Li Xuan held the flintlock gun in his hand. The appearance of this flintlock gun was no different from the first flintlock gun he saw a few years ago.
In his early years, Li Xuan asked students from the Royal Institute of Technology to develop flintlock guns, and he produced a prototype gun in a short time. However, because the quality of the spring steel was not up to standard and the firing rate was too low, he did not even have testing equipment.
The equipment was immediately shelved.
Today, several years later, the overall structure of the flintlock gun Li Xuan saw was almost exactly the same as the prototype gun. The barrel and other overall structures were basically replicas of the first-year matchlock gun.
The caliber is also 14 mm, it also has a front sight, a ruler, a bayonet holder, and is equipped with a new steel bayonet.
The only difference is the firing mechanism.
Li Xuan knew that the basic structure of the gun barrel, which was almost the same as that of the first year type, was for better mass production. In this case, the existing gun production line would hardly need to be changed much, especially for a musket.
In other words, the most important core component is the 'barrel'.
This means that the existing matchlock gun can be turned into a flintlock gun by simply modifying the bolt mechanism.
After all, it is impossible for the Tang Dynasty to be so luxurious as to throw away all the existing matchlock guns, which already exceed 100,000, and then replace them with flintlock guns on a large scale. This is not even a simple cost issue, but a lack of time.
.
At present, the Tang Dynasty's gun production is limited, with hundreds of thousands of muskets, but it will take several years to produce them.
After Li Xuan briefly looked at the flintlock gun in his hand, he nodded slightly to the officials on the side. Then, the soldiers who had already been prepared began the live ammunition drill one after another.
The first thing to start is the loading drill!
The loading mode is somewhat different from the matchlock guns currently used by the Tang Dynasty Army. First, you need to push the buckle spring to expose the firing slot, move the bolt to a safe position, then take out the fixed paper package ammunition, and then tear it into pieces with your mouth.
At the end of the paper-wrapped ammunition, put a small amount of gunpowder into the firing slot, then pull back the buckle spring to cover the firing slot, then pour most of the remaining gunpowder into the barrel, and then put the wrapping paper and lead bullet into the gun.
pipe, then compact it with a purge, and take out the purge.
Then he cocked the gun upward and waited for the command to open his mouth. After the command to prepare to fire was given, the gun was placed flat and aimed.
After the order to fire is given, the trigger is pulled, and wow, the bullet is fired!
However, despite these differences in details, the biggest difference between a flintlock gun and a matchlock gun is that a lit match is used to ignite the fire, while a flintlock gun fires directly by pulling the trigger!
Looking at it this way, people may think that there doesn't seem to be much difference between a flintlock gun and a matchlock gun. Why should a flintlock gun be used instead of a matchlock gun? Moreover, the firing mechanism of a flintlock gun is much more complicated than that of a matchlock gun.
, which also represents an increase in increase.
At present, the purchase price of a first-year-style matchlock gun is only about four taels of silver, but after evaluating the new flintlock gun, Jiangnan Arsenal gave a price of five taels.
Moreover, this price is still based on large-scale production. If it is early production and the production volume is not large, the price will reach six taels of silver.
Don't look at it, it's just one tael of silver, an increase of two taels of silver, but muskets are used on a large scale, and they are consumables. The equipment scale is hundreds of thousands, and a large number of muskets will be lost due to training and combat.
Here again, a large number of muskets need to be added.
So the small difference of one tael of silver adds up to a cost of hundreds of thousands of taels of silver.
However, why the cost has increased and the matchlock gun must be replaced by a flintlock gun? Simply put, there are the following factors.
The first is the following shortcomings of the matchlock gun: the matchlock must be lit in advance, but after lighting the matchlock, if you do not fire for a long time, the matchlock will burn out, but the key point is that when fighting, it does not mean that you can light the matchlock.
To fire, sometimes you have to wait for a long time before you get the chance to fire. In the process, the match rope may burn out.
Another point is that it is very inconvenient to use the matchlock gun in rainy days, because the matchlock is easily extinguished by the rain.
In addition, after the matchlocks of the matchlocks are lit, the soldiers need to keep a relatively large distance apart, so as to prevent the soldiers' matchlocks from igniting the guns of the soldiers next door and causing a misfire.
Compared with matchlock guns, flintlock guns almost avoid these defects. Flintlock guns that do not use matchlocks have almost no problems mentioned above. The problem of rain resistance, as long as it does not encounter heavy rain, will hardly affect the firing.
And another very important point is that troops who use flintlock muskets almost don't have to worry about the soldiers' guns misfiring, which means that the queues of the musketeers can be denser.
With the same width, only ten musketeers could be arranged in the past, but after equipped with flintlock muskets, twenty musketeers can be arranged.
What does this mean?
This represents an increase in firepower density!
For battles in the musket age, the increase in firepower density can reduce the number of spearmen.
Now in the regular army of the Tang Dynasty, the ratio of musketeers to spearmen is almost one to one. If the flintlocks are equipped on a large scale, the ratio of musketeers to spearmen can be two to one or three.
Compared to one, the spearmen were even completely eliminated at the end.
Only with the emergence of the flintlock can it be possible to completely eliminate cold weapon infantry!
In other words, if the Tang Army could equip flintlock muskets on a large scale, it would not only gain advantages such as the rate of fire of the muskets and being not afraid of rainy weather, but more importantly, it would gain a completely different combat method.
By then, a pure musketry infantry phalanx will appear!
Just when Li Xuan was thinking about how to use flintlock muskets to organize infantry units with pure firearms, and completely bring the Tang Army into the ranks of modern armies, the flintlock musket tests below continued.
As the soldiers in front of the test pulled the trigger, and then the gunshots rang out, before the smoke cleared, the soldiers started the second round of loading, then fired again, and the third round of loading, fired!
The soldiers in these tests fired ten consecutive volleys, and Li Xuan nodded slightly after watching it. Although duds were inevitable during this process, the rate of fire was still higher than that of the first-year matchlock gun.
It's much faster.
Moreover, in order to demonstrate the new tactical application of flintlock muskets, the test soldiers listed a very tight three-row queue, which is very different from the six-row queue commonly used by the Tang Army.
And what this tactic brings is more intensive firepower!
After the test, Li Xuan immediately said: "Okay, this thing should be my weapon of the Tang Dynasty!"
The eyes of the army generals who also finished the test were all bright. Although they are natives of this era and do not have prophets like Li Xuan, as army generals, they have an understanding of the wars of this era.
I felt even more deeply when I saw the performance demonstrated by the flintlock gun test and the application of its new tactics.
None of them could bear it anymore.
Zeng Ziwen asked the Ministry of Industry official on the spot: "Our army wants this flintlock gun. When will you be able to mass-produce it?!"
Officials from the Ordnance Department of the Privy Council on the side also said: "We have to cancel the orders we placed for those first-year-style muskets and replace them all with orders for flintlock muskets!"
After hearing this, the officials from the Ministry of Industry naturally did not show much concern. They had already conducted internal tests in advance. The performance of this flintlock gun can definitely beat the existing ones.
It is a matchlock gun, and although the price is a little expensive, it is not much more expensive. The cost is slightly increased, but it is definitely worth it in exchange for a flintlock gun.
Li Xuan ignored the words of the officials from the Army and the Ministry of Industry below. The mass production and equipment of flintlock guns had become a foregone conclusion. He did not need to worry about the next thing. The Army could handle it themselves.
There were flintlock muskets, but the subsequent tests of several new weapons just didn't seem to have much flavor. The Ministry of Industry tested an 18-pound howitzer, but the Army said it was too weak and weighed too much.
In addition, there are tests of new grenades. Although they are said to be new grenades, they are actually still the original basic structure, with only minor adjustments made. The performance has been improved, but the improvement is limited.
Therefore, the rest of this inspection became a bit boring. In the short period of time that followed, the Army's Ordnance Department had already issued a total of more than 30,000 brand new weapons to several arsenals of the Ministry of Industry on the spot.
An order for flintlock muskets, and an order for 20,000 matchlocks converted into flintlock muskets!
And this is just the first batch of orders!
Subsequently, the Guards and the Army also placed orders on the spot!
However, Li Xuan went out to inspect the city today. Although the flintlock gun was the focus, there were other things that should be seen. After seeing the Jiangnan Arsenal, he led his ministers to the Jinling Shipyard.
Jinling Shipyard is a typical inland river shipyard. Its positioning is similar to that of Zhaoqing Shipyard. The largest shipyard is only 300 tons. It mainly builds inland river warships, patrol ships and inland river transport ships that are in large demand by the navy.
host.
At present, the shipyard has just been completed and many ships have just started construction. Therefore, it is naturally impossible to see any magnificent large-tonnage warships here. However, the focus of this shipbuilding is not to see any large-scale warships, but to see any large-scale warships.
I just came to see the factory itself and a few river warships.
One of the new second-class inland river battleships made Li Xuan quite satisfied. This second-class inland river battleship was recently improved and designed by the Navy based on the original second-class inland river battleships.
The tonnage is not large, only 60 tons, and the firepower has basically maintained the original scale. It is not very powerful, but the draft has become shallower, and the utilization of the sails has also been higher, and it can fight in more complex inland rivers.
To meet the operational needs of the middle and upper reaches of the Yangtze River and a large number of small and medium-sized rivers.
Of course, more importantly, the hull cost of the new second-class inland river battleship is 30% cheaper than the original second-class inland river battleship, and the crew is reduced by 20%.
This means that the navy can equip more of these second-class inland river warships with limited funds, which is very important for the Tang Dynasty King Division who is fighting the Ming army.
Nowadays, in the sea, the Tang Dynasty Navy has an absolute advantage over the Ming Navy. However, in the field of inland rivers, it is more average. The most important reason is that there are not enough inland river warships!