I want to be emperor

Chapter 366 Research Model
Dai Xinhan, this person is not a traditional scholar, of course, he has nothing to do with a craftsman in the traditional sense.

He was born in a family of officials. Several generations of his ancestors worked as officials in the official weapon workshop in Xiangyang City, which was passed down from generation to generation. Finally, Dai Xinhan also became an official official workshop in Xiangyang City.

As for the official in the workshop, if you want to say that he is a craftsman, he is not. If you want to say that he is a scholar or even an official, he is not.

It can be regarded as a relatively special group in the traditional feudal dynasty.

Because the production environment is not bad, more than enough than the top, Dai Xinhan was able to read and write when he was young, but he was born in a family of officials, so it is naturally impossible for him to take part in any imperial examinations... he is not qualified!
Also because of the influence of his family, he was exposed to all kinds of guns, swords and spears since he was a child, which cultivated his strong interest.

After a lot of age, I will search for relevant books to read, and I will also think about improving related tools and gun craftsmanship by myself.

It's just that these were useless in the Ming Dynasty. As an official in a weapon workshop, he was not qualified to change anything without authorization.

And when the Great Chu Empire came to Xiangyang and took over the official workshops under the Ming government, Dai Xinhan also took advantage of the opportunity to join the Great Chu Empire.

Of course, at the beginning, like many people, especially the officials or craftsmen, he didn't think that he had formally joined the Great Chu Empire as a traitor, they just thought that he was just working in the factory.

After Dai Xinhan became a thief, he became a junior manager in the Xiangyang Arsenal.

At this time, it happened that the Great Chu Empire was looking for all kinds of scientific talents, especially professionals in the manufacture of guns, and offered generous salaries.

At that time, Dai Xinhan didn't have much idea, just wanted to get more money to improve the family.

At that time, his wife had just given birth to his third son, and the second brother's life at home was also very tight and he needed his support from time to time. Moreover, he had a younger brother who had not yet married and his old father had passed away. An elder brother like a father naturally needs to bear the corresponding responsibilities.

The pressure of raising a family is not small!

In order to get a higher salary, Dai Xinhan went to find his boss, and talked about his idea of ​​improving machinery and guns, but he didn't expect his boss to attach great importance to it.

It didn't take long for Dai Xinhan to become an engineer directly, leading a group of people under him to solve various technical problems in gun manufacturing.

Slowly, Dai Xinhan became a senior engineer at the artillery factory under the Xiangyang Arsenal.

When the Great Chu Empire was preparing to build the Hantian Armory, Dai Xinhan, together with other middle and senior technicians, was transferred to Daye County, Hantian Prefecture, and served as a senior engineer at the Artillery Factory under the Hantian Armory. artillery.

That is, the nine-pound naval gun used on naval warships.

After the successful research and development, the nine-pound naval gun he presided over the research and development and production quickly passed the inspection and was successfully installed on the navy's warships.

Immediately afterwards, he continued to develop the fourteen-pound naval gun, and successfully produced many guns before the Eastward Campaign.

At this time, Dai Xinhan has become the leading heavy artillery research and development expert in the artillery factory. His title has also changed from senior engineer to deputy engineer of the artillery factory. technical challenge.

Later, the Ministry of Industry of the Great Chu Empire, according to Luo Zhixue's oral order, divided the artillery factory under the Hantian Armory and separated out the Heavy Artillery Factory.

Dai Xinhan also took advantage of the opportunity to become the chief engineer of the heavy artillery factory.

But at this time, Dai Xinhan had already deviated from the original expectation. He was not only working for the arsenal of Chu thieves, but also became an official of the Great Chu Empire.

Because the core technical posts of several important factories under the Ministry of Industry of the Great Chu Empire, mainly the deputy chief engineer, will be awarded official status and enjoy corresponding political treatment.

As the chief engineer of the Heavy Artillery Factory, Dai Xinhan was awarded the fifth grade.

And the chief engineer of the Hantian Armory, which is even higher, is of the third rank, which is comparable to the rank of the directors of the ministries and the chief envoys of the provinces.

Similarly, the senior management positions in these arsenals are also of high grade.

The supervisor of the Heavy Artillery Factory is the fourth rank, and the co-organizer is the fourth rank, which is basically related to the rank of a magistrate or fellow magistrate.

However, these official ranks are only limited to senior management and senior technical personnel. For ordinary middle and lower management and ordinary technical personnel, the method of ordinary employees is adopted.

After Dai Xinhan became the chief engineer of the fifth-rank heavy artillery factory, he focused his energy on the research and development of a new type of artillery, that is, the [-]-jin naval gun.

This 24-pound naval gun is about the same as the [-]-pound naval gun on the side of the foreigners.

In fact, there is no problem with the basic design. It is enough to directly enlarge the fourteen-pound naval gun, and the fourteen-pound naval gun in the Chu army is derived from the nine-pound naval gun.

It is estimated that the nine-jin naval gun is derived from the traditional Hongyi artillery.

Generally speaking, the technical route is still in the same line, even if there are subsequent changes, the overall changes will not be too big.

But the difficulty lies in production!
Or to be precise, mass production.

We must know that the Great Chu Empire has a very large demand for artillery, and has adopted a preliminary industrial system and used mechanical equipment for processing.

This can be seen from the production of a large number of bronze field artillery of the Chu Army. Although the entire production process is similar to the traditional Hongyi cannon in terms of technical route, it is different from the traditional cannon in terms of specific processing and production. The production of Hongyi cannons is different.

The most typical one is the use of a large hydrodynamic boring machine to finish the bore of the bronze gun barrel, so that the inner diameter of the gun barrel is highly uniform and smoother.

It is worth mentioning that, except for mortars, all the long-barreled artillery of the Great Chu Empire, whether it is army field artillery or naval naval artillery, including those heavy artillery of [-] catties and [-] catties, are all made of bronze. casting.

The reason why the cheaper cast iron artillery was not adopted was mainly because the Great Chu Empire did not lack copper materials, at least there was no shortage of copper materials for casting artillery, so that it would not be forced to use cast iron artillery because of the lack of copper materials.

In addition, copper cast artillery is easier to process than cast iron artillery, and has lower requirements for mechanical equipment.

This means that if copper artillery is used, with the current technical capabilities of the Great Chu Empire, it is possible to process a barrel with better performance.

Finally, there is one more important point, even the most important, that is, the Great Chu Empire is really not short of that bit of cannon money!

A nine-pound naval gun used by the navy, that is, a gun with a 110mm mouth, a 24-fold barrel, and a nine-pound solid shell. If it is cast in bronze, the cost of the whole gun is about 800 taels.

However, if iron cast artillery is used, the cost can be controlled at about 300 taels.

But the problem is that the Great Chu Empire is not short of the 500 taels...

One door costs 500 taels, one hundred doors is 5 taels, and one thousand doors is only 50 taels of silver. Compared to the Great Chu Empire, which spends 3000 million taels a year on military expenditure, it is not even a fraction...

For the Great Chu Empire, the problem of artillery has never been the price, but the production capacity and performance!

Even if it is cost, it is more about maintenance cost. For example, the cost of the Army Artillery Unit is not the purchase cost of the artillery itself, but the expenditure of artillery, mules and horses, and ammunition for training and combat.

For the navy, even the maintenance cost is much lower. After all, it is not necessary to use mules and horses, and it is the expenses of the artillery crew members.

So long ago, all kinds of long-barreled cannons in the major arsenals of the Great Chu Empire began to switch to bronze cannons, and large-caliber naval guns were no exception.

The purpose is to increase production capacity while reducing the frequency of troop replacements, indirectly increasing artillery production capacity.

If a division on the front line uses iron cast artillery, basically three large-scale high-intensity battles, if each artillery fires hundreds of shells, these iron cast artillery will have to be replaced, otherwise the chamber will explode in minutes.

But if copper artillery is used, then these copper artillery can last ten large-scale high-intensity battles or fire thousands of shells before the artillery needs to be replaced.

The difference between the two is huge, and it is far more important than the cost of a few hundred thousand taels of silver.

To sum up, the Great Chu Empire is more inclined to use copper cannons, but even if copper cannons are used in production, the processing difficulty is relatively lower. The processing difficulty of caliber naval guns has also risen linearly.

Among other things, it is very troublesome to move the barrel of the large-caliber artillery and adjust its position during processing.

At the same time, it is very difficult to use a boring machine to finish the barrel of a large artillery.

The combination of many aspects has caused the Chu army to face a series of technical problems that need to be solved in the mass production of large-caliber artillery.

And Dai Xinhan led the people, from the special design and manufacture of new large-scale hydraulic machinery, to the improvement of processing methods and many other steps, and finally finalized the production of the [-]-jin naval gun.

To be precise, Dai Xinhan did not mean that he designed the [-]-pound naval gun, but solved the problem of mass production of the [-]-pound naval gun.

And this is actually more important to the Great Chu Empire.

The design of the artillery, in fact, the artillery these days has no good design, it is just a barrel. If you want to hit farther and have more power, then the barrel should be longer and thicker.

If you want mobility, the barrel should be shorter and the barrel thinner.

If I have to say yes, it means that some details on the gun mount have been adjusted.

Or study some patterns carved on the barrel...

What really troubles the engineers and arsenals/workshops of casting artillery in various countries is how to make the artillery.

Low cost, manufactured in large quantities, and maintain performance.

And this is the problem that many technicians in the Great Chu Empire urgently need to solve and improve!
(End of this chapter)