At Xincheng Arsenal, Yang Fan took Tu Shanyue and Lin Yueru for inspection.
One of them is in charge of the secretariat and the other is in charge of the intelligence department. There are certain things that they must know. There are two secret weapons being trial-produced here.
After passing numerous guards, Yang Fan and his team arrived at Workshop No. 6 deep in the arsenal.
The chief engineer was Chang Zhu, the second largest craftsman of Xinghe Iron Works at that time. His status is second only to Fu Laoliu.
Now he is responsible for small arms research and development. Fu Laoliu is responsible for the research and development of heavy weapons.
"Master, please see, this is the first punch press we have just trial-produced." Chang Zhu introduced it to the master and his wife with some excitement.
A piece of equipment that looked like a large wardrobe was placed on the floor, next to a Newcomen steam engine and transmission mechanism.
A punch press is a machine tool that uses a metal slider to move up and down to punch and manufacture metal parts.
The design principle of the punch press is to convert circular motion into linear motion. The power machine outputs force to drive the flywheel, which drives the gear, crankshaft (or eccentric gear), connecting rod, etc. through the clutch to achieve linear motion of the slider.
This thing is exactly the opposite of the principle of a steam engine. The cylinder of a steam engine changes linear motion into circular motion through the crankshaft. The punch press is to change the circular motion transmitted from the power source back to linear motion.
This technology uses a metal heavy-duty slider to move up and down, and then punches parts directly and quickly using a mold.
The punch press was invented very early in China.
Archeology in my country has discovered that as early as 2,000 years ago, stamping dies were used to make bronze wares in my country, proving that ancient China's achievements in stamping molding and stamping dies were world-leading. The Ming Dynasty also had simple machines with similar principles.
The punch press in modern times is the hydraulic press invented by the British in the 18th century. But this was too troublesome, and Yang Fan didn't let the craftsmen do it now.
Instead, he first trial-produced a punch press that moved up and down driven by a Newcomen steam engine.
This technical difficulty is not difficult, because similar punch machines have long been put into production in hydraulic forging factories. In the past, plate armor was produced using forging machinery driven by water wheels and assembled from parts punched out of molds.
This kind of hydraulic stamping equipment and punch press are actually the same thing.
These equipment have greatly improved the production efficiency of Yang Fan's metal processing workshop. Just hit it up and down, and a part will be formed in the mold.
An order for tens of thousands of sets of plate armor can be completed in a month.
Yang Fan's craftsmen are all very familiar with water-driven metal processing machinery. The most commonly used is the water hammer for forging. Nowadays, almost no manpower is needed for ironmaking, and high-speed water hammer is used for hammering.
Now, Yang Fan's gun barrels are made of iron rods cast from open-hearth steel, which are then hammered with high-speed water hammer while it's red hot to squeeze out the air bubbles and bridge the cracks.
Heating and quenching are continued until the strength and toughness requirements are reached.
Then, use a hydraulic milling machine to cut it into a standard cylinder. Then the holes are drilled with a hydraulic boring machine to create a smooth and precise gun bore.
After these hydraulic machines were put into use, Yang Fan's arsenal has greatly improved its production capacity of gun barrels.
The monthly output reaches more than a thousand pieces, and they are all high-precision, and the quality far exceeds those made by hand. Far from before, it took a craftsman a month to drill out a qualified gun barrel by hand.
With the increase of production equipment in the future, the output will continue to increase.
After all, we are only investing in one milling machine and one boring machine for trial production.
But in the first punch press, Yang Fan did not use hydraulic power.
Because the uses are different. It is possible to use hydraulic machinery to forge molds and make rough armor parts and even weapons.
However, the accuracy is not enough to do what Yang Fan wants to do now.
After all, Yang Fan's current technical level is not up to par. With unstable power such as water power, he cannot make things that require high precision.
Therefore, Yang Fan decided to use the Newcomen steam engine as output power. After a series of equipment, stable output power is guaranteed.
Yang Fan's punch machine is used to produce metal fixed bullets for percussion guns.
In one press, fifty copper metal bullet casings can be extruded from the die.
Based on the idea of equipping one generation and developing one generation, although flintlock guns are now being assembled on a large scale, the next generation of percussion guns must also begin to be developed.
The most important technology of a percussion gun is the ammunition. The percussion gun uses bullets with fixed metal bullet cases.
The main reason why Yang Fan wanted to get a percussion gun in advance was that the enemies faced by the Ming Dynasty were basically cavalry, and the Ming Dynasty's cavalry was not good. It is an army that has long been dominated by infantry.
Historically, it was not artillery that drove cavalry off the battlefield, but machine guns. Only machine guns are the nemesis of cavalry.
Yang Fan currently has too few troops, and his idea of building an army is to build an elite army, so equipment is very important.
Before there were mercury fulminates and flash caps, there was still a way to fire bullets with metal shells, which was to use glass powder mixed with copper powder and sulfur powder. Mix it with water into small particles, which can completely ignite after being impacted by an external firing pin.
This is the same idea as Yang Fan's current grenade firing tube. Yang Fan's current grenade firing tube is made of glass powder, sulfur powder and spiral thin copper wire. When the copper wire is pulled with a rope, the glass powder and sulfur powder will rub against each other and ignite the fuse.
Glass powder can be produced in a porcelain kiln, and opaque glass can be easily fired from quartz sand. Grinding the ingredients isn’t difficult either.
Now that this problem has been solved, custom-installing metal cartridge cases can be put on the agenda.
So Yang Fan arranged manpower and began to trial-produce a punch machine specifically used to produce bullet casings.
With the custom-installed metal cartridge case, we can continue to develop the percussion gun in the future.
After all, flintlock guns are now also called self-fire guns. It has been invented by Europeans for decades.
Soon Western colonists will appear in East and Southeast Asia with these advanced weapons. Whether it is the Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese, or the Russians in the north, they will all carry flintlock muskets and appear on the battlefield in large numbers.
Yang Fan must plan ahead and maintain his technological lead, so he must develop a firing gun in advance.
Because the flintlock gun is loaded from the muzzle, the gun must be held upright and the gunpowder and bullets are loaded from the muzzle. In this way, people must stand to operate and launch.
The percussion gun is a breech-loading gun, with fixed bullets loaded from the end of the barrel. Therefore, the shooter can crawl on the ground and reload while lying on his stomach.
As you can imagine, Yang Fan's soldiers were lying on the ground loading and shooting. While the enemy stands, reloads and shoots. This kind of queuing to kill, who takes advantage and who loses, is clear all the way. Breech-loading guns can also be used in trench warfare. Hidden yourself better.
"Sir, you see, the transmission device of the Newcomen steam engine is relatively mature at present, and the speed can be adjusted easily. It can maintain a stable output and output the power according to our needs."
Yang Fan watched the punch press hit the mold from top to bottom. Fifty golden copper bullet cases were produced every time, and he was very satisfied.
"Currently, can the breech-loading gun we trial-produced be used?" Yang Fan asked.
Chang Zhu pondered for a moment and replied: "The firing gun currently produced according to the drawings provided by the master can fire, but the reliability of our bullet firing device is not good, and the firing rate is only half. In other words, every two bullets can fire One shot. It will definitely not work on the battlefield."
"Go to the shooting range and try shooting a few shots." Yang Fan said.
Yang Fan took the two ladies to the shooting range, took a percussion gun, stuffed a thick bullet into the gun chamber from the back, and then pulled the trigger.
boom! There was a gunshot, the bullet flew out, and a hole was punched in the target ten meters away.
Yang Fan nodded with satisfaction.
But in the subsequent shootings, firing failures began to occur continuously, and the misfire rate was at least 50%.
Once it misfires, the bullet must be ejected and replaced with a new bullet. Reloading is very troublesome and a waste of time. You definitely can't wait any longer on the battlefield, so it's better to use the original flintlock gun.
This shows that this kind of percussion gun cannot be equipped at all unless it solves the problem of bullet misfire.
But Yang Fan didn't care about this.
After all, his real intention was not to use a single-shot rifle to fire these metal-cased bullets at this stage. He has better firing firearms.
