenades exploded successfully.

“Well, yes, good!” Scrooge was very happy, and he even promised to give them a small bonus.

“Mr. MacDonald, I have a new idea.” Raphael was very happy to see Scrooge, and took the opportunity to talk to Scrooge about his new idea.

Scrooge has always been very supportive of ideas that can bring benefits to the company. Said Scrooge stopped and said to Raphael, “Tell me?”

“We can make a prefabricated fragment into a sleeve. When it needs to be defended, put it on an offensive grenade. The offensive grenade becomes a defensive grenade; when it needs to be offensive, take it off, and the defensive grenade is enough. It’s back to an offensive grenade.” Raphael said proudly.

Seeing Raphael’s happy face, Scrooge was very unwilling to blow his enthusiasm. But some things must be taught to him. Otherwise, if it is not done well, he will use his talents in the wrong place like this. So Scrooge thought for a while and said to Raphael:

“Raphael, your design is imaginative and completely feasible. However, you have to pay attention to this point. That is, any of our innovations are ultimately aimed at selling more products to users. Think about it, if this new idea is not adopted, the user needs to buy a batch of offensive grenades for offensive operations, and he needs to buy a batch of defensive grenades for defensive operations. In this way, they need to buy a batch of defensive grenades. Buy at least two batches of grenades from us. And if they use Niu’s creativity, they can buy a batch of grenades. This way, their purchases will decrease. And this means that the money we make will be Reduce. So, Rafael, do you now understand the problem with your idea? A R&D person not only thinks about how to make things better, but also thinks about how to deal with the market. I hope you will do research in the future When the time comes, don’t forget the market’s reaction. As long as you can do this, you will have a lot of money in the future.”

On the boat leaving the 51st area, Scrooge said to the lawyer who was with him: “Go and apply for a patent on Raphael’s idea.”

“Oh, his idea is not…”

“After the grenade of other companies appeared on the market, his idea was to win Magic Treasures.” Scrooge said.