At the artillery range of the craftsman camp on the west bank of the Baihe River in the north of Yunzhou Fort, Shi Tiegen, Li Chengmao and others were looking at Zhang Cheng with confusion, especially Li Chengmao who repeatedly muttered: "Wooden pipe... wooden support..."
He also picked up a cylindrical cannon and inspected it. Suddenly, Li Chengmao jumped up and said in surprise: "The commander-in-chief is saying that the wooden pipe is used as the fuse instead of the reed pipe...?"
Now even Shi Tiegen looked at Zhang Cheng in surprise. The meaning was obvious. Marshal, how did you think of it? Can the wooden pipe really replace the reed pipe?
In their doubtful eyes, Zhang Cheng smiled calmly and said: "I also remembered for a moment that I seemed to have heard a master talk about this matter before. Today I suddenly remembered that many details were unknown, but I still wanted to It’s up to you to figure it out on your own.”
He looked at Li Chengmao and continued: "Li Chengmao, since you are the head of this artillery bureau, I will tell you some of my thoughts and you can think about it together."
Zhang Cheng raised his hand, pointed at the cylindrical cannon held in his left hand, and said, "You see, this cannon is entirely controlled by the fuze. The length of the fuze controls the time it takes for the cannon to explode.
What I am using now is a reed tube. The wall of this tube is thin, flammable and natural. The values of each reed tube are not uniform. You can try using a wooden tube as a fuse.
As for what kind of wood to use, I can't say here. You can try all kinds of wood. Take a piece of dry wood, drill and grind it into an empty tube in the center, and fill it with granular black gunpowder and compact it.
As for the appropriate thickness of the wooden pipe, more experiments need to be done. It can be made longer initially. If successful, it can be considered to pre-make wooden pipes of three length specifications, corresponding to commonly used shelling angles. "
Li Chengmao replied: "The villain has memorized it all. And what is the wooden support that the commander just mentioned...?"
Zhang Cheng smiled. Fortunately, he usually read a lot of things online. Although he was confused about the details, he was always in the right direction. This was enough. As for the specific technical details, he could leave them to these craftsmen.
He didn't talk about the wooden tray, but called Lin Fangping and said: "Fangping, send the order, dinner is served here, tell Chi Yuan not to wait."
"Here!"
After receiving the order, Lin Fangping went to arrange for his personal personnel to go to Yunzhou to report and guard Chiyuan.
Here, Zhang Chengcai turned to Li Chengmao and Shi Tiegen and said: "The barrel and the cannon cannot be completely closed. When firing, there will be fire. If there is too much, it may cause the cannon to explode or the fuse to burn quickly.
Look, if a wooden bottom bracket is fixed at the end of the cannon, and one or two circles of horizontal grooves are carved on the wooden bracket, it can effectively reduce the fire escape.
The fire gas just ignites the wooden tube fuze, and the wooden butt is plugged into the barrel, which also helps to increase the chamber pressure in the barrel and increase the rate of fire. At the same time, the cannon has such a tail, which makes the head heavy and the tail light, which is also conducive to stabilizing the flight trajectory.
Of course, this is just an idea. The specific design and operation still need to be studied by masters like you. You can follow this idea to improve the cannon regulations of this flying cannon. "
"Yes, the villain has remembered it all!"
"Well, come on, let's ask someone to give it a shot and try the effect!"
As the military order was passed, six sergeants trotted forward. They were in groups of three. One person held the flying cannon and fixed the position. The other person loaded the cannon into the barrel. The third person took a torch in his hand and lit it. Got the fuse.
Two clouds of smoke rose up, and cylindrical cannonballs shot out from the smoke. They first flew high into the sky, drawing a beautiful arc. The two cannonballs were at a distance of one hundred and fifty steps and two hundred steps respectively. Landed.
One of them exploded as soon as it hit the ground. Iron filings could be seen flying in all directions, and a cloud of smoke instantly rose up. The other one, which landed at a distance of 150 steps, took a short time after landing. It will explode after a while.
Although there are still many unsatisfactory things, as a mortar in this era, Zhang Cheng is quite satisfied. He just called Li Chengmao and said:
"The effect of this flying cannon is still good, and the manufacturing process is not difficult. I need to prepare a hundred of them first, but the cannonballs used need to be carefully considered. Try the wooden bracket and wooden tube fuse I proposed."
When Zhang Cheng said this, he suddenly turned to Shi Tiegen and said: "Shi Tiegen, send someone to tell Wang Qiancheng of the Fire Gun Bureau, Du Gui of the Gunpowder Bureau, Xin Congjian of the Frame Bureau, and the Armor Bureau and other chiefs to come over. Today, the Japanese Admiral Let’s share supper with you.”
"Yes, I will make arrangements now. Commander, should we look at other places?" Shi Tiegen asked.
"Don't look anymore. Find a quiet place. I'll chat with you while we wait for dinner." Zhang Cheng ordered.
…………
At Shenshi, there was a village fort near Baihe River in Yunzhou Jiangying. There was a small building by the river. Although it was only two stories high, it was built on an earthen platform and was the tallest in the village fort. building.
Zhang Cheng was looking out the window on the second floor of the small building at the Baihe River. Wei Zhice walked over slowly and whispered beside Zhang Cheng: "Commander Commander, Chen Zhong accompanied Jin Yong here a few days ago, and he will be here from now on." Take away ten large baggage chariots and a hundred charioteers.
Was it really the commander-in-chief who ordered Jin Yong and others to attack Zhao Shihu at Muzhajian? "
"Haha, it's just a fake Taoist plan to defeat Guo!"
"Fake Dao to defeat Guo?"
"Haha, don't worry too much, you will know it in the future."
Zhang Cheng smiled mysteriously at Wei Zhice, turned around and walked back into the room. Everyone was talking softly and stopped when they saw Zhang Cheng turning around.
Zhang Cheng sat down on his seat and said with a smile: "Why don't you continue chatting later? In fact, I quite like the topic you just discussed. We were talking about artillery, right?"
When he came over, the people here had stopped discussing, but Zhang Cheng still vaguely heard something, so Li Chengmao bowed and replied: "Come back to the commander-in-chief, the villain and the others were talking about artillery and medicine just now. Problems of burning and fuzing.”
"oh."
Zhang Cheng is now very interested in firearms. Of course, he also knows very well that the current level of firearm technology is not enough to determine the success or failure of the war.
However, if they are well-made, well-trained, disciplined, use firearms rationally, and work closely with infantry and cavalry, although they cannot influence the success or failure of the war, they can still play an extremely critical role in the outcome of a battle.
He did not expect that he could bring about a breakthrough in firearm technology at the end of the Ming Dynasty, but as long as he could set a correct direction for them and give them a correct goal, he believed that the performance of the skilled craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty would not be weaker than that of later European powers.
At that moment, he said solemnly: "The use of firearms is full of knowledge. You must be good at summarizing it in order to continue to improve. Let's talk about this gun. We didn't learn it from the barbarians.
Even Mr. Xu Ge during the Apocalypse advocated following the example of the Westerners. Aren’t the red Yi cannons and the Folang machine guns brought by the Yi and Folangji people?
If you are good, let's learn. There is nothing wrong with this, but we can't always imitate others. To learn means to fall behind, and if you fall behind, you will be beaten. We also have to study and figure it out ourselves, and we must be better than the barbarians! "
