When Li Xuan stepped forward to look at the three prototype guns, the person in charge of the Zhaoqing Arsenal and the director of the Ordnance Department of the Ministry of Industry and other people who were specifically responsible for the imitation work of the guns also followed and explained to Li Xuan
Details of the gun’s imitation work!
"Since purchasing the 12-pound artillery piece from the Francois in May, we have immediately surveyed and mapped the artillery piece and prepared to start independent mass production!"
The speaker was Bi Guanlin, director of the Ordnance Department of the Ministry of Industry. Like many officials of the Ministry of Industry, this man is a technocrat who became a monk by the way!
He was not a formal official at the beginning, but a manager in the arsenal under the Ministry of Industry. However, because of his excellent administrative management skills and his understanding of technical affairs, he was quickly transferred to the Ministry of Industry.
, getting promoted is like riding a rocket. In one year, he reached the position of director of the Ordnance Department, responsible for the overall management of all arsenals under the Ministry of Industry.
Although he is an administrative official, he is relatively proficient in various technologies, so he will not be like other officials who talk about vague data.
Just listen to him continue: "Based on the strength of several arsenals under the Ministry of Industry, we finally decided to let Zhaoqing Arsenal start the preliminary imitation work to prepare the technology, and then promote it to other arsenals, and then achieve large-scale production!
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"Through the efforts of many engineers at the Zhaoqing Arsenal, we have manufactured a total of four prototype guns, and conducted intensive extreme testing on the first prototype gun some time ago. According to the test results, we found that although the weight and range of the gun have reached
The requirements are met, but the barrel life is somewhat worse than that of our seven-pound and five-pound cannons. The barrel life of the seven-pound and five-pound cannons, which are also made of bronze, can reach about a thousand rounds, but the nine-pound cannon we imitated
The artillery weighs 5 pounds and has a barrel life of only 800 rounds."
"After subsequent efforts by engineers, after repeatedly improving the material formula and processing technology, the barrel life was finally reached to the average level of a thousand rounds of bronze artillery. However, after improvements, the weight of the artillery was heavier than that of the Folan Robot.
The twelve-pounder gun has also been slightly improved!”
"Our processing problems are not big. The main reason is that the materials have certain defects. At present, we have mobilized more than 30 engineers from various arsenals with outstanding abilities in the field of materials to set up a working group to study various material formulas.
, to improve our current level in the field of materials!”
Li Xuan nodded slightly while listening. In the Tang Dynasty, the processing level is actually not bad anymore. The Zhaoqing Arsenal is the most outstanding representative. They use water power and animal power as power, and use various primitive machine tools to control materials and industry.
The primary processing of products has greatly improved production efficiency and improved the yield rate. This production model has barely entered the stage of primary industrialization!
However, it has a major shortcoming in the field of materials. Even bronze, which our ancestors have been playing with for thousands of years, actually has relatively large flaws, let alone steel products.
For example, the Tang Dynasty has always wanted to use iron to cast artillery, but so far, there are many problems with iron casting, the most important of which is that the materials are not up to standard, and the processing technology is limited by the limitations of the times.
Insufficient, so it has always been difficult to cast large-caliber artillery from iron.
At present, in the Tang Dynasty, only two large-caliber and short-barreled shotguns, two catties and three catties, are cast with iron on a large scale. Because the bore pressure of these two types of artillery is relatively low, the quality requirements for the artillery are not very high.
It is too strict, so it is still possible to cast it with iron. It is just that the life of the barrel is shorter and the weight is heavier. However, these shortcomings are completely insignificant compared to their cheap cost and feasibility of mass production.
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Nowadays, the two-pound and three-pound shotguns used throughout the Tang Dynasty are all made of iron, and all the bronze cannons made in the past have been recycled.
In addition, they also started to make five-pound cannons from iron on a small scale. However, the shortcomings of making such long-barreled cannons were too big. First of all, the quality was not good enough and it was easy to explode the barrel. In order to avoid the barrel bursting, they began to thicken the barrel.
The wall of the tube, thus causing a surge in weight.
It is inconvenient for the Army to equip such a heavy iron artillery piece, so the five-pound iron artillery piece is only for the Navy. The Navy is not very sensitive to the weight of the artillery anyway, so a heavier one is not a big problem.
In fact, the weight is not the important point. What is more important is that the life of the barrel is too short!
The iron five-pound cannon has a barrel life of only 350 rounds. Compared with the bronze five-pound cannon, which has a barrel life of one thousand rounds, the gap is really huge.
If the Army's artillery force is equipped with such cast-iron artillery, it is possible that after a large-scale battle, these cast-iron artillery will be scrapped. You must know that the Army's artillery can be fired casually in a large-scale battle.
One hundred rounds of artillery shells, if the battle lasts longer, it is possible to fire two hundred rounds of artillery shells.
Only the Navy can accept such a poor barrel life, because Navy warships cannot often fight. Unlike the artillerymen of the Army, they are fighting the enemy every day and are very sensitive to the issue of barrel life.
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Of course, the Navy is actually unwilling to buy these junk goods, but it is cheaper to hold up these iron cannons, and the Navy's demand for artillery is larger and more urgent than that of the Army, so now the Navy is holding its nose and equips these quality guns.
An iron cannon that is so bad that it is almost unbearable.
The quality of the artillery is not good, material and processing issues are the key!
At this time, Bi Guanlin continued: "After preliminary development and strict extreme testing, we finally determined the manufacturing process and the detailed parameters of this artillery, and based on this, we trial-produced three prototype guns!"
Li Xuan knew that the three nine-pound cannons in front of him were the cannons they used for trial production of artillery. As for the previous prototype cannons, they were not representative at all. The previous prototype cannons were all for the purpose of finding
The problem is to determine the production technology and process, and most of them have been scrapped by various extreme tests and have been recast. Li Xuan can't see it even if he wants to see it.
"The caliber of this artillery is 116 mm, the barrel length is 2.6 meters, 22.6 times, the total weight is 1,400 kilograms, and the solid ball projectile fired weighs 5.44 kilograms!"
"The effective range of the ruler is 550 meters. When we tested it, the maximum range could reach 3,600 meters. However, as before, we strongly recommend not to exceed the effective range of the ruler, which is 550 meters.
Fire from outside, because the hit rate will be very low!"
The various units used by Bi Guanlin were all promoted by the Tang Dynasty. To be precise, they were the new systems advocated by Li Xuan. This was specifically promoted by Li Xuan for large-scale industrial production.
Therefore, if the weight of the newly manufactured artillery shell is used to refer to it, this artillery should be a 5.5 kilogram artillery piece, but this conflicts with the new artillery classification method that the army and navy are preparing to implement on a large scale.
Because it is no longer possible to classify the numerous artillery types in the Tang Dynasty in detail using the method of bullet weight, the army and navy are currently preparing to use a combination of age, caliber, and multiple calibers to conduct detailed classification.
However, habits are hard to change, so many people are still used to calling it a nine-pound artillery piece. At most, they add a three-year type in front of it to become a three-year-type nine-pound artillery piece. Li Xuan is not prepared to call it a nine-pound artillery piece.
Making forced changes is just a matter of naming and will not affect the measurement issue.
If Li Xuan is willing, he can call this artillery the Hongyi Cannon, but is it necessary? No!
Li Xuan knew that the 12-pound performance data of the Folang Robot was basically similar to the nine-pound cannon produced by himself, except that the self-produced nine-pound cannon was heavier, but not much larger.
After all, it's a big guy weighing over a ton, so a mere weight difference of less than 100 kilograms is nothing.
After a brief explanation, the live-fire test began. In fact, representatives from the arsenal and the military had conducted the live-fire test many times before, otherwise they would not have dared to demonstrate it in front of Li Xuan.
Therefore, the result of the test launch was naturally very successful!
After the test firing was completed, Li Xuan instructed the Ministry of Industry to start mass production as soon as possible!
Now, whether it is the army or the navy, there is a very large demand for this kind of cannon with a caliber of 116 mm, that is, a nine-pound cannon.
After watching the test firing, Li Xuan naturally did not go home directly. Instead, he went to the Zhaoqing Arsenal for inspection, focusing on inspecting the existing muskets, artillery and various weapon production lines in the arsenal.
At the same time, we also watched the many processing machines in the arsenal that have begun to be put into practical use and are powered by waterwheels and animal power.
In Li Xuan's opinion, these machines are still very primitive, but he also knows that these machines are actually very technological in this era, especially the huge hydraulic forging machine.
Li Xuan was amazed when he saw it.
It is not easy to develop such an arsenal with preliminary industrialization in a handicraft industry!
After seeing these machines, Li Xuan knew that the Tang Dynasty could already increase the production schedule of plate armor!
Plate armor is something that neither Li Xuan nor the military generals in the Tang Dynasty are familiar with, because they had already discovered the plate armor equipped by the Folangji from their previous contact with the Folangji.
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They even had some plate armors in their hands. They had already bought several pieces of plate armor from the Fo Lang robots in the arms trade with the Fo Lang robots. Of course, they were only used for research at the beginning, not that
Buy it and equip it directly.
However, although they had done some research on this, they never thought that His Majesty would directly say to mass-produce and equip plate armor!