Font
Large
Medium
Small
Night
Prev Index    Favorite Next

Chapter 63 Methods

As if in a dream, the Military Prefecture Department had countless gunpowder overnight, which could be squandered by the artillery. At the same time, a larger and longer new style or artillery was also produced by Jutien Mansion.

At this time, everyone knew the secret of gunpowder, and the various departments and departments of the Grand Sima Mansion gradually learned that the king had made a new weapon comparable to the power of thunder. However, the Grand Sima still had many controversies about the use of this new weapon.

The first one is that its power is between a catapult and a crossbow, making it a weapon that can be eaten without meat and discarded with taste. However, when the cannon is charged four times and the shell is fired 1,200 meters away, the cannon disappears without a trace.

Of course, more than 1,200 meters is not an effective range, and the effective range is less than half of the longest range, which is only a few dozen steps further than the catapult, but this is enough. Although the catapult fires 100 kilograms of stone bombs, the catapult is difficult to move and cannot fight in the field; although the Jingjuan can also fire about five kilograms of stone bombs, it cannot throw the stone bombs to a thousand meters away.

Artillery was the best weapon to replace the catapult and the Jingbird. When the installation was gradually becoming the menstruation topic of the Grand Sima Mansion. However, before the discussion of the Grand Sima Mansion was completed, the king had ordered the Juti Mansion to build artillery, which had been built in more than 200 pieces. The most unexpected thing was that these artillery were actually loaded on the sea boat.

In late autumn, a Chaos-class gunboat that had just been launched was sailing on Shaopi. When the autumn wind blew, the twelfth bell rang, Wu Kong, the artillery captain standing on the artillery deck, was ordered to load the soldiers. At this moment, there were only four eighteen-pound naval cannons on the deck.

The artillery must be very cautious, especially the artillery mount of the sea pier cannon is completely different from the infantry cannon. The artillery mount is a low four-wheeled car, and the cannon is installed on the car. The ropes on both sides of the end of the car are connected to the bulwarks next to the opening of the cannon door. The huge recoil formed by firing the cannon shells will cause the cannon stand to retreat rapidly. The sea pier is not on land, and the longest beam is only ten meters. These ropes can control the distance of the rear seat of the cannon stand within two meters.

The gun mount, the artillery itself, and even the load-bearing capacity of the artillery deck, and the center of gravity of the gunboat all determine that the gunfire is not reckless. This is also the reason why Xiong Jing did not choose a twenty-four-pound naval cannon. A twenty-four-pound naval cannon weighs two tons, which is just a calculation. In fact, the weight of a twenty-four-pound long cannon often reaches two and a half tons. With more than four hundred kilograms of cannon trucks, the total weight is nearly three tons. A six-class frigate with a draft of five or six hundred tons is only equipped with twenty-four eighteen-pound cannons at most, and the heavy ship will be unstable.

Although not in the sea, Xiong Jing, who was standing on the deck of the stern, could still feel the hull rising and falling with the waves. He liked this kind of ups and downs, but Xiang Yan and others who were standing beside him seemed not very much liked this kind of ups and downs, which made people dizzy.

"If you want to talk about cannons, you should talk about horses first. General thought that how many horses can be used for infantry cannons cannons?" Xiong Jing wanted to laugh at this time. Xiang Yan was obviously jealous of the Red Navy's first gun, and then he was reluctant to leave it alone.

Kong also had a surname of Mi, and his clan Wu. However, this Wu clan..., a woman was in trouble with the country. When King Zhuang of Chu, Wu ministers were confused by Xia Ji's beauty and actually eloped with Xia Ji to Jin. Therefore, Kong was ashamed to mention his clan to others and only told people his name. Wu Kong went from Jing crossbow to catapults to artillery, and then to artillery. Although the principles of weapon launching were different, he could use it very skillfully. Xiang Yan originally had high hopes for Wu Kong to form the first infantry artillery unit, but he did not expect that he was transferred to the sea boat by Xiong Jing.

"I think six horses are good." E Zhuo replied, "The total weight of infantry cannons is 1,800..."

"Wrong!" There was a boring machine, the body of the twelve-pound gun was very easy to build, but the gun mount took nearly three years to barely be finalized. In the end, the weight of the twelve-pound gun rank was 1,830 kilograms. "Four times the charge, the body of the gun has been thickened, and the weight of the twelve-pound gun has exceeded 1,900 kilograms."

"Even if this is the case, you can also pull it into six horses." E Zhuo was stunned by Xiong Jing's "wrong" and as the director of the Transportation Department, he knew how heavy the six horses could pull it.

"How many stones can a six-horse cart be loaded on the grass?" Xiong Jing knew that E Zhuo did not realize his mistake, so he had to ask a question in another way, talking about the surprise attack on Xianyang that he had been planning. According to the plan, the cavalry of the four countries would detour from the grassland to the Yanshi barrier and finally attack Qin. The cavalry supplies were shipped by the accompanying four-wheeled carriage.

"Riding in the grass, grass..." E Zhuo originally estimated that the four-wheeled carriage with six horses could be loaded with 1.5 tons. In fact, six horses started to lose weight after being pulled by 1.5 tons. This was still a military horse. If it were replaced by a smaller Dima, the situation would be worse.

"The king thought how many horses should be used to help the infantry cannons?" E Zhuo's face turned red and her ears were red, and Xiang Yan had to speak out to save the scene.

"Eight horses are necessary." Xiong Jing's answer was slightly surprised. "The dragon horse can be reduced to six."

A few years ago, because of the publication of a certain field artillery history, someone proposed that a horse can only drag 160 kilograms, and a cannon cart can only drag three or six horses, and that too many can't be used. Therefore, he remembers the use of horses with horses. The normal pulling force of a horse is between 12 and 15% of the weight of a horse. The smaller the horse, such as a Mongolian horse, the higher the ratio. This is a normal pulling force. In extreme cases, the pulling force can reach or even exceed half of the weight of a horse.

The pulling force is like this, and pulling weight is to multiply the drag weight by the drag coefficient. This is not only related to the road conditions, but also to wheels and bearings. Although Chu State had roller bearings, there was no rubber as wheels. The resistance coefficient of any dirt road would exceed zero point one. In many cases, the resistance coefficient exceeded zero point one and approached zero point two.

This means that under normal pulling force, a Di horse weighing 300 kilograms can only weigh at least 225 kilograms, which is normally 250 kilograms. A twelve pound of a rank weighing 1,900 kilograms must be dragged by four horses, while a four-wheeled carriage towed by six horses has measured the coefficient of resistance to the grassland to reach 0.16, so the weight cannot exceed 1,700 kilograms. If a 500 kilogram carriage is reduced, the weight that six horses can tow on the grassland can be at most 1,200 kilograms.

Of course, Xiang Yan didn't know the scientific summary of later generations. He heard that Xiong Jing wanted to use a precious dragon horse to drag the cannon, so he shook his head repeatedly and said, "I would rather have eight horses than to use a dragon horse to pull it away."

With four parallels and eight horses, Xiong Jing couldn't imagine how long the queue of four parallels and eight horses would be towed cannons. He turned to the question, "I thought it would be okay for the two armies to fight without cannons, but it would be unfavorable if there were cannons."

"Please tell me in detail." Xiang Yan was puzzled. He didn't know if Xiong Jing really didn't want the troops of each county to be equipped with artillery, but wanted to monopolize this thunder artifact by himself.

"The cannons need to be dragged by eight horses, arranged in front of the array, and bombarded before the army." Xiong Jing roughly talked about the use of cannons for combat, "However, if the enemy retreated a mile and then lined up, what would our army do?"

"Our army should pursue it." Xiang Yan replied, this kind of question is common sense for military knowledge.

"What about artillery?" Xiong Jing asked again. "Does the army wait for artillery to fight in formation or not?"

"This..." The artillery dragged by the eight horses was fine in the field, but it was fine if there were any gullies, it would be impossible to get through. When the two armies faced each other, they could not wait until the artillery was transported before they started fighting, right? If you pursue, the artillery had not been transported yet, the two armies would have already rushed together.

"Although artillery is good, it cannot be advanced with the army array in time. What's the use of goodness?" Xiong Jing said. "Ju Tie Mansion is trying to make artillery small. Only by making small can artillery be pursued by the army."

Involuntarily, Xiong Jing remembered the leather cannons that the Swedes used. The so-called leather cannons are cannons made of leather. Why should they be rolled with leather? It was the Swedes who partially abandoned the lethality of the cannons in order to pursue the maneuverability of the cannons. Of course, the Chu army could not use leather cannons. Jutiedu Mansion is testing the lighter six-pound cannons.

"Another, it is better for soldiers to throw shells than their artillery shells." Xiong Jing said another method. "Putting several kilograms of gunpowder into pig iron cans, ignite them and throw them into the enemy's formation. This can break the formation. The two armies are facing each other, isn't the one seeking to break the formation?"

"Let's go-away!" As soon as Xiong Jing finished speaking, Wu Kong's order to open fire came from the artillery deck of the bottom cabin. "Boom..., Boom..., Boom..., Boom..." The sound of the cannon was deafening.

Four eighteen-pound naval cannons fired one after another. Everyone standing on the deck of the stern immediately felt the sea boats under their feet moving violently to one side, and then a pungent smoke rushed towards them. Every time the sea pawn cannon fired, the entire sea boat could move, but the infantry could only throw it with pig iron cans. Everyone suddenly felt a sense of laughter and crying.

Xiang Yan was a wise man. He was not affected by the cannon fire and just nodded and said, "It is true, but it is inconvenient to ignite the iron can."

"It is not convenient to use a fuse." Xiong Jing said. He did not plan to build a fuse gun, but he did not say that he would not build a fuse.

"Foin?" Xiang Yan was puzzled.

"If there is no heavy rain, the fuse will not be extinguished." Xiong Jing explained. "The fuse can be wrapped around the soldiers' necks, ignite the iron can during the battle, and then throw the iron can into the enemy's formation. After the explosion, the enemy's soldiers are disturbed and injured, and our army can take the opportunity to break the formation. This is the easiest thing."

Breaking the formation is always the theme of war in the era of cold weapons. In order to break the formation, Wei State trained martial soldiers, Qin State trained sharp soldiers, and Chu State trained heavy cavalry, which consumed so much effort and materials. All they wanted was to break the enemy formation during the battle. Breaking the formation does not mean victory, but breaking the formation is infinitely close to victory, and gunpowder is the weapon to make the Chu army infinitely close to victory.

"It's so!" Xiang Yan remembered the power of gunpowder he witnessed for the first time. Half of the ten-meter-thick city wall was blown down.
Chapter completed!
Prev Index    Favorite Next