Chongzhen revived the Ming Dynasty

Zhu Youjian had no idea about how to improve the way of taking and putting the cleaning rod.

Because he had never seen this way of placing the cleaning rod in history, he didn't know what the effect of the improvement would be.

So he repeatedly reminded them not to stick to the methods he proposed, but to use their brains and continue to improve them.

As long as the time can be shortened, we can organize people to try and further increase the firing rate of the flintlock musket.

No matter what the officials and craftsmen around them thought, they all knelt down and obeyed orders.

Seeing this, Zhu Youjian frowned again and ordered:
"Don't kneel and kneel, it's a waste of time."

"Besides, there are so many tools in the workshop, is there a place to kneel?"

"If anyone wants to kneel, go outside the workshop."

"I have established a rule here that craftsmen do not have to kneel in the workshop."

"It's like a teacher in a school, who doesn't have to kneel before an official."

This order made the craftsmen even more excited.

It can even be said that this is the best news the emperor has brought today.

It established the craftsman's dominance in the workshop, just like the teacher in the school.

It also means that the emperor treats craftsmen and teachers equally.

This made them unable to help but shout "Long live the emperor" in unison under the leadership of Lu Xiang.

They truly supported this emperor who valued craftsmen.

Seeing this, Zhu Youjian asked them to stand up again and again, but he couldn't help but sigh in his heart.

The reason why he issued this order was that he felt sorry for these craftsmen, because most of them were actually serving in the army.

Only a small number of craftsmen who were awarded the title of engineers would be paid wages, and their wages would be based on the salaries of officials of the corresponding rank.

Compared with their contributions, this is extremely small.

So he promoted these people in status and made them feel warm.

When the financial situation improves in the future, he will further reform the tax and service system, abolish the system of assigning households to perform duties, and allow special households such as artisans, doctors, and salt households to truly enjoy the same treatment as ordinary households.

After paying tribute to the craftsmen, Zhu Youjian continued to watch the firearms in the workshop and instructed Lu Xiang and others to optimize and improve the various components of the muskets.

For example, in the connection between the buttstock and the barrel, he suggested adding a piece of wood above the barrel to facilitate fixing the barrel with the copper hoop and the buttstock below.

A sight can be added to the musket to adjust the height of the rear sight for aiming.

The rear sight can be a notch type or a peep hole type, and is combined with the front sight for aiming.

The combination of bayonet and musket also proposed improvements

……

Although these bits and pieces of improvements are not very eye-catching, they are still very meaningful in improving the combat effectiveness of the musket.

Lu Xiang and others wrote them down one by one, and then showed his new achievements to the emperor:

Breech-loading flintlock musket.

This was a musket he designed and manufactured based on the rotating locking structure and revolving bolt proposed by the emperor.

Originally, a spring wheel lighter was used, but after the emperor decided to use a flintlock lighter, it was changed to a flintlock lighter.

Zhu Youjian had never seen this kind of firearm, because in history, when the rotary locking structure was mature, firearms had already entered the era of percussion cap guns, and there was no need to use a flintlock at all, so naturally this kind of firearm had not been born.

So he looked at the primer hole drilled on the gun barrel and the flintlock next to it, and his expression became more and more strange.

This kind of strange musket was the first time he had seen it.

Lü Xiang didn't know what the emperor was thinking, so he held up his musket and introduced:
"Your Majesty, please look, this is the locking mechanism of the musket."

"According to what Your Majesty said, the rotary lock has two locking protrusions at the front. After it is pushed forward, it only needs to be rotated 90 degrees to lock tightly."

"It uses paper-wrapped bullets. You just need to bite open the paper bag, pour the primer into the powder pool, load the ammunition into the chamber, and then push the bolt to lock it."

"This locking method is very tight, which greatly increases the power and range of the breech-loading musket, making it almost the same as the muzzle-loading musket."

The emperor's proposal of a rotary lock was highly praised.

He also used this locking method on the improved Portuguese cannon, greatly enhancing the power of the breech-loading cannon.

After his initial surprise, Zhu Youjian was extremely impressed with Lü Xiang's ability to create such a fire gun, and praised him:

"Lu Qing really put a lot of effort into making this musket." "Compared to the self-flowing flintlock musket, does it have any obvious advantages?"

Lu Xiang uttered a "hmm" and stopped talking for a moment.

If it was before the advent of the gravity-priming system, he could confidently say that this would eliminate the four steps of using cleaning rods to load the bullet, greatly increasing the rate of fire compared to muzzle-loading muskets.

However, after the emergence of the self-priming system, the flintlock musket using self-priming only required ten loading steps.

His flintlock musket also required ten steps: laying the musket flat, pulling the bolt, opening the powder pool, taking out the ammunition, biting the ammunition, pouring the priming powder, closing the powder pool, loading the ammunition, closing the bolt, and holding the musket against the shoulder.

The number of steps for loading a self-priming flintlock musket is the same.

The firing rates of the two are similar, except that one omits the reverse primer and the other omits the cleaning rod.

However, in terms of cost, this type of breech-loading musket with a rotary lock is much more cost-effective than a muzzle-loading musket because of the relatively complex structure of the bolt and chamber.

Moreover, because the ammunition is loaded from the back, the paper shell of the paper-wrapped bullet may block the ignition hole, reducing the firing rate.

These problems have not been solved, and Lu Xiang does not have full confidence in this kind of musket.

However, there were also people who knew what was good in the group. Li Fengxiang, the seal holder of the Imperial Horse Administration, said:

"You don't have to stand up to load the breech-loading rifle. You can just lie on the ground and shoot."

"When defending on the city wall, you don't have to stand upright to load ammunition."

"It can be mounted on a bipod or tripod, and you don't have to lift it up after firing a shot."

This made Zhu Youjian nod his head repeatedly and look at Li Fengxiang with new eyes for expressing so many insights.

This person has so many insights on firearms, which shows that he is very thoughtful.

He praised Li Fengxiang and said to Lu Xiang:

"I was really surprised that you could make this kind of musket."

"As long as its cost is no more than twice that of a muzzle-loading musket, I will allow it to compete with the muzzle-loading musket."

"Even if the competition fails, it can be used on special muskets such as city wall muskets and sniper muskets, and continue to be improved."

He praised Lu Xiang generously and affirmed the significance of this musket.

In Zhu Youjian's view, it is definitely the future. As long as fulminate of mercury appears, it can be quickly transformed into a needle-fired gun to further increase the firing rate.

However, it has just appeared and still has many imperfections. The cost is also relatively high, which makes Zhu Youjian dare not bet on it.

Therefore, he still preferred to equip the self-priming flintlock musket as the next generation weapon. After the successful manufacture of fulminate of mercury, he directly manufactured bullets with primers, and based on this musket, he manufactured the pin-fire musket.

Lu Xiang was somewhat unwilling to accept this, because he had invested a lot of effort in this kind of fire gun, in order to defeat the self-flowing powder flintlock fire gun improved by Bo Jue, Gu Yanwu and others, so that the emperor would continue to pay attention to him.

But the problems with this type of musket are real.

Especially in terms of cost, compared to the muzzle-loading musket, which simply adds a bolt at the back, the breech-loading musket needs to dig out the chamber and make the breech block. Not only is it much longer, but the cost is also correspondingly higher and the weight is also greater.

The manufacturing requirements are also very high. The bolt and chamber must reach a certain precision to fit smoothly. There are also certain requirements for materials, and high-quality steel is required.

It is indeed as the emperor said, now more suitable as a special musket.

Just as he was thinking this, Zhu Youjian looked at the appearance of the ammunition and suddenly said:
"If you load from the back, there are fewer restrictions on the shape of the bullet."

"In addition to the Minié bullet, Lu Qing can also try to make longer round-nosed bullets, or even cover lead bullets with brass jackets to make pointed bullets."

"If it is fired from a rifled barrel like this, its power will surely be outstanding."

"The next thing Lu Qing is going to make is this kind of warhead."

I drew a cylindrical round-nosed bullet that was originally used in later generations of metal fixed ammunition, a boat-tailed pointed bullet with a brass jacket, and even an armor-piercing bullet with a steel core...

Zhu Youjian asked Lu Xiang to try to make these projectiles to see how powerful they were.

The structures of these warheads have been verified by later generations, and some of them are even the mainstream ammunition in later generations.

If the breech-loading flintlock rifle can solve a series of problems such as firing rate, weight, cost, and manufacturing, it can be put into use.

Zhu Youjian truly regarded it as the next generation of muskets and included it in the research and development plan.

(The one on the far left is the Chassep rifle bullet, the shell is oil paper and linen, the upper right picture is its structure diagram, you can see the primer is at the rear, the bullet is a cylindrical round-head bullet.

On the left side of the upper right picture is the Dresser rifle bullet, which has the primer in the middle, has higher requirements for the firing pin, and the bullet is shorter and thicker.

The lower right picture shows the 5.8X42 normal bullet and heavy bullet, both of which use a steel core and a copper-clad steel jacket) (End of this chapter)