Zhang Luan, the eunuch of the armor factory, reported that the prototypes of the new rifle rifles have been made. When they deliver them, a certain prince can take a look. He hopes that what they make will not be too outrageous, but he will give them at a one-to-one ratio. The drawings they made.
The Lumi gun weighs about eight kilograms, and the bird gun is lighter, only five or six kilograms. Therefore, the weight of the new rifle gun must not exceed the weight of the Lumi gun. The eight kilograms is close to the ten city kilograms. It is inconvenient to be too heavy. Soldiers carried and shot.
The standard rifles of later generations rarely exceed twelve kilograms, and the magazine is basically controlled at about ten kilograms. Even the weapons used by strong Western livestock are not too heavy. There are only light machine guns and squad guns. Except for sniper rifles.
The new rifle is an imitation of the French "Charleville" 1777 flintlock smoothbore gun. Two versions have been temporarily produced. The long-barreled version has a tube length of three and a half feet, or 114 centimeters, and the long-barreled version of the "Charleville" The length of the gun tube is exactly the same.
The short-barreled version of the gun has a tube length of three feet, and its weight and size are more suitable for Asians to use. It is equipped for cavalry and vehicle crew members.
The large-caliber version is half an inch, and the xiaokoujing version is three-inches. There are also corresponding recommended quotas for projectiles and charges. It all depends on the mood of the soldiers on the battlefield...
"Your Highness, this is a Type A gun!"
Zhang Luan, the eunuch of the sticker factory, respectfully presented a beautifully crafted fire blunderbuss. Compared with bird blunderbuss, the biggest advantage of the new rifle gun was its beautiful appearance and its compliance with ergonomic standards when used.
Yaoji looked at the new gun placed on the table, then at the gun, and then chose to ignore the ugly, rubbish product.
Military weapons must look good first, and then be easy to use.
This is a common problem in this era, such as the "Sea Sovereignty" carved on the butt...
If it's not easy to use and doesn't look good, then why equip the troops with it?
The streamlined appearance of the "Charleville" 1777-style flintlock smoothbore gun looks very beautiful. In order to build four similar guns, Bureau Officer Liu Feng used 20 craftsmen and it took nearly ten days to complete.
Not counting other wear and tear, there are more than 40 scrapped gun tubes alone. Including labor costs, I am afraid that the manufacturing cost of each gun will exceed fifty taels of silver.
"Well, yes, it's very beautiful. Can the handguards, gun rests, triggers, and flintlock mechanisms of these four rifles be the same?"
Except for gun tubes, Yaoji requires that all parts of the derivatives must be common in advance and must be 100% consistent, so as to facilitate mass production and reduce costs.
Due to the addition of a more complicated flintlock mechanism, the manufacturing cost of the flintlock gun must be higher than that of the matchlock gun. The only feasible way to reduce the cost is to manufacture as many as possible, preferably 10 million.
The total output of the French "Charleville" 1777 flintlock smoothbore gun is as high as seven million, making it the sales champion among flintlock guns. A certain prince believes that the output of the derivative version will not be lower than this number.
Two hundred thousand rifles are manufactured every year, and they can be produced for fifty years. If the two numbers are replaced, they can still be popular for twenty years.
Taking into account the amount of wartime attrition, the three armies of the Ming Dynasty alone needed at least four to five million rifles of various types. The rest could be exported on a large scale, and they could be bartered if they could not be exchanged for real gold and silver.
"Your Highness, except for the gun tube, all the components of these four rifles are exactly the same. I will not dare to tamper with the drawings drawn by Your Highness without permission!"
The unscrupulous cannon allowed Zhang Luan, the eunuch of the post factory, and Liu Feng, the bureau officer, to make money legitimately. They got the benefit and obeyed the prince's orders.
As senior industry insiders, they looked down on the "iron barrel" at first, but they didn't expect that if it didn't blow, it would kill people. The "iron barrel" could also be used as a cannon, which made them inexplicably surprised and eye-opening.
Since the prince believed that this picture was a sample of a new type of gun, they just let the craftsmen in the factory work hard to build it without any objection.
If I could satisfy and please the prince, I would place an order for 100,000 new-style muskets, and each one would only get one penny of silver, which is still a lot of 10,000 taels, and both of them could still get it if they split it half. Five thousand taels.
Because he had experienced this thing before, Yaoji knew the parts of the "Charleville" well. The specific individual small parts may be a little different, but as long as the substitutes did not affect the actual performance of the gun, it would be fine.
"Weigh!"
"yes!"
Yaoji does not believe in the data provided by the factory. Certain inspection tasks must be done by people around him, and he must supervise them with his own eyes to feel completely at ease.
The chamberlains carried very precise weights, which were specially used to measure the weight of various objects. Even if it was an elephant, as long as the prince wanted to know how much the object weighed, the chamberlains had to "weigh the elephant according to the order."
"Type A weighs nine pounds, three taels and seven cents!"
This weight is equivalent to more than eleven kilograms, which has exceeded the critical upper limit of eleven kilograms determined by a certain prince. If it were any heavier, this gun would be a burden to ordinary soldiers.
The original version only weighed nine kilograms, and the only difference in weight was the gun tube. The original version had a single tube. Daming's craftsmanship couldn't do it, so it had to use a blunderbuss-style outer tube to wrap the inner tube.
Only in this way can the air tightness of the gun tube be guaranteed, but the accuracy and range of the gun using a double-layer gun tube are definitely not as good as the original version of the French single-tube.
This weight has exceeded that of the Lumi gun, but its range is not as good as the latter. The few advantages it shows are that it is beautiful and comfortable to use.
Since a card slot is reserved for installing a bayonet, the new rifle is much more lethal than the Rumi gun in hand-to-hand combat.
A certain prince specially drew a ring on the sketch, which is located behind the bayonet slot. This can be used to install a bipod to facilitate soldiers to stably aim at the target during an ambush.
"Type B weighs eight pounds, four taels and one cent!"
This large-diameter short-barreled version weighs more than 90 pounds. It seems that the weight is reasonable and not so dazzling.
The weights of the two versions of xiaokoujing correspond to that, because except for the caliber, the other two guns are exactly the same as the two being weighed. Due to the level of workmanship, the weight will be slightly different, that's all.
A certain prince looked at these four weapons one by one very carefully. The craftsmanship was similar to that of later generations' collector's edition hunting swords. It must be said that the craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty were still very good at chisels...
But this is a weapon that will draw blood when fired. It is not a beautiful handicraft or luxury product. It not only has to look good, but also has to demonstrate established performance. The next step is the live-fire test.
It is divided into five levels: fifty-step target, seventy-step target, one hundred-step target, one hundred and forty-step target, and two hundred and ten-step target. Based on the relevant hit rate, the advantages and disadvantages of each type are compared.
The target is a two-meter-high, one-meter-wide wooden board painted with white paint. In the center is a red heart the size of a volleyball, surrounded by five black circular concentric rings.
At a distance of fifty meters, it is easy to hit such a target, but after pushing it to a distance of one hundred and fifty meters, the target seen in the crosshair is about the size of a soybean grain.
The testers responsible for firing were all veteran gunners from the armor factory. Although they had never been on the battlefield, their shooting accuracy was by no means inferior to those in the Yongwei Camp.
Generally speaking, the most skilled pilots in the Air Force are not the aces who shoot down enemy aircraft in the usual sense, but are test pilots.
The gunners raised in the armor factory can be said to be most of the types of fire guns installed by the Ming Dynasty army. They have test-fired almost all of them, and they have even played with the rifles equipped by the Spanish and Dutch armies.
"Test firing one by one!"
The armor factory is not big enough, but the imperial city has plenty of space, especially in the Taiye Pond west of Hongshan. There are no nobles at all, because mahjong has become popular in the palace.
The concubines who usually have nothing to do now have a big project, that is, they start to climb the Great Wall in a group of four. After washing up in the morning, eating breakfast, and reading the daily newspapers, the beauties started rubbing rubbish and playing until sunset. , very busy.
Since there were newspapers and mahjong, and the royal meal had added many new dishes according to the prince's request, the concubines felt that their lives were extremely fulfilling, and the quality of the royal meal had also improved a lot.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief when they heard that the Queen decided not to reduce the annual salary of the palaces. The quality of the royal meals has not been reduced, but has been significantly improved, which is even better.
Because the food cooked by Shangshan Superintendent was so delicious, there were many "diners" like a certain prince who had to lean on the rockery to digest their food after eating.
To a certain extent, playing mahjong can also be regarded as a digestive activity. At least the four people participating in the activity were sitting, instead of simply lying down and rubbing their stomachs...
The firing of rifle guns in this era was not very loud, and it would not disturb the "main business" of the concubines. What's more, they were tested one by one, not all at once.
There are four shooters in a temple, and each of them fires four guns five times, with a perfect score of 100. Those who reach 60 points can receive the prince's silver reward. The higher the score, the more silver reward will naturally be.
"Bang~!"
Since a group of would-be judges were standing behind him and there were a large number of internal guards around him, the shooter could not cheat and had no time to commit assassination. He could only complete his job honestly.
Scores will not be counted. If you want to get more silver rewards, you have to rely on your own abilities. A certain prince also wanted to know the level of the shooters raised in the armor factory.
The first shooter showed great ability. He shot at the 50-meter target, and four of his guns hit the bullseye. Only one gun missed the red heart, and he scored twenty-four points in one fell swoop.
There are dedicated statisticians on site, who have detailed notes on the name of the shooter, model of gun used, distance, hit situation, and projectiles and charges. After registration, they will be used for summary analysis. The weather, wind direction, and wind speed of the day are also noted.
I'm going~!
A certain prince almost blurted out what was in his heart. The second seeded player was even more fierce. He came up with a long-barreled and large-caliber version. He came up with a five-hit series. The qiangqiang hit the center of the circle and took away twenty-five points.
The other two were also unambiguous, scoring 23 points and 24 points respectively. They were absolutely determined to win the silver reward, but their skills at the 50-meter target were not shown at all.
The other four levels of targets are where gun skills are tested. The farther away they are, the more it tests the shooter's eyesight, arm strength and shooting accuracy.
Yaoji does not have any requirements for their shooting posture. You can stand, squat, or lie down, but you are not allowed to use objects as supports, but you can use your arms.
Because when the gunmen were arrayed on the battlefield, it was impossible to find a bracket again. After loading, they would pick up the gun and wait for the officer's order to fire a volley.
The smartest way is to sit on the ground, curl up your knees, and then put the torch on your knees. If you still feel a little bumpy, use your arms as a buffer.
This posture can best ensure the stability of the gun when shooting, but if you are really a marksman, you can fire in three seconds based on your feeling, and the hit rate will make the audience stunned...
When it came time to shoot at the target at seventy paces, some shooters missed the target.
Yaoji could see clearly that every time the shooter finished firing five bullets, the guard would present the target in front of him.
The highest score at this time was only nineteen points, which meant that the average score for each bullet was less than four points.
A certain prince will not punish the shooter for this. The object of today's inspection is a gun, which has little to do with people.
If it hadn't been the first time for the shooter to use this new gun, his results would have been better and the probability of missing the target would have been greatly reduced.
When it was time to test-shoot the 100-step target, the four shooters all missed the target one after another. Fortunately, it was only once.
Fortunately, the test shooters were all experienced masters, and they only missed the target twice at most during 200 steps.
Their strengths are also close to each other. After four rounds, the highest score was 68 points and the lowest score was 60 points, just on the passing line.
"As long as you reach sixty points, as many points as you get, I will convert it into one-tenth of the cash as a reward for you!"
The first place received six taels of silver and kept kowtowing happily to thank him. This was equivalent to his three months' income. He could buy a lot of wine and meat when he went back and eat with his wife and children for many days.
"Take the four guns back and take good care of them. We will test-fire again tomorrow and the day after!"
Yaoji didn't intend to just decide on the specific model of the new gun. That would be too arbitrary. He had to test it for three days and get an average result. Not only to take care of the gun, but also to give the shooters a break.
It is the first time to use the "Charleville" 1777 smoothbore flintlock gun. The shooters will inevitably feel strange. Moreover, they are firing in front of the prince and surrounded by a group of people. The tension and pressure caused by this are obvious. of.
By the second and third time, the subjective factors that interfere with shooting should be reduced a lot, especially the possibility of receiving silver rewards, which will further stimulate shooters' desire to get high scores.
"This is top secret. No one is allowed to tell others. If there is any leakage, you will be severely punished!"
Yaoji doesn't want to wait until mass production. The enemy already knows the performance of this weapon well. Even if it is only a rifle, it must maintain a high level of confidentiality.
The new rifle was named the "Invincible" rifle. After it was equipped with the troops, everyone knew it was invincible, but the name was enough to make people confused.
When looking at the transcript, the gun tube factor is not taken into consideration. Fools all know that the longer the gun tube, the higher the accuracy.
Xiaokoujing bullets have higher results within a hundred steps, while large-caliber bullets have just the opposite effect.
A certain prince was still hesitant as to whether to use xiaokoujing or large caliber.
The advantage of the xiaokoujing version is that it is very accurate at close range. The shooting accuracy at a distance of one hundred steps is almost half that of the large caliber.
The advantage of the big mouth gun is that it has good long-range accuracy, and the larger the diameter of the bullet, the greater the damage it will cause to the enemy. ...Friends who read books, you can search "Blue Chinese Network" to find this site as soon as possible.
