Above the water, following the command boats Zhao Ying rode away in a row of three rows of oars and warships. Zhao Zheng did not understand water warships, nor had he seen the Jing people warships. He only felt that the Qin army warships in front of him were like centipedes flying on the water. These centipedes went further and further, turning into black dots. Then these black dots beat drums, turning from black dots back to the centipede warships and rowing back to the front of him.

He looked at the warships without saying anything, but was a little confused. The water of the shui connected to the Wei River, but to the north of the Wei River, the Han River flowing down from Sanguan was south of the Wei River. However, the water of the shui did not connect to the Mian River south of the Qinling Mountains. Zhao Zheng could not imagine where this water battle would take place. He could not imagine that Xiong Jing, who was in the business, could not imagine what kind of war he would encounter.

"I would like to ask the king to give it a try." In the county magistrate's mansion, Gun was holding a flintlock rifle loaded with ammunition in his hand.

Since Xiong Jing decided to build a musket, the main force in the research and development is still the Jade Mansion. Jade carving is very different from making a gun, but for a flintlock device, this is no different. The tests are all about the minds and skills of craftsmen.

"Well." The flintlock rifle was still heavy, and the bolt was not improved. This time, the main test was gunpowder. Xiong Jing, who took the gun, was a little careless, and shot at the target not far away, but he didn't hit it at all. The gun quickly took it over and put it on the gunpowder again. Xiong Jing took it and fired it again, and after shooting, he took the medicine again, but with a "bang", another shot.

At this moment, Xiong Jing was suddenly stunned. Seeing him, Yufu Gong, the Yu Mansion on the side, and the others laughed brightly on their faces. The pot loading the medicine also laughed. He once again brought the gun to fire. The fire failed. He broke the gun and pulled the trigger. "Bang--" the gun body shook, and the gun hit the bull's eye.

"Why is this?!" Xiong Jing threw the gun to the turtle, his hands wide open, and the person seemed very excited.

"Reported to the king, I think it is pure saltpeter, and it is grinding enough." Feng Geng laughed, and the sorrow of that day could not be found on his face. "Therefore, the first five shots were ten beaten seven, and the second five shots were ten beaten four beaten four."

"No, it's a fine medicine! fine medicine!!" Xiong Jing snatched the gunpowder from Yan's hand. He was not familiar with the flintlock rifle, but at least he knew a lot of things, such as the fine medicine now.

It is said that the gunpowder installed in the medicine pool must be finely ground, and only in this way can the rate of fire be increased. According to Fengshen, the first five shots were ten and seven shots, and the last five shots were ten and four shots were ten and four shots, which was far higher than the previous first shot, eighty percent of the fire, fifty percent of the fire be fired, and fifty percent of the fire be fired after the third shot.

Of course, saltpeter purity cannot be ignored. Saltpeter is pure and finely ground to be the bottleneck of the flintlock rifle. In other words, gunpowder is the soul of the gun. The barrel of the gun is just a container that carries this kind of soul. The container may be important, but what is more important is the soul itself, because all power comes from gunpowder.

Xiong Jing grabbed the gunpowder bottle and realized something, but then his expression changed drastically. Just as he was about to cheer, he poured a bucket of ice water over - he just realized what the bottleneck was, and there was no technology to solve the bottleneck.

"Report to the king, although the medicine is fine, it is very difficult to grind." Feng Qiang said with a bitter face. "A thousand people only take a month to grind a ton. During this period, there are endless people who fry it. You must be very careful."

"One thousand people? One month? One ton?" Xiong Jing felt that he heard it wrong.

"Yes, it's too. A skilled craftsman only grinds four taels a day, which is too little." The soup complained about the bitterness. "The more than 40 tons of saltpeter need to be ground for more than three years. I also want to use equipment to grind them again, but every mill is blown up, and people in the shop are panic and dare not try again."

"What if that's the case?!" A thousand people make one ton per month. In other words, a craftsman grinds out four liang of gunpowder every day (Xiong Jing didn't make any calculations, but one ton per month is less than four liang per day). One liang is about fifteen grams, and only two or three shots are fired. It's better to use bows and arrows! A craftsman in the building mansion makes at least fifteen arrows a day. Facing the Qin army that penetrates leather armor, the range is about seven steps, and the bows and arrows are faster and more accurate. Is it better to fire one shot with seven arrows or five arrows?

"I don't know." Zhuo Geng said. "I can only ask the mansion to send more craftsmen, if there are tens of thousands of people..."

"Ten thousand people?!" Tens of thousands of people grind gunpowder by hand, Xiong Jing could not imagine such a scene.

"There are tens of thousands of people!" Jiao Geng emphasized. "If there are tens of thousands of people, they can produce 120 tons of gunpowder a year; if there are fifty thousand people, they can produce 600 tons of gunpowder a year; if there are tens of thousands..."

"Get out!" Xiong Jing scolded angrily without feeling angry.

The technology is not enough to make up the manpower. Even if the manpower can make up, there is still one thing that has not been reported, that is, the quality of hand-grinding gunpowder is uneven. Some people grind heavily, while others grind lightly. They also have 50,000 pounds, and the grinding medicines are different in thickness. Whether it is used on muskets or cannons, it will cause trouble for shooting. If the charge is too much, it exceeds the bearing range of the inner chamber, which may also lead to a blow-up.

Unlike some people who talk about granulation and increasing the power of gunpowder, granulation has very limited improvement in the combustion speed. What can really increase the power of gunpowder is to increase the fineness of the particles. After it is increased to a certain level, the low ignition point of sulfur and the effect of adhesives, and the gunpowder can also be ignited normally. Moreover, because the nitr content increases, the power can be greatly increased, and the smoke will be greatly reduced.

It is difficult to achieve just increasing the fineness. One reason is that Zaofu has no better grinding means, and cement grinding is the limit of fineness of gunpowder grinding, but Zaofu cement cannot even be considered coarse cement; the other reason is that even if the fineness of cement grinding is barely feasible now, it can increase the firing rate of flintlock guns to a temporarily acceptable level, and there is no way to industrialize large-scale manufacturing. The safe and non-explosive grinding technology cannot be achieved overnight.

Xiong Jing, who doesn't understand where the bottleneck is, still has hope. If he understands where the bottleneck is, but cannot solve the problem, he is really disappointed. Of course, Dongzhou saltpeter still needs. It is still necessary to transport it back and add about 20% of the impurities. Chu Jun continued to use four times the charge of gunpowder, which is currently feasible. Grinding technology can only hope that it can be solved in his lifetime.

"Get back, there is no hurry to grind." The sulfur from Hu Dansozhi has arrived. With sulfur, it doesn't matter when Dongzhou saltpeter will be ground.

"I..." Before Zhou Geng and others came, they thought Xiong Jing would be very happy, but they didn't expect Xiong Jing was not at all happy.

"The grinding prescription is the top priority." Xiong Jing had to emphasize. "After today, the Gunpowder Mansion will think about grinding, and may ask the Concrete Mansion for advice. You only have four taels of grinding every day. How many shots can you shoot in four taels? How many days can you shoot in one shot?"
Chapter completed!