Chapter 261: City Wall Busters, Medieval Trebuchets
"It's such a headache to meet an anchor like you!" Someone asked in the live broadcast room: "Is there any veteran who understands military affairs to come out and explain to the anchor?"
After being broadcast for so long, Lin Shuhang has accumulated an extremely large number of fans. It is conservatively estimated that two-thirds of the world's human beings have become his loyal fans.
In other words, every day when it is broadcast, there are at least 4 billion off-site viewers around the world waiting to watch his prehistoric live broadcast. This does not include those humans who are forced to connect and bundled to watch the live broadcast. If we add those who are forced to connect
The number of people who are forced to watch live broadcasts must be at least over 6 billion.
Among the many spectators outside the venue, there were quite a few capable people who knew military knowledge, and soon some spectators outside the venue volunteered to stand up.
"Ahem... I'm not talented. I studied the history of ancient weapons for several years when I was young. Now let me explain it to the host."
The man said: "As we all know, in ancient wars, cities were easy to defend but difficult to attack. If you don't equip a few heavy weapons when attacking a city, you won't be able to capture a few cities."
"In the thousands of years of cruel war history of mankind, there are many types of siege weapons invented by the ancients. Among them, the most powerful and barbaric siege weapon is the large trebuchet."
"A trebuchet is a large, long-range projectile instrument that can throw one or more objects to attack and damage enemy military personnel and facilities."
"Based on different launch methods, this kind of equipment can be divided into four major categories. They are elastic trebuchets, gravity trebuchets, torque trebuchets and human trebuchets."
"Elastic trebuchets are also called crossbows, ballistas, and archery machines. They have been widely used in ancient Greece and Rome.
This kind of machine relies on the elastic force of the bow string to project combat objects. In addition to shooting large arrows, it can also shoot clay pellets and stone bullets. It is a special variant of the mechanical crossbow."
"Let's talk about the torque machine."
"The torsion trebuchet is also called a catapult, catapult, or ballista. It was used on a large scale in ancient Greece and Rome.
This kind of machine relies on twisted ropes to generate force to eject combat objects. The ejection rod is usually upright. The top of the rod is a "spoon" or a leather bullet bag for holding projectiles. The lower end of the rod is inserted into a tightly twisted rod.
Inside the horizontal rope.
When ejecting, first use the winch to pull the ejection rod to a nearly horizontal position, and put the projectiles into the "spoon" or leather bullet bag."
"And a counterweight trebuchet."
"The counterweight trebuchet is a large projectile device that appeared in the European Middle Ages.
This kind of instrument was invented relatively late, probably in the first half of the 12th century, and was invented in the Middle East.
In some medieval battles, the counterweighted trebuchet was the most common large-scale siege equipment used in siege warfare.
Unlike other types of trebuchets, the projection force of the medieval counterweight trebuchet comes from the gravity of its heavy counterweight, rather than from the torque of the rope like trebuchets and ballistae.
This device uses the lever principle to launch stone bullets. One end of it is equipped with a counterweight, and the other end is equipped with a bullet bag for loading bullets.
Before launching, the end where the ammunition is placed must be pulled down with a winch, pulley or directly by manpower, and the other end with the weight attached will also rise accordingly.
After placing the stone bullets, the military personnel released or directly cut the rope, allowing the end with the counterweight to fall quickly. When the counterweight fell completely, the stone bullets flew out from the ammunition bag at an angle of about 45 degrees.
This type of trebuchet was introduced to China through Islamic areas and was called "Hui Hui Cannon"."
"The return gun is a veritable behemoth. Its arm is usually more than 15 meters, equipped with a counterweight of about 5-20 tons, and the projectiles it fires are generally 45-90 kilograms in weight.
By the mid-14th century, some counterweighted trebuchets could even eject stone projectiles weighing 1,000 pounds, or about 454 kilograms. One shot could blast a large gap into the enemy's city wall, which was called a "city wall."
Nemesis"."
"City Wall Nemesis?" Lin Shuhang couldn't help but said: "This name is domineering!"
The man smiled and said: "That's quite domineering. Some ancient military enthusiasts once conducted relevant experiments. The experiments showed that a counterweight trebuchet with a boom length of 50 feet and a counterweight of 10 tons can move 200 tons.
A 300-pound (about 90-136 kilogram) stone projectile is thrown about 300 yards (about 274 meters)..."
Lin Shuhang once again interrupted the other party's explanation and asked: "How long is 50 feet?"
"About 15 meters." The man replied.
Lin Shuhang asked again: "What about 300 pounds?"
"136 kilograms, 272 pounds, the weight of a fat man."
"The weight of a big fat man?" Lin Shuhang was amazed: "So powerful!"
"Anchor, do you have anything else to ask?" The man said, "Why do you always interrupt me? It's easy for you to disrupt my thinking."
Lin Shuhang smiled awkwardly and said: "Last question, last question..."
The man said impatiently: "Say."
Lin Shuhang asked: "How far is 300 yards?"
"Can you please stop asking such a mentally retarded question?" The other party sent me a shameful expression.
"What is the problem of mental retardation?" Lin Shuhang was dissatisfied: "Who asked you to talk about so many foreign measurement units? You and I are both Chinese, are you saying that China's measurement units are bad?"
"Okay, it's my fault." The man thought for a moment and said, "If you convert it to the meters you are familiar with, the distance of 300 yards is about 274 meters."
Lin Shuhang nodded: "Yes, the range is quite long."
"Anything else you want to ask?"
Lin Shuhang said: "No, you continue talking."
"Due to its huge size, the counterweight trebuchet can throw one or more objects at once to attack the enemy. The objects thrown can be huge stones and gunpowder shells, or even poison, filth, and human or animal corpses.
, a very abnormal siege equipment.”
"The last one is the oldest human-powered trebuchet in the history of warfare."
"As the name suggests, a human-powered trebuchet is a machine that uses pure human power to project stones. It first appeared in China during the Warring States Period."
"The firing method of the human trebuchet is primitive and backward, that is, using human power to pull the cannon tip of the trebuchet."
"What is the cannon tip?" Hearing this, Lin Shuhang couldn't help but interrupt the other party.
"Um... a cannon carrier, to put it bluntly, is a rope for people to pull, so that the stone bullets can be thrown out."
Seeing that Lin Shuhang was not asking questions, the man continued: "Cannon tips are divided into single tips and multiple tips. Most human-powered trebuchets have very few tips, with the most having thirteen tips. A maximum of 500 soldiers are needed to launch it."
"Of course, with so many manpower to cast it, its power is quite terrifying. One cannon can destroy at least half of the city wall."
"500 soldiers were released together?" This data made Lin Shuhang speechless. He sighed: "This is simply the Gustav cannon on the ancient battlefield! Awesome, really awesome!"
The "Gustav Cannon" Lin Shuhang refers to is a horrific super cannon manufactured by Nazi Germany during World War II - a giant 800mm train cannon.
This is the heaviest and largest caliber cannon in the world. A soldier can squat in the barrel. The Germans called this gun the "Dora Cannon."
The barrel length of the gun is 32.48 meters, the total length is 42.9 meters, the caliber is 800 mm, and the total weight of the gun is 1329 tons. The shells it fires are also appalling. Each armor-piercing shell weighs 7.1 tons, and a high-explosive shell weighs 4.8 tons.
tons, and the propulsion fuel ranges from 1.8 tons to 2 tons.
For comparison, the U.S. Iowa-class battleships have nine 406mm main guns. Each shell weighs just over 1,200 kilograms, which is enough to blast a crater as big as a football field on the ground, not to mention the 7.1-ton Dora cannon.
The heavy artillery shells are so powerful that once they are fired, the whole city will tremble for three times.
Of course, the huge size of the Gustav cannon is very troublesome to operate. When firing cannonballs, more than 1,400 soldiers are needed to directly operate the cannon! In addition to two anti-aircraft artillery regiments and security personnel responsible for air defense tasks,
A total of more than 4,000 maintenance personnel are needed.
After listening to the explanation from the audience outside the venue, Lin Shuhang suddenly realized and said to the live broadcast camera: "There are really many talents in my live broadcast room? Now I understand! Crazy General, get ready, we will start making trebuchets right away!"