On the north bank of Ruoshui, more than two hundred elite cavalry guards Yang Ji, Yin Shishi, Yang Shanhui and others rushed towards Tiangong City where the Tiangong Department was located.
Tiangong City was built by Yang Ji for the craftsmen in the third year of Renshou. It was nominally to prevent the loud and clanging sounds from disturbing the people, but in fact, in addition to focusing on the manufacture of weapons, agricultural tools and other equipment, it was also developing new equipment.
Here are not only the best weapon forgers, crossbow makers, blacksmiths, carpenters, masons, stonemasons, cobblers, and papermakers sent by Yang Jian, but also mechanical masters invited from all over the country. While imparting their lifelong experience to apprentices in Tiangong City, they also learned from each other and learned from each other's strengths, thus colliding with new ideas.
Today, this Tiangong City has become quite large. In addition to the government offices and R&D departments in the north, and various workshop areas in the central and north, there is also a large number of private houses in the south separated by a wall. This is a trust house allocated by the government to craftsmen. , which is regarded as a reward and encouragement to the craftsmen. In addition, each craftsman household is also allocated good farmland.
For people of this era, land is an important criterion for whether a family can take root and whether the family can be passed down. It is more valuable and important than gold, silver and jewelry. Otherwise, those aristocratic families would not desperately annex land.
Almost all of these craftsmen were migrant workers. When they had houses and fields in this strange place, and their children had the opportunity to study, their uneasy hearts calmed down. Coupled with the establishment of various reward systems, these craftsmen worked even harder. Play for Liangzhou.
The officials in Liangzhou were relatively opposed at first, not because they despised the craftsmen, nor because they looked down on "fantastic skills", but because Yang Ji invested too much money and food; but the Tiangong Department was in a "pixiu" state , no matter how much money the government invests in grain, it eats everything, but in the end it gets nothing in return.
Over time, Liangzhou, which was already unable to make ends meet, couldn't bear it, so everyone asked Yang Ji to reduce investment and the number of craftsmen, but Yang Ji insisted on having his own way.
He had enjoyed the dividends of the "two bombs" in his previous life. It was precisely because the first generation of great men were far-sighted and supported the scientists who invented the "two bombs" that he later fell out with the powerful "Big Brother" and "Old America". , but neither of them dared to completely break up. The reason for this was firstly the poor and ambitious Central Plains Dynasty that exerted great energy on the Korean Peninsula; and later it was the combination of national prestige, military prestige and the "two bombs".
It is precisely in view of this that Yang Ji does not want to waste his good time because of his current poverty.
Fortunately, this is the era of cold weapons, and what needs to be done is not that complicated. In just one year, this Tiangong city began to exert its strength. Yang Ji in the Great Lakes area and the Turks defeated the enemy's strong bows and crossbows. Made in the "assembly line" workshop here, there are also lighter and stronger armors and sharper and more durable weapons for elite divisions, also made by the Tiangong Department; in addition, there are also agricultural tools that improve farming efficiency, and tools that are convenient for people. New daily utensils are all invented and cast here.
The contribution of the Tiangong Department to the military and civilian fields is obvious to all. Even the School of Liberal Arts of Liangzhou University, which does not look down upon craftsmen and engineering skills, sometimes invites Zhang Zhong, the director of the Department, to give "lectures" at the School of Literature to talk about the impact of engineering skills on people. important and necessary.
In the past six months, the skilled craftsmen of the Tiangong Department have overcome many problems and invented many good things. Although Yin Shishi, Yang Shanhui and others think it is good, the final decision on whether to mass-produce it has to be made by Yang Ji, the state pastor.
When Yang Ji heard the good news, he took it seriously and came to the Tiangong Office to watch it in person.
After entering the city gate, more than a dozen knights rushed towards them. The one running at the front was Zheng Zhangzhong, who came to greet them after hearing the news.
"I'm sorry to see you, Your Majesty!" From a distance, Zhang Zhong dismounted and saluted.
"No courtesy!" Yang Ji said: "Sima Yin said that you have invented many good things. I ran over early in the morning and we went to the institute to talk."
"I obey my command!" Zhang Zhong knew that Yang Ji had just arrived in Zhangye yesterday and had many things to do, and there were also Pei Ju and Shi Xiang sent by the imperial court in the city, so his time was extremely precious and he could not stay here for too long, so he remounted his horse. Welcome Yang Ji and others into the official residence of the institute.
When they got inside, Zhang Zhong asked people to bring everything up. Since Yang Ji arrived suddenly and they still needed to prepare, Zhang Zhong simply said: "Your Majesty is here just in time. I have an excellent craftsman to recommend to you."
"Oh?" When Yang Ji heard the words "excellent craftsman", his eyes lit up like a cat smelling a fishy smell: "What is this person good at? Invite him quickly."
"Don't worry, Your Majesty, it will take about half a month for this person to arrive." Zhang Zhong said this and introduced in detail: "This craftsman claims to be a descendant of Liu Ye, his name is Liu Chaowu, and he currently lives in Xiangzhou; his humble position has been He was invited here, but the other party was moving his family and the journey was relatively slow, so I asked someone to bring the samples first, and the samples he gave were two horizontal knives."
Yang Ji immediately said: "Take it and take a look."
"Here!" The sample was in the sample room next to it. Zhang Zhong stood up and took it.
The horizontal knife has a single edge, a thick ridge, a thin blade, and a straight spine. It is extremely sharp. On this basis, the craftsmen divided it into two types: light and heavy according to the needs of the task: the light horizontal knife is particularly sharp and can cut through the body. For civilians, it is quite deadly; but because the light horizontal sword is too sharp, it sacrifices the life of the blade. Once it is cut with the opponent's weapon, it is easy to have chips or even break, so it is generally used for Self-defense, not suitable for use on the battlefield. The heavy horizontal sword is a short weapon specially used by soldiers. The blade is lethal but relatively thick, and the tip is not very sharp to avoid breaking when stabbing an armored soldier.
Zhang Zhong's three samples were heavy-duty horizontal knives specially designed for the battlefield. Yang Ji took out one to test the sharpness and feel. He waved it vigorously a few times and said, "The sword is a fine war knife, and it is the same as mine." There is almost no difference between the standard horizontal knives equipped by army soldiers. But Liu Chaowu made you pay so much attention to it, which shows that this knife has some wonderful features that I don't know about."
"What the king said is absolutely true! There is indeed nothing special about the style of this sword, but Liu Chaowu used less iron than the standard horizontal sword!" Zhang Zhong pondered for a while, then gave an example: "We can make ten swords of iron, but he can make Give out fifteen."
"Seriously?" Yang Ji was moved when he heard this. If what Zhang Zhong said is true, it means that the smelting technique has achieved a major breakthrough and produced epoch-making changes.
Smelting is a top priority national event. Due to the progress of society and the needs of the country, it has been improved by outstanding craftsmen. It has experienced the process of block smelting, hundred steel smelting, and steel frying. In the Southern and Northern Dynasties, it appeared again A more sophisticated steel filling method was developed, which led to a substantial increase in steel production.
Steel is now generally popular, and most blacksmiths have mastered the steel filling method, which has increased steel production capacity. However, because supporting equipment such as fuel, ignition point, temperature, etc. cannot keep up, the supply of steel is still in short supply.
Liu Chaowu improved the smelting technique, so the 30% to 40% iron saved can be used to do more great things. The 30% to 40% iron for a knife is indeed not much, but under the premise that the production capacity cannot keep up, from 100,000 knives to 100,000 knives, A million knives save 30% to 40% iron, but it is a very scary and surprising figure. Moreover, this is still the most conservative estimate.
"That's true!" Zhang Zhong nodded: "This is still the most conservative estimate."
Yang Ji looked at Zhang Zhong displeased and complained: "Since you know that Liu Chaowu is so capable, why didn't you invite him here earlier?"
Zhang Zhong smiled bitterly and said: "I heard a craftsman talking about this person not long ago, so I sent someone to Xiangzhou to look for him."
"Send some more people to guard him to prevent him from making any mistakes on the way. At the same time, let the inns along the way treat him like the governor of Shangzhou." Yang Ji thought for a while and then ordered: "In the future, we will use this as an example to ask more craftsmen in the city. , to see if they have any outstanding craftsmen they are familiar with. If so, they will do everything possible to invite him to Tiangong City. As long as he is willing to come, has strong ability, and contributes a lot, his salary, official position, etc. are all easy to negotiate."
For this rare scientific and technological talent, Yang Ji never cared about extraneous things, nor did he care about the imperial court's rules for officialdom and promotion.
"Here!" Zhang Zhong responded quickly.
"Your Majesty, the testing ground has been set up." At this moment, a small official came in to report.
The test site of the Tiangongshu Research Institute is specially used to test the performance of new weapons. It does not take much time to deploy it at this moment. When the group arrived at their destination, they saw a large crossbow placed on the square in front of the official residence.
At first glance, this heavy-duty bed crossbow looks like a rectangular iron box installed on the front end of a large bed crossbow. The box has nine holes divided into three layers. Each hole holds a cold arrow, which makes it look like a heavy-duty bed crossbow. It looks a bit like a small vehicle-mounted rocket launcher.
This kind of repeating crossbow has the same principle as the hand-held repeating crossbow. It looks like it is just amplifying the repeating crossbow countless times. However, this idea of enlarging the repeating crossbow has not been thought of by craftsmen before, nor has it been tried before, but the materials are not good. , The lack of earthquake resistance has prevented its vision from being realized.
Because the rebound force is too large, this overly complex design often causes heavy repeating crossbows to fall apart. The craftsmen of the Tiangong Department failed hundreds of times before the initial test was successful. However, if they want to be used in actual combat on a large scale, Obviously it still doesn't work.
Zhang Chong introduced to Yang Ji who stepped forward to watch: "Your Majesty, we first made a heavy repeating crossbow out of hard wood. In the end, it can only fire six arrows in a row, and the range will be greatly reduced. When it is made into nine consecutive shots, , just after firing a few rounds, it fell apart."
"The current one uses a very tough bronze crossbow body. Although the crossbow body is a bit bulkier, the iron arrows have been replaced by heavy and hard jujube wood arrows, so the overall weight increase is not much, and the jujube wood Compared with iron arrows, arrows are easier to make, cheaper, and easier to replenish. In addition, because jujube wood arrows are lighter than iron arrows, the range is also increased."
Yang Ji patted the cold crossbow body and said, "Demonstrate it once!"
The crossbow made of bronze was a large yellow crossbow with a strength of ten stones. One person could not unstring it. Two big men had to step on the string together. After the string was strung, Zhang Zhong put the nine crossbow arrows into the holes.
After loading the arrows, Zhang Zhong cupped his hands and said, "Please, Your Majesty, try the crossbow!"
Yang Ji looked at the wooden phalanx in front of him. The distance between the two was about three hundred steps. In other words, the effective range of this heavy repeating crossbow was actually about three hundred steps. He stepped forward and pulled the hanging knife, only to hear a 'click' sound, and nine long arrows whizzed out and nailed the wooden man's body with a bang.
What surprised Yang Ji was that, except for the three wooden figures nailed in the middle, the other six arrows were scattered in a fan-shaped manner. It was obviously a scattered crossbow.
A crossbow with a range of 300 steps is considered a sniper rifle in this era, and no matter how far it is, it doesn't make much sense. After all, there are no sights in this era, and there are not so many archers who are always on target, so once it exceeds At a distance of three steps, I am afraid that there is not much accuracy, but this kind of heavy repeating crossbow has dense arrows, strong lethality, and a wide range of damage, and it also scatters. If it is placed on the top of the city, it can be used to deal with the intensive attacking phalanx. It is undoubtedly a big killer.
"Your Majesty, we are going to develop two types of heavy-duty repeating crossbows, namely the wooden wheeled type used to defend the city and the vehicle-mounted type used in field battles." Zhang Zhong glanced at Yang Ji and said apologetically: "This repeating crossbow is made of ten-stone rhubarb. The crossbow frame can only be used for testing at present, and it cannot be equipped with a large number of armies. The main reason is that the arrow box cannot withstand the impact of the ten-stone bow force."
Yang Ji also knew the difficulty of developing weapons, and since the craftsmen of the Tiangong Bureau had produced a test model, he said that half of the success was achieved. In the future, he only needed to improve the materials and strength issues to equip the entire army on a large scale.
He thought for a while and then asked: "If it were replaced with a crossbow body with low power and short range, would the lifespan be better?"
"Of course it's okay!" Seeing that Yang Ji didn't blame him, Zhang Chong breathed a sigh of relief and introduced in a relaxed tone: "If it is replaced with a five-stone crossbow body, it will not fall apart, but the range will be reduced by half. If a winch is added, a soldier can wind up the string. However, if the distance is so short, it will be easily destroyed by the cavalry. If the spearmen and sword and shield soldiers in front cannot withstand it, they may become the enemy's trophies, so it is necessary to Keep changing."
"You have thought it through carefully and will continue to make changes." Yang Ji nodded silently and said, "Consider the life of the crossbow based on a battle that lasts for half a day. As long as this goal is achieved, we can find lightweight and cheap materials. Replacement. In addition, the arm strength of the soldier must also be considered."
Zhang Zhonggong bowed respectfully and said: "Please let me know clearly, Your Majesty!"
"When a soldier fires a round bow for twenty or thirty years, his arm strength will be seriously reduced, and the winch commonly used for heavy crossbows is too strenuous." Yang Ji said: "In this regard, I think you can involve the mechanism master. It would be even better if labor-saving mechanisms could be added.”
Zhang Chong said with a smile: "Actually, He Gongcao (He Tuo) also mentioned the problem of using mechanisms to save labor that the king mentioned, and we are now studying this aspect. It's just that the parts of the mechanisms are relatively detailed and complex; so the production The mechanical crossbow that comes out saves effort, but the chance of falling apart increases."
"So you have already tried it!" Yang Ji suddenly smiled and ordered: "You are experts in making tools. As long as you think it is good, just do it according to your idea. Don't be influenced by me."
"Here!"
