The Ming Dynasty did not have Western-style full-body cavalry armor, so why did the Ming Dynasty not develop full-body cavalry armor?

This is a question that has been debated endlessly in later generations. Ma Cheng is naturally the most say. Ma Cheng once thought about it seriously. The answer is very simple. The main reason is the difference in the intensity of war between China and foreign countries. The lower the intensity of the battle, the individual soldiers will be.

The greater the combat effectiveness, the smaller the combat loss and the lower the supply pressure. Only in this low-intensity battle can the exquisite and excellent equipment such as the full-body armor be outstanding in cost performance.

The intensity of the war in the Central Plains dynasty determines that the Chinese's equipment must arm more people as much as possible and have good repair and supply capabilities. Reducing a little protection and combat power can be compensated by quantity, so full-body plate armor will not be a suitable choice. Our

Choice must be the most suitable for our actual battlefield, because it is tested with countless lives. Westerners use knife and fork, while Chinese people use chopsticks. Chopsticks are not as exquisite as knife and fork, but they must be suitable for China.

However, in the current local war, this one-time investment weapon for breaking the formation is just right. It is said that building a full-body cavalry plate armor requires hydraulic hammer forging. Horse City looked at the busy Portuguese craftsmen and smiled it and created the whole body.

Does the plate armor need hydraulic tempering? It can be unnecessary? Because the busy Portuguese craftsmen in the craftsman camp did not tinker with any mysterious hydraulic hammer forging, they started to build the full-body plate armor.

The Portuguese craftsmen still used the forging method, which was also the hundred forging method mastered by the Ming craftsmen. The difference is that the rich iron ore produced in India can be directly forged. This is what stunned the Ming craftsmen, and it is also the rich iron ore.

The difference between it and poor iron ore also made Ma Cheng feel hot. This is the innate stubborn disease of the Ming Dynasty and the stubborn disease that has plagued the Central Plains dynasty for thousands of years. The Ming Dynasty had an increasingly urgent need for a natural iron ore-rich land.

The complex technology that made the Ming craftsmen admired him also made Ma Cheng finally understand that the biggest gap between the Ming and Western steel technology lies in the forging process. Ma Cheng probably understands the heat treatment of cooked iron, which is a process of heating and cooling.

However, there are ever-changing differences due to the different temperatures and cooling speeds of heating.

For the same annealing, the usual practice of the Ming craftsmen is to decarbonize cast iron parts by annealing. However, for the ripe iron parts that contain very low carbon content, this is not possible. First, carburizing is necessary to increase the carbon content to achieve

The level of medium carbon steel is the best for plate armor.

Therefore, Portuguese craftsmen buried this piece of armor in a grease-like carburizing agent and heated it in a carburizing furnace for a long time. The exquisite quenching technology of Portuguese craftsmen stunned the Ming craftsmen. In terms of quenching technology, Daming

I don't know how many years have passed. European armor was provided by private workshops throughout Europe for a long time, and relying on the existence of the market and the entire industry to ensure technological innovation and continuity. In the Ming Dynasty, the nationalization of weapons production was carried out every time, for fear that the technology would be rebelled by the public.

, What kind of tricks can you improve at this time?

After quenching, back-tempering must be carried out to remove internal stresses caused by quenching to avoid hidden dangers everywhere inside. When the external force is touched, the inside and outside should be broken. When the tempering is completed, the component will be completed after grinding. Just talk about forging and annealing,

The techniques of quenching and tempering seemed to have been used in ancient China, but in terms of details, China and the West vary greatly. The Ming Dynasty lags far behind the West, and the details determine success or failure.

After seeing the exquisite skills of Portuguese craftsmen, Macheng only said one word, learn!

Half a month later, the first four sets of cavalry armor were created. Ma Cheng was excited to try it on himself. Three Portuguese craftsmen served her and fiddled for an hour before they put it on. After putting on it, the weight was not as big as they imagined.

It is heavy, weighing about forty to fifty kilograms, and its joint movements are also very flexible. This made Ma Cheng's impression of the Western-style canned iron in his impression, and it turned out that this thing was not very heavy.

The whole body weighs about forty kilograms, which is about the same amount as the two layers of armor.

As for the protection ability of this thing, who is better than the mail and cotton armor, this is purely a false proposition with no debate value. The strength of the protection ability of this whole-body plate armor depends entirely on its material.

What is the point of discussing its performance when opening a material.

This high-quality full-body cavalry armor that cost a lot of money has a protective ability far exceeding that of the mail, cotton armor, and three-layer armor are far less solid than this thing. This is more than 300 excellent Portuguese craftsmen, and it took more than half a month to carefully craft it.

The fine plate armor made of the best Indian iron is made of the best material.

The protection ability of the full-body cavalry armor depends entirely on its material. The material is not good, the protection ability is very poor, and it can be broken at one shot, and its protection ability is even worse than that of the Ming Dynasty cotton armor. However, using high-quality iron and high-quality materials, the full-body cavalry armor,

It cannot be urged. It can be said to be the most outstanding armor in contemporary times. There is no doubt that this is the heavy tank in the cold weapon era, which can be crushed by tonnage.

Ma Cheng slapped his chest with his hands a few times, and the cavalry armor in his body made a bang. He admired in his heart that the thickness of each part of the armor in this set of armor was also different. The unimportant calf armor and the thickness of the forearm armor was about two millimeters.

The important parts are as thick as three millimeters, and a two millimeter armor plate is also installed on the chest, so that the most important parts on the chest are as thick as five millimeters. What is the concept of five millimeter armor? The step bow can also shoot within fifty meters.

Not worn!

Ma Cheng tried to walk a few steps, and the ground was slamming, sighing in his heart that the arguments in later generations were really meaningless.

This well-made full-body cavalry plate armor is really a powerful tool for heavy cavalry to rush forward, but the manufacturing cost is also very high. Three hundred Portuguese craftsmen spent more than half a month to create such four pieces, regardless of the cost of iron.

The labor cost is terrible. This result made Ma Cheng laugh and cry. No wonder the heavy cavalry in his body could not form a large-scale army. This labor cost is really too scammed.

At this speed, the equipment of 500 heavy cavalrymen in the first battalion required one thousand skilled craftsmen to build for a whole year!

Ma Cheng smiled bitterly, it was not because the whole body of armor was not good, it was really impossible to afford it. Fortunately, there were dozens of sets of noble cavalry armor in the arsenal of Malacca City. Although the quality was much worse, it was barely usable. At present, it was only hard.

I put on the scalp and mobilized the Taiwan Town Military Craftsman Camp to learn and build while thinking it was just spending money to buy technology.

Taking off the heavy armor on his body, Ma Cheng sighed that forging techniques can be learned, but also supported by Fu Iron Ore.

In a short period of time, I can only buy rich iron ore from India. After this battle, the fleet that went to India to buy rich iron ore should be back. I don’t know how the results are. With rich iron ore, Taiwan Province can produce it.

The excellent muskets and cannons have a long way to go. Two days later, the four hydraulic forging machines were finally set up. With the four hydraulic forging machines put into operation, the speed of craftsmen building cavalry armor was greatly accelerated, and the Ming craftsmen had already
Chapter completed!