The Tang Dynasty used its technological advantages to drive those indigenous countries into despair step by step.
Until now, even the Tatar Kingdom is very honest and continues to play with its own flintlock guns.
Both breech-loading rifled guns and front-loading rifled guns are all fake, castles in the air. They can see them, but they can't touch them!
But now, what these natives don't know is that the Tang Dynasty has launched a large-scale costume change!
From a tactical point of view, this change of equipment is not actually epoch-making, because the weapons that the Tang Army is preparing to change on a large scale this time are not actually new concept weapons, they are still breech-loading rifled rifles.
The Firearms Division of the Army Ordnance Department has been working on improved combination rifles for many years.
This rifle was developed based on many features of the Combined Rifle and the Li Fu Rifle, but one thing that still embarrasses the military is that the improved model of the Combined Rifle is still not as good as the improved model of the Li Fu Rifle in terms of performance!
The Li Fu rifle has been successfully designed and developed for many years, and has been produced and equipped for the Guards. Its performance cannot be said, and anyone who uses it can say it is good.
However, the high cost of construction and the even higher cost of use have stopped the army and navy from doing so. Only the Guards can equip it regardless of the cost.
However, with the gradual development of industrial technology over the years, various manufacturing technologies of Li Fu rifles have become more mature, and the cost has been decreasing year by year, but it is still very high. The purchase price of a newly produced Li Fu rifle is still more than five yuan.
Ten Tang and Yuan Dynasties.
Therefore, no matter how good the Li Fu rifle is, the military cannot afford to equip it.
In the end, I had to start something new and prepare a cheap version of a magazine-fed breech-loading rifle that uses metal bullets. Well, it must be cheap enough to be affordable.
After all, in recent years, although the cost of Li Fu rifles has remained high, the cost of metal bullets has dropped significantly. Especially because the empire has developed several large-scale copper mines overseas, the price of copper mines has continued to fall.
These laid the foundation for the army and navy to replace their copper-cased fixed-loading bullets on a large scale.
In fact, what the military originally wanted to equip was the Li Fu rifle equipped by the Guards, and it was the latest improved version of the Li Fu rifle.
The improved version of the Li Fu rifle is quite good. For the first time, smokeless powder-coated copper-cased bullets were used. At the same time, taking into account issues such as technological continuation, ammunition reserve, and versatility, the caliber continued to be eight millimeters.
This eight millimeter is also the future standard caliber jointly established by the Army, Navy, and the Guards. Any subsequent development of rifles will basically follow this caliber.
It uses double magazines to feed ammunition, which can hold ten rounds of bullets. It adopts a rear end lock. When the gunner loads the gun, he can complete the loading action with his wrist movement. Therefore, this improved rifle has an extremely high rate of fire. A skilled shooter can fire fifteen rounds per minute.
Shooting bullets is easy.
At the same time, the barrel is made of the most advanced steel and processing technology, with good corrosion resistance. The barrel has extremely high accuracy and an extremely high effective range. Professor Li Fu even claimed that his improved rifle can accurately hit human-sized targets within one thousand meters.
, of course, this is under experimental conditions.
How to put it this way, as long as you can aim and calculate the ballistics, the Li Fu rifle can hit the target one thousand meters away.
At the same time, the barrel life is greatly increased.
And it can be used even in harsh environments!
The latest improved model of the Li Fu rifle is still technically ahead of all other rifle designs.
Similarly, in terms of cost, it is still unparalleled and ahead of all rifle designs!
Therefore, this thing is still only equipped by the Guards!
The improved version of the combined rifle that the Army and Navy are preparing to replace is said to have adopted many new designs, but many of them are left over from the Li Fu rifle.
Moreover, many designs may seem advanced, but in fact they are all designed to save costs.
For example, take this gun stock. Although the Army claims to have adopted the most advanced gun stock design that is in line with the human body, which can better suit the shooting movements of soldiers, the life of the gun stock is still not as good as that of the Li Fu rifle, because this improved model
Cheaper wood is used...
Even the barrel life is not as good as that of the Li Fu rifle!
Because the latest improved version of the Li Fu rifle, the steel used in the barrel and the processing technology are all top-notch.
The military is developing an improved eight-millimeter version of the combined rifle. The reason why it has a lot of seemingly advanced but actually cheap gadgets is because the estimated total purchase of this rifle by the Army and Navy is in the millions.
For at least the next twenty years, the military's main rifle will be this rifle, and the cost must be controlled.
Therefore, the initial purchase price of the improved model of the combined rifle is only sixteen Tang Yuan each. After mass production in the later period, the price will further drop. In the end, it is possible to purchase one unit for twelve or thirteen Tang Yuan.
However, as for the latest improved model of the Li Fu rifle, it took more than fifty years for the army and navy to collectively purchase millions of these expensive Li Fu rifles.
Although the improved model of the Combined Rifle is similar in performance to the latest model of the Li Fu Rifle, it is much better than the numerous Combined Rifle 11mm rifles equipped by the military.
In the past two years, the military has begun to provide 11mm metal fixed-loading ammunition for the 11mm version of the combined rifle. After all, nearly three million 11mm rifles have been purchased and equipped, so it is impossible to just throw them away.
Even for a long time in the future, the 11mm version of the joint single-shot rifle will still be the main equipment of the army and navy. It will take at least ten years or even longer to completely retire it.
After all, you have to change your equipment slowly. If you replace 200,000 pieces a year, it will take more than ten years to complete the complete change.
But one thing is certain, that is, the military has fully entered the ranks of metal ammunition!
Paper-cased ammunition has been completely abandoned.
In the 40th year of the Xuan Ping Dynasty, the first batch of thousands of joint-type II rifles were loaded on military cargo ships and set off from Shanghai Port all the way south, across the South China Sea, bypassing Malacca, and finally successfully arrived in Gohe Prefecture.
The 18th Army Division stationed in Go River State, India, will have the honor of becoming the Army's first organic unit to be equipped with the Joint Type II Rifle.
The experimental equipment and testing of the Joint Type II rifle have been carried out many times in China. The Guards has rich experience in using repeating rifles, so the earliest live ammunition test of the Joint Type II rifle was carried out by the Guards.
It's going on over there.
Many subsequent armies in the empire were also equipped in small numbers for testing. The troops stationed in the northern ice fields were equipped, the troops in the northwest grasslands were equipped, and the troops in various regions such as the Gobi desert, plateau, and Nanyang coast were all equipped in small numbers.
It has been equipped to test its performance in different environments and climates.
Because Datang's armies are spread all over the world, Datang's weapons and equipment also need to face the test of climate and environment around the world, and this is not that easy!