Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 1460 Changes in Southern Border ([-])
Facing the two princes who were obviously a little too excited, Gao Wushi was also a little dazed, and hesitantly asked, "You two...do you find it difficult?"

"No, no, no difficulty."

"No, no, we mean it's a great idea!"

The performance of these two seemed to be scrambling for the first place, and Gao Wushi couldn't help being surprised: "Could it be that you two treat the Spaniards as ordinary barbarians?"

Zhu Yingzhen waved his hand and said: "Of course it's unusual, they are Hongyi! We know this, we know it."

Zhang Yuangong coughed lightly, and said: "Is Rixin going to talk about Hongyi cannons? Ah, they can make cannons, of course they are not ordinary barbarians, but the level of Hongyi cannons is just like that now, Jinghua Isn’t the cannon better than theirs? Then what are we afraid of!”

Gao Wushi frowned and said, "Who told you this?"

The two dukes were taken aback for a moment, and said in surprise, "Isn't it?"

Gao Wushi shook his head resolutely, and said: "Back then, Portugal—that is, the Franji people, the Hongyi cannon they sold to Daming may not be their best cannon. This is like we would not sell the best firearms to others Same, do you understand me when I say that?"

"Oh, you mean they have even more powerful cannons?" Zhu Yingzhen obviously became cautious when he heard this.

But Gao Yushi said: "Actually, whether it is the Portuguese or the Spaniards, I am not very sure about the level of their artillery. However, according to the brief exchange of fire between the Nanyang Fleet and the Spanish Fleet at sea before. Look, the range of the Spaniard's artillery may be slightly lower than that of Jinghua's."

Zhang Yuangong breathed a sigh of relief: "That's good, that's because Jinghua's artillery is even more powerful."

However, Gao Yushi still shook his head: "This is not necessarily the case. For artillery, under the same gunpowder thrust, the range and weight of the ammunition cannot be balanced. The problem now is that we don't know whether the Spaniards used thicker guns. , artillery with larger barrels and shorter barrels. If they do this, it is also possible that they emphasize close range and high power, instead of emphasizing range and accuracy like Jinghua's artillery."

"This..." Zhang Yuangong coughed lightly: "I don't really understand artillery or something... Rixin, what do you mean? I just want to know, what are our advantages and disadvantages?"

"What I want to say is that even I am not very clear about what the specific comparison should be like. You must know that when we bought the Hongyi Cannon in the past, it was still during the Jiajing period. After the past, how much progress has the family made?
Just like when we Daming ourselves, when we first got the Hongyi cannon, our cannons were not as good as theirs, but soon we imitated them, but they were not very durable, they were easy to explode, and the yield rate was pitifully low.

After Jinghua was established and set foot in the manufacture of artillery, due to technological progress in various aspects, the durability problem was first solved, and the inexplicable explosion of the chamber was basically controlled.At the same time, Jinghua's good product rate is much higher than that of the Ordnance Bureau's products in the early years, and it really has the value of installation.

In terms of more critical combat indicators, since the court has been financially tight, I thought that gunpowder should not be wasted. First, the accuracy of shelling must be improved.Secondly, as the range of muskets gradually increased, from the perspective of tactical cooperation, I asked Jinghua's craftsmen to focus on increasing the range.Correspondingly, it must be that the power of the artillery has not improved much. "

Ancient China has always paid more attention to projectile weapons of mass destruction such as artillery, and it originated very early.During the Spring and Autumn Period, China already used a projectile weapon called 礮. In 1164, the army of the Southern Song Dynasty invented the earliest artillery, the Flint Cannon (Thunderbolt Cannon), but it is still controversial.The Yuan Dade Second Year Cannon unearthed in Heilongjiang was the earliest artillery relic at that time.

After China's gunpowder and firearms spread to the west in the 13th century, artillery began to develop in Europe and was quickly popularized and used.It has largely replaced the ancient tension and torsion siege machines of Greece and ancient Rome, which have been in use for a long time after the advent of black powder.This kind of machine is easy to make, low in cost, and has a large throwing capacity, so it is very reliable in use.

However, in addition to this old-fashioned machinery, new guns have begun to show their promise.The first major impact of black powder on siege artillery was the invention of cannons after the advent of black powder, which was more effective and easier to use.However, it was not until the second half of the 15th century that the cannon really effectively replaced the trebuchet and became an important siege gun.

In fact, a wide variety of heavy cannons appeared as early as the 14th century, the most important of which was a huge cannon called a stone cannon.These guns had shorter barrels, usually cast in bronze or iron, sometimes in copper and brass.

Since the stone projectiles it fired weighed 300 pounds, a lot of gunpowder had to be used.The gunpowder often fills the entire barrel, and the stone bullets protrude outside the barrel, so the firing accuracy is not so accurate, and the muzzle velocity is extremely low.In order to improve the effectiveness of the cannon, the cannon had to be placed very close to the city wall so that the stone bombs could hit the target.

Cast-iron shotguns are said to have been used to bombard the Italian city of Terni in 1340.The English may have attacked Cresse in 1346 with smaller catapults.

At the end of the 14th century, people welded wrought iron bars and fixed them with rings to make longer stone-shooting cannons.Richard II built some of these guns to defend the Tower of London.The famous Monsmeg gun in Edinburgh, England is made by connecting several sections of cast iron with screw buckles, and then welding and strengthening the entire gun barrel with rings.

Before the middle of the 15th century, cast iron blocks were smelted in Dijon, France, but this was an isolated technical achievement that was still in its infancy and not very successful.In the early days of the Tudor Dynasty in England, this new technology of casting iron was introduced to England, thus laying the foundation for the ironmaking industry in Sussex.

Since then, Sussex's ironmaking industry has dominated the gun manufacturing industry in Europe.The advantage of cast iron is that it is cheap, not that its performance is superior to other metals, whether it is brass or bronze, although it is expensive, it is tough and not easy to burst.

The casting of large cannons has absorbed the casting technology of bells.It is made by pouring molten metal into a clay mold.The mold is composed of a mold core and a horizontal shell.The clay model is placed in a hollow, and the iron furnace has an outlet to allow molten iron to flow into the form.When the casting has cooled, the mold is broken and the casting is removed.

Each cannon cast at this time is like a piece of sculpture, an independent product with different fine decorations, and the quality of the cannon depends on the craftsman's casting skills.It took 200 years before people managed to continuously cast cannons from a single mold.

After breaking the mold and taking out the casting blank of the gun, a drill bit mounted on a long shaft will be used as a power to carry out boring by a hydraulic turbine.Because the shaft of the drill bit is only provided with a support at one end, the boring often cannot be done accurately, and due to the problem of the boring process, the original error on the mold cannot be corrected.

After boring, the test of the gun should be carried out, including visual inspection, beating with a hammer, and firing with a gradually increasing amount of gunpowder. The amount of gunpowder fired in the last shot should be equal to the weight of the projectile.If the test is passed, the gun can be delivered for use.

At present, although there are slight differences in the level of cannon casting in major European countries, it is highly pragmatic to estimate that they should all be at this level.

According to Gao Pragmatism's recollection, it should not be until the 18th century that the Netherlands would occupy a leading position in the boring technology of integrally cast gun barrels.

However, since Jinghua has always placed "heavy industry" in an important position in its development, the development of artillery is of course highly pragmatic and will not be ignored.Although he can not give much guidance on specific casting techniques, and most of the time he can only provide guidance ideas, but because he can learn from history, this kind of guidance is still very important.

From the perspective of technology and historical development, before the middle of the 19th century, in addition to naval heavy guns, bronze and brass guns always had an advantage over cast iron guns in the manufacture of guns.However, the barrel of the bronze cannon is relatively soft. When the round shells are fired many times, the shells pass through the barrel in an out-of-round way and easily deform it. Therefore, bronze is not suitable for making heavy cannons.

Therefore, in addition to trying every means to make Jinghua work hard to improve the level of iron smelting, Gao Yushi still manufactures a large number of bronze cannons, especially the artillery used by the fleet.This is because bronze cannons have good casting performance and are not easy to rust, while iron cannons can only be said to be low-end products in the age of great navigation.

Under the technical conditions at this time, compared with bronze cannons, iron cannons not only have more air bubbles, but also are easy to rust. The only advantage is that they are cheaper.According to historical development, it was not until the appearance of crucible carbon steel and related casting techniques that iron cannons became the mainstream.

However, although Jinghua iron-smelting technology is a highly pragmatic copy of the indigenous steelmaking method of the *** era, it is much higher than the current European mainstream level.Therefore, in terms of land artillery, Gao Yushi experimented with the No. [-] and No. [-] cannons and used iron cannons to cast them—but it must be noted that the quality of these iron cannons themselves did not exceed that of bronze cannons. Gao Yushi did this completely. It is aimed at reducing costs and increasing the total number of artillery possessions.

After all, Jinghua's production capacity in iron and steel smelting is very large, so big that it can beat major European countries, but Daming has very few copper mines—the copper mine reserves of the later Hong Dynasty only accounted for slightly more than 5% of the world— Therefore, it is still very cost-effective for him to replace Daming with an iron cannon.

It is the actual contradiction between materials and technology that has caused Gao Yushi to keep an eye on the Philippines, because the Philippines has large copper reserves, and these copper mines are often copper-gold associated mines, and the development of copper mines can also get a lot of gold mines .

The attack on the city of Manila is expected to be divided into two parts, sea and land.In terms of naval warfare, it’s okay to say, after all, the main force of the Spanish navy is now concentrated in Portugal (Philip II intends to let the fleet set off from Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, to replenish the Spanish army in the Netherlands first, and then conquer England), so it anchors There should be fewer warships in Manila than in previous years, and the fleet of the Beiyang Maritime Trade Alliance can overwhelm them by relying on their numbers alone.

However, when it comes to land battles and sieges, Gao Pragmatic is relatively cautious.The reason is simple: bastions were already very popular in Europe at this time, and Philip II's father, Charles V, had suffered from bastions (1552, the battle for Metz), and the Netherlands, which had broken out for a while, During the war, because the Dutch built a large number of bastions, the Spanish army's offensive was also difficult.

At this time, the Europeans were still able to learn from the war, so looking back, the Spaniards also built bastions in many of their key overseas strongholds.Manila is one of such key strongholds.

Jinghua itself also has experience in building bastions. For example, in the offensive and defensive battle of Bagu, Huang Zhiting quickly transformed Bagu City into a bastion at the suggestion of the generals of the Jinghua Department after capturing Bagu. Mang Yingli had a huge numerical advantage in the air force, but in the end he was bruised.

Gao Yushi is still very vigilant about difficult things like bastions. He doesn't want the Beiyang Maritime Trade Alliance to be beaten all over the head when they jointly go out for the first time.

Gao Pragmatically explained everything from the history of artillery development, prospects, and technical descriptions to the key points of the construction of the bastion and the intelligence of Manila's city defense.

The two of them were obviously relieved when they heard that Jinghua's technology was superior, and they immediately became nervous when they heard that their opponent was difficult to deal with. Gao Wushi suspected that if he continued to talk for a while, the two of them might get a heart attack .

After he finished analyzing the situation in all aspects, the two Dukes were finally not as excited as they were at the beginning, and both of them thought about it for a while.

Then Zhu Yingzhen spoke first and asked, "I have to ask something first. Even if we take down Manila, or even Cebu or the whole of Luzon, what will we do next to make a fortune? Should we continue to do business with the Spaniards, or Go digging by yourself or something?"

Zhang Yuangong saw that he asked, and also echoed: "Yes, this matter is very important. If what we want is to save that [-]% of taxes, I think this battle is a bit unworthy. According to Rixin Judging from the situation you just mentioned, the strength of the Spaniards in Manila is at its lowest ebb, so let’s sail more boats and force them to lower their tax rates. In fact, most of them don’t need to fight.”

Yo, I underestimated you, you actually know naval diplomacy?
However, Gao Yushi forgot that when the Beiyang Maritime Trade Alliance was doing business with many famous names in Japan, they often played naval gun diplomacy, and Zhang Yuangong was actually quite familiar with it.

But before Zhang Yuangong finished speaking, he paused and continued: "If we are to occupy the whole territory of Luzon, there are two problems: first, since Luzon was conquered and ruled by the Spaniards, After I defeat Spain, shall I restore the country to Luzon? Second, if I do not restore the country, shall I go to the imperial court to incorporate it into our Ming Dynasty, and will the imperial court agree?"
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(End of this chapter)