Emperor Chongzhen of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 462 Rifled Guns and Future Manufacturing Bottlenecks
Zhu Youjian didn't know that Sun Heding was unhappy about forcibly interfering with his research direction.

Now he thinks about Daming's next industrial development because of smokeless gunpowder.

After Zhu Youjian took over the Chongzhen Type 22 breech-loading rifle that looked like a Martini-Henry rifle from Bi Maokang, he looked at it carefully.

On the whole, the biggest feature of the Chongzhen Type 22 rifle is that it uses the lever principle to allow the shooter to turn the bolt by pulling the lever to expose the chamber, plus the firing pin automatically retracts to the front of the bolt, and the trigger is embedded in the iron block. When activated, the firing pin fires the gunpowder, causing the ammunition to explode and launch.

Compared with the rotation method of the Chongzhen Type 21 flintlock gun, a lever is added.

In addition, the flint is replaced by gun cotton, and then a spring structure can be added, which can make the shell case automatically fly out as the gun body descends after firing, and thus speed up the loading process.

"Yes, with such a sharp weapon, the victory of the Northern Expedition will be more assured. Immediately determine the standard and put it into mass production. How soon can the army be equipped?"

Zhu Youjian questioned Bi Maokang, and Bi Maokang pondered for a while before saying:
"It can be put into production at the end of May. Now that the steam engine is used in the boring machine instead of hydraulic power, the production efficiency has improved a lot. It is estimated that 22 Chongzhen Type [-] rifles will be produced by then."

"Very good. I'm going to inspect the Southwest in June. I can equip Zhang Tongchang's Imperial Guard Infantry Battalion of the Second Army first, and follow me to the Southwest battlefield to verify the actual combat capabilities of the rifle."

Zhu Youjian said this to Lu Jiude, the head of the General Armament Department of the Grand Marshal's Mansion.

The most advanced weapons and equipment of the Ming Dynasty are all directly controlled by the Generalissimo's Mansion, in order to prevent civil officials from getting involved.

Lu Jiude answered yes, while Zhu Youjian continued to ask about the development of artillery.

Tang Ruowang, the person in charge of the Artillery Bureau, took Zhu Youjian to the artillery test firing base, pointed to a cannon that was green in color and its base was carried by a four-wheel-drive iron wheel vehicle, and said:

"Your Majesty the Emperor, this is the rifled breech-loading gun made by Weichen for you, that is, the Daming Type 22 infantry light field gun. Using the principle of the Franc machine's son and mother gun, this artillery is also divided into two basic structures: a sub-cannon and a mother cannon. The mother cannon is a chambered cannon. The front section of the mother cannon is threaded by a steam boring machine, and the rear section is hollowed out to load the sub-cannon. The sub-cannon shells are not fired with gun cotton, because the production of gun cotton is too small and a small amount of gun cotton is difficult to fire the shells. It is fired by igniting black powder with a matchlock.

However, the propellant used in the primer is nitration explosive, so it is easier to detonate and has a stronger explosive force. In addition, Weichen has transformed the shell into a conical shape and made it of medium carbon steel clad with brass, which can make the shell explode when the nitration explosive explodes. The bullet casing is made of high-hardness steel, so that when the bullet casing is highly lethal, it can also cause the gun body to explode to form greater destructive power. "

Tang Ruowang was mainly in charge of making artillery in the Ming Dynasty in his early years. He has a lot of experience in making artillery. Better artillery.

Zhu Youjian can see that there is actually a big gap between the breech-loading rifled gun mentioned by Tang Ruowang and the modern breech-loading rifled gun. In essence, it is still a front-loaded gun, because the sub-cannon is still loaded from the front. , but because of the improvement of rifling and propellant plus the improvement of shell materials, it is enough to perfect the current Daming infantry field artillery.

"Flower ammunition plus rifled guns, in field battles, artillery can already cause great damage to cavalry, let me test fire now!"

Zhu Youjian retreated into the gazebo after speaking.

At that time, the test team of the Artillery Bureau came over and began to operate a newly developed rifled breech gun.

Boom!
The huge vibration almost knocked off the roof above Zhu Youjian's head, and the whole earth trembled a few times.

And when Zhu Youjian rushed to the ground where the crater was with a group of officials, he saw that there were metal pieces and a huge crater everywhere.

"This Daming Type 22 infantry light field artillery is also very effective. Well, Tang Ruowang, you might as well stop preaching and just build artillery for me with all your heart. I will never treat you badly. Maybe I can help you usurp it when the time comes. take your place as king, and make you king!"

Zhu Youjian couldn't help but patted Tang Ruowang on the shoulder.

"I don't have the ideal of being a king. I only hope that after the unification of Ming Dynasty, His Majesty will allow me to resign from the official position and continue to preach!"

Tang Ruowang bowed his head and said.

"Forget it, I promised you the freedom of preaching, so naturally I won't stop you, but you can preach, but you can't try to hijack the congregation to participate in politics, otherwise I won't be polite!"

After talking, Zhu Youjian returned to the topic of the artillery itself: "When will this Ming 22 infantry light field gun be put into production, and when will the Ming 22 infantry heavy field gun be manufactured?"

"Reporting to Your Majesty, artillery is no better than rifles. The production of nitric acid and nitrated explosives in Ming Dynasty is limited, and the primer of shells requires higher density of nitrated explosives. It is more difficult to manufacture such high-density nitrated explosives. Therefore, even if the production is standard now, Not many can be produced, and it is estimated that only one hundred units will be produced by the end of July this year, and it is impossible to exceed two hundred units per year in the future."

"For such a heavy artillery, it would be easy to simply increase the weight of the shell. You only need to make the barrel thicker and heavier. But in that case, because the proportion of steel in today's artillery increases, adding weight will cause inconvenience in transportation. If you want to To manufacture a heavy artillery that is both light and destructive, we need to go further in terms of materials. This depends on luck and time, and I can't guarantee whether it will take a year or ten years."

When Tang Ruowang said that, Zhu Youjian could only nod his head.

It has been nearly five years since Chongzhen moved to the south in 17 years, and the manufacturing industry in Ming Dynasty has advanced by leaps and bounds to 200 years later in its original history.

"I also understand that firearms already have rifling and rear loading methods. To improve firearms in the future, the concept of firearm manufacturing must be redesigned, and new materials must be introduced to improve the rate of fire and ease of operation. The same is true for artillery, even including Gunpowder itself, from now on, I can no longer provide you with a clear development direction.

"Now you not only want to mass-produce the most advanced firearms available, but also keep good experimental records and relevant experimental experience summaries. After the victory of the Northern Expedition, we will organize people to compile teaching materials based on these experimental data and build a complete knowledge system. Neo-Confucianism has four books and five classics, and the practical sages taught by Taizu also had to construct a theoretical hierarchy from elementary to profound under the classification.

"In many years, I and you will both be old. These things have to be passed on. The three laws of mechanics in Gewuli, the three laws of thermodynamics, and the electromagnetic theory that has not been verified, as well as organic chemistry and even biology. Many of them don’t understand, and they have to learn as much as possible, and pass on what they have learned.”

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(End of this chapter)