Chapter 1680 Artillery is more expensive and shells are more expensive
When he saw that the Navy actively limited the rate of fire of naval guns because the rate of fire of breech-mounted artillery was too fast, Li Xuan couldn't help but pay attention.
He couldn't figure it out. Why could artillery be produced and equipped, but why couldn't it be used?
Therefore, it was rare for Li Xuan to personally intervene in the issue of ammunition supply for breech-loaded artillery, especially the three-caliber army and navy guns that use metal fixed-loading shells: 120 mm, 100 mm, and 75 mm.
Interfering with the cannonballs can be considered a break from Li Xuan's practice in recent years.
Originally, Li Xuan only paid attention to the armaments development of the army and navy in the early years. However, after the Unification War, Li Xuan rarely paid attention to the development of ordnance personally, and even less directly intervened.
Because at that time, we had entered the age of guns, and the entire army had already installed flintlock muskets, making it the world's leading and invincible state.
In addition, Li Xuan also knows that the emergence of new weapons, especially large-scale deployment, is based on the premise that industrial technology reaches standards.
If industrial production capacity cannot reach a certain standard, even if new weapons are designed, they will not be manufactured or installed.
This is the same as the flintlock gun of the past. The Tang Dynasty had already had a design for the flintlock gun, but it took several years of trial and error because of the broken spring.
The same goes for other new weapons.
The research and development and equipment of most new weapons are based on industrial technology.
For example, the 10,000-ton battleship of the Tang Dynasty Navy may look like just a ship, but in fact, the battleship Wandan is currently under construction. If you want to build it, it will require the joint efforts of many institutions and countless companies in the empire.
, but one shipyard alone cannot do it.
The steel required for its hull and armor is ostensibly provided by two steel companies, Jiangnan Steel Plant and Northern Steel Plant. However, behind these two steel plants there are a lot of upstream and downstream companies.
Without the support of these enterprises, Jiangnan Iron and Steel Plant and Northern Iron and Steel Plant are unable to provide these steel products.
The same is true for naval guns. On the surface, they are only products of the Shanghai Gun Factory, but the equipment in the Shanghai Gun Factory's production line needs to be provided by many other machinery companies, and those machinery companies need the technical support of many other upstream companies.
Not to mention the power system. Since the emergence of practical steam engines, steam engines and even various future internal combustion engines and other power systems are typical industrial flowers. They are the integrated products of an entire industrial system, lacking any
There is no way to produce even one link.
The construction of a battleship involves at least dozens of companies directly involved, and hundreds or even thousands of companies indirectly involved.
This also leads to the fact that the development of the national defense industry after entering the era of the industrial revolution is based on an entire industrial system, not just the design drawings of one or two new weapons.
If we just talk about blueprints and the like, there are no design drawings for battleships in the Naval Ship Administration Department. A mere 10,000-ton battleship is nothing.
They already have quite complete designs for battleships of tens of thousands of tons, and there are even designs for super giant ships of one hundred thousand tons.
But is it useful?
Useless!
The largest dry dock in the Tang Empire Shipyard was only over 10,000 tons!
Moreover, the 800-millimeter cannon that is expected to be used in the 100,000-ton giant ship is 40 times or even 50 times larger. Let alone practical issues, it is estimated that it will not be built after a hundred and eighty years.
Therefore, design is not actually a problem for the Tang Empire. There are always a lot of lunatics making all kinds of messy designs. Some are whimsical, some are half a step ahead, and some are one step or even dozens of steps ahead!
But it’s useless if you can’t create it.
Li Xuan has known this for a long time, so he is too lazy to intervene on weekdays. After setting the general tone, he just lets it go.
The tone set in the last decade has been the development and equipping of rifled weapons.
As for how to do it and how to do it, Li Xuan certainly doesn't need to worry about it.
But the military finally came up with rifled weapons. The Navy was also the first to equip a large number of breech-loading rifled guns. At this time, they came over and said that the rate of fire of these breech-loading guns was too fast and too expensive to use, so they must be restricted.
use……
Not only the navy, but also the army has this argument, saying that the cannon is a good cannon, but it consumes so much ammunition that the army's existing logistics system cannot support it, and the cost of ammunition has also increased significantly. This is already
The army's top brass had to carefully consider limiting the number of rear-mounted artillery pieces equipped by the troops, or limiting the frequency with which artillery units used artillery.
This reminded Li Xuan of some countries in later generations that were unwilling to equip or reduce equipment because automatic weapons such as machine guns and automatic rifles fired too fast and consumed too many bullets.
This situation left Li Xuante speechless!
What kind of country is the Tang Empire? After all, it is currently the largest industrial country on earth, and it is also the only industrial country. It has an almost global market as support, and its national power exceeds that of other countries combined.
To put it bluntly, the only ones who can defeat Datang now are aliens.
Such a powerful country cannot afford to equip breech-loading cannons?
What an international joke!
However, when Li Xuan saw the detailed report submitted by the Navy, he took a look at the detailed ammunition consumption and purchase price, and then closed the report.
Finally, the Navy's report stated: People determine the outcome of a war, not one or two new weapons. The Navy should exert the spirit of hard work, strive to improve artillery skills, and strive to destroy the enemy with long-range and accurate artillery fire.
Li Xuan, who said this, also agreed with the naval munitions department!
Damn, he didn’t understand it at first, but after seeing the specific data, he was speechless.ァ新ヤ~8~1~中文网www.x~8~1zщ.com
Really can't afford it.
Because new artillery shells are too expensive, there are currently not many arsenals in the Tang Empire that can produce new cylindrical artillery shells. Currently, there are ammunition factories under the Shanghai Gun Factory, Tianjin Gun Factory, and another
Zhenjiang Ammunition Factory.
As for other ammunition factories, they are still in the process of technical preparation and production line transformation.
Because the current supply is relatively small, and another point is that several key technology patents for the new artillery shells are not in the hands of the three major weapons companies, nor are they in the hands of the Royal Institute of Technology, or even
It is not in the hands of any state-owned enterprise or royal enterprise, but in the hands of several private companies.
Although the three major weapons companies have already obtained authorization for these key patents, patent fees still have to be paid, and they are not low.
The patent licensing fee plus the cost of equipment upgrades and modifications. In addition, the manufacturing cost of custom-made artillery shells is relatively high. Not to mention the copper shells, maroon gunpowder is still used as propellant. Many factors have pushed up the price of these custom-made ammunition.
price.
Now, even for a new 75mm howitzer, the purchase price is about ten yuan, which is extremely expensive. However, this price cannot last for long. It is estimated that it will come down after a few years when the production volume increases.
In seven or eight years, several of the key patents will expire, and by then the price will be reduced further.
Seventy-five millimeter grenades are so expensive, and the price of custom-made howitzer shells with larger calibers of 100 millimeters or even 120 millimeters has doubled.
You know, in the Tang Dynasty these days, the monthly income of ordinary workers working in the Shanghai Silk Reeling Factory was only about four or five yuan, while the monthly income of skilled workers, tailors, train drivers, etc.
Between eight yuan and fifteen yuan.
The most common 75mm grenade costs about ten yuan, which is equivalent to two months' salary of an ordinary worker. You can imagine how expensive it is.
According to the standards set by the Army, each 75-mm howitzer is equipped with 500 rounds of ammunition. Just one artillery requires 5,000 rounds of ammunition. This does not include the shells used for daily training. It only requires 500 rounds of ammunition.
The bullets are usually kept in the warehouse and used when preparing for war.
This five thousand yuan is already more than the price of the 75 Howitzer itself. First published on the New Bayi Chinese website
Datang's artillery prices have never been expensive. For example, a 75-meter howitzer for the army in the Tianjin Gun Factory actually costs a little more than 2,500 yuan. If the purchase volume is large, the Tianjin Gun Factory can also purchase more
Give you a discount or something...
However, artillery is discounted, but shells are not!
People in the arsenal are also smart people. They know that new artillery is too expensive and the shells are even more expensive. In order for the military to make the decision to completely change the equipment, they do not expect to make money on the artillery itself. They basically buy it without losing money.
People are counting on making money from cannonballs!
The Army has tried every means to deal with the problem that new artillery is expensive to purchase and more expensive to use, such as reducing spare shells, not using live ammunition during training, and using training ammunition.
During the battle, the troops were asked to recycle artillery shell casings. Those shell casings were all made of brass and were very expensive!
The Army, which has a lot of money and has never frowned when it changed its equipment in the past, plans to wait for the past few years to wait for the domestic arsenal production capacity to increase and those damn patents to expire before it can stockpile artillery shells on a large scale.
Not to mention the navy. The navy's military expenditure is not as good as that of the army. In addition, the navy's naval guns are medium and large-caliber artillery. Not to mention the artillery is expensive, and the shells are even more expensive.
Moreover, when a warship goes out, it cannot imitate the Army's example of casually carrying dozens of artillery shells, and then dispatch them from the rear in case of war.
The Navy of the Tang Dynasty has always maintained preferential treatment for warships performing missions. Anyway, the shells of the front-loading cannon era, especially the solid shells, are very cheap, and they will be filled with ammunition before leaving the port to perform missions.
After all, once the warships of the Tang Dynasty left the port for duty, they would basically inevitably encounter various combat missions. Gunboat diplomacy was the most common, and it was normal to fight against pirates. It was also normal to fight with the indigenous navy when necessary.
Therefore, the supply of ammunition is sufficient. Anyway, the ammunition we usually shoot are solid bullets, so they don’t cost much.
On weekdays, when officers have nothing to do, they will fire off cannons for fun. It is called the live ammunition training!
But now when I think about the future, a warship will have to carry thousands of extremely expensive rounds of artillery shells when going out, and if it goes out for a walk, it will more or less perform naval gun diplomacy, escort, live-fire training and other tasks, and it is estimated that it will come back after a run
, the cost of shells would cost thousands or even tens of thousands.
This caused even more headaches for the Navy's top brass.
Some people even thought that it would be better to equip a few more front-loaded smoothbore cannons. These smoothbore cannons are actually quite useful against the indigenous people, and they do not necessarily have to have breech-loaded rifled cannons!