Match gun

The structure of a convex gun is that there is a metal hook on the gun. One end of the hook is fixed on the gun and can rotate around the axis. A burning convex rope is clamped on the other end. When the soldier fires, he pushes the metal hook into the fire door with his hands, so that the convex rope ignites the black fire, and then launches the projectiles contained in the gun chamber. Because the convex rope is a hemp rope or a tight cloth strip, which is soaked in a * or other salt solution and then dried, it can burn slowly, with a burning speed of about 80 mm to 120 mm per hour. In this way, after the soldier presses the metal hook into the fire door, he can hold the gun with one hand or both hands, and his eyes are always fixed at the target. According to historical records, a trained shooter can fire 2 bullets every 3 minutes, and the long-barrel gun range is about 100 meters to 200 meters.

Operation process

1. Close-up of the equipment on the presenter, in which the trapezoidal iron-edged pot is for medicinal use; the leather box on the right is for projectiles; the white bottle is for medicinal use, and each bottle contains one dose of medicine, which can prevent soldiers from loading more or less fired medicine due to tension on the battlefield.

2. The first step: Clean the ignition hole and the induced medicine pot. The residue of the ignition hole blocks the ignition hole, which is a common problem with muskets.

3. Pour the induction medicine into the induction medicine pot and close the lid of the induction medicine pot.

4. Unscrew the small vial of the launching medicine and pour the launching medicine from the muzzle (observe his outfit close up);

5. Put the projectiles in the mouth (which were commonly used by musketeers at that time) from the muzzle;

6. Pull out the strips from under the barrel and pound the projectiles and launch medicine;

7. Ignite the fuse: The fuse burns faster and is easily exposed after ignition, so the fuse is generally not ignited before shooting;

8. Fix the fuse to the fuse clamp (that is, the hammer of the gun). Since the pot lid of the induction pot is closed at this time, there is no need to worry about the Mars ignition of the fuse causing the fire.

9. Pull the trigger, and when the fuse falls, the lid of the induction pot is opened. The induction pot is ignited and the projectile is fired~ In order to avoid the fire burning the eyes and the flames are dazzling, the gunman closes his eyes at the last moment of shooting.

【History of the Match Rope】

The Westward Journey of Fire Yao Weapons

As we all know, the invention of Huoyao is an outstanding contribution made by the Chinese to the world. Since Huoyao was born from the alchemy furnace in the Tang Dynasty, it has formed an indissoluble bond with the god of war.

At the end of the 10th century AD, military technicians and generals of the Northern Song Dynasty in my country, based on the fire yao formulas used by the previous alchemists in the process of refining elixirs, they prepared the original fire yao and made primary fire yao weapons for combat, creating a new era of using firearms in the history of human wars. By 1259 (the first year of Kaiqing in the Southern Song Dynasty), the firearm developers of Shouchun Prefecture (now Shou County, Anhui) invented the firearms, which was the first single-soldier handheld bamboo musket in human history. The creation of the firearms was valued by firearms developers in later countries. They were recognized as the earliest tube-shaped firearms in the world and cannons.

In 1206 AD, Temujin, the leader of the Mongolian Qiyan tribe, was established as the Mongol Khan in the Onan River and respectfully called Genghis Khan. After the rise of the Mongols, not only destroyed the Western Xia, defeated the Western Liao, and destroyed the Jin Dynasty in a short period of time, but also went south to overthrow the Song Dynasty. In this process, they obtained the manufacturing and use of fire weapons. In addition, Genghis Khan and his descendants tried their best to expand their foreign military use, expeditions from the east to the west, and went south to the south to the south to attack the continent, radiating primary tube-shaped firearms to many countries and regions in Europe and Asia. Especially in 1252, the Mongolian army led by Hsulewu invaded Iraq and Syria, which made the manufacturing and use of primary firearms at that time pass into the hands of the Arabs. It was not until more than 100 years later that China's firearm manufacturing technology was introduced to Europe through the Arabs and developed greatly in Europe.

The birth of a medlin

In the 1430s, the first type of tubular metal firearm appeared in Europe, called the fire door gun.

The earliest record of hand-held guns in Europe was in 1364. A list of Perugia arsenal in Italy recorded "500 cannons, one piercing long, can be held in the hands; very beautiful, can shoot through any armor." The unearth of the hand-held gun in Tanneburg shows that Germany had made a considerable level of metal tube firearms around the 1470s and 1480s. Tanneburg is located in Hesse, where Germany has a relatively rich mineral deposit, and is not large in scale. It was destroyed in 1399. In 1849, someone excavated a copper hand-held gun in the ruins. The gun was 330mm long, 17mm in diameter, and 1.24kg in mass. It is currently in the Germanic Museum in Nullenburg. It is collected in the Chinese People's Revolutionary Military Museum.

The musket hidden in the 11th year of Zhizheng (1351 AD) was basically similar in shape and structure: they were all composed of a bore, a medicine room and a house, but the wooden handles were all rotten. The body of the musket in the 11th year of Zhizheng" was 430.5mm long, a diameter of 30mm, and a mass of 4.75kg. Compared with the two, the musket in the 11th year of Zhizheng" was more exquisitely made. The unearth of the hand-held gun in the Tannai Fort is the most favorable evidence that the Chinese metal hand-held gun was transmitted to Europe through western Arabia. However, this simple hand-held musket had neither a gate nor a sight, and no stock that could stand on the shoulders, and could only conduct rough shooting. Its role in war was probably only to cause chaos in the enemy and give its own infantry and cavalry an opportunity to take advantage of it.

Chinese muskets, Arabian motor methods, and European fire door guns are fired with handheld ignition objects, which is very inconvenient to use on the battlefield. About 1450, European firearm researchers improved it into a semi-mechanical ignition device: a groove is opened on the outside or upper part of the butt stock, and a snake rod is installed in the groove. One end of the rod is fixed and the other end forms a trigger, which can rotate, and a clip is clamped to slowly burning fuse soaked with *. The rear end of the barrel is equipped with a fire disk. When firing, the trigger is pulled, the machine head is pressed down, and the burning fuse enters the fire disk to ignite the fire, and shoots the projectile or arrowhead. In addition, the stock is improved and guardrail is installed so that the musket can shoot against the shoulder.

By the second half of the 15th century, European mesh guns made considerable progress. Let me give you two examples to illustrate.

——In 1499, a list of Naples, Italy recorded a mesket called "musket". This name comes from the Italian word "moschetto" (a sparrow hawk), which means that this gun is as powerful as "falcon" and "eagle". Its gun is heavier and has a tripod. This gun was first used in the Battle of Charabib in Italy in 1521.

——A German collector named Blair collected a collide gun made from 1493 to 1519. The gun body is 550mm long, the diameter is 30mm, the handle is 880mm long, the total length is 1430mm, the barrel is octagonal, and the front end of the guardrail is equipped with a fixed jig, which can be connected to a tripod and fired by two shooters.

The Mushket mesh gun in Spain in the 16th century represented the advanced level of European mesh guns at that time. The gun had a caliber of 23mm, a mass of 10~11kg, a mass of 50g, a maximum range of 250m, and an effective range of 100m. It uses a mechanical sight and can fire 2 rounds per minute. Although the gun is very bulky and can only use a fork seat to support the firing, the lead projectiles shot out are extremely powerful and can penetrate the heavy breastplate worn by the knight within 100m (at that time, most weapons could hardly cause any damage beyond 80m). The Spanish conquered the huge and backward Inca Empire with this weapon.

▲The cowlin gun produced in the Warring States Period of Japan from 1543 to 1600 (equivalent to the Wanli period of Jiajing, Ming Dynasty) was a practical gun used by ordinary soldiers.

▲The cowlin gun produced in the Tokugawa Shogun period of Japan from 1600 to 1868 (equivalent to the Qing Dynasty in China) was worn by the noble samurai class, with luxurious and beautiful gun body

The East Pass of the Match Rope

Japan was in a warlord melee in the 16th century, and warlords everywhere supported the development of navigation commerce. In addition, European explorers and merchants at that time wanted to seek the best interests in the East, so Japan at that time became a developed country in navigation commerce, which also provided an opportunity for foreign firearms to be introduced into Japan.

The Japanese mesh gun was introduced by the Portuguese and occurred on August 25, 2012 (22nd year of Jiajing, Ming Dynasty, 1543). At that time, a ship carrying more than 100 people docked on Seed Island in the southern part of Kyushu. There were three Portuguese people on the ship, as well as Wang Zhi, who was named Wufeng of the Ming Dynasty (later known as the leader of the Japanese pirates of King Jinghai Wang Zhi). The Portuguese carried a mesh gun with a hole next to it (i.e. Fire Gate), which was a road to ignite with a fire, installed a fire yao and a small lead ball, and ignited it with a fuse.

The lead ball can be shot out and hit the target. When it is fired, it emits a fire and a thunderous explosion. When it is fired, the Japanese Shiyao (local warlord) saw that it was rare and called it an iron cannon. Later, he bought it with a lot of money and sent his minister, Koshiro Tokawa to learn the use of a coercion gun and its fire-making method from the Portuguese, and imitated more than a dozen. Soon, some Japanese iron smelting fields successively imitated Japanese-style coercion guns. At that time, Japanese pirates also used this kind of firearm to plunder China.

In contrast, in China at that time, due to the Confucianism of the Ming and Qing dynasties that value culture and neglected military affairs, the social status of civil servants was extremely high, while the social status of military officers declined and the corruption of the army declined. In addition, the implementation of the ban in Shanghai caused the army to lose all the opportunities to obtain advanced firearms, and the development of firearms in China stagnated. Although the Ming and Qing governments did not attach importance to the development of firearms, under the promotion of some knowledgeable people, the coercion guns were still popularized and developed in China. There are dozens of coercion guns recorded in "Wu Bei Zhi", "Qing Hui Dian", and "District of the Dynasty Liquor Gallery".

【Disadvantages of a Match Rope】

Match guns have been popular among the armies of countries around the world for more than 200 years (even in Asian countries), and have many shortcomings, especially in extreme environments on the battlefield.

First, since a fuse is required to trigger a fuse (usually a fuse made of several strands of thin linen rope, cooked with vinegar or soaked with *), every musketeer at that time had to carry a fuse several meters long on himself. Before the war, they had to light the fuse, because when the weather was wet, it was extremely difficult to ignite, and experienced soldiers would ignite both ends of the fuse so that they could fire the second gun at any time, so that a fuse would not burn for long. In the British Bourgeois Revolutionary War,

A sir named Ralph fell into this predicament. At that time, he was besieged by Waller in Deviches. Since all the fuses were used up, he had to order his officers to "search all the ropes from the city to take them back, and hammer and cook them as soon as possible" as a fuse for emergency use. It is also dangerous when the fuse is ignited. If you are not careful, Mars will ignite the elastic belt on your back, causing an explosion to injure the musketeer himself. Moreover, the ignited fuse can easily reveal itself at night, so it is impossible to attack the enemy at night.

Second, the shooting process of the mezzanine is very complicated and slow. Qi Jiguang recorded 10 processes of using the mezzanine in "Qi Jiguang's Art of War". In Europe, a volume of illustrations "Weapon Practice" published by Jacob De Geier in Amsterdam in 1607 describes the firing steps of the mezzanine, which is divided into 25 steps. When the musketeers go to battle, they must bring guns and fuses, fire yao (used in the gun and fire door), projectiles, and fork-shaped brackets. Once the enemy and us exchange fire, the shooter is busy firing - loading - and then firing, and his hands and feet must be very agile, and the best shooter can only shoot two or three rounds per minute. Therefore, the musketeers are usually in five or six rows, sometimes ten rows, and the front row fires back and back to reload the bullets, and the gunmen in the back row continue to fire. But then

People found that it would be more effective if all the gunmen fired together, so the gunmen began to line up in three rows, kneeling in the first row, standing in the second row half-standing, and standing in the third row, replacing the old circular shooting method with a volley. China lined the gunmen in nine rows, one in every three rows, and the first group retreated to the back and loading the bullets, and the second group continued to shoot. Although there were these remedies, the situation where the enemy rushed to the musketeers, and the musketeers would not be able to resist at this time, so the musketeers must be mixed with soldiers using cold weapons to form companies or battalions. However, the proportion of the use of the musketeers was increasing continuously in 1571. The ratio of musketeers and spearmen in the Spanish Legion stationed in the Netherlands was 2:5, but by 30 years later, it became 3:1.

Third, it cannot be used on rainy days. Water will enter in rainy days and cannot get angry. In fact, it cannot be used on rainy days, but it cannot be used even when the wind is strong, because the wind will blow away the fire transmission on the fire door. Moreover, because the fireworks were used at that time, it would be as smog bombs when shooting, which would seriously blind the sight of your own army.

Fourth, the accuracy is poor and the effective range is close, so you can only shoot targets within 100m.
Chapter completed!