"Dong! Dong..."
While Tang Ning was judging Italy's strength, a knock on the door outside the room interrupted his thoughts.
"Enter!."
Tangning felt a little uncomfortable with the voice interrupting his thoughts, but he was not grudged or annoyed because he knew that these guards had nothing important to do and would not disturb him.
"Your Majesty, General Kaka wants to see you." A guard came in to report.
"Well, invite him in." Tangning attached great importance to her confidant, Kaka, the Chief of Staff of the Portuguese Ministry of National Defense.
General Kaka walked in at a leisurely pace. He directly stated his purpose to Tang Ning without any ink.
"Your Majesty, all countries are now paying attention to Italy's new equipment, especially the application of aircraft. Our Portuguese army also needs the latest aircraft."
"This requires the efforts of Henry Aircraft Manufacturing Factory. Let the experts do the professional work. I will go to inspect it later to see the development of our country's aircraft."
After answering General Kaka's question, Tangning continued: "The Chief of General Staff should be looking for me not only because he is concerned about aircraft issues, right?"
"Yes, Your Majesty." Kaka replied.
He paused and continued. “Your Majesty, our war with Spain is about to begin, and I came here to invite the Emperor to inspect the training and combat effectiveness evaluation of the reorganized Portuguese army.
During the inspection in January, the newly reorganized Portuguese divisions performed very poorly, but they learned their shame and became brave. Now they train harder and work hard to win the war with Spain.
The morale of the new Portuguese army was very low. They were eager to fight bloody battles to build Greater Portugal. They hoped to regain their honor in front of the emperor. "
After hearing what the Chief of General Staff said, Tang Ning felt it was time to go to the army for an inspection.
This year, because there were many things to do, there were very few inspections of the reorganized army. Except for the first inspection, people from the military headquarters were allowed to go.
Now that there is going to be a war with Spain, as His Majesty the Emperor, Pedro Downing should also check the army.
This would kill two birds with one stone, not only allowing Tang Ning to understand the current situation of the army, but also boosting the morale of the army soldiers through personal visits.
"Can."
Tangning, who wanted to understand this, agreed to General Kaka's request.
After hearing the emperor's promise, General Kaka immediately told the time. "Dear Your Majesty, how about we start inspecting the army on the 5th?"
Tangning thought that it was only a few days away, "You can make arrangements."
"Your Majesty, then I will make arrangements for the trip."
"Can."
After receiving the emperor's promise, General Kaka left with satisfaction. Tangning thought about what the Chief of General Staff said, and maybe she should go to Henry Aircraft Manufacturing Factory to take a look at their progress.
He called a guard and gave orders. "Prepare the vehicle. I'm going to Henry Aircraft Factory for an inspection."
"Okay, Your Majesty."
When Downing's motorcade arrived at the Henry Aircraft Manufacturing Factory in the suburbs, factory director Byrd and his assistant Kusma led a group of employees to greet the emperor's arrival at the door.
After seeing the emperor come out of the car, Byrd and Kusma stepped forward to greet his inspection. "Welcome to your Majesty."
Tangning looked at Bird and Kusma's greasy clothes. It seemed that they had just received the news.
"I came here this time to see how the development of your new aircraft is going."
After hearing the emperor's question, the two looked at each other awkwardly. In the end, it was factory director Bird who answered the emperor's question.
"Your Majesty, the new aircraft has almost been manufactured. There is just one small problem that needs to be solved before it can be tested."
After Tangning heard Bird's answer, she looked at him in surprise.
In Tang Ning's impression, this new aircraft was probably still under development, because the requirements he made were exactly the main aircraft of various countries when the First World War broke out. Unexpectedly, they were about to successfully develop it.
"Are there any minor issues that haven't been resolved?" Tang Ning asked with a smile.
The big problem was solved, but the small problem was not simple at all. But Tangning soon realized that this small problem was not small at all.
"We planned to change the French's rotary cylinder radial air-cooled engine into a shaft-rotating engine, but now we are running into a little trouble." Bird was a little afraid to look at the emperor and tell him about the current trouble.
In fact, this is not a small trouble at all. This is because changing the rotating cylinder to a rotating shaft involves the structure of the engine. Tangning looked at Bird's expression and it was obvious that the two of them were still at a loss to deal with this.
However, Tang Ning knew that there would be no rotary-cylinder engines in later generations, and since the two of them had the right idea, they did not discuss it too much.
Tang Ning is aware of the general trend of aviation development, but he is not very clear about the specific details of industrial engineering. Tang Ning is also not clear about the specific manufacturing of engines, so he doesn't have many methods.
tomato
Seeing that the emperor didn't say much, Bird didn't know what to say for a moment. Fortunately, Hou Kusi immediately came to the rescue.
"Your Majesty, let's go take a look at this new plane."
"That's fine." Tangning didn't want everyone to stand here in embarrassment, so she agreed.
Bird quickly directed the emperor to the aircraft manufacturing workshop to see the new aircraft that was missing an engine. When passing by his friend Kusma, he gave him a grateful look.
The group came to the aircraft manufacturing workshop. Tang Ning had been here several times, so of course she was not unfamiliar with this place. At a glance, Tang Ning saw a new aircraft in the middle of the workshop that was different in shape from the ones she had seen before.
"Your Majesty, this is the new aircraft we have developed." Bird pointed at the aircraft Tangning saw.
The biggest difference between this new aircraft and the one seen before is that a protective cover is installed on the nose, making it look more pleasing to the eye than its predecessors with exposed engines. Moreover, a windshield of about fifty centimeters is installed on the aircraft position.
"The plane looks good."
Tangning was quite satisfied with this post-World War I-style aircraft and praised Bird and Kusma beside him.
"This is all the result of His Majesty's support, otherwise we wouldn't have enough funds to complete our vision." Bird said flatteringly, and Kusma was also beside him to express his approval.
Tangning didn't reply when he heard their flattery. He was already immune to flattery now.
"Let's increase production of old aircraft first, but you must be aware that the demand for better-performing aircraft in the military is increasing. You must speed up the progress of new aircraft and not let the military wait too long."
Although the new aircraft was not in a hurry, Tang Ning still warned the two Portuguese aircraft manufacturers and managers, otherwise something might happen to them next time.
The two people who were beaten by the emperor felt a little embarrassed. They knew that this was urging them to be down-to-earth, and if they had any questions, they should try to raise them and not be too ambitious.
"Your Majesty, let me introduce this new aircraft to you now." Kusi immediately stepped forward to change the topic.
Most of the work at Henry Aircraft Manufacturing Factory is now done by Kusma, so the current employees say privately that he is the old foreman, while Byrd is the aircraft designer and factory director. He only cares about the macro and specific operations. Not much energy to manage.
"Then tell me about the situation of this plane."
"Okay, Your Majesty." Kusma signaled to the emperor and began to explain.
"We named this brand-new aircraft United Star. It has a fuselage made of iron wood and skin. It is 12.4 meters long, has a wingspan of 10.1 meters, a wing width of 0.9 meters, a distance between wings of 1.1 meters, and a total weight of 641 kilograms.
We plan to transform the Land God engine as a new power source, but we are still not close to progress.
If the military has urgent time requirements, we can use France's latest 80-horsepower Land God engine as power. After our calculation, the approximate flight distance of this aircraft is 90-110 kilometers, and the altitude is about 2,500 meters, so it is still a little behind the requirements of His Majesty the Emperor. "
After listening to Kusma's explanation, Tangning's senses about the two of them became much better. This at least proved that both of them were doing things with their heart, but they just had a higher vision.
"You have done a good job. I am quite satisfied with it. I hope you can get this United Star flying as soon as possible. I will ask the military to come for acceptance by then, and there will probably be another purchase list waiting for you."
The two people who got the emperor's approval breathed a sigh of relief in their hearts. It was their honor to be recognized by His Majesty the Emperor, which showed that His Majesty the Emperor was still satisfied with the abilities of the two people.
After Tangning inspected the new aircraft, he returned to the palace. After that, he was going to prepare to see the situation of the Army that he was most concerned about.
In the war between Portugal and Spain, the army will definitely play the leading role, because in terms of navy, Portugal defeats Spain in all aspects.
Spain would not easily give the territory claimed by the Portuguese doctrine, so the Portuguese army would definitely use its bayonets to see red and use guns and artillery to crush Spanish resistance on land to obtain it.
