Daming Yuanfu

First discuss with Meng Gu Zhezhe the issue of Jurchen's transfer to the town which is the best solution, then Gao Wushi turned to Huang Zhiting and Liu Xin and said, "I will go to the Ministry of Households and the Ministry of War in the afternoon, and talk to them about the incidents of Buri Hatudong criminals in Gansu this time. Now, there are a few things I want to ask you to understand."

Huang Zhiting and Liu Xin said in unison: "Sir, please tell me."

Gao Wushi looked at Liu Xin first, and asked, "Xiner, Jinghua, I have been urging the Army's artillery classification and ammunition classification a few years ago. To what extent have you achieved it now? Can you introduce it into actual combat as soon as possible?"

Huang Zhiting also knew about this, but she was not in charge, but the secretariat, so she also looked at Liu Xin.

Liu Xin replied: "So the master wanted to ask about artillery? At present, the "two plus two" classification of artillery has been completed. If necessary, Jinghua can adjust the title of future shipments at any time.

That is, "Jinghua No. [-] Siege Straight Cannon", "Jinghua No. [-] Siege Curved Cannon", "Jinghua No. [-] Field Straight Cannon", "Jinghua No. [-] Field Curved Cannon" and so on.At present, it has been prepared to be divided into No. [-], No. [-], No. [-], and No. [-] straight guns and curved guns according to the size of the caliber. It is also divided into No. [-], No. [-], No. [-], and No. [-] field guns and siege guns according to combat use.

On the whole, the weight and caliber of the siege artillery are larger than that of the field artillery, and the vehicles used for its transportation and maneuvering are also specially manufactured, and the models are different from the field artillery. "

The words "field battle" and "siege" do not need to be explained, but the so-called "straight artillery" and "curved artillery" here need a little explanation.

In fact, to put it simply, this "straight gun" is the so-called cannon in later generations, and the "bent gun" is the so-called howitzer in later generations.

Friends who are not military fans may not have paid attention to the difference between a cannon and a howitzer. In fact, since the two belong to the category of artillery, the basic structure and firing principle are similar. The reason for the distinction between the two names lies in the used Needs vary.

Because of such differences in use, howitzers and cannons have significant differences in some specific details.

This obviously did not meet the high pragmatic requirements, and even reminded him of the Confederates cursing at their own howitzers during the American Civil War.

But there are some problems at this time. For example, the shell may explode over the enemy, or it may explode after smashing into the enemy's fortifications, or it may simply be a dumb gun, or even explode in the cannon.

In the Napoleonic War era, Napoleon's favorite army 12-pound cannon had a maximum range of more than 1100 meters, and its effective range could reach 500 meters. [Note: This is talking about army artillery, the navy is another matter. ]
After this kind of shell is fired, the shell will advance in a gentle parabola, destroying all enemies it meets along the way, and it will bounce on relatively hard ground, just like a stone floating on the water. Such a round of solid ammunition is enough to reimburse an entire column of enemy troops.

Gao Pragmatism can only choose to compromise in the end, so the gunners who later changed to howitzers increased the intensity of training. They were required to be responsible for cutting the appropriate length of the lead wire according to the specified target distance on the battlefield.

During the American Civil War, the artillery commander of the Confederate Army ruthlessly belittled the twelve-pound howitzers in his regiment as "nearly useless" and "almost worthless", thinking that this kind of howitzer was not even as good as the six-pound cannon. Only useful when breaking wooden village buildings.

Jinghua Artillery Factory spent 13 years to overcome the problem of "blossoming cannon" according to the high-practical guidance. Among them, it took seven years to research and improve the grenade technology (parallel development of each technology line).

However, the test results were not ideal, and the technicians involved in the artillery factory and the garrison all believed that this would also lead to the need to prepare various lead wires of different lengths in actual combat, which greatly increased the logistical pressure and was not cost-effective.

In other words, the concept of "howitzer" basically did not exist before Gao Pragmatic ordered the classification-unless you insist that the catapult has a curved trajectory, so it is a howitzer.

The commander even planned to send this howitzer back to the rear to melt down and recast it into a Napoleon gun or a 32-pound howitzer, but he was forced to give up because of production capacity reasons.

In this case, you use a curved ballistic to hit behind the bunker, because the projectile is dropped from the sky, basically don't expect the ricochet to kill - it is likely to hit the ground directly, and the lethality... can be called If ten does not save one, what is the use?
So here comes the question. Is Gao Yushi urging Jinghua to classify artillery because there are products other than solid bullets?Yes, the preliminary product has indeed been produced, that is, the elementary grenade, or the grenade with a relatively primitive technical level.

For example, the Hongyi Cannon and Franco Cannon imported from Europe are all cannons, and Daming's own Shenwei General and Tiger Crouching Cannons, which are heavily equipped with troops, are also cannons.

The "Jinghua Curved Cannon" series, which came out after 13 years of professional research, has a grenade shape that is quite similar to a football. It is manufactured using integrated casting technology. At present, it can explode into 32 fragments relatively stably, reaching the goal proposed by Gao Yushi in his early years. skills requirement.

Howitzers shoot in curves and hit high-throwing ballistics, so they do not have high requirements for the initial velocity of the shells. The barrel of the artillery is obviously shorter than that of the cannon, usually about [-] or [-] times the caliber.

Why is there no howitzer with a curved trajectory at this time?due to usage requirements.The reason why the cannon is so popular is that the main artillery ammunition of this era is solid ammunition.A solid bullet will not explode, and its lethality depends on the direct kinetic energy of its own being fired, but in actual combat, it must usually be counted on to "ricochet" to increase its lethality.

Simply put, the main factor that determines when grenades come out and become a useful weapon is the level of technology.

The launch method is divided into two parts, first igniting the shell fuze, and then igniting the propellant charge, and then the grenade will hit the enemy's fortifications from high altitude in a parabolic manner.

Fortunately, although Gao Pragmatic's hands-on ability is bad, his ability to move his mouth is not bad.As a fan of various strategic and tactical games back then, he had a certain understanding of some key technologies of the grenade - although he couldn't recover it by himself, it would be enough if he only gave theoretical guidance.

In terms of lead wires, because Jinghua invested heavily in landmine technology in the early years, by the way, high-quality lead wires have made breakthroughs as early as more than ten years ago, and they can also produce waterproof leads (because Jinghua also researches mines).

For example, because the cannons of later generations need to shoot flat to attack tanks, the initial velocity of the projectile is required to be high so that it can hit the target as straight as possible. Otherwise, the projectile will continue to decline due to the effect of gravity. Effectively hit the target as far as possible.

However, as I said just now, the difficulty of the grenade lies in the processing technology, and at this point, high pragmatism is open.In the nearly 30 years of development, Jinghua has always regarded metal processing as one of the most important directions of technological progress, which has created Jinghua's current level of metal processing that can definitely be called the world's number one.

This requires a lot of learning of various knowledge, so the average salary of the gunners in the armed forces of Jinghua has reached 15 taels to 20 taels of silver per month, which is basically the same as the regular monthly income of the county lords in Daming.Think about it, the salaries of the gunners of a thousand cannons cost 2 taels of silver a month, needless to say how precious they are.

With a good "flowering bomb" and a good fuse, it is not difficult to control the explosion time of the grenade.Of course, according to Gao's pragmatic habits, he originally hoped that the lead wires would be cut according to different lengths before leaving the factory, so that he could hit the specified targets according to the needs on the battlefield.

These situations were quite helpless in the early days of the grenade. Because of the manufacturing process, not every grenade was reliable in quality, and the fuse that determined the duration of the grenade explosion was not very reliable under the technical conditions at the time.

In addition to being loaded with solid ammunition, the cannon can also be loaded with shotgun shells and exotic ammunition, which is very useful, so Napoleon affectionately called this cannon "French girl". [Note: But after the English translation, it became "French daughter", I don't know why. ]
Speaking of grenades, the early grenades were casted backwards due to the backwardness of casting technology. The hollow shells were cast in two halves separately (leaving the fuze hole) and then joined together.Due to its low strength, it cannot withstand too high chamber pressure, otherwise it will explode in the gun cavity.In view of this, at that time, grenades were generally used for large-caliber short-barreled mortars with curved shots, rather than high-pressure long-barreled cannons.

Grenades, also known as blooming bombs, actually have their records in China as early as the 11th century AD. They are ammunition that use the fragments and shock waves produced by the explosion of projectiles to kill or explode.But the so-called grenade at that time was really primitive. In fact, it can only be said that China had already tried this at that time. As for the actual combat effect...it can basically be ignored.

Of course, there was also the so-called added howitzer later, that is, it can shoot directly like a cannon, and shoot at a curved line like a howitzer, combining the functions of the two types of artillery that were originally clearly defined.

Generally speaking, howitzers are mainly used for parabolic ballistic shooting, which can hit targets behind hillsides or bunkers; while cannons are mainly used for flat shooting, and are generally used in later generations to attack targets such as tanks and armored vehicles, or infantry personnel on the ground.

Before Gao Yushi ordered Jinghua's artillery to be classified as "straight cannon (cannon)" and "bent cannon (howitzer)", Daming's artillery technology was still relatively primitive, and it was impossible to distinguish them even if they wanted to.In fact, let alone Ming Dynasty at that time, European artillery basically didn't score at the moment.

China also used howitzers in the early years of the Qing Dynasty. For example, when Kang Mazi conquered Galdan three times, he used flowering bombs (grenades) and left a record: "When using (flowering bombs), first put gunpowder into the medicine chamber, Wood is used in between, soil is added, and then the shell is put into the breech, filled with gunpowder outside the shell, and then a layer of wet soil is placed, and finally the muzzle is sealed with wax. When firing, first ignite the fuze on the shell from the muzzle, and then Fuze on the fast-burning door."

Most of the time in ancient times, the projectiles fired by the cannon were solid bullets and would not explode, but it would destroy all enemies in front of him, and as I said just now, it would bounce on the ground.

This kind of old-fashioned explosive ammunition has many disadvantages. Not only is it unsafe, but it also takes time and materials to process. Not only the Qing army does not like to use it, but even the Western army is not generally equipped with it.During the Napoleonic Wars, solid shells, shotgun shells (grape shells) and various types of shells were the most equipped. These three types of shells together accounted for more than 90% of the total shells.

Jinghua's improved grenade uses a hollow wooden tube filled with slow-burning gunpowder as the fuse, and ignites the shell fuze by the high-temperature gas leaking from the propellant through the gap (the gap between the shell and the barrel) to the front.However, during the development process, it was discovered that because the trial-produced field howitzer was too powerful at that time, it could only be shown with a large-caliber mortar, or it could be used on a special ten-caliber cannon.

For example, at the time before Gao Pragmatic's crossing, the self-propelled artillery equipped by various countries was basically called a howitzer.But there is no need to elaborate on this, because it is impossible to reproduce it during the Wanli period.

The howitzer can choose different charge packs according to the strike needs of long and short ranges. If you want to hit a farther target, you can use more charge, and if you want to hit a closer target, you can use less charge, which is adjustable.

The bullet rest, wooden conical funnel, and integral casting technology of shells, which are crucial to the development of grenades, were not invented until the late 18th century in the original history. However, the actual manufacturing difficulty of these things is not unattainable. The main reason is that the urgency of the demand has not been met.

In addition, the shell charges of cannons and howitzers are also different.The cannon uses a flat shooting angle to attack tanks, and usually has a range limit, within which a high hit rate can be guaranteed, and it is difficult to hit the target beyond the specified distance.This is because the range is so far, and generally there is not much variation, so fixed shells are usually used, and the charge is fixed.

The larger muzzle velocity of the shell also determines that the cannon needs a longer barrel. Usually, the length of the barrel is more than 40 times the caliber. For example, the artillery mounted on the tank is the cannon.

Those early grenades had very little internal charge, so their power was also low. After the explosion, they might even just collapse in half. It was far less powerful than those in later generations of film and television dramas. This thing was widely equipped in the original history. Wait until after the Napoleonic Wars.

Blossom bullets made great contributions to the Qing army when they dealt with Galdan’s camel formation. Of course, the Qing army owned and used most of them were all kinds of general cannons (cannons) that fired ordinary shells. Blossom bullets can only be regarded as embellishment.

Of course, fortunately, the "Jinghua Curved Cannon" is a new product. At present, there are less than 1000 howitzers in Jinghua...

After listening to Liu Xin's introduction, Gao Wushi thought for a while, frowned slightly and said, "That is to say... For example, the No. Four types of cannons, namely the City Straight Cannon and the No. [-] Siege Curved Cannon? If so, isn’t the total number of cannons too much?”

Liu Xin nodded first, but immediately added: "It's a lot more than before, but it's not like the master imagined, for example, the No. Siege money.

In addition, the difference between siege guns and field guns is actually not big, and the calibers are universal.The main difference lies in the vehicle rather than the artillery itself. In this case, it is better to achieve multiple uses of one bomb for artillery manufacturing and ammunition supply, without placing too many additional requirements on logistics.

As for transportation, mobility, etc., it is actually a matter of vehicle manufacturing.Daming has never been short of carpenters. We don't have to worry about our production capacity in this area, and the solution is not complicated. "
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PS: I'm late tonight, so I should only have one update.In addition, after thinking about it today, for a long period of time in the future, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I may have a tight time at night, so I tentatively plan not to make up updates on Tuesdays and Thursdays every week (in case it is made up, that’s another story ).Of course, the total number of chapters to be updated will not change, and any missing chapters will be filled.