afterglow

Chapter 474 Chapter : A new era: a wooden cow and a lost horse; epoch-making individual equipment

In addition to increasing the carrying capacity of company and platoon-level units, it is also completely feasible to replace part of the mules and horses of regiment and battalion-level units.

Because the equipment standard of the standing army before the war was relatively high, and so far it had not suffered a major defeat, nor had it expanded its army wildly, which allowed the Army Infantry Division's motorization level to remain at a respectable level - even if the Ming Dynasty's automobile industry was not strong.

The Ming Army's automobile battalions are divided into three categories: light, medium and heavy. The infantry division has a division-affiliated automobile transport group, which has one medium battalion and two light battalions, with a total of more than 3 2-ton trucks and more than trucks. A ton truck.

In addition, the division artillery regiment is also equipped with a medium-sized vehicle battalion and more than 3 -ton trucks.

For an infantry division that has not been reinforced for battle, it has about 470 trucks of various types, not including the remaining motorcycles and off-road vehicles.

Although the divisional transport regiment of the Ming Army is one unit in terms of organization, it will be split into units in actual combat - the medium battalion is basically used to transport supplies from the rear, and the two light battalions are assigned to directly affiliated units such as the engineering battalion, communications battalion, and air defense battalion. .

The establishment of the Ming Army's 36-year-old infantry division can be said to be relatively good. The limited number of trucks will be reasonably allocated, and the motorization level of the division headquarters, artillery regiments, and directly affiliated units will be improved.

Although each infantry regiment is also equipped with some motorcycles and off-road vehicles, they are obviously not used to pull goods and transport people. The infantry regiments can only rely on mules and horses for marching and material transfer.

Therefore, in addition to cars, each infantry division also has mules, draft horses, pack horses, and war horses, totaling more than 4,200 horses.

Compared with the armies of the great powers at the same time in history, the first wave of German infantry divisions had more than 900 trucks of various types and more than 4,000 mules and horses; the Japanese draft horse division had more than 100 trucks of various types and 7 mules and horses. More than a thousand horses.

【Picture】

Based on his combat experience in the Pacific region over the past year, Zhou Changfeng felt that his flash of an idea was very meaningful.

Auxiliary power carts are not designed to compete with serious trucks. They should essentially be mules and horses that drink fuel.

Horses are animals after all, and they are delicate by nature. They have to eat ten pounds of barley, eight pounds of hay, and two pounds of beans or corn every day. They will lose weight if they are overworked or not taken care of well. If they are not careful, they will be infected with horse plague and die.

Moreover, the humid and hot environment in the Pacific was not conducive to horse activities. The Ming army, which thought it was well prepared, still lost nearly 30,000 mules and horses during the Nanyang Campaign.

Zhou Changfeng believes that it is very cost-effective to gradually replace part of the mules and horses with powered carts. Firstly, the leather is durable and does not require careful handling. Secondly, transporting fuel is much easier than feed.

After careful consideration, he called Hengguang Company early the next morning.

Hengguang Company is now booming. It has received more orders in the past year than in the previous five years combined. The Type 39 submachine gun produced by the stamping process has a high defective rate and low net profit, but the advantage lies in the large quantity, so the total amount is still a lot. .

Even so, Zhang Chengji and others still regretted that the company's limited scale could not take on large orders. It would have been better if they had been bolder before the war and raised money to purchase a batch of machinery and equipment.

"I have plans for new products here. Are there any factories on the market with good reputations that make agricultural tools?"

"Ah? What are you talking about? Farm tools?"

"You heard that right, farm tools, trolleys, tractors and the like."

"Okay, okay, okay, are you anxious? I will send someone to inquire about it and then list it out."

Naturally, the production task of such things must be left to private enterprises, otherwise there will be no cost-effectiveness at all.

Do not occupy the production capacity of professional military equipment and maximize the use of the country's production capacity.

At noon that day, Zhang Chengji called and listed a dozen relatively complete enterprises, large and small, in South Zhili.

Zhou Changfeng randomly picked a local agricultural machinery factory in Nanjing. After changing into regular clothes, he took a few attendants and soldiers there in a car.

After the Spring Festival, Yingtian Mansion in the capital has basically returned to its normal busyness. The excitement and festivities of the New Year have almost faded away, and citizens are waiting in twos and threes under the tram station.

The car turns south onto Nanmen Avenue, passes through the magnificent Jubaomen, and then drives five miles west, where you can see six or seven factories next to each other.

Some make hardware, some make food, some make molds... The types are different, but the common feature is that they are small in scale, with a few hundred people in light industrial enterprises.

Zhou Changfeng, who had a plaster on his left hand, attracted the attention of nearby employees as soon as he got out of the car. After expressing his intention, the stewards on duty hurried over soon after.

"I am Zhou Changfeng, the commander of the 1st Marine Brigade, and I came here to see you today."

"I've met General Zhou, no... I wonder what you want when you come here in person?"

The employees present were all surprised. Everyone knew that this situation could only be a good thing. After all, why did our little-known small factory need to bother the naval general to come in person?

"The Nanyang frontline often involves cross-country travel in rugged places, and mule and horse trailers are too delicate." Zhou Changfeng looked around and said, "After thinking about it, a trolley is better."

"The kind of wheelbarrow you're talking about? Yes, we have some here..."

"No, we don't want a one-wheeled one, we want a double-wheeled one, and we have to add an engine. We can't rely on human power to push it."

"A trolley with an engine? This..." The steward on duty hesitated for a few seconds and then said: "General Zhou, we have never built this kind of thing before. But listening to your request, there is nothing surprising. We can make it fresh.”

"Let's go and take a look at your factory."

"Okay, I'll lead the way."

This company called Zhaofeng Agricultural Machinery Factory is unremarkable, with only two larger factories and a few buildings used as processing workshops.

The workers operated the old lathe, and the turning tool rotated to process threads for the steel rods; the harsh hissing sound of metal came from next door, which was the cutting machine cutting off the steel frame.

Zhou Changfeng saw rows of completed small walk-behind plows in the factory building used for final assembly, as well as dump trolleys waiting to be painted.

Seeing that those plows used gasoline generators, he asked: "Is this an assembly factory? Where do the engines come from?"

"Yes, yes, we ordered this machine from Jinan."

"How much horsepower?"

"This is a piece of four pieces. We bought a batch of three pieces from the factory in Shanghai before."

Zhou Changfeng nodded and said nothing.

After thinking for a while, he pointed to the row of dump trolleys next to him and said, "Let's make a prototype in this style, replace it with a flat-bottomed square body, and then install a small engine."

"Okay, this is easy. Let's make one tonight according to your instructions." The steward agreed.

At this time, a famous master raised his hand and asked: "May I ask General Zhou, is this car used to transport goods? Do we need a gearbox?"

Gearbox? I don't expect it to run very fast. The person driving it is also walking, so it doesn't make much sense to install a gearbox on this thing.

Zhou Changfeng directly objected: "It's not necessary, as long as someone is walking fast on the flat ground."

After installing the gearbox, do I need to lengthen the body and install the seats? Then do you want another headlight? And then add the brakes? It's easy to complicate something. However, simplicity is king, as long as it meets the needs.

After promising to purchase a large amount if they could meet expectations, Zhou and his party left directly.

Everyone at Zhaofeng Agricultural Machinery Factory agreed that this was an excellent opportunity to make a pie in the sky. In order to meet the needs raised by Zhou, the factory owner, supervisors, technicians, and master craftsmen gathered together to discuss the best design.

"If this car were to run in a wasteland, the gasoline engine might not be able to drag heavy objects, so it would have to slow down and increase torque."

"The gearbox is not allowed to be used, so how about using a belt?"

"How can that be done? The belt is unreliable, easy to break, and can slip. Just use a chain to get rid of it."

They burned the midnight oil to fight, the cutting machine hissed, the acetylene welding torch spit out bluish-white flames, and sparks flew everywhere.

In one night, the two samples were rushed and tested.

Several steel pipes are welded together as the frame, with two extending backwards from the top as handrails. An iron-rimmed wooden spoke wheel is installed on the left and right sides. The engine is arranged behind the frame and is connected to a large reduction wheel on the axle through a chain... …

Just after Chen time, people who had stayed up all night gathered together to have breakfast. Those with benches sat on benches, and those with horses sat on horses. The smell of steaming wontons and vermicelli soup filled their nostrils.

Zhou Changfeng arrived as scheduled. He did not want to waste time and hoped to produce a batch of testing results on a small scale before the war on Guadalcanal began.

"Puff puff puff puff——"

After turning the handle quickly for a few times and then suddenly pulling it out, the four-stroke single-cylinder diesel engine ran successfully...

The noise when the first trolley started was far beyond Zhou Changfeng's expectations.

Looking at the black smoke spewing out of the exhaust pipe, he was a little surprised. He felt that the noise and exhaust gas were louder than the single-cylinder diesel engines he remembered from rural single-cylinder engines in later generations.

hiss! One car is like this, but if there are more than a dozen or dozens of cars...

I'm afraid this is not suitable for the battlefield environment, it is easy to expose itself, and the huge noise exceeds the acceptable level.

This sample uses a 5-horsepower single-cylinder direct-injection diesel engine, and the other sample uses a 7-horsepower single-cylinder gasoline engine.

Generally, a diesel engine with the same power is larger than a gasoline engine, which is even more obvious under today's technical conditions.

The noise of the second power trolley was much smaller. Several attendants took turns trying to drive it for a while, and they all felt that it was pretty good.

Even such crude mechanical equipment made Zhou Changfeng very excited. If his left hand had not been injured, he would definitely have tried it.

What's this? This is the new era! A tough guy!

Boy! Daming Technology!

The prototype of the gasoline engine version of the trolley was not satisfactory and basically satisfied Zhou's idea. However, he rejected the iron-rimmed wooden spoke wheels.

"This kind of wooden wheel is not good, it is easy to get stuck. Replace it with wider solid rubber tires with herringbone patterns."

Finally, he said that he would first manufacture 200 units within ten days. If he could not do it, he would contact friends for help.

This requirement has exceeded the capabilities of Zhaofeng Agricultural Machinery Factory. The semi-manual and semi-machine workshop-style production is naturally inferior to that of large factories.

There were a lot of good things happening in late February, and there was a lot of news that greatly boosted Zhou Changfeng's confidence.

The Consultative Council passed the "Wartime Additional Construction Plan for Naval Ships" in early January. It has only been more than a month since then, and some of the ships covered by the plan have been completed.

According to the construction plan, 100 of the 32 Sunda-class torpedo boats will be converted into Sunda-type A motor gunboats, which will be used to carry out raids on enemy beachheads, intercept enemy landing craft, and attack enemy transport ships in complex sea areas.

Now, the first batch of 12 torpedo boats and 10 gunboats have been delivered to the newly established Navy's th Torpedo Boat Fleet and th Gunboat Fleet.

The trial-produced Type 80 mm recoilless rifle underwent more than a dozen minor modifications based on feedback from frontline soldiers and was officially finalized for mass production.

After the production line has been set up and debugged, the Wuhan Army Arsenal started trial production in mid-February. It is expected that 50 to 60 units will be shipped this month and 140 to 150 units next month.

Zhou Changfeng was quite anxious and called the Ordnance Bureau to ask for it. No matter what happened, he would decide on 40 units first!

He believes that he is very reasonable - all fronts are relatively stable now, and there is no urgent need for recoilless rifles. However, the 1st Marine Brigade will soon go to Guadalcanal, and it is obviously necessary to prioritize equipping some.

In addition, some minor difficulties in the large-scale printing and dyeing process of camouflage patterns have also been solved by several manufacturers.

Camouflage uniforms, capes, dual-purpose ponchos, tents, and helmet covers are being mass-produced at a rapid pace. The Army placed a relatively small order with a try mentality and was completed quickly. The order placed by the Navy will probably be completed in March.

However, there are currently several thousand sets of orders that have been delivered, enough for the front-line units of the 1st Marine Brigade to complete the replacement.

The last day of February.

In the morning, the gentle spring breeze blows by, and there is no time more pleasant than this.

At the detention center where the 1st Marine Brigade was originally stationed, Zhou Changfeng witnessed with his own eyes the epoch-making image of a complete set of individual soldier equipment being worn on the body.

A tall and powerful officer-in-waiting who had just come to report was roped in as a guest model.

Wearing a trial-produced Type 40 forest camouflage combat uniform, a Type 36 helmet also covered with a forest camouflage helmet cover, and holding a Type 39 short automatic rifle.

Then put on the trial-produced Type 2.5 personal protective gear, and install a 10mm light insert plate on the front and rear. The material is a surface carburized hardened steel plate, which can be immune to 9mm Parabellum pistol bullets or .45ACP at a distance of m. Pistol bullets.

Then hang up the canvas chest-mounted triple magazine carrying tool, install the three magazines, and stuff a grenade into the small bags on both sides.

Very good personal equipment, American Ma Run was stunned!

"Okay, very spirited!"

Zhou Changfeng nodded and said "tsk tsk tsk" a few times. What he saw in front of him was really satisfying, and the corners of his mouth turned up involuntarily.

Before the Guadalcanal War began, most combat units of the 1st Marine Brigade could be equipped with this set - but bulletproof vests were not included.

Type 39 short automatic rifles and trial-produced Type 39 individual protective gear are still in short supply, and only the elite boat scouts and beach front selection battalions can equip them.

It is difficult to imagine the mental state of the US military on Guadalcanal after encountering the 1st Marine Brigade.

Just as Zhou Changfeng was intoxicated with optimistic fantasies about the future war, a messenger came quickly and announced with clasped fists: "Report! Your Majesty, the Governor's Office is calling, asking you to attend a meeting at 2 p.m. to discuss changes in the situation in the West. "

(End of this chapter)