At the end of April, the weather was already very warm, and the bright sunshine shone on the plains of Tianjin, making the wheat fields that had harvested winter wheat look bright yellow.
Li Zhi and several subordinates stood on a shooting range in the outer suburbs to test the newly produced breech-loading rifles produced by the arsenal.
After more than a year of exploration, the technicians of the arsenal have completely mastered the structure of the Sharps 1859 breech-loading rifle. The only problem is that this rifle requires too high production accuracy, and it completely requires the machining accuracy of the mid-to-late 19th century.
Otherwise, the gun's locking mechanism, which is constantly opening and closing, will leak air.
Currently, the most advanced machine tools in Fanjiazhuang can only control the processing accuracy to one-fifth of a millimeter - which is a step further than before. But if you want to produce a qualified locking structure, you must at least control the processing accuracy to
One-tenth of a millimeter.
However, in any era, skilled craftsmen are always ahead of the machine. Although the machine cannot yet meet the precision requirements, Li Zhi's craftsmen can achieve the requirements through manual polishing.
In the end, the arsenal adopted a compromise production method: general workpieces were mass-produced using machine tools, while parts requiring the highest precision were ground by hand. Although this production speed cannot be compared with large-scale mechanical production, it is still considerable.
Using semi-mechanical and semi-hand grinding, the first batch of Sharps 1859 breech-loading rifles were born.
The craftsmen who made the rifle were amazed by Li Zhi's genius design. They really didn't understand why Li Zhi could draw such a complicated rifle structure with his bare hands. Li Zhi did not name the rifle, so the craftsmen named the rifle "Jin".
King style rifle", referred to as Jin King style.
Of course, this rifle requires the use of mercury fulminate as a primer. Fortunately this month, the chemical laboratory finally mastered the method of safely preparing mercury fulminate - although the mercury fulminate exploded many times, no test craftsman was killed
Fingers, all experimental craftsmen received a fifty-tael bonus on the premise that their bodies were intact.
With mercury fulminate as the primer, the Jinwang rifle has the prerequisite for use.
Li Dao, the governor of Jilin and the general manager of Fanjiazhuang, patted one of the rifles and said to Li Zhi: "Your Majesty, now we can produce twenty of these rifles a day. That's seven thousand a year." After a pause, Li Dao
Said: "Our machine tools will continue to improve in the future. If you give us a little more time, there will be no problem in mass production of machinery."
Li Zhi nodded and said: "If there are seven thousand a year, it is not a small amount."
The breech-loading rifle is a leap in the history of rifle development, and the Sharps 1859 rifle is one of the milestones in this leap.
The shooting principle of this breech-loading rifle is simple to say: the original flintlock flash cap is replaced by a flash cap that uses a primer. The propellant and bullets of the Mini rifle are all replaced by a paper shell bullet. The rear part of the paper shell bullet
With smokeless gunpowder, when shooting, open the end of the barrel of the rifle and load the paper bullet into it.
When the person using the rifle presses the trigger of the rifle, he hits the iron to hit the primer. The mercury fulminate in the primer explodes and spreads the flame from the air hole to the gun bore. At the same time, the bolt cuts the tail of the paper shell bullet in the gun bore.
, cut the paper shell to reveal the gunpowder in the paper shell. The gunpowder is ignited by the flame of the primer, explodes in the gun chamber, and shoots the bullet out.
However, this seemingly simple principle is extremely complicated to implement. The entire rifle consists of seventy parts, which can be regarded as the most cutting-edge product of this era.
Such a cutting-edge product, even if there are only a few thousand, is enough to change the ecology of the battlefield.
Li Zhi opened the gun and looked carefully at the handiwork of the gunsmiths.
The bolt is basically composed of three parts: locking block, air-locking ring, and connecting pin.
The most critical locking block consists of two parts: the fire hole and the air locking ring. There is an annular grooved steel block around the fire hole. The lifting and lowering of this steel block depends on the hinge structure driven by the trigger guard. The air locking ring and the locking
Corresponding to the grooves of the block, it is set with a transparent integral reverse bevel block.
The half-moon edge on the top of the air locking ring has a certain angle and forms a scissor-like structure with the rear end surface of the gun barrel, so it can both hold the air and cut the tail of the paper shell bullet.
When firing, the blocking piece on the locking block fits with the end face of the rear of the barrel. Normally, the fitting is not completely pressed. But when firing, the gunpowder explosion creates chamber pressure in the barrel, and the pressure will act on the barrel.
On the reverse slope, the blocking piece will move forward and fit closely with the end face of the rear of the barrel.
Li Zhi looked carefully at the handmade products of the gunsmith and saw that there were many traces of tool processing on the parts, which made the entire locking structure look a bit rough. But for a rifle, a beautiful appearance is not necessary.
The key issue is that the rifle must be airtight between reloading and firing.
Li Zhi raised his rifle and prepared to fire a test round.
Li Laosi, who was standing nearby, was stunned, stopped Li Zhi's reloading action, and said: "My boss has a body worth thousands of dollars, how can I risk my life? If this gun leaks, it will hurt people. Your Majesty, you can't try it."
Shoot, let me come down!"
Li Dao and Zhong Feng, who were standing next to them, quickly saluted and said, "What Mr. Li said makes sense. Li Dao is willing to test fire for the prince!"
"Zhong Feng is willing to give the prince a few shots."
Li Zhi thought for a while and said with a smile: "Then let Li Laosi do the test firing."
Li Laosi took the rifle, consulted the gunsmith next to him for a few words, and then started loading.
The first step of loading is to prime the gun and put the semicircular primer into the primer pool. Then pull the bolt to open the bolt, take out the paper shell bullets from the ammunition bag and put them in. Then close the bolt and close the bolt.
It only took five seconds for Li Laosi to load a bullet and aim at the human-shaped target 200 meters away.
There was a crisp "pop" sound, and the Jinwang rifle fired. A large amount of flames and smoke were emitted from the tail of the bolt, which almost burned Li Laosi's eyebrows.
The target two hundred meters away fell down.
Li Laosi didn't wait for the soldiers to go up to check the target, loaded the weapon again, and aimed at another target. This time, Li Laosi leaned his head back a little to avoid being burned by the flames sprayed from the powerful machine.
Shoot again, and the second target falls again.
Aim at the third target, shoot, and hit again.
Li Laosi put down the rifle and said: "The accuracy is not bad, but the fireworks leaking from the bolt were too big and almost burned my face."
Several gunsmiths nearby said in a panic: "Come back to the commander-in-chief, we have tried our best. We will also find ways to improve in the future."
Li Zhi smiled, took Li Laosi's rifle, and looked at it.
"Okay, the rate of fire and accuracy are good. Let's continue to find a solution to the air leakage problem. Now let's improve and produce at the same time, and strive to produce 7,000 guns in the first year and equip them for the troops."
