The Chu State's artillery was already a breech-loading cannon - and it was a breech-loading cannon with a threaded breech block and good sealing.
Historically, the birth of front-loading cannons and breech-loading cannons basically occurred at the same period. However, until the 18th century, breech-loading cannons had a fatal weakness - vegetables!
Its power is much less than that of a front-loading gun of the same caliber, so it is not favored.
The reason is simple - air leakage.
As long as the matchlock hole is left for the muzzle-loading gun, the other parts are completely integrated, and there is no sealing problem. Until the Napoleonic period, the army mainly used pre-loaded matchlock cannons.
During battle, the gunpowder, filler, and shell body are "punched" into the barrel in sequence, and then an iron stick is inserted through the matchlock hole at the rear of the barrel - corresponding to the gunpowder part inside, and then the fuse is inserted, and then ignited.
After a shelling is completed, a long gun brush must be used to quickly clean the remains of the combustion residue in the gun barrel.
However, when various types of sealed breechblocks appeared, breech-loading guns began to gradually take over the mainstream...
Even when the breech block is closed, it still requires a lot of manual operation, but it is faster than "pushing" gunpowder and shells in from the front, and because it can be opened from the back, cleaning is faster, and the rate of fire is at least half that of the front-loaded gun.
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Even if Chu State missed some "excellence" because of skipping technology, and... gunpowder production is relatively weak, after all, there are no high-explosive gunpowder recipes online.
But now the Chu State's breech-loaded matchlocks can fully reach the level of the Chu (four-shot) country's front-loaded cannons during the Napoleonic period.
It's a pity that the Chu State's artillery has not yet entered the firing era - the flintlock cannon is barely adequate. After all, neither the flintlock mechanism nor the breech block has any cross-generational technology. What is lacking is only creativity and... mechanism structure.
However, the advantages of the flintlock gun over the matchlock gun are limited, because the detonation hole of the artillery is much larger than that of the musket, so there is no need to pursue the flintlock gun.
To enter the firing stage, you need "fulminated mercury" that can ignite. As for how to refine and make mercury fulminate, Bai Tu is really not very clear. After all, the information on the hard drive is all legally searched online, and at most it is somewhat theoretical.
The instructions will not really teach you step by step how to make pyrotechnics.
In this regard, the white picture only points out the general direction, hoping that Yu Ji can use his "drawing talisman" to discover the method of making mercury fulminate.
At the same time, the Chu artillery is still a divided artillery in terms of artillery shells, that is, the gunpowder and artillery shells are separated.
This makes the artillery in front of me seem to be not very simple to operate. Fortunately, it is already rear-mounted - otherwise, the method of slowly poking it with a small stick would feel too primitive.
In fact, in general, Chu State lags behind other industries in terms of ordnance.
Compared with steam armored ships, breech-mounted guns appeared more than half a century earlier. Similarly, the Chu State's trains now only lack pneumatic power and are not in a hurry to lay the rails.
If we look at it a few years later, as long as the source of Qi power is solved, Chu State will actually be a small era ahead of the military in many aspects.
After all, it is enough to crush the opponent. Bai Tu does not want to focus too much on armaments. Being ahead of armaments in other aspects is actually beneficial to human security.
Facing Gao Shun's charge, the timing and movement of Xu Shu's first round of shelling were far beyond everyone's expectations.
When the distance was still a thousand meters, the first salvo was fired. The range was comparable to that of a full-string shot of a Zhenqi crossbow.
With the same ten cannons, Gao Shun's cavalry was incomplete. Visual inspection showed that the casualties were significantly higher than the previous results of Baigong Cannon!
Moreover, the huge noise made Gao Shun slightly startled, and the war horses began to "break down" one after another. This was an inherent weakness of the war horses, which could not be compensated for by Gao Shun's command.
then……
The interval was about the same as that of the Baigong cannon. Xu Shu prepared the second bombardment - after all, cleaning inside the cannon was inevitable, and even due to the inferior quality of the gunpowder, there were more residues. It was just that the breech-loaded cannon was more convenient to clean, but continuous firing was impossible.
Continuous.
Although the artillery is "bulky" compared to ordinary infantry, compared with the catapult, it is simply a clever little ghost. Its size and height are much smaller than the catapult. One person can push it in a small range. After adding the turntable structure, the cavalry wants to go around.
It's not easy to get to the flanks!
He quickly aimed at Gao Shun's test cavalry again, but at this time Gao Shun had also gone around to the testing ground, and the land was even more uneven and muddy.
I originally thought that these different ground settings were to restrain the cavalry, otherwise they would bully others, but now Gao Shun understands...it is actually to restrain this weird iron cannon!
Although there was lightning and flint just now, Gao Shun could clearly see that these solid iron cannons could bounce up and cause damage after landing. After each shell bounced three or four times, it was still deadly to Ji Zao soldiers, and
Ordinary Ji Zao soldiers were torn apart completely, and the speed of the shells was only slightly reduced, so the damage was so great!
From hitting the first row to penetrating a thousand-man array, this shell has always been lethal...
Gao Shun was behind the array and saw an iron bullet bouncing slightly from his side, so he bent down and fished it out...
Tsk!
Gao Shunyi grinned - it seemed that his speed was no longer fast, but he was still a little shaken!
If he were in front of the formation and was hit in the front when his speed was not consumed, even an ordinary gilded warrior would be defeated.
As for gilt and below?
I'm afraid that only by loading plate armor can you have a chance of surviving serious injuries. The premise is that you don't get bombarded from the front and have a chance to offload your strength. However, ordinary Ji Zao soldiers, even if they wear plate armor, can only consume more of their speed...
Just like the ordinary Ji Zao cavalry simulated now, the thousand-man array was directly penetrated by the cannonballs, and the cannonballs could even shock the hands of the golden and jade generals!
No wonder the plate armor is sold without feeling distressed at all - many generals like them feel distressed!
In order to restrain the iron bullets, Gao Shun commanded the cavalry to go around the potholes on the ground. At least in this way, the shells could not bounce effectively. If the iron bullets as big as fists rolled, the impact would be much smaller than that of huge stone bullets.
Xu Shu had noticed this a long time ago, and when directing the loading of ammunition, he also ordered more gunpowder to be loaded than last time.
While quickly turning the cannon head, he ordered the gunner to raise the cannon head at a higher angle, and then fired another salvo!
Accompanied by a loud noise…
If it was a bouncy ball that caused death or injury before, then this time it was a bowling ball that fell from a high altitude!
Previously, it was a ricochet bomb that was almost flat-firing, but this time it was a direct bomb that cut into the air at high altitude - this requires the commander and execution artillery to have enough judgment to decide the amount of gunpowder and the launch angle.
Within the range of the cut-in angle, even if the "bowling pins" themselves collide with each other, each shell can still cause twenty or thirty people to fall from their horses and fall to the ground...
In terms of direct power, it is more powerful than ricochet. For a general like Gao Shun who is not good at direct combat, it is dangerous to fight head-on. Of course, it is still very easy to avoid. After all, the intuition of a warrior is that of sword, light, sword and shadow.
The sound of the direct bullets falling from the sky is very conspicuous to the warriors even in the middle of a fight.
However, Gao Shun also secretly encouraged himself, not only ignoring the signs of defeat, but even forcibly commanding the cavalry to disperse in formation and continue to advance.
With the artillery's rate of fire, there is only one chance for the last shot, and before the opponent's artillery attack, the cavalry can get close to within 200 meters...
Gao Shun could also see that the iron cannon's shells not only had a long range, but also had a long killing distance, but as long as the formation was sparse, the iron ball might not cause more damage at short range.
But at this time, Xu Shu also directed the artillery to load another type of shotgun with small projectiles wrapped in aluminum foil...